Follow UsNathan Ellis has played 11 international games thus far in his career, but opportunities have been sporadic and far between one clash and the other. Barring the three-match ODI series against Pakistan, the recent T20I series against South Africa was the first time the right-arm pacer has played consecutive games for Australia.
In all those clashes, the speedster has shown signs, but for the first time, with two consecutive appearances against South Africa, Ellis showed that he is here to stay and insisted that getting the mentality out of his mind was the biggest ‘challenge’.
"It's something that I've… not struggled with, [but] you sort of have to try and become accustomed to," Ellis said. "I haven't played consecutive games and have got one game here, one game there, so it's definitely easy to fall into the mindset of 'this is my only chance' or 'this could be my last chance', that sort of thing.
Ellis is part of the extended Australian squad for the upcoming ODI World Cup, but with consistent displays here in South Africa, the speedster could jump the queue.
"So for me, one, trying to get that mentality out of my mind is a challenge, and two, I'm just trying to do the best I can any time I wear the colours. I'm under no illusions that at the current stage I'm not in the first XI, so it's taking the opportunities when they come and doing the best I can and keep throwing my hat in the ring for selection."
The 28-year-old has been pigeonholed as a death-bowler in the shortest format, but over the last two encounters in South Africa, Ellis has shown that he is as good in the powerplay.
"In T20 cricket, it's very easy to get pigeon-holed in certain roles and I've been spoken about as a death bowler for a little while now," he said. "So a big goal for me was... trying to make an impact in the powerplay, so to do that last night was obviously really great."
Realistically, Ellis has more white-ball opportunities than red-ball opportunities for Australia. The speedster has insisted that he wants to put all the ‘eggs’ in the white-ball baset.
"For me, my opportunity is white-ball cricket for Australia so I sort of feel, at the moment with the World Cups coming up in the next year or 18 months, put all my eggs in the white-ball basket currently then when the opportunity to play red-ball cricket arises, if it makes sense, it makes sense."