IAN CHAPPELL Explains the impact Brett Lee will have on Australian cricket.
"I like Bing Lee," may well be the chant of the Australian fans and skipper Steve Waugh, but you can bet that opposition batsmen aren't so excited about the meteoric rise of paceman Brett Lee.
Known to his team-mates as "Bing", Lee has pace, that quality so sought after and yet rarely found.
Former Australian champion all-rounder Keith Miller, who was pretty quick himself, reckons he's only seen three who had the extra speed that make batsmen uncomfortable - Frank Tyson, Gordon Rorke and Jeff Thomson.
It's probably not so easy to instill the "fear factor" into modern-day batsmen because they wear helmets and a lot of protective equipment. Nevertheless, the greatest factor in batting is the "fear" of being dismissed...and no amount of padded clothing and headgear can protect against that mental torment.
Lee, the latest rage in an imposing Australian side, has pace and a lot more.
He bowls a good out-swinger to right-handers, and it's an accepted fact that if a bowler can "go out at pace" he'll take a lot of wickets as long as the guys behind the wicket can catch.
Lee is supported by a number of excellent catchers, and he can also swing the old ball back into right-handers, which gives him the ideal two-pronged attack to dispose of top-order players and the tail.
As if those tools aren't enough to take him to the top, he has also spent some time with Dennis Lillee, and there is no better fast-bowling tutor in the world at the moment.
Lillee partnered Thomson for some time, and as great as he was, "Dennis the Menace" benefited from "Javelin Jeff's" thunderbolts. Thommo's ability to make the ball climb off a good length and pass the batsman at around throat height had many of the willow-wielders wishing they were at the other end, no matter that it meant the best fast bowler in the world was lying in wait.
This is a batsman's worst nightmare - nowhere to hide.
That is the prospect facing current opponents of Australia, because batsmen scurrying to get away from Lee will find themselves facing the extremely successful Glenn McGrath.
That is the great plus in having a bowler with genuine pace; he not only takes wickets, he also contributes to some captured at the other end.
Quite often a flurry of shots are played when a bowler is operating at genuine pace and that is why crowds love to watch a bowler like Lee; either there are wickets falling or runs are coming at a good rate and sometimes a combination of both.
However, one team-mate hasn't benefited from Lee's elevation and that is Shane Warne.
When Lee made his debut at the MCG, Warne only needed six wickets to equal Lillee as Australia's highest wicket-taker and he was hopeful of achieving that distinction on his home ground.
Two Tests later, he still needs four victims after going wicket-less at the SCG. While Lee continues to be successful, Warne is probably going to get less overs and fewer opportunities to demolish the tail, as the young speedster takes care of that task adequately.
While Lee will take many wickets with short-pitched deliveries (like the one that got rid of V.V.S Laxman at the SCG) and will re-arrange the footwork of a few others with his bouncer, it is his late out-swing which is his greatest asset.
Once all the fanfare dies down and the pace recedes a little, a quickie has to have skill and that is where the out-swinger and the in-swinger yorker will stand Brett in good stead.
In the meantime, the crowds will flock to see him bowl fast and batsmen will prefer the other end.
There is always the suspicion that the extra fraction of pace is "God given", and while it may well be, Brett has increased his pace considerably since he was at the cricket academy in 1996.
He was a lively customer even then, gleefully throwing himself into sessions that involved batsmen practising their horizontal-bat shots. However, unlike a lot of fast bowlers, he was quite eager to take his turn with the bat, probably realising that if he was going to "hand it out", the bouncers would be returned like a well thrown boomerang.
Lee is the not the archetypal quickie; sure he's aggressive on the field, but he's more a smiling assassin and he actually looks like he's enjoying the job of taking wickets, rather than purely taking pleasure from the batsman's discomfort.
There is no doubt that the arrival of Lee has taken Steve Waugh's side from good to top-class, and enhanced their chance of a long stay at the top of the rankings.
Don't be surprised if after an Australian victory you here the traditional chorus of "Under The Southern Cross", closely followed by a few strands of "I like Bing Lee".