Josh Hazlewood is targeting a return to the Australian Test side for the upcoming series against Bangladesh in Darwin, which begins on August 13. The 35-year-old has not featured in a Test match since July 2025, having missed the entire Ashes series due to hamstring and calf injuries. Hazlewood last played alongside Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, and Scott Boland in a day-night Test in Jamaica where conditions allowed for an all-pace attack. When a spinner is included, however, Hazlewood and Boland have only played together once, at Edgbaston in 2023, when Starc was omitted.
With Nathan Lyon returning from injury and the Darwin pitch expected to require a spinner, it is likely that either Hazlewood or Boland will miss the first Test. Despite this, Hazlewood is confident he will play alongside Boland over the next 12 to 18 months, noting that Australia has 20 or possibly 21 Tests to navigate with an aging group of bowlers. Speaking at a training camp in Brisbane, Hazlewood said, "I'd love to play more with Scotty. We're obviously a little bit similar, but I think there's still a lot of differences in our bowling. Every time he's come in, he's done unbelievably well. His career just keeps getting better and better the older he gets." He added that the team will likely need to lean on all six quicks, including Michael Neser and Brendan Doggett, over the next 18 months.
Hazlewood, who is five wickets away from 300 Test scalps at an average of 24.21, has been vulnerable to injury, suffering setbacks in four of the last five home summers and playing only six of Australia's last 14 Tests. To mitigate these risks, he and the coaching and medical staff have adjusted his preparation, including resting him from white-ball tours of Pakistan and Bangladesh following the IPL. Hazlewood noted that this is the first time he has had a lead-in to a Test without other cricket games. "It's been big days, Tuesdays, Thursdays mostly, with some other stuff filtered in around that, and then last week we had a few back-to-back days, Tuesday, Wednesday, and again next week I think back-to-back," he explained. He noted that leading into other Test series, he would usually be playing T20s or one-dayers while travelling, making it difficult to fit in bowling sessions. This current preparation has been tailor-made for a Test match, as it is trying to replicate a day in the field of Test cricket. "Really, it's bowling multiple spells in a day. It's bowling back-to-back days," he said.
Given his injury history, Hazlewood is taking a cautious approach, focusing only on the first Test against Bangladesh. "I think every time you look ahead in sport it can bite you pretty quickly," he said, adding that he is taking it day by day to tick boxes and get his workloads in. Looking further ahead, he acknowledged that the upcoming series against England, India, and South Africa are major goals for the group. "I guess that's been a driving factor during this prep, sort of in the back of your head, and even the months leading into it. Some real big Test series, and they're all away, obviously those big ones. Tough competition, and hopefully we get the job done," he stated.
