Doug Bollinger couldn't win an Ashes spot but he is working hard to ensure he will be rushed to England should the pace attack suffer any injury dramas. Bollinger made his Test debut in Sydney and was part of the squad in South Africa but the return of Brett Lee and Stuart Clark from injuries squeezed him out.

Instead, he will have to settle for some Australia A outings in Queensland starting next week. Since his first ODI series, against Pakistan in the UAE, Bollinger has been keeping busy to prepare himself for whatever matches come his way.

"When I got back from Dubai I kept the body ticking over, going to the gym and doing some bowling in the indoor nets," Bollinger told the Daily Telegraph. "I took the news of missing out on the Ashes with a grain of salt. There wasn't a lot I could do about it and there was no use sitting around whingeing.

"If an opportunity was to come up now I'd take it, I'd be more than ready to jump over there. I thought I've bowled well lately, I took five wickets in my second one-dayer, and hopefully I'll be the first one picked if anything does goes wrong."

There is little doubt he will be next in line and the former fast bowler Geoff Lawson believes Bollinger should already be in England instead of Lee. The one consolation for Bollinger is that he will be at home when his wife Tegan gives birth in seven weeks.

"At the moment my only focus in on Australia A," Bollinger said. "If I think too much I'll go insane. It's hard not to think about things, but everybody has done that. Sometimes you have to take a step back and let things ride."