Brendon McCullum will enjoy an England bounce only with boardroom backing
There is an old story about a Somerset team meeting sometime in the 1980s, when they were struggling to come up with plans for how to bowl to the other side’s batsmen. “Easy,” Ian Botham said about the first opener, “I’ll bounce him out.” As for the second: “I’ll bounce him too.” It was the same for the No 3. And the No 4. And so on right through the order. “Bounce him”, “bounce him”, “bounce him”. It can be a simple game when you’re that good at it. It reminded me of a conversation I had with Andrew Flintoff last year. “Let’s be honest,” Flintoff said, “everything in English cricket feels better when the Test team are winning.”