Michael Vaughan's graduation to world-class batting status has ensured the close attention of the Australian camp as they prepare for the third Ashes Test in Perth, which starts on Friday.

The Yorkshire opener scored 218 runs in England's innings defeat in the second Test defeat at Adelaide, moving up to fifth place in the world batting ratings as a result.

But the Australians believe Vaughan's tendency to go for his shots from the outset will always give their bowlers m a chance, and they aim to exploit a Perth wicket regarded as the quickest in 20 years to probe his weaknesses.

"He's the danger man in the England line-up," said seamer Andy Bichel, who is tipped to retain his place ahead of Brett Lee in Australia's bowling line-up.

"He comes out and plays his shots - that's aggressive cricket and that's what we play and he attacks all the time. He's going to give you a chance playing like that, but you can also go for some runs against him.

"There's no doubt during his innings he looked uncomfortable at times against short-pitched bowling and we'll be targeting him at certain times."

"We've talked about their team and there's going to be a lot of short-pitched bowling in this game, but teams can get a bit carried away with that at Perth.

"In their game against Western Australia at the start of the tour, the English bowled pretty short, especially Steve Harmison and Simon Jones, and that's a trap you can fall into - you've got to use the pitch in the right way.

"I've had a lot of success here before for Queensland and it's one of the pitches you want to play on as a fast bowler. There's plenty of bounce in the wicket and there's a little bit of swing."

The groundsman at the WACA, Richard Winter, believes the pitch, which was regarded in the 1970s as the quickest in world cricket, could be the fastest Test wicket there in years.

"It's probably going to be a bit pacier than it has been in previous years," Winter predicted. "It's hard and flat and we're expecting it to be a lot more bouncy than it has been in the last few years.

"It's been our plan to get the pitches back to what they used to be like and we've done a lot regenerative work on them for that reason."

Meanwhile Andrew Caddick is to have a second injection in 48 hours in a bid to overcome the back spasm that has made him a major doubt for the Perth Test. He was given a steroid injection yesterday.

Caddick benefited from the Perth surface earlier in the tour by claiming four for 49 against Western Australia.

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