Australia Cricket / Jamie "The Pacman" Pacheco / 08 November 2011 /

Shane Warne is coming out of retirement to play in this year's T20 Big Bash but over in South Africa current Australian skipper Michael Clarke will be facing a very different challenge of his own.

Not for the first time Shane Warne grabbed all the headlines today when the story should have been about the Australian cricket team.

The man they call 'Hollywood' announced in a press conference that he will be making a return to competitive cricket by turning out for the Melbourne Stars in this summer's Twenty20 Big Bash League, staged at the MCG.

"There had been a few offers about coming out to play and I was pretty comfortable with where I was at," Warne told the assembled press at the MCG.

"But then looking back at how lucky I'd been with Australia and Australian cricket and what I'd been able to achieve at the highest level with a great group of players, when Cricket Australia started to launch the BBL, something new with all the city-based teams, it was something quite exciting."

Initially Warne had toyed with the idea of making just a couple of cameo appearances but has since decided to "do this properly" and will play in the whole tournament, for which the Stars are marginal [6.2] favourites on Betfair in a very tight market.

The years go by, the hair gets blonder and the teeth get whiter but it would be no surprise for the man who writes his own scripts to play significant role in helping his home team go all the way, just like he did with the Rajasthan Royals in the inaugural edition of the IPL. This time though, he will be solely in the team as a player, with regular Stars (and Australia T20) captain Cameron White calling the shots.

Over in South Africa though, the Australian national team have far more important things on their minds than the latest comeback of a 42 year-old better known these days for endorsing poker websites, having more hair now than he did ten years ago and being the latest love interest of the ever-glamorous Liz Hurley.

South Africa is one of the toughest places in the world to go for a Test series and doesn't new skipper Michael Clarke know that only too well. His captaincy was praised during their 1-0 series win over Sri Lanka but that was a team in transition whereas this Proteas side is virtually a 'Who's Who' of Test stars. South Africa's batting line-up looks a formidable one with Hashim Amla, Jacques Kallis, AB de Villiers and Graeme Smith to name but a few but Australia can be said to be more in 'Test mode' seeing as the hosts haven't played a match in the longest format since January of this year. The Betfair market finds it hard to split the two with South Africa at [2.8], Australia [3.3] and the draw at [2.9].

We find the two teams very hard to split ourselves whilst the draw is also a lively runner, with rain predicted for day one at the very least. Shaun Marsh looked made for the longest format over in Sri Lanka, including a century on Test debut, and the South African attack won't have seen too much of him. He's [6.0] to be Australia's top runscorer in the first innings and that's where our money is going.

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