The 37-year-old wicketkeeper will feature for Tasmania against Queensland in the Sheffield Shield on Thursday, despite missing out on a state contract for the season.
Paine stepped away from playing duties when details came to light of a historic investigation into a 2017 text message exchange between Paine and a female employee at Cricket Tasmania.
It meant he missed out on leading Australia into the 2021-22 Ashes series, resigning just weeks before the battle with England began. Paine's last first-class match saw him represent Tasmania against Western Australia in April 2021.
Ahead of his return at Allan Border Field in Brisbane, Paine said: "I'm pretty fresh, that's for sure."
Quoted by ABC, he added: "I've obviously been training for five, six weeks. I'm ready to go, excited, obviously a bit nervous, but looking forward to it."
Paine was backed by Tasmania coach Jeff Vaughan, who said team selectors were "quite unanimous" he should be welcomed back, describing him as "one of the world's best wicketkeepers".
"We have absolute faith and trust in Tim and his preparation," Vaughan said, quoted on cricket.com.au. "Physically he is probably in the greatest spot of his physical career, emotionally he is sound."
The return of Paine has also been backed in the Australia ranks, with T20 captain Aaron Finch saying: "I think Australian cricket is better for having Tim involved in a playing capacity."
Reports in Australia on Tuesday claimed Paine is set to give his side of the sexting story in a new book.
The 37-year-old wicketkeeper was playing in his first such match for 20 months, resuming a playing career that ground to a halt following a sexting scandal.
Paine stepped away from playing duties when details came to light of a historic investigation into a 2017 text message exchange between Paine and a female employee at Cricket Tasmania.
It meant he missed out on leading Australia into the 2021-22 Ashes series, resigning just weeks before the battle with England began. Paine's last first-class match had seen him represent Tasmania against Western Australia in April 2021.
A cheap dismissal on his comeback, caught by Matt Renshaw off paceman Gurinder Sandhu's bowling, saw Tasmania slip to 74-6 in their first innings, before recovering slightly to post 147 all out.
Paine took a catch in Queensland's reply, holding on to remove Renshaw and give Riley Meredith a wicket, as the home team at Allan Border Field reached 70-1 at stumps.
Australia endured a batting collapse on Monday as India put themselves within touching distance of victory at the MCG.
The hosts were reduced to 133-6 at stumps on day three, with a lead of just two runs, after losing four wickets for just 28 runs in the evening session.
However, there was some controversy over one of the dismissals, when Australia captain Tim Paine was judged to have been caught behind off Ravindra Jadeja.
Paul Reiffel's on-field decision of not out was overturned by third umpire Paul Wilson, who gave Paine the benefit of the doubt in a contentious run-out call in the first innings.
Paine was clearly frustrated, with the decision having been based on a Snicko spike and no evidence of an edge showing on Hot Spot.
Though that was the correct procedure, Wade has called for consistency, with Australia's review against Cheteshwar Pujara on day two – when there was no mark on Hot Spot and a minor spike on Snicko – not resulting in the India batsman being sent on his way.
"From what I've seen it looked pretty similar to the first ball of yesterday, the one we actually referred, I think it was off Pujara," Wade, who made 40, said in a news conference.
"So from all reports and what I've seen, Snicko showed a very similar thing, one was given out and one was not out.
"That's the way the cookie crumbles sometimes, but that's what it looked like from where we've been sitting and watching.
"I heard a noise on the Pujara one, I was at first slip at the time, and his bat was the only thing out there, and then we saw what you guys saw on the ground, which was a small spike. Either way if it was out or not out, consistency is all you want as a player."
Cameron Green (17 not out) and Pat Cummins (15 not out) saw Australia, who lead 1-0, through to stumps and Wade is hoping the pair can frustrate the tourists on day four.
"[India] bowled pretty well, pretty straight, made it hard for us to go out and score," he said. "But we've only got ourselves to blame.
"We'll take anything [in terms of a lead]. It'll be really nice for these two to get a nice partnership together – something we haven't done enough over this Test match. Anything over 100 would be good."
