Satire: Andrew Strauss' voodoo tricks make Australia forget how to play cricket

Yes Stuart, that’s how we all reacted

Ouch.

Before the Ashes began, you, me – and everyone with the ability to open the wrapper over a lollipop and eat it – were of the opinion that England are going to struggle. It seemed logical to make such a deduction after a World Cup campaign that made Sophia Coppola’s performance in The Godfather III look less disastrous.

After England were E.N.G.L.A.N.D’d (embarrassing no-gooders knocked out prematurely…okay, well, that didn’t match, but you get the point) out of the World Cup, there were calls for Kevin Pietersen to be called back to the team.

However, Andrew Strauss’ jealousy of Pietersen’s great looks denied the latter the comeback he deserved. Even Adolf Hitler lost his cool when he found that out. A mauling was at hand and with no savior in sight, fans could only pray.

Fast forwarding to the present scenario and England are leading the Ashes 2-1 and have absolutely desecrated the Aussie batting line-up in the first innings of the fourth Test.

A month ago, if someone had predicted such an adversity for the Kangaroos, that person would have been caged and shipped off to the shores of Crazy Island before being brought back and labelled as God’s incarnation.

So what changed? How does a team that played in the World Cup like a bunch of toddlers make the team that won the World Cup look like a horde of blind men swinging their bats against the wind in hope of hitting the cork?

Nothing. Not in cricketing terms anyway.

After almost everyone under the Sun that gave an ounce of toss about the England cricket team shared their pre-Ashes-post-WC concern, Andrew Strauss knew he had to do something when that something didn’t include bringing back Kevin Pietersen.

With nowhere else to go, it seems like Strauss decided to take voodoo assistance from the witch doctor. After collecting the chest-hair of the Aussie players while they were drunk and wasted from celebrating the World Cup triumph, a voodoo doll of each and every Australian player was made.

And now, the repercussions of this can be seen as the Baggies have forgotten how to play - the Australia batsmen can’t score even in a party organized by Chris Gayle.

Steven Smith no longer looks like a number 1 ranked Test batsmen; he looks like someone who was told that the bat is a stick and the game is an orchestra and he is the conductor.

Michael Clarke recently claimed that Australia are playing with 10 men. He is wrong. Australia aren’t playing at all. They are just waiting for someone to rise from the Ashes inside the trophy and save them from this voodoo trick.

Right now, the Australian fans are more heartbroken than me as the ability of their team to play cricket is worse than my ability to come up with funny puns and ironic humour. Both of us are so outdated that even sarcasm doesn’t sound amusing anymore.

On a serious note, if the world champions become all out against England for just 60 runs right after winning the World Cup, then we might as well stop watching the game altogether and start watching golf.

Okay, no, don’t watch golf. It’ll bore you till you resort to watching Boyhood for entertainment.