On Boxing Day a cricket fight awaits: Australia v Bumrah

There's a certain type of greatness, so profound, so bewitching, so unusual, that for a moment it makes you forget which side you're on.

- Rohit Brijnath

Or where you come from. Or what passport you carry.

Greatness that mostly transcends such trivialities of tribalism or one-eyed-ness. Greatness like Roger Federer. Or Pele. Or Usain Bolt. Greatness that's a glue which holds you to your seat. Gin and tonics can wait. So can complaining bladders. Greatness which reminds you why you first fell in love with sport.

Greatness like what awaits us on Boxing Day at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. I mean Jasprit Bumrah, holding a red cricket ball and wearing a gentle smile, which if translated might mean this: "Good morning, batsman, nice to see you, enjoy your short stay at the crease."

An Indian team are touring Australia, but Australia are playing against Bumrah. The bearded Indian is not just the finest bowler at work currently. No, he is simply the best cricketer on the planet. He is menace without meanness. He is fast while running in slow.

In three Tests against Australia this summer he's taken 5/30, 3/42, 4/61, 6/76 and 3/18, numbers impressive but incomplete. It's like simply adding up the number of 6-0 sets by Rafael Nadal on clay. Dread is a more complicated thing. It's the very thought of Bumrah which is unsettling.