4 minute readIt’s become one of the great, weird, modern cricket clichés that Brendon McCullum has the ability to make players feel they are an incorrect height. (Invariably taller, invariably 10 feet.) But he doesn’t always make them feel that, does he? We’d be interested to know what height Shoaib Bashir currently
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3 minute readIn the wake of England’s most successful Ashes tour for 15 years, it was widely agreed that some England players needed to play smarter and so that is what Brendon McCullum has promised to deliver henceforth. Some players didn’t need to play smarter though. One in particular has built an
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3 minute read“In terms of skulls… how many skulls? Do you think?” There are plenty of England fans and a good few in the cricket press who have a Tom Wambsgans-esque appetite for skulls right now. England lost the Ashes and no-one has been sacked. It’s an unusual scenario. The boring story
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6 minute readTop level cricketers really care about what they do. Caring is the basic fuel for their careers. But whether it’s an Iranian gasfield, a Tesla Cybertruck battery or merely the giving of shits, sometimes fuel can also finish you. Part of an international coach’s job is therefore to protect players
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3 minute readUnder Matthew Mott, England were very bad at the 2023 World Cup, then made the semi-finals of the 2024 T20 World Cup, where they lost to India. Under Brendon McCullum, they were very bad at the 2025 Champions Trophy, then made the semi-finals of the 2026 T20 World Cup, where
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3 minute readWe’re inclined to agree with Brendon McCullum that it’s “quite annoying” there’s currently so much focus on the night Harry Brook got chinned by a bouncer. We would however disagree with his assessment that it’s all about the specific players involved and that, “piling on to them is not helpful
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3 minute readEither Brendon McCullum’s ahead of the curve on this one, or he’s found a brand new road to a very familiar destination. England have moved quite some way from one of Eoin Morgan’s central principles when it comes to putting together a one-day international (ODI) bowling attack. “Pace just adds
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3 minute readBrendon McCullum has been given a new hat – the England white ball coach hat. What we want to know is whether this new role comes with a literal, physical new hat, because we’re kind of sick of that Cinch one. This is the Cinch hat. This is what Brendon
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3 minute readBad shots are bad shots, but in an age when the dumbest moments are endlessly replayed and dissected, it’s important to at least try and take in the bigger picture. A batter who sometimes plays the wrong shot is nowhere near as bad as a batter who’s always worrying about
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3 minute readBazball is a completely annoying word because any time it’s used – which is basically every other sentence these days – everybody is talking at cross purposes. The foundations for this ongoing noisy surround sound argument lie in the fact that almost no-one knows or acknowledges the definition that Cricinfo
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