Thank fúck, the selectors have finally given Hayden a subtle uppercut and he’s “retired”.

Sure it would have been better had Hayden retired after the Melbourne failure thus allowing his replacement the luxury of a home debut, alas that has been sacrificed for a further 70 runs to Hayden’s career tally which has finally ground to a halt at 8625 at an average of 50.73.

I suppose I should mention how dominant he was in his prime, how he held Test Cricket high score record for a few weeks after spanking Zimbabwe for 3 days before Lara took it back against a proper English team, how he dominated the Cricket World Cups like in 2007 when he scored 659 runs at 73.22 while nursing a broken foot and a broken toe.

Instead, and I’ll stress that Hayden forced my hand here by playing on after Perth, I’ll mention his never say enough attitude. How he put his personal desire to relive former glories in front of future team development. How he kept playing at the impossible age of 37, painfully scratching around outside off stump and spooning wide half volleys to Duminy. How he lost us our first home series in 16 years. How his last 17 innings yielded scores of 0, 13, 0, 29, 83, 16*, 16, 77, 8#, 0#, 24#, 12, 4, 8, 23, 31 and 39. (# against new minnows).

So see ya later Hayden, and unlike your contemporaries Warney, McGrath, Langer and Martyn there wont be any calls for your recall, we’ve finally seen the back of your gigantic torso and have no desire nor inclination to go through this pain again.