Aussie selector: Our cricketers are vulnerable

Australian cricket selector Rod Marsh. Photo / Getty

Rod Marsh concedes Australian cricket is vulnerable.

After naming a callow 15-man Test squad to tour Bangladesh next month, chairman of selectors Marsh says there are gaping holes that need filling.

"Are we vulnerable? Yeah, we are," Marsh told reporters in Adelaide on Monday.

Marsh and fellow selectors named 10 players who have played less than 10 Tests, with two uncapped - 30-year-old Tasmanian paceman Andrew Fekete and West Australian opening batsman Cameron Bancroft.

Seven players in the squad are aged 26 or under, and there are nine changes from the losing Ashes squad.

"Another chapter is about to begin," Marsh said.

"That is the way we have got to look at it because we have had so many retirements, we have got injuries.

"It's not scary. I think it's exciting.

"You're damned if you do and damned if you don't. If we pick an old side, we're the worst selectors that have ever gone around. If we pick a young side (it's) why haven't we picked some old blokes?"

Retirees Michael Clarke, Brad Haddin, Shane Watson, Chris Rogers and Ryan Harris are gone, pace duo Mitchell Johnson and Josh Hazlewood have been rested, and David Warner is injured.

Selectors threw Test lifelines to Usman Khawaja, Joe Burns, Glenn Maxwell and spinner Steve O'Keefe.

The selection of 22-year-old Bancroft was tipped but Fekete's inclusion was unexpected for the two-Test series starting October 9.

"He's just one of those old-fashioned fast bowlers that runs in and bowls pretty straight," Marsh said.

"There is nothing too fancy about him."

Fekete impressed national selectors on a recent Australia A tour of India and was the Sheffield Shield's most successful fast bowler last summer, with 37 wickets.

The 193cm-tall right-armer only made his first-class debut for Tasmania in November 2013 after moving from Victoria.

"It has been publicised that they're resting a few quicks and there will be opportunities, so it (selection) passes through your mind briefly. But until you get a phone call you never count your chickens," Fekete told reporters in Hobart on Monday.

In Warner's absence, Adam Voges was appointed vice-captain to new skipper Steve Smith.

And pace ace Mitchell Starc will tour despite Marsh describing the left-armer's future as "in the lap of the gods" because of bone spurs on an ankle.

Starc will eventually need surgery, and then a three to four month spell from cricket - but nobody knows when.

"He can keep going until it actually gets a hell of a lot worse, and then he will have to have an operation," Marsh said.

"Rest won't help him.

"Eventually it is going to have to be removed but it will take another three or four months after the operation for him to be able to play again."

- AAP