PERTH, Dec 20: Brett Lee was Monday named in an unchanged Australian squad for Sunday's second cricket Test with the strong likelihood that he will remain 12th man for the eighth straight Test match against Pakistan in Melbourne.

Lee has been left out of the starting eleven for Australia's three Test wins at home this southern summer - two over New Zealand, one over Pakistan - and his dearth of first-class cricket is expected to continue in the Boxing Day Test.

Lee is being hamstrung by a lack of solid match bowling practice with his only outlet in one-day matches - where he can only bowl 10 overs maximum - because the fixture clashes do not allow him to bowl for New South Wales in first-class matches.

NSW's five remaining Sheffield Shield matches this season clash with Australian commitments, so unless Lee can force his way into the Test side he will have played just one first-class this season - a tour match for NSW against New Zealand.

NSW's next two four-day Shield matches - against South Australia starting Jan 18 and against Queensland starting Jan 27 - conflict with Australian one-day matches against the West Indies (Jan 21) and Pakistan (Jan 30).

The Blues' last three Shield matches are in February and March, when Lee could again be away with the Australian side - in New Zealand - but not necessarily playing in the Tests.

Australian coach John Buchanan was aware of Lee's lack of game time but said he was needed in case a member of the frontline pace attack - Glenn McGrath, Jason Gillespie and Michael Kasprowicz - suffered an injury or suddenly lost form.

"It's a case of having a close look at what is best for him and it may mean that he doesn't play a first-class game but he ends up playing all the one-day games," he said. "Hopefully, by doing that it sets him up for playing first-class cricket (in New Zealand) where we've got some Test matches coming up."

Buchanan said it would be ideal if the first day of Shield matches did not clash with the first day of Tests so players could be released to play for their states, but accepted that would be hard to schedule. "The answer is ideally, yes, that would be the case," he said. "But once you begin to try to mix all those games together it becomes quite difficult."

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