Fourth Test, Day 1. MCG Cheerio Brendan McCullum?

A Bazball

Another crazy day in the world of BazBall, to be fair the bowlers did a good job, Tongue deserved his 5-fer (and don't forget he's on a hat trick, when he bowls next). But the batting was a disaster. Duckett is fried, Bethell is not a #3 Test batsman,  When he plays for Warwickshire, which is not often these days and is part of the problem, he bats at 7 or 8. It was obvious that he was going to fail. It was also obvious since Brook has switched back his default setting (see his first ball), that he was going to get out before he got to 50. Surely someone has to accept responsibility for this cluster-f*ck, and my vote is McCullum, sincehe is the responsible line manager. He should be jettisoned before he does permanent damage to England Test cricket. Of course some structural changes are required. If it was up to me I would mandate that centrally contracted players play a minimum of 5 red ball fixtures for their county per season, and that the ECB should arrange the fixture schedule to allow county games to take place in the middle of the summer, not just shoehorned into May and September. Apparently this is only the ninth Test where the third innings has started on the first day.

First ball in front of 94,000 spectators when things appeared normal.

The ground is so huge they need a 5-dimensional co-ordinate system (Gate/Level/Bay/Row/Seat) to get people to their seats

A reminder of home