England lost the Ashes so quickly it barely qualified as a series. By the time most supporters had adjusted their sleep schedules, the urn was gone, Bazball was wobbling, and Brendon McCullum was explaining — calmly, politely — that his future was someone else’s problem.
Some men chase enlightenment in monasteries; Brendon McCullum appears to have found his in the warm, humming void between reality and whatever dimension England’s Ashes preparation currently occupies.
Perth didn’t just wake up hot — it woke up hostile. The city buzzed like a neon motel sign on its last night before collapse, flickering over the great baked bowl of the stadium where nineteen wickets were about to get dragged screaming into the void.
It begins, as all good hallucinations do, under floodlights that feel like interrogation lamps. The pitch is a slab of madness, the crowd already fizzing with sugar and beer, and somewhere deep in the corporate cortex of Cricket Australia, a banker has decided that this — this first over of the Big Bash — needs to be a democracy.
Ok so the first question you’re asking is “Who are you and what are you doing in my house?”. This will be followed by “Where have you been all these years?”. I can’t answer the first due to legal reasons however I can have a stab at some professionally poor excuses for the second.
You didn’t need to see the 1st game in the current ODI series between England and India to to agree with me, but it does add considerable weight to my argument. I would also like to not the singular language in this title. I’m not suggesting he’s one of the shits, but rather THE shit. You name me a better, more exciting and consistently wicket taking bowler across all formats and I will laugh in your face as if it were Richard Pryor performing some of his classic standup in a small New York club.
After the 1st test of this 2 match series, there was hope that Australia had revitalised it’s approach and ability to battle subcontinent conditions, and the inevitably skilful teams that come along with them. That hope was clearly a little premature as Australia returned to form and crumbled like an overcooked meringue in the salivating mouth of an excellent Sri Lankan outfit. Rather than going through a play by play (it hurts too much anyway) let’s just cover a few things of interest.
Well it seems that Bazball couldn’t save England from a trouncing in their recent T20 match against India. In all fairness they do have a different coach for the shorter formats in Matthew Mott. Oddly enough they were playing something they could be described as Mottball, although I’m not sure that tag is going to catch on.
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