Australian cricket has been rocked by another captaincy scandal - this time involving Tim Paine and just weeks before the Ashes start.
On Friday, Paine announced his decision to resign from the role over sexually explicit text messages to a female member of staff in 2017.
The married father-of-two young children was investigated by Cricket Australia in 2018 after the woman complained, but cleared of misconduct and the matter kept secret.
Tim Paine resigned as Australia Test captain on Friday due to his part in a sexting scandal
The 36-year-old sent a photo of his penis to a female co-worker along with a stream of lewd text messages, many of which are too raunchy to publish.
'Will you want to taste my d***?? F*** me, I'm seriously hard,' one of the messages sent to the Cricket Tasmania employee read.
As a result of his misdemeanour, Sportsmail looks at the candidates that could succeed the wicket-keeper as Australia's Test leader.
PAT CUMMINSAs vice-captain, 28-year-old fast bowler Pat Cummins would be the obvious choice to replace Paine and his appointment would enable a rapid transition with the start of the Ashes series against England only three weeks away.
Although Cummins has an impeccable record and currently tops the test bowling rankings, Australia, like most of cricket's leading nations, has traditionally chosen its captains from the ranks of its batters.
Ray Lindwall's temporary one-test stint in India in 1956 makes him the only specialist fast bowler to lead Australia in the longest format of the game.
Cummins, though, said recently he was ready, willing and able to step up to the top job and was not overly concerned about adding the captaincy duties to the sometimes arduous workload of leading the pace attack.
Former captain Steve Waugh said earlier this month that it was time a bowler, specifically Cummins, was given the chance to lead the test team, and middle-order batman Travis Head concurred on Friday.
'Obviously Pat's been well spoken about, named as vice-captain, it's hard to go past him, or give him the opportunity,'
