Brendon McCullum uses his feet

Brendon McCullum recently found his feet. Now he’s putting them to good use.

If you’ve read the page we just linked to, this might sound kind of familiar. This is the Test version of that post.

Brendon McCullum’s had 52 Test innings. In his first 45, he managed two hundreds and six fifties. In his last seven, he’s added another three fifties – all against England. That in itself wouldn’t count for much if it weren’t standing unsteadily atop his form in the shorter forms of the game.

Brendon McCullum hit the record Twenty20 score recently and the Brendon McCullum one-day post mumbles on and on about how he’s started to come good in that form. He’s a batsman on the up and maybe yesterday’s 97 was a sign that he’s starting to think he can do the same in Tests.

Why not use the same approach? It’s been working for him. If anything, he could be even more successful. In Twenty20 and when opening one-day innings, you’ve really got to go after every ball. In Tests he’s got the luxury that he can leave some of the more dangerous deliveries while still flaying everything else.

In fact, he could leave even the semi-dangerous deliveries and maybe just work ones and twos off the bad balls. He could bat all day if he really minimises risk. Oh, wait. This isn’t using the same approach at all, is it?

England v New Zealand, first Test at Lord’s – day one
New Zealand 208 (Brendon McCullum 97, James Anderson 3-42)