There is nothing more predictable in professional sport: sack the coach, get a win the next game.
The Queensland Bulls are perhaps not toasting to that old cliche, but it has got their Sheffield Shield season back on track after a thumping outright victory over Victoria on Monday.
In their first match since the axing of Stuart Law, the Bulls beat the Bushrangers by an innings and 13 runs at the Gabba, rounding out the rout inside three days.
Queensland captain Chris Hartley admitted Law’s sudden departure forced the players to reassess their approach and their form, and the result was a surprise triumph over the Shield ladder leaders.
“When you do have changes in your players and in your coaching staff, I guess the one positive is that it gives you a chance to refocus on what you need to do as a group to get back to the basics,” he said.
“That’s something we tried to do as a group, focus firstly on what individual players needed to be doing within the team, and then getting the team itself to do that.
“It’s that old adage that if you’ve got 11 people pulling in one direction, that usually makes things a lot easier.
“We saw that after three days.”
The Bulls romped to victory on the back of Chris Lynn’s sensational 250 and an even spread of bowling contributors headed by Peter George, who took seven wickets for the match.
Lynn was eyeing off Martin Love’s record score of 300 – the biggest total ever by a Queenslander in the Sheffield Shield – after resuming on the same score on Monday morning.
But he lasted just two more balls, much to the disappointment of his teammates, who were willing him onto history.
“Seeing how weary and tired he was this morning, it doesn’t surprise me he had a swish at one early in the piece,” Hartley said.
“Probably the fact he was so exhausted today showed just how much he put into that innings.
“Watching him from the other end, that first hour of play yesterday, I have to say the Victorian bowling was outstanding.
“Everyone knows that Chris Lynn is a very good strokeplayer, and you know if he goes after it he’s likely to hit boundaries.
“They were challenging him around that off-stump for long periods of time and I think he only scored five runs in that first hour of play.
“To see that type of discipline and concentration – yes, he smashes the boundaries and sixes and that’s what gets all the highlights, but it was certainly his work in that first hour that set up the innings.”
