You get the feeling, sometimes, that if Colin Munroe was cast in Dumb and Dumber, he could play both roles! A silly, unnecessary dismissal. At two wickets down and going at six runs an over, all that was required was some sensible batting.

If you wish to see a changing of the guard anytime soon, may I suggest The Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace. Because you're sure not going to see a changing of the guard in Men's Tennis in the foreseeable future. Not with Rafael Nadal playing like this, at least. 6-2,6-4,6-0 and Stefanos Tsitsipas must have wondered why he bothered beating Roger Federer in the fourth round. And the great Federer, wherever in the World he was watching this demolition, must have been secretly relieved at missing being on the end of this wanton brutality. This wasn’t some first round bunny, ranked 132 in the World, Nadal was suffocating the life from. This was a Greek, a Greek ranked number fifteen and a Greek who conquered Federer not so long ago. Yes, Federer, one of the greatest to have played the game. And, allegedly, this made Tsitipas one of the next big things. This may well be but, if that is to be the case, it’s several years down the road. The Spanish great has just proved that Tsitsipas is not yet a Greek God. And after this semi-final eradication, Nadal will now enter his twenty-sixth Grand Slam Final against the winner of Tomorrow’s Semi-final between Novak Djokovic and Lucas Pouille. Legend. That seventeen of those have served his bank balance exceedingly well in the form of victory will mean zip to the thirty-two-year-old if he were not to replicate this performance and clinch an eighteenth title. For this lefty with hefty groundstroke’s appears as focused as ever. Revered he is by many, and rightly so, for the relentless efficiency off either wing – And those wings, particularly the forehand, with one around the net post winner grasping the gasps of illusionists the World over, could do more damage to a foe’s health than anything you could purchase at your local KFC – was joined by an unusually suave service game. Not once was it broken. Not once did it look like being broken. Only once in three sets was this insanely secure point ice-breaker taken to deuce. Once. Unbelievable. Anyone perusing the World number Two’s form over the previous decade would have noticed on many an occasion the one-time Australian Open victor struggling to hold serve. Not here, not now. A serve as hot and as invincible as a comet’s fiery tail, it sped the angles out wide at clicks beyond a twenty-year old’s comprehension. Such swerve crushing with verve a foe’s delicate psyche. By the time the third set had arrived, with Nadal breaking the Greek in the first game, the rising star was fading as fast. He was lost, forlorn of hope, deep down knowing, surely, that he was staring indomitability in the face. Such was the shame. For Tsitsipas put forth a sterling account of himself in the central set. Having lost the first – after having to wait for eight minutes in the corridors of apprehension for Nadal to join his acquaintance upon entering the arena beforehand – comfortably, the lad set about attacking greatness with a clobbering forehand. Ably backed by a serve of inherent mischief, usually down the centre line, the postulant seeked to douse the comet’s conflagration. Marinate, he couldn’t. But at least he held his own. Until, at four apiece, Nadal’s instincts of visceral paunch grinding winners came to the fore. Now a break down and at the mercy of the Carlos Moya coached ace, the wannabe ace couldn’t withstand yet another domineering service game from Nadal. Two sets to nil down, it was over. Over before it was over, but over. The spice of a Spanish Patatas Bravas had, in the end, destroyed the Greek salad. A performance for the ages, and surely we’re in for an epic on Sunday. Over to you, Novak Djokovic.

Australia, since the Lunch break, have lost four wickets for six runs. Now that’s some bowling by India. Or some dud batting by the home side. Nah, not really. This pitch has taken on the persona of a 1930’s sticky wicket. You know the ones, back in the day, whereby said pitch was left uncovered for the duration of an inclement weather’s temper tantrum. Upon the resumption of play this rabble-rousing rectangle spewed forth unseemly amounts of mud. Even batting’s one true God, Don Bradman, could average not more than twenty-one on sticky wickets. Which means the South Australian was going at well over one hundred for his innings on ordinary pitches. Not the worst around, was he. Now the modern day athletes know what the old timers were going through. One moment Pat Cummins is bowled by an ankle knocker that knocked on middle stump’s welcoming door. The next you’ll see Usman Khawaja being molested by leather’s sharpness 1.7 metres or so from Terra Firma. Talk about mood swings. This pitch has it all. One minute Australia are sauntering through to 192 for 4, then, suddenly, they find themselves in a rather perilous state at 198 for 8. Mind you, they still possess a two hundred and sixty-one run lead which is currently climbing. . . Just. And India have to chase this over the last day and a half. Good luck to them on that front. They’re going to require all they can get. They could also do with Bradman. They do have Kohli. But then, as good as the Indian Captain may be, and is, he’s no Bradman. They could do with the greatest of all time right now. Because this is a rather sticky situation for the Indian batsmen.

