Analysis: Punching out five Test matches in five weeks, with the best players becoming unavailable through injury, risks turning something beautiful and variegated into a weekly grind, writes Malcolm Knox
The Australian home Test cricket “season”, if that’s what it is, is five days into its 40-day run.
The reason behind this compression is well-worn: Australia is interlocked with a global schedule and no longer sets its own rules on its own turf. More interesting than the cause, right now, are the consequences. The longer they resisted, the heavier the load on Josh Hazlewood and Mitchell Starc, not to mention on the rest of the team who would no doubt have been happier sitting in ice baths or sucking glucose gels or checking their phones or whatever they do to celebrate a Test match win during a three-day break with a three-hour flight.
But they did not drop their bundle in their second innings. They tried their very best to preserve a chance of winning the series. So, unless the West Indians and South Africans fold as meekly as England last summer, the next five weeks will be as wearing on the Australians as the past five days.
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