Bat-Man
The Boxing Day Test is a glorious occasion which calls for someone to stand up, to wield their blade and put their team on their back as they do what we all wish we could - score runs. Well, that's kind of the goal of any batsman in any cricket game so excuse the build up but here's the bats that have been used by the best willow wielders in the past few days.
Steve Smith, the Australian captain has gone through a few bats in recent years. He's settled with New Balance who along with Spartan are the new boys on the block. I'd keep an eye on the old New Balance as they've got a growing list of players on their books and with the toast of Australian cricket flashing their sticker they could swiftly grow in usage.
The Indians always provide a few exciting blades of wood and with Virat Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane both representing Nike, we got a bit of a tricky one. Nike appear to have a strong hold on the Indian market and we've seen the Nike bat make its way to our shores but I'm not convinced that the top players are using specific Nike bats. We've all heard rumours of how the Indian players like to dress their favourite blade with a few stickers so I have a feeling this may be the case here. I mean on Ebay in India you can buy pretty much whatever bat stickers you want.
In South Africa, Dean Elgar and Faf du Plessis both got hundreds for South Africa. Elgar's in the Kookaburra camp.
However it's slightly more interesting with du Plessis who used to use a GM but has now settled on the rather obscure IXU. I love seeing these smaller brands get some love from the world's best and I'm sure many a youngster will be asking mum and dad about the IXU blade. It looks like IXU is a South African based brand and that du Plessis is the only major player using their gears so keep an eye out for IXU.
In New Zealand we've seen Brendon McCullum go absolutely bonkers against Sri Lanka and you'd have to imagine that Puma are loving every moment of McCullum's hot form.
To make these hallowed pages you've gotta get somewhere near a hundy and I'll make exceptions for those who come close or impress. Angelo Mathews fits that category as he hit 50 and 66 with his Vampire BAS (Beat All Sports). While the BAS bat might be a bit slippery, it's well liked by many an international batsman, with Hashim Amla and Darreny Sammy both rocking the BAS. Interestingly, Virat Kohli is on the books for using BAS gloves which could lend itself to the Nike sticker theory but that's just me being a nerd.