The Pura Milk Cup having been dismissed with richly-deserved contumely, the domestic competition decider reverted some time ago to the traditional Sheffield Shield. Many have called into question the need for such a thing. Certainly the clarion calls to abolish the final and have the domestic competition as first-past-the-post have been strident of late. No less strident has been formation blether from past fossils who apparently still command some form of public megaphone. And look: we’re only going to say this once. Will you idiots lay off Usman, once and for all? The last thing our veteran Test opener needed on the brink of the Shield final was blithering nonsense about his injuries. Yes, we’ve actually noticed that Usman is a bit different. Yes, he’s a devout Muslim. We understand that this is a bit confronting for some folks. We urge them to contain their personal traumas and lay off. Is this too much to ask?
As it happened, it was the last thing Usman needed. In case you hadn’t noticed, Joe, he’s actually playing Shield cricket for his adopted home. He’s not footling around the IPL. He’s here, doing his thing for Queensland. He did not prosper today. Would he have, had over-mighty past players not poked unwanted oars into his personal life? We will never know. Truth to tell, batting at Karen Rolton Oval today was far from easy. Nathan McSweeney took one look at the straw-tinged wicket, the humid atmosphere, the shiny red ball, and inserted the Bulls. Why would you not? Batting was going to be a chancy business, and the probability was that Queensland would fluff their lines. Which they did.
Nathan McAndrew must have wondered if he had stepped on a pavement crack and incurred some mysterious curse. His twelve overs with the new ball produced figures of 2/22; but it could have been so much more. He had Khawaja dropped twice as the ball swung around like a police helicopter above a public demonstration. One delivery to Labuschagne cannoned into the stumps and failed to disturb the bails. He and Jordan Buckingham might as well have been bowling the Holy Hand-Grenade of Antioch for all that the Bulls could decipher. In the twinkling of an eye they had descended to 5/22. The stalwart veteran Michael Neser launched a lifeboat, top-scoring with 34; but Brendan Doggett swept them away, taking 6/31 as the Bulls were dismissed for 95.
With the final all but lost, teenage tearaway Callum Vidler dragged the visitors back into the match with an exuberant spell of fast bowling. Hunt and McSweeney endured 34 scoreless deliveries between them as the ball continued to hoop around, and both departed for tortuous ducks. Sangha came and went to Neser. Conor McInerny kept the home side humming along by judicious wafts until he fell to Wildermuth. Vidler then prised out two more scalps and the match was back in the balance (In Trutina for Carmina Burana fans) at 6/112. Jake Lehmann meanwhile kept his head where his Test-playing team-mates had lost theirs.
But the archetype of Aussie country cricketer was waiting at No.8. Ben Manenti is built like the proverbial brick outhouse: bowlers’ droop moustache and all. His finger-spin will be needed later. But he showed the others how it should be done. The ball was losing its fiendish menace, and those who play straight and hit hard may well prosper. He and Lehmann have already put on 46 – 36 of them to the belligerent spinner – and at 6/158 the Redbacks hold a pronounced advantage, with the pugnacious McAndrew still to come in. If conditions continue to favour seam bowling then the lead is already substantial. If (as might be expected) the pitch flattens out into a road, then the fourth innings might see conditions at their best for batting. Either way, South Australians may well look forward to their first triumph this century. Queensland has a great deal to do.