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Lloyd Pope is an 18-year-old who’s been involuntarily thrust into the spotlight to bear a dangerous amount of pressure in his formative years. Nevertheless, I reckon he will ultimately save this country from everything.
For those unaware, the young leg-spinner took eight wickets in a stunning spell on Tuesday that catapulted Australia to the semi-final of the under-19 World Cup, and now the nation is whole again.
In lay terms, with England in touching distance of a breezy victory, Pope is now the Governor General after rescuing us from the unspeakable humiliation of failure in a youth tournament.
And if I know young Lloyd – which I definitely do, after seeing 9.4 overs compacted in to a 45-second story on the nightly news – he’ll do the same again in the semi-final, and forever.
Because he’s the next Shane Warne, because we’re desperate for another Shane Warne.
Because of course we are (AP Photo/Rui Vieira)
The local stock exchange peaked at record highs yesterday, while the CSIRO scrambled to clone the spinner’s DNA to ensure four prongs of Pope for the Ashes in 2019 – a series England incidentally forfeited upon hearing the news. All after one afternoon of googlies.
The eight-wicket haul gripped the nation in a familiar sensation – the one of grossly over-budgeting on untested leg-breaks. By nightfall, we’d been thrust into a deep state of unsubstantiated euphoria and optimism.
Like most things, it’s all Warne’s fault.
That’s because anything related to leggies, beating England and deep thrusting has been forever associated with the champion social-media enthusiast, and rightfully held up to irrational comparison.
But why stop at a parallel? We’re desperate nowadays.
That’s why I’m forecasting Pope to exceed Warne’s delectable catalogue of blonde-topped delights.
The teenager’s demolition job was not some titillating beach shoot, this was nation-saving leg-spin like nothing we’ve seen since our last exorbitant over-reaction to an Australian leg-spinner. Simply anointing him ‘The Next Shane Warne’ is completely insufficient.
Pope possesses better wrong-uns, hair and pun potential than Warne, and already seven more Balls of the Century.
(Photo by Kai Schwoerer-IDI/IDI via Getty Images)
At the risk of low-balling, there was enough in that one spell to suggest he will definitely take 5000 Test wickets, consigning the Victorian legend to someone we will vaguely recall as a cheese addict with a paltry 700.
All we have to do now is drum our fingers on the desk as we wait for Pope to knock over Jacques Kallis with a spitter from the rough.
So enough of your comparisons to Warne, because the youngster will be much better than that. After all, he performed good things on the telly one non-descript Tuesday afternoon.
Some may claim it’s unfair to place pressure on the kid, but it never hurt Beau Casson, Cameron White, Jason Krezja, Bryce McGain or Nathan Hauritz, did it?