Paceman delivers in short order

FORMER Alstonville cricketer Brendan Drew's representative career just keeps getting shorter and shorter.

At least in the format of the game he's been selected for.

He's become a one-day specialist at the Tasmanian Tigers, was named in Australia's preliminary 30-man squad for the Twenty20 World Championships and has now been selected to play for Australia at the Hong Kong Cricket Sixes.

For the uninitiated, the Sixes format sees two teams of six players bash the hell out of the ball over a maximum of five action-packed overs.

As a right-arm pace bowler, it can't be much fun charging in against some of the world's best batsmen intent on hitting every ball you bowl over the fence for six.

The tournament will be played at Hong Kong's famous Kowloon Cricket Club from November 8-9.

“As a bowler the aim is to try and see if you can get as many dot balls as you can, at least that's in Twenty20 games,” Drew said.

“If you can manage to limit it to six an over in the Twenty20 games you have done your job.

“I don't know what the target is in this form of the game.”

The Australian team will be led by John Davison, who made a name for himself when he blasted 100 off 67 balls while playing for Canada against the West Indies at the 2003 Word Cup in South Africa.

Although he spent the first five weeks of his life in Canada, Davison has played the vast majority of his first-class cricket in Australia, enjoying playing stints in NSW, Victoria and South Australia.

Apart from the make-up of the team, Drew doesn't know what to expect when the team assembles in Hong Kong.

“All I know is that it is over very quickly and the game only lasts about half-an-hour,” Drew said.

“It is very, very popular over there and the games get quite a good amount of support from the community.”

He's also unsure about why he's been pigeon-holed as a player in the shorter forms of the game.

“I'd definitely like to make teams in all forms of the game and I find it quite strange because when I first went down to Tasmania I was straight into the four-day stuff,” he said.

“But I'm happy with my move down there and I am enjoying the opportunity of playing cricket professionally.”