AUSTRALIA are desperate to ensure doubts about playing in Pakistan do not leave the side under-prepared for the important Test tour of India that follows, with fast bowler Stuart Clark prepared to take an early passage to India to keep the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Australian hands.

Cricket Australia will today name a squad for a three-match one-day series against Bangladesh in Darwin starting August 30, but players and officials are in a state of limbo, with the decision on whether to attend next month's Champions Trophy in Pakistan probably still several days away.

If the ICC's last-ditch effort to convince Australia to play in Pakistan is unsuccessful today, the Australians will be dreadfully short of match practice ahead of the sequel to last summer's engrossing series against Anil Kumble's men starting in October.

"It's always hard going to India, you really need to go there and familiarise yourself with the country, the wickets and the conditions," said Clark, who has played one-dayers in India but will feature in his first Test series there. It's all good and well to train here but the conditions are so different sometimes that if we go a few days early that wouldn't bother me because I think it will be very important for my preparation to get acclimatised to those conditions. It can be very different and daunting but it's a challenge and if we go early it wouldn't hurt anyone."

As it is, there is only one tour match scheduled before the first Test begins in Bangalore on October 9, but CA is ready to swing into action at short notice to ensure its players have enough time to adapt to sub-continental conditions in the event of a Champions Trophy boycott.

When the Australians stormed their "final frontier" four years ago, breaking a 35-year drought in India, the series was regarded as a triumph of planning and preparation, and they are not prepared to leave anything to chance this time around.

"We're looking at it. At the moment the Champions Trophy is still going ahead, so we can only plan as if that is going to happen," coach Tim Nielsen said.

"The ideal situation won't be that we go to Darwin for one-dayers then home for two-and-a-half weeks then go to India. We will certainly have some other things on the go [if CA does not send a team to Pakistan]."

Options are believed to include heading to India early and staging a longer camp in Brisbane before they leave.

The confusion over Pakistan has delayed the announcement of a Champions Trophy squad. If CA decides to send a team, players will have to make individual decisions on whether to declare their availability or stay home for safety reasons.

It is looking highly unlikely Australia will feature in the tournament, with the government warning citizens not to travel there and closing its consulate offices in Karachi and Lahore - the two cities where the CT will be be played - for fear they would be bombed.

Sri Lanka has been mooted as a back-up venue but with the tournament scheduled to start on September 12, there appears too little time to organise security inspections there. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is in the process of moving staff after several deadly bombings in Colombo.

"We wait for these security reports, spend all your time waiting, I wish we knew two weeks ago because at least there would be closure," said Clark, whose wife is pregnant. "You hear about Australia closing its embassies in Pakistan, what are you supposed to think? And the back-up country has its own problems."

The squad for three one-day internationals in the Top End against Bangladesh will gather in Brisbane for a camp next week, but skipper Ricky Ponting and opening batsman Matthew Hayden are still in doubt with wrist and Achilles injuries, respectively.