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Once another trivial schedule-clogging Twenty20 international is out of the way, attention will fully turn to Australia’s Test series in India.
It’s a four-game series to decide whether Michael Clarke’s developing side are the real deal or one who are merely threatening to be.
Talk of the upcoming Ashes can wait – it isn’t until July after all – and while there is next to no chance of that happening in the media on this side of the world, let’s concentrate on the present.
The obvious question has to be whether Australia can win in India.
Take a look at the state of the respective teams and the answer should be, why not?
The hosts will certainly start the tussle as favourites, and quite rightly so given their general dominance on home soil, but the Australians should take great heart from England’s victory there before the turn of the year.
While Clarke will lead a side into battle who are still having significant teething problems, MS Dhoni’s outfit are more in danger of losing their teeth rather than sharpening them.
Aging batsmen, impotent seamers and spinners who aren’t all they’re cracked up to be do not make for an all-conquering set-up and have created plenty of vulnerable areas that can be exploited.
England were successful because they played a traditional, grafting, old fashioned Test match style of cricket that was dictated by the surfaces that were being used.
Runs made by lengthy occupation of the crease, two spinners working in tandem and seamers being used in short, effective bursts pays dividends in the sub-continent regardless of whether they are alien conditions or not.
It took a good drubbing in the first Test for the penny to drop but with the amount of analysis done these days, the Australian hierarchy should be well aware of this fact.
And although there are plenty of variables that cannot be legislated for, a couple of simple factors are non-negotiable.
One of those is playing two spinners. The seamers available are of a high-quality but Glenn McGrath and Jason Gillespie they are not. I wouldn’t be expecting miracles from Xavier Doherty and Glenn Maxwell, but they’ve been picked for a reason and one of them has to be selected as such.
Another is playing six specialist batsmen. Runs have to be scored in large enough volumes if the bowlers are to have anything to work with and if they’re chasing the game then they’re in trouble.
Run of the mill all-rounders – Maxwell and Moises Henriques – with first-class records that are nothing to write home about will, as a rule, not decide the outcome of Test matches and the urge to try and fill two spaces with one untried and untested newcomer would be a short-term plan with less chance of success.
A four-man attack can work and while it would be hard toil for those involved, that is what they’re paid to be there to do.
With regards to the batting order, Matthew Wade could well be a number six, although I’m still to be convinced, but not yet he isn’t and too long a tail is asking for trouble.
Planning for Trent Bridge in July is a tricky thing to do in India but six batsmen and Wade at seven is the best option in both series. That should mean Usman Khawaja gets a gig but while I think Shane Watson should open, he could well surface in the middle somewhere leaving David Warner and Ed Cowan to go in first.
This may be overly simplifying the whole equation and rarely is everything as black and white as observers would have it, but the evidence has already been planted and imitation isn’t always an unwise route to go down.
India are no longer the force they were, not by a long shot, and they are ripe for the taking.
That means an intriguing contest is in the offing and while the Pom in me wouldn’t mind seeing the Aussies getting a good hiding, I’ve got a sneaky feeling that an upset just might be on the cards.