MELBOURNE: Australia's middle-order batsman Peter Handscomb has admitted that he felt hurt after not being picked in the 26-man preliminary squad for the potential limited-overs tour of England.
The right-handed batsman also said that he learnt of the 26-member squad through an Instagram post.
"I saw a post on Instagram that Australia had named a 26-man squad for the ODIs in England. I was like, 'Oh cool, all right. I guess I'm not in that!' That sucked," cricket.com.au quoted Handscomb as saying.
"I was in the 15-man squad to go to India in January. I still thought I was in the top 20 one-day players given what I had done over the last year and a half. To not be in the 26, that really hurt," he added.
Handscomb also said that he was a part of the squad for the India tour earlier this year, and it was difficult for me to digest that 11 more guys were picked over him for the tour of England.
"Going from being in the 15 and then having 11 guys essentially jump me - I know they're different roles and different positions - but that hurt a fair bit," he added.
The 29-year-old Handscomb also said that he had a good discussion with chief selector George Bailey as to why he was not selected in the 26-member squad.
"I had a really, really good conversation with George. I just wanted to get clarification around how I had gone from being in the 15 to not being in the 26," Handscomb said.
"I would like to think with the World Cup in India in 2023 that I am at least on their radar. I'd consider myself a good player of spin and being able to control those middle overs," he added.
The preliminary 26-player Australian list for a proposed Tour of England in September -- Sean Abbott, Ashton Agar, Alex Carey, Pat Cummins, Aaron Finch, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Marsh, Glenn Maxwell, Ben McDermott, Riley Meredith, Michael Neser, Josh Philippe, Daniel Sams, D'Arcy Short, Kane Richardson, Steven Smith, Mitchell Starc, Marcus Stoinis, Andrew Tye, Matthew Wade, David Warner, Adam Zampa.
If Australia indeed tours the UK, then both sides will be locking horns in three ODIs and as many T20Is.