Be warned, Shane will be back in 2009

14 April 2012

Anyone searching for clues as to why Shane Warne is on the verge of reaching the extraordinary milestone of 700 Test wickets would have seen just as many on the day before the second Test in Adelaide began as on the day that amazing match ended.

I'm sure there would have been those watching Shane putting himself through his paces in the nets wondering why a bowler who would be on 694 Test scalps by the end of the match needed to practise that hard. But Warney was able to exert such a physical and psychological stranglehold on England's batsmen because not only was he turning the ball square, he was landing it wherever he wanted whenever he wanted.

England's batsmen found themselves with nowhere to go. If they were waiting for a bad ball, they had a long wait and if they chanced their arm, they did so at huge peril.

There's nothing left in this game for Warney to prove to anyone. He is the best. What he would have relished as we went into the final day was the opportunity to show that, with him in the side, there is no such things as a certain draw or defeat for Australia.

To him, nothing is impossible.

He just doesn't believe in that, concept and that has a huge impact on the rest of our team. Mike Hussey said that one look in Warney's eyes on that final morning told him that Shane didn't just hope we could win, he really believed.

And that approach soon spread to the rest of us.

England have some good players and they have shown they can score runs. But they now need to show they can take wickets because if they can't, they won't win a game, let alone the two they need to retain the Ashes.

They could be criticised for their approach on that final day at Adelaide. By batting that number of overs and scoring so few runs they really shot themselves in the foot.

Warney is the only bowler in world cricket who could make that sort of thing happen. And I've bad news for England and everyone else: the way he's bowling — in body and mind — he could go on for ever.

I hope that when he does finally pack up he won't have too many regrets, though there is no doubt he would have loved to have been captain of Australia. The hole he'll leave is going to be huge and the whole team are going to have to pick up the weight because no one player will even come close to filling it.

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