An important man in Tasmania's middle order for the past few seasons, George Bailey added the captaincy to his list of responsibilities for 2009-10. He had been the deputy under Daniel Marsh for three seasons and it was no surprise, when Marsh stepped down, that Bailey was named as his successor. In his first season as full-time captain he led the Tigers to the FR Cup title and, having been the competition's second-top scorer with 538 runs at 59.77 including his first century, was called into Australia's ODI squad for the Chappell-Hadlee Series in March 2010. He didn't play any match in that series, but his captaincy for Tasmania so impressed the selectors that he was named Australia's Twenty20 captain in the 2011-12 season. That made him the first player since Dave Gregory in the first Test match in 1877, to be named captain in his first match for Australia in any format. This despite his ordinary batting record in the format: he'd scored only one T20 half-century in the last three seasons.

Bailey had long been viewed as a future international prospect and had been given extra state responsibility back in 2006-07, when Marsh tore his calf late in the season and Bailey guided the Tigers to two important wins before giving the reins back to Marsh for the historic final triumph. Another consistent summer in 2008-09 brought Bailey 673 Sheffield Shield runs at 37.38, following on from his 734 runs the previous season. His reliability that season earned him a spot on the Australia A tour of India in late 2008 and he also won an IPL deal with the Chennai Super Kings.

A destructive striker who can change a match within a few overs, Bailey arrived as a state one-day player at 19. By 2005-06, he proved he had added patience to his game when he was given an extended stint in the first-class team due to another Marsh injury, scoring 778 Pura Cup runs and earning a second invitation to the Academy. Talk of the state leadership and possible national team representation began that summer, when his highest score was 155 against South Australia, an innings that formed part of a state-record fourth-wicket partnership of 292 with Travis Birt. Another highlight came shortly before the 2006-07 season, when he bludgeoned 136 from 65 balls for the Academy against a Zimbabwe Board XI. Bailey is a former national under-19 player and the great-great-grandson of George Herbert Bailey, who was part of the 1878 touring squad to England.
Cricinfo staff