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Brad Haddin is looming as the favourite to replace Adam Gilchrist as Australia’s next wicketkeeper following his shock announcement that he will retire at the end of the summer.

Australia�s selectors will not have to pick a successor until Gilchrist hangs up his gloves in March but Haddin is almost certain to get the job.Although he has yet to play a Test, Haddin has been serving as Gilchrist’s understudy for nearly seven years and is a dashing wicketkeeper-batsman with a similar approach to the game.

Haddin has played 26 One-day Internationals and was a member of the Australian squad that won the World Cup in the West Indies last year. Former Australian wicketkeepers Ian Healy and Steve Rixon said he was the obvious replacement.

�We are very lucky with wicketkeeping, we have got as close to Gilly as there is in Brad Haddin,� Healy told the Nine Network on Sunday. �Haddin is the closest in world cricket to being able to emulate Gilchrist.�

Rixon, who has coached Haddin at New South Wales, told the Sun-Herald newspaper the 30-year-old was ready to make the transition to Test level.�The Test side will not lose a thing with Brad there, he�s still young enough and certainly has the skills and the right attitude,� Rixon said.

Gilchrist plans to step down from Test cricket after the fourth Test against India ends on Monday but will play in the one-day series against India and Sri Lanka starting next month. Australia�s next scheduled tour is to Pakistan in March and April, although that remains in doubt because of security fears, followed by a trip to West Indies in May and July.

Source:Cricket News