In 2011, Cummins famously became the second-youngest Australian man to make his Test debut, but despite taking 6-79 in his second innings, the paceman needed to wait six years for another chance amid a horror run of injuries. He returned on tour of India in 2017 and the rest, as they say is history. Cummins has forged a fast-bowling triumvirate with Mitch Starc and Josh Hazlewood as one of Australia's "big three quicks" and, in 2021, became the first fast-bowler appointed full-time to the Test captaincy.
Ricky Ponting - 20 years, 354 days
Tasmanian batting prodigy Ponting came within a sliver of hitting a century during his first innings in the baggy green, dismissed lbw on 96 by Sri Lanka's Chaminda Vaas at the WACA Ground. It was a sign of things to come for Ponting, the finest batter of his generation and Australia's most prolific Test run-scorer to this day. Ponting's pull shot and cover drive were the stuff of legend, and helped him to a formidable average of 54 from 29 Tests against India.
Steve Waugh - 20 years, 207 days
Waugh made his debut in the Boxing Day Test some 39 years before Sam Konstas is likely to earn his own maiden baggy green in Melbourne. With scores of 13 and five, it was a first outing to forget. Axed during the 1990/91 home Ashes, the middle-order batter returned to the team with new purpose and eventually became its most successful captain of the past 60 years by win percentage. Waugh led Australia for all but one game of a 16-game Test winning streak between 1999 and 2001 that is yet to be beaten.
Sir Donald Bradman - 20 years, 95 days
The greatest batter in cricket history managed only 18 and 1 in his first Test match against England in Brisbane during the summer of 1928/29. It was on tour of England 18 months later that the Cootamundra-born right-hander announced himself with a mind-blowing 974 runs for the six-match series. His average of 99.94 remains far-and-away the best for any Test player, and would have been 100 had he managed to score at least four runs in his final hit, instead falling to a second-ball duck.
Ian Craig - 17 years, 239 days
The only man under 18 to ever play Test cricket for Australia, the right-handed Craig made a half-century in his first knock, against South Africa on debut at the MCG in 1953. He would go on to briefly captain Australia on tour of South Africa in the summer of 1957/58, by which point his run scoring abilities had been compared to Bradman. That series was to feature the last of his 11 Test matches. Craig contracted hepatitis before the start of the next season and could not reclaim his Test spot, ultimately retiring from cricket at 26.
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