Holy Crap: Nathan Bracken

As we all know, Nathan Bracken's rubbish. Like many mediocre, third-reserve seam bowlers, his main skill is being left-handed.

In the good old days, this was enough to render you a pariah, but nowadays in these times of 'tolerance' and 'understanding' you can not only get away with it, but are considered useful. Difference isn't always a good thing. Deep down Nathan Bracken's parents are bitterly disappointed with him and his choice of handedness.

Anyway, he's rubbish, but due to Australia's pitiful pace-bowling reserves, they keep having to give him international caps. Look inside any discarded bottle of Victoria Bitter and you'll find at least eight Australian batsmen of Test standard. Conversely, get below the top three or four pace-bowlers and you're scratching around for anyone at all who doesn't look like Pat Sharp.

Well, as is the tradition with our limited Holy Crap feature, here's the unlikely statistic: Nathan Bracken has taken 89 wickets at 20.12 in one-day international cricket. That's frighteningly good.

So it is that we say:

Holy crap! Nathan Bracken's not rubbish!

Nathan Bracken's BBC column

A picture of a perfectly executed cricket ball header there. Good work Nathan. You wouldn't have been able to pull it off without the extra padding of your bouffant though. Don't try this at home, kids.

The BBC have recruited Nathan Bracken to be their new voice of Australia. Justin Langer previously held this post, writing regularly and well about his experiences playing for his national side.

He was a bit prone to irritating pronouncements about 'executing our skills correctly', but so would any of the Australian team under John Buchanan. Overall Langer was great value. So how will Nathan Bracken compare?

His first column has appeared today and it contains some intriguing grammatical decisions. We were mostly struck by the following line which describes the aftermath of Australia's recent one-day series losses.

"There was no more time for questions - just answers. We had to improve our skills, knowledge and tactics to if we were to win the World Cup."

It reads like an eight-year-old's story about winning the World Cup. 'We had to improve... if we were to win the World Cup' - doesn't that sound like Nathan's already won the World Cup and is now recounting the tale of how it happened? Bit presumptuous.