You may soon see the Australian Men’s
cricket team donning a specially-designed jersey, aimed to commemorate the
aboriginal contribution in the country’s sports culture, especially cricket.

The jersey is designed collaboratively by
ASCIS—a Japanese multinational sports equipment manufacturing firm—and two
indigenous women, Aunty Fiona Clarke and Courtney Hagen.

“Clarke is a direct descendent of late cricketer ‘Mosquito’
Couzens (known as Grongarrong), one of the Aboriginal players who toured
England in 1868 as part of the first sporting team from Australia to play
abroad,” cricket.co.au reported.

The men’s team will sport the jersey during
T20 matches upcoming with India’s tour of the continent nation starting
from November 27.

The first-look of the jersey was revealed on Twitter
by Cricket Australia which shared a picture of Australian pace bowler Mitchell
Starc wearing it.  

The country was originally inhabited by aborigines,
whose culture was subjected to an elaborate erasure—via disease and conflict–
and driven to near-extinction during the colonial days of the nation. The country
was at a time treated as a penal colony by their colonial master—the Great
Britain.

When the Men’s cricket team wears the jersey, it would be following the example of their women counterpart who
did the same early in the year in a match against England.