Colin de Grandhomme’s pace is as threatening as the National Party’s poll ratings during a Jamie Lee Ross text flurry. Yes, he may recover somewhat in the aftermath yet during the storm lightening and thunder strike the demented soul of his plodding one hundred and twenty-five kilometre per hour arm warmers. And warm is being kind. They could barely friction air’s pulse let alone explode it into a riposte of respiration profoundly voicing its velocity. So why, why O why, does he feel the urge to bowl no-balls? How difficult could it possibly be for he to propel forth his unwieldly vista of untamed bulk toward the popping crease without overstepping the mark? Sure, accepted the Zimbabwean born allrounder does not overstep on purpose. But, really, a no ball at the clicks of lead, not warp Sci-fi. Then it happens. As only it could on a no ball. Dimuth Karunaratne hits a full toss – Yes, a full toss and a no ball, De Grandhomme has mediocrity’s market cornered – straight to extra cover for the simplest of snares. The New Zealander’s, having Sri Lanka already in trouble at three for thirty-one and now not much more than sixty, with the Opener looking untroubled in his early thirty’s, miss an opportunity to stab the heart of one of their foe’s top practitioners. Survives he does. And then proceeds to pile on a further forty-five runs until finally dismissed for seventy-nine and the visitor’s now 142 for 4. Not 60 for four. Possibly a match defining moment. Only time will tell. But all so avoidable for New Zealand. I guess they’ll just have to suck it up.

The fifth day of this first Test Match of the series, a session and a half to game's end, Australia require sixty-four runs to win, India desire two wickets. This, folks, is why we have a fifth day in Tests. And this folks is why we must keep a fifth day in Test Matches.

It occurs to One that maybe Colin Croft, the former West Indies fast bowler of the late seventies and early eighties, was a man for the times. With twenty-seven Tests and one hundred and twenty-five wickets at an average of 23.30 to his name, not only was he a speed sphering great, here was a character beholden to the fine art of the shoulder charge. In Cricket of all sports. A game whereby the only contact is, supposedly, between willow and leather, the bruising of leather upon fragile skins, and unless some fiery speedster unintentionally let’s rip with a beamer aimed at a batsman’s noggin and swells that noggin larger than said batsman’s average – not hard in some cases, admittedly – a shoulder charge is generally not an anticipated outcome within a day’s play. Even with a five-pronged attack of Roberts, Marshall, Holding, Garner and Croft engendering fear upon the mean strips of Worldly pitches the globe over, no one really expected to see shoulder on shoulder action at Christchurch’s Lancaster Park in 1980. Fred Goodall, the umpiring recipient of Croft’s unwelcome attention, certainly wasn’t expecting the unexpected. At 6ft 5”, though, Croft would surely have made a fearsome forward within the Rugby League fraternity back in an era where the shoulder charge was nothing more than the equivalent of air kissing. Having more than one string to your bow and all that. These days, air kissing – let alone the shoulder charge - would be deemed too brutal. Alas, the shoulder charge is supercharged with connotations of long-term brain damage, and has been banned – And fairly, too. So, there probably wouldn’t be much of a future for Croft in modern sport. Even Cricket, these days, take a somewhat dim view of such deity’s as sledging let alone physical harassment. But with that average of twenty-three, a fine bowler the West Indian was when he was concentrating fully on the intricacies of his craft. Best we remember Croft for the good. Because pace bowling was clearly a craft for Croft.

Well, it’s better late than never, I guess. The penny has finally dropped for the England selectors, who have at last seen fit – and finally seen the bleedingly blatant, which everyone else has been able to ascertain for many months – to install Jonny Bairstow at number three. And here he is on 42 not out. Which is 39 more runs than Moeen Ali scored in two innings of the first Test. And probably as many as the spinner scored in his previous half dozen innings at number three. Sure, Bairstow may disapprove, seeing as he still pines for the protection of the gloves behind the stumps. This is a team game though. So it’s off to the gloves of number three he goes to protect this side from any form of catastrophic collapse. With Burns and Jennings already ensconced back in the pavilion for 14 and 13 respectively, a World class number three, one would surmise, is a vital backstop for these two highly fallible openers. Afterall, Bairstow claimed the other day that not all that long ago he was one of the World’s top ten ranked batsmen. So here’s his chance to prove how good he is with timber in hand. And there isn’t much better position to do that than at Number Three. Not to mention far more satisfaction garnered from contributing to this young side’s rise out on the ground than sitting as a reserve for five days. Because Bairstow has his work cut out wrestling those wicketkeeping gloves back from Ben Foakes.