Tweet surprise as Paine gets call-up to face the old enemy Tim Paine batting for Tasmania Tigers. Tim Paine was one of a handful of Australia A players who learnt of their selection to play against England on Twitter, leading Cricket Australia to promise to get better at communicating with its players. Some players received calls, but communication with those who were in India with the one-day squad, which included captain Moises Henriques and all-rounder Glenn Maxwell, is understood to have been haphazard. "We were actually talking about it yesterday - a few of us saw it on Twitter, it was interesting," Paine, the Tasmanian captain and wicketkeeper, said on Thursday. I heard a few whispers from our head coach that it may happen so they were preparing to pick [Sheffield Shield] teams, and being captain of Tassie that's how I found out about it - through our selection meeting, then I came out and it was on Twitter. I'm happy to be here and getting an opportunity, obviously it means something, but it hasn't been handed down to me as yet, I'm just trying to do as well as I can. A criticism of the previous selection panel, chaired by Andrew Hilditch, centred on poor communication. "Our priority is to communicate with players who are new to a squad or have been dropped from the previous side," a CA spokesman said. In this instance we could have communicated better with our players, and we'll work to ensure it doesn't happen again in future. The second day of the tour match in Hobart was abandoned without a ball being bowled. Rain cleared late in the afternoon but the run-up at the southern end was too wet for play to resume. The weather at least provided some respite for Australia A's makeshift attack, which was hammered as England openers Alastair Cook and Michael Carberry carried the tourists to 0-318 on day one. Paine, meanwhile, senses the battle to be Brad Haddin's understudy has "opened right up" since Matthew Wade was dropped from the Test and one-day international teams. "There is no doubt it has opened up a bit," he said. Brad is obviously the No.1 but, after that, who knows? It is about performing. I think whoever does that, and if anything does happen to Brad or he decides to hang them up in the next year or two, it will be who is in the best form. That is a good thing for the guys who have probably been back in the order in the last couple of years. Paine was recovering from a badly broken hand when Wade replaced Haddin in the Test team in April 2012, and the Victorian scored two centuries before the veteran was recalled as vice-captain. Paine, 28, has had the index finger on his right hand reinforced with a piece of bone from his hip, but feels his glovework is almost back to where it was before he was injured in an exhibition match three years ago. He has had to change his batting grip and his hand aches with arthritis in cold weather. He has also had to overcome doubts exacerbated by the uneven bounce at Bellerive Oval early last season, when he was worried about being struck again on the hand. "I've still got a bit of work to do with my batting - that is purely about putting runs on the board and performing out in the middle," said Paine, who has a first-class average of 31 but just one century, a breakthrough 215 in his second season. He has played four Tests, and made 92 against India in 2010. "I'd like to think they would go back to a wicketkeeper-batsman rather than a batsman-wicketkeeper," he said. But at the same time it's going to have to be someone who is scoring runs consistently and I think all wicketkeepers around the country pretty much do their job with the bat. So 'keeping is always going to be No.1, but the [Chris] Hartleys, [Peter] Nevills, Wades - they score runs as well so I'm going to have to do the same.