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Watch your back, James Pattinson. That’s all I’m saying. You may have made a spectacular debut, ripping through the Kiwis like a hot machete through a carpet python, but all you’ve done is draw attention to yourself.
You’re now bound to come under attack from whatever shadowy cabal of assassins it is that has apparently dedicated itself to crippling Australian fast bowling.
The evidence is well established.
Who has been the best-performed Australian fast bowler of recent times? Ryan Harris, of course, a man whose rubber band knees go ping every time he so much as thinks about playing two Tests in a row.
Shane Watson dared to stick his head above the parapet in Cape Town, taking five South African wickets in a devastating burst that would be remembered as match-winning if only Australia hadn’t lost.
And now Pat Cummins, the mighty teenager who applied such an effective chokehold to the Proteas in Johannesburg, has followed up that one triumphant Test performance with an injury that started out as a bit of soreness, progressed to a bruised heel, is now a bone injury, and by January will probably be multiple bullet wounds. So we’re without him too.
We just have to face the facts: either someone’s out to hobble the Aussie attack, or God just hates them. The long-term injury of Mitchell Johnson now takes on a sinister aspect: having avoided malevolent attention thus far through his reassuringly erratic bowling, suddenly Mitch is out for the season? We can only assume he had been turning in some sensational performances in the nets, and the Fast Bowling Nemesis was not willing to take the chance of letting him loose.
Peter Siddle seems to have found an intelligent path: keep plugging away in an endearingly wholehearted fashion, never quite awful enough to make anyone want to drop him, but never anywhere near good enough to catch the eye of the hit squad. Mitchell Starc needs to take note – his debut was promising but inconsistent, and if he sticks to that he’ll be fine.
You may laugh, but it is genuinely baffling why every fast bowler who looks like he might be something is stricken by injury upon injury. Right now Harris, Cummins, Johnson, Watson and Ben Cutting are out of action – an entire team’s worth of quicks. Josh Hazelwood of New South Wales has only just returned from a long-term injury, and if he starts doing well, will no doubt get another one.
I feel like it wasn’t always this way. Surely fast bowlers of old didn’t so frequently break down? I know there was Bruce Reid, whose spine collapsed every time he walked through a spiderweb; and Craig McDermott once had his bowel twisted as punishment for disobeying Allan Border’s orders to pitch it up; but on the whole the fast men have been a hardy bunch.
Dennis Lillee broke his back once, but was back bowling in no time: it was his contention that a fast bowler didn’t really need a back anyway. He’d never have a bruised heel – his heels would be too scared of him to step out of line. And Merv Hughes bowled all the way through his pregnancy.
But it’s too easy to say that today’s fast bowlers are just soft, pampered nancy-boys who need to strap up their ankles and get out and bowl until their boots fill with blood and they grow a decent moustache. Modern fast bowlers are just as tough in their own way: let’s see Len Pascoe put in an hour on the stairmaster after a gruelling all-day Gatorade commercial shoot. It’s harder than it looks.
No, it’s not the bowlers’ fault: there’s something about the modern game that is just too much for our quicks to tolerate. Maybe the pitches are too hard. Maybe modern shoes provide insufficient cushioning. Maybe insane snipers in the crowd are firing paralysing darts into bowlers’ feet as they run in. I’m open to all theories.
But really, something has to be done. I suggest a comprehensive Bowler Protection Programme. First, we bolster all fast bowlers’ boots with several layers of cotton wool. Second, we provide motorised wheelchairs to transport fast bowlers everywhere: we do not want to see any quicks using their legs unless it’s on the field.
Third, we encase all fast bowlers’ arms in indestructible adamantium. Fourth, we make sure all wicket squares are completely covered in thick gym mats, to ensure a soft landing in delivery leaps. Fifth, nobody bowls at over 120 kmh, it’s just too dangerous.
Last and most importantly, of course, all promising fast bowlers are to be given new identities and relocated to safe houses under 24-hour guard, to prevent any more unfortunate incidents like Cummins’s ”foot injury”.
Yes, it’ll be expensive, yes it’ll be logistically tricky, but nobody ever said being champion of the world was going to be easy or sane. We will be on top of the world again, Australia. And no gang of fast-bowler-attacking thugs will stand in our way!