Well, to be Perfectly Francis (Thank you Fred Dagg), not a great deal that we didn't already suspect.

We already knew McCullum could whack the ball around, that Vettori could stick around (the man has a couple of Test match hundreds, after all) and that this probably wasn't a batting order that was going to be demolishing too many attacks on the way to forcing the Black Caps into the top half-dozen Test playing nations.

As far as the bating goes, I think we can refer to a number of soft dismissals and leave it at that. After all, I'm totally unfamiliar with the alternatives on the New Zealand cricket scene, and all I can go on is what I've seen.

In any case, I'm more concerned with the evolution of the Australian side and the way back into the Number Three spot on the Test rankings, which means rolling one out of England, India and South Africa out of that spot.

The most likely means of doing that in the short term is a series win against India, which will mean taking twenty wickets against a strong batting line-up.

On the strength of what we saw yesterday, this attack isn't going to be able to do that.

It's often remarked that when it comes to bowling, all you need to do is to send down ten good wicket-taking deliveries. Allowing for the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, the reality is that when you take ten wickets some will come from certified Jaffas, some from soft dismissals and some from crap balls that didn't deserve a wicket.

I think it's fair enough to describe most of yesterdays five-for as soft dismissals, and Jaffas were few and far between. They're usually few and far between, but the numbers were down and the intervening distances greater.

But there are a few things that are obvious.

First, as a spinner Lyon is coming along rather nicely. He's now looking good to hold down his place in the side, which means Messrs Hauritz and Kreja have something to top if they're looking for a recall.

Now we need to be looking for a leggie and a left arm orthodox to fill out the spin contenders' ranks.

Next, it's obvious that Peter Siddle isn't the man to lead the attack much beyond this game. That's not to suggest he can't hold down a place in the side, but he's a twenty-five to thirty overs in a day mostly up the hill into the breeze back of a length workhorse rather than a man who's going to come out and lead the attack. Mind you, in this attack, he's the leader by default on the strength of seniority, but that's not a situation that's going to last.

As far as the rest of the attack is concerned, what we saw yesterday underlines how much we need Watson in the side, and the importance of the overs he bowls.

Take out the nerves on debut factor, and Pattinson's later spells were a significant improvement on the first, so there's potential there. Subtract the 13 that came off his first over from the analysis and 10/1/37/1 is a bit more expensive than you'd like, but it's early days yet,

Starc was, I thought, the better of the debutants, got a bit of shape back into the bat to go with the left arm jagging across staple, and has clearly shown that there are alternatives to Bollinger when you're looking for a non-Johnson left armer. With Johnson out for most of the summer, we'd seem to have that side of things covered.

Siddle, who probably wouldn't have been taking the new ball under other circumstances, was tidy, but tended to be a bit short, underlining what should be his actual role in the attack rather than his present leader by default status.

As an aside, in a four man bowling attack sending down ninety overs in a day you're going to be looking at someone to send down twenty-five to thirty, two to look after twenty to twenty-five and one to chip in somewhere between ten and twenty.

Under normal circumstances, with Watson fit, he'd be looking at the ten to twenty role and you'd be scaling things back with an extra specialist bowler, so that you'd have three blokes who could send down fifteen to twenty-five and the workhorse responsible for twenty-five plus. Lyon would be one of the blokes in the middle, Siddle would be a prime contender for the workhorse role and you'd have the means to limit the workload on the likes of young Cummins.

Then, of course, we come to the fielding, where we need to start by questioning the absence of the fielding coach. I don't know what happened with Mike Young and Steve Rixon, but it's obvious we need someone sharpening things up. Yesterday was tidy at best, with several notable lapses.

Let's just say there's no way Michael Clarke should be at first slip and leave it at that, shall we? Watson will be back in that role, but there's a definite need to work out a viable and reliable slip cordon.

The other situation that needs close examination is Khawaja at bat pad. He may well be the best option for the position out of the current eleven, but he's going to need a lot of work if he's going to be a long term in close man. I thought he tended to move his weight backwards by instinct and tended to come up too early. I don't know a whole lot about the technical side of coaching wicketkeepers and bat pads, but I do know that once you've started to go up or back it's hard to deliver a split second change forward or downwards.

So there's a bit to work on, some promising signs and the interesting prospect of seeing how quickly we can grab these last five wickets. That, as far as I can see, equates to keeping Vettori quiet and working over the bloke at the other end. Should be interesting.

Then we'll see Hughes, Warner and Khawaja against their attack at that will be interesting, taking note of suggestions that young Bracewell is the new Richard Hadlee.