The step has been taken as precautionary injury cover for Mitchell Marsh. Marsh bowled 17 overs in Australia s humiliating loss by 295 runs in the series opener in Perth on Monday and pulled up sore afterwards, calling into doubt his fitness for next week s day-night test in Adelaide.

Webster has been in fine form for Tasmania in Sheffield Shield and shone for Australia A against their Indian counterparts before the test series. He will join the squad in Adelaide next week, the team said on Thursday.

The tall 30-year-old, who until 2020 offered off-spin to supplement his batting, breathed new life into his career when he spent a COVID lockdown learning how to bowl medium pace.

Webster, who has scored 5,297 runs at an average of 37.83 and taken 148 wickets in first class cricket, was last year s Sheffield Shield player of the year.

Australia are already without another regular all-rounder in Cameron Green, who was ruled out of the India series after opting to have surgery on a stress fracture in his lumbar spine.

The second test starts at Adelaide Oval on Dec. 6.