Gabba nets annoy 'grumpy' Johnson

New Zealand might be coming up against Mitchell Johnson at an unfortunate time. At 34 and with 71 Tests to his name, Johnson is the old veteran of Australia's team, but he is far from spent.

In fact, after resting from the recent one-day series in England and then the first stages of the Matador Cup, he is bowling faster than one of his Test and state team-mates has ever seen. Mitchell Marsh was part of the Western Australia team against Tasmania at Bellerive Oval in the Sheffield Shield last week, and he said watching Johnson handle the pink ball was a sight to behold.

"Some of those spells down in Hobart he was pushing 150kph for sure," Marsh said. "By far the quickest bowling I've seen on the field and I've played with Johnno over the last 18 months.

"I don't know if it was the pink ball but he bowled a couple of overs that were rapid. He's looking really good. In our schedule to get six weeks off and for him to get in the gym and recharge the batteries, hopefully he'll put it out there on Thursday."

If that wasn't enough to worry New Zealand's batsmen, Johnson also looked somewhat irritated at Australia's training session on Tuesday. Johnson sat around while the other fast men bowled at Australia's batsmen, and eventually ran in off a few steps, before attempting to bowl off his full run-up. But the Gabba nets didn't allow him enough room.

Instead, Johnson had to trek across Brisbane with bowling coach Craig McDermott to bowl at the National Cricket Centre, while the rest of his team-mates kept working at the Gabba. Marsh joked that Johnson "turned 34 yesterday and he's getting old and grumpy", but if he was getting riled it was perhaps best for Australia's batsmen that they didn't have to face him in the nets.

Fellow left-armer Mitchell Starc said it was not unheard of for nets to be too short for the fast bowlers, and he himself found the measuring tape running into the fence at training on Tuesday. Starc opted for a bowl off his long run in the middle of the Gabba, whereas Johnson preferred to head to the NCC.

"The nets aren't long enough for a few of us," Starc said. "Out in the nets it's too short, that's why I came out into the middle [of the Gabba] to bowl a few off my full run. There's a few places around the world which are a bit frustrating with the lengths of the run-ups, but it's the things we deal with and we'll be fine come Thursday.

"My run up is 22.8 metres and the run-up [in the Gabba nets] isn't 22.8m. I'm not sure how long it is. Most of us use the tape measure these days so it's pretty spot on."