Melbourne, Mar. 9 : Former Australian captain Bill Lawry believes current opener Phillip Hughes should have been picked earlier than he was, claiming he was held back because of a selection process that required overhauling.

"The success of Hughes is a wake-up call to our selection panel that you don''t need to be 30 before you play for Australia,'''' Lawry, a left-hand opener himself, was quoted by the Herald Sun, as saying today

Melbourne, Mar 9 : An 8-year-old Kiwi boy found a message in a bottle, which was washed up on the beach, 25 years after a girl threw it into the ocean from the same spot.

Tom Hussona, from Auckland, discovered the message on Christmas Day last year.

Kylie Tatham-Tahere, who threw the bottle in the ocean 25 years ago, said she was "blown away" when she got a text message from Tom's mother Erica.

"The message was just in hundreds of bits," News. com. au quoted Erica as telling the Waikato Times.

"The paper was so delicate... we had to try to get between the folds and unravel it with toothpicks," she added.

Melbourne, Mar 9 : The Sound Relief concert organised in Melbourne to raise funds for Victorian bushfire victims have become the largest-ever paid event in Australia.

Several international acts will perform and some legendary Australian bands have also reformed for the bushfire aid concerts to be held side by side in Melbourne and Sydney on March 14.

More than 78,000 tickets have been sold for the sell out Melbourne event, which will feature the likes of Kings of Leon and Kylie Minogue.

Melbourne, Mar 9 : Aussie actor Sam Worthington is tipped to replace Christian Bale as Batman in the third instalment of the caped crusader's franchise.

The 32-year-old star is likely to make his mark in the US with the May release of James Cameron''s Terminator Salvation, and again in December with release of Avatar.

Cameron calls Worthington a breakout star of both films, reports News. com. au.

Melbourne, Mar 9 : Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is not known for using "colourful" language, but the global economic crisis seems to be enough to cause a slip of the tongue in even a mild-mannered leader.

The Prime Minister made the slip when explaining that current circumstances made it necessary to borrow to keep the wheels of the economy turning, but that created a political "shit storm".