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Bazball might be dead, or at least on its last legs, but before its demise it appears to have bewitched cricketing prodigy Cameron Green with its high-risk, at times mindless aggression.
Some of the young allrounder’s premeditated shots during the Ashes have made England wunderkind Harry Brook look like their unpretentious former opener, Geoff Boycott.
In the second Test, Green was promoted to No 5 and powered his way to 45 while belting England’s short-ball barrage to all corners of the Gabba.
Even though his regular backing away towards the leg-stump to counter Brydon Carse’s bouncers was becoming a little reckless and predictable, it didn’t matter because Green was striking the ball so cleanly.
Then he started telegraphing his attacking philosophy so early that all Carse had to do was aim at the pegs, because despite Green being two metres tall, his outstretched bat was nowhere near the ball when it smashed into his stumps.
The dismissal was even more baffling given that Australia was cruising at 291 for three.
Throughout this Ashes series, several England batters have impulsively thrown away their wicket in the name of that cricketing dogma known as “Bazball”.
But Australia tend to be more working-class in their batting. Maybe Green had been under the spell of Bazball, or was just a little giddy after becoming the most expensive overseas player in IPL history the night before.
Either way, the Western Australian gave a remorseful media confessional, saying he was a bit embarrassed by the dismissal and that there would be “really great learnings for future games”.
We couldn’t tell whether Green had changed his ways for Adelaide because he barely troubled the scorers. The 26-year-old then ran himself out in the first innings of the Boxing Day Test.
But in the second innings of the chaotic Melbourne Test, as Ben Stokes brought himself into the attack, Green began choreographing his contrived intentions before the England skipper was even in his delivery stride.
Stokes didn’t need to reach into his bag of tricks for this wicket.
With Australia wobbling at 119 for 6, Green appeared to boot-scoot down the wicket rather than charge at Stokes’s bowling, gently deflecting the ball to Brook at second slip.
Green’s tentative stroke play resembled a game of cricket on the front lawn on Christmas Day.
Naturally, cricket fans across Australia cursed Green on social media for being a false messiah, and thousands of dogs got an unexpected walk from their frustrated owners.
But can we blame Green for his wayward batting? He has been shuffled up and down the batting order more often than Australia changed Prime Ministers in the early 2000s.
Over his last nine Test matches, Green has batted at No 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8, so we might excuse him for feeling a little disoriented and unsure.
But the reason the Australia camp is so desperate to squeeze Green into the side, even when he’s not bowling, is that he is widely regarded as a generational talent. The fact that he can bowl at over 140 km/h, as well as bat in the top six, is the recipe Australia has craved since Keith Miller.
Green is also the only current member of the Australian side who isn’t closer to the end of their cricket career than the beginning.
There is no denying Green is a prodigiously gifted player. He became the youngest Sheffield Shield debutant to take a five-wicket haul at 17 in early 2017.
Just under four years later, when he made his Test debut for Australia against India, the cackling cricketing fraternity had already hailed him as the next Ricky Ponting.
It took some convincing, but when Green clobbered a masterful 174 out of a total of 383 against New Zealand in March 2024, the “Punter” comparisons didn’t seem misplaced.
When fully fit, Green showed he could be a bowling force by demolishing South Africa in the Boxing Day Test in 2022, finishing with 5 for 27.
He’s the complete package but has failed to impose himself on a series as the talents he has been blessed with look more and more like a curse.
The golden child of Australian cricket’s stats this Ashes make for grim reading. He has scored 112 runs at an average of 18.66 and taken just three wickets at 52.66. But he has been sparingly used with the ball while Mitchell Starc, Scott Boland and a band of seamers have bowled England out cheaply.
Green’s batting on home soil has never been as imposing as it needs to be. In 19 Tests, he averages only 27.80. And while we like to place lofty expectations on our allrounders, he has yet to make a hundred in Australia with a top score of 84.
Yet Green’s numbers aren’t that bad when you compare them with the most damaging allrounder in the game – Stokes. The 34-year-old averages a tick over 35 with the bat and 31.11 with the ball across 119 Tests.
After 36 Tests, Green averages 32.5 with the bat and 36.6 with the ball.
The selectors have always been patient with their allrounders, giving both Mitch Marsh and Shane Watson a fair rub of the green in recent times.
Given Green has battled crippling back injuries, he deserves a little more time to find his feet. However, the cricketing hierarchy needs to reassure him that, wherever he bats, it’s acceptable to grind out his runs as he has done so prolifically at Shield level.
But if Green continues to underperform, Australia’s unluckiest cricketer, Beau Webster, is waiting in the wings.
