Travis Head scored 629 runs as Australia’s opener in the Ashes. He hit three centuries. He won his second consecutive Allan Border Medal. And after all of it, he says he is not a true opening batter.
Head made the statement in an interview with ESPNCricinfo on August 8, a day after collecting the AB Medal at the Cricket Australia awards function in Brisbane.
“I think my game is conducive to playing well. I feel like I can do a role at the top. I’m at the top, but it’s not [as] that true opening batter, if that makes sense. I know that I’ve still got to work continuously hard at the new ball. I know I’m going to make mistakes. That’s okay. I’m very comfortable with where my game’s at.”
Travis Head, ESPNCricinfo interview, August 8, 2026
Head has played roughly 170 to 180 first-class matches. He has opened in about 10 to 12 of them. The rest were spent at No.5 or No.6, where he averaged 41.46 in Tests and built his reputation as one of Australia’s most destructive batters.
His distinction is specific. Openers in Australian cricket come through the grades facing the new ball from their teens. They do it in state cricket, then in Tests. Head did none of that. He was a middle-order player who was pushed up.
The promotion happened by accident. Usman Khawaja suffered a back spasm during the first Ashes Test in Perth last November. Marnus Labuschagne opened in Khawaja’s absence in the first innings. For the second innings chase, Head was sent out instead.
His 123 off 83 balls ended the Test in two days. Cricket.com.au reported the Perth move was the result of years of quiet lobbying by Head to Australia’s leaders for a chance at the top.
He followed with 170 in Adelaide and 163 in Sydney. His 629 runs were the most by any batter in the series. Only seven Australians before him had passed 600 in an Ashes.
Head averages 52.64 as a Test opener compared to 41.46 at No.5. The batter who says he is not a true opener has produced the most dominant opening stretch in recent Ashes history.
But Head measures himself differently. At the Allan Border Medal ceremony, he dismissed individual records entirely.
“Again, individual accolades and runs, and all those things I’ve never really been too worried about. That’s why I rocked up tonight not expecting anything. To win an Ashes series is incredible. To have an opportunity to maybe win a Border-Gavaskar away, to win an Ashes away, to win a World Cup away in South Africa later in the next year, that’s all I’m sorely worried about.”
Travis Head, Allan Border Medal ceremony, Brisbane, August 7, 2026
🔴 MY FOCUS IS TO WIN BGT IN INDIA & WORLD CUP IN SA 🤯
Travis Head said🎙️: Individual runs are not his main concern. His biggest focus is helping Australia win the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in India and the World Cup in South Africa next year.
He knows both will be huge… pic.twitter.com/pzvAD4L0Oa
— Sam (@cricsam02) August 8, 2026
He pointed to his two fifties in Barbados against West Indies earlier in the year as the kind of innings he values most. They did not look like big scores. But they won Australia a Test on a difficult pitch.
Head polled 153 votes for the AB Medal, one ahead of Alex Carey’s 152. He scored 1,437 runs across 30 matches in all formats during the 2025-26 season, becoming the fifth player to win consecutive AB Medals.
What 21 Tests in 10 Months Demands From a Non-Traditional Opener
Head’s next assignment begins next week. Australia play Bangladesh in Darwin on August 13, the first of two winter Tests and Bangladesh’s first tour to Australia in 23 years.
Three Tests in South Africa follow in September and October. It will be Australia’s first Test tour there since the sandpaper crisis of 2018. Four home Tests against New Zealand run from December into January. Then comes the five-Test Border-Gavaskar Trophy in India, starting January 21 in Nagpur and finishing March 3 in Ahmedabad. Chennai, Guwahati, and Ranchi fill the middle. A 150th anniversary Test against England at the MCG follows on March 11. The Ashes in England begin in June. A possible WTC Final at Lord’s sits in between. The World Cup in South Africa arrives in October 2027.
Twenty-one Tests across four countries in conditions ranging from Darwin’s heat to Nagpur’s spin to English seam. Head acknowledged what lies ahead.
“We’re going to play in a lot of different conditions over the next 12 months. It’s going to require different efforts. It may not look like the traditional thing all the time. I just want to be able to play a role that ends up winning Test matches.”
Travis Head, ESPNCricinfo interview, August 8, 2026
He said he was setting no statistical targets. The approach would change series to series, ground to ground.
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Opening in Perth against England’s pace and opening in Nagpur against India’s spin are two completely different jobs. In Perth, Head could back his hands and his eye against bounce and speed, playing the shots he has played all his life. The ball does what you expect it to do.
In India, the new ball grips and turns from the first session. The pitch deteriorates by the hour. An opener schooled in that system sets up for survival through the first hour, rotating strike and building in singles. Head has never been that batter. His method is to attack before bowlers settle, to score so fast that the pressure shifts before the pitch takes over.
He opened in India during the 2023 BGT after David Warner’s injury and averaged 55.75 across five innings. That record gives Australia confidence. But five Tests across January and February, on pitches designed for home advantage, will test whether his counter-attacking approach holds across an entire series rather than a few innings.
Head is not pretending to be an opening batter in the way Australian cricket has always understood the role. That honesty about his own game, heading into the most demanding stretch ahead of him, is more valuable than any technical adjustment.
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