New Delhi, Jul 17 (IANS): As Australia prepares for a T20I series against Scotland and England, Nathan Ellis is gearing up to step out of the shadows of his fast bowling idols, Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc.

With Cummins out for the entire white-ball tour of the UK as part of a load management strategy and Starc also absent for the T20 leg, Ellis will have the chance to lead the attack alongside Hazlewood.

"It's a tricky one for me because these are guys that I've looked up to for a long time coming through as a kid," Ellis told cricket.com.au. "Now I'm at the point where I want to compete and be a part of that group – they're the big three, hopefully, I can make it the big four.

In the recent T20 World Cup, Ellis impressed with a wicket in every match he played, finishing the tournament with an economy rate of 6.72 despite often bowling at the death.

"It's an honour to play alongside those guys and I just try and take what I can from all of their preparations and how they go about it. They've been so good for so long, so I went into the World Cup under no illusions as to where I stood in the pecking order. Maybe that's a mentality I should try and change but they've been such great servants for our country and with that comes a lot of credits," he said.

"I love playing for Australia and it's something that I don't take for granted and I never will, so I'm hoping that I'll become a bit of a mainstay but to do that, I've got to play some good cricket," he cincluded.