IT’S one of those typically warm Australian evenings. The air is thick under a clear night sky, as the stars dance among the familiar hue of neon lights at the local bar precinct.

Here, a collection of hungry males prowl the sidewalks like lions stalking their prey. Short-skirted, heeled women parade their bronzed, delicate skin to allure the pride — all of whom are wearing the exact same collared white or navy shirt and dark coloured jeans — while the raw incandescence of animal attraction plays out over a stolen glimpse; a private smile; or a domestic lager that was purchased with a five per cent off player’s card.

While this merry dance occurs each and every Saturday evening (and Friday night if you’re fielding, or batting lower than four), the male species has its own ritualistic dance that is often as unspoken as Don Burke’s internet search history. Particularly if you’re on a late night circuit with your cricket friends (not to be confused with your ‘real’ friends), a whole evening can go by without engaging in any form of social interaction with a woman.

On occasions such as these, grade cricketers will revert to playing their favourite game; alpha each other in increasingly subversive ways in order to gain social capital among people that they genuinely hate.

It is in the darkened nightclub that grade cricketers play their favourite game. Source: Supplied

I have spoken for years now about the fabled ways of portraying yourself as the alpha male in cricketing and social circles. Obviously, ruthlessly referring to everyone as “champ” is a fundamental aspect of this. Nothing will make a man feel more inferior than being called “champ” to his face and by the rules of western society, that man is now your submissive.

But before you can get to the familiarity of the suffix “champ”, “championship” or the lesser used “champions league”, the alpha power play begins with the very first interaction with another male.

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As per the rules of grade cricket, if you play a higher grade than someone, you are a better person than them. For the same reason that CEOs don’t have lunch with mail boys, unless you think that a person is a direct threat to your position or you are sure that they can offer you something (like social capital, free gloves or a lift to the game) anyone who isn’t as good at cricket as you should be treated with utter disdain like a pauper or supplicant in the middle ages.

To reinforce this, it is absolutely essential that you never look anyone in the eye who plays in a lower grade than you. You are right to barely acknowledge their existence. If at any point you are stuck in a conversation with a lower grader, look over their shoulder and speak in short, disinterested bursts. You don’t need to know what happens in these ‘yuck’ lower grade fixtures and you don’t want to know.

LISTEN AS THE GRADE CRICKETER TALKS ENDING CAREERS AND SALAD-BASED SELECTIONS WITH FOX SPORTS’ TOM MORRIS

Until you see a luggage tag on their kit — suggesting that they may have had a season abroad in the UK — or you hear rumblings that they have scored back-to-back 30s, act as if they are a 90-year-old woman on public transport and you’re sitting in a seat reserved for the elderly: pretend like you haven’t seen them.

These are the basic principles of the alpha power play. On occasion, however, a more aggressive display of alphadom is required to subvert your challenger.

Keep in mind that any sort of interaction with a beta male is fraught with danger if you yourself don’t have the required social capital to pull off an alpha power play. Slapping someone firmly on the shoulder with as much power as your hand can manage, jolting your victim from the sheer velocity is something my father has employed for years, for instance.

This, coupled with a “nice to meet you, champ” is about as brutal as it gets. The savagery of this especially rocked me because, given that he was my dad, we had already met several times before.

Former Prime Minister John Howard (R) and former Labor leader Mark Latham engage in some alpha behaviour. Source: News Corp Australia

There are, of course, many examples of what not to do. Think Mark Latham’s handshake on then Prime Minister John Howard. Think Donald Trump’s meeting with Justin Trudeau.

Think Jonny Bairstow’s headbutt on Cameron Bancroft.

On each occasion, the man attempting the alpha power play was inturn immediately alpha’d by the targeted submissive.

Although in the latter’s case, the painful turning of the alpha tables was made to wait for weeks until it played out in the international media — a doubly alpha move from the debutant.

And that’s what makes Bairstow’s attempt of an alpha power play so painful.

Bancroft was merely a state cricketer revelling in the surrounds of a late-night circuit with international cricketers (surely every man’s dream) when Bairstow, a 45-capped Test cricketer who was sure of selection for Brisbane, attempted to alpha Bancroft with a greeting akin to something from zoology.

It was a bold move: ‘No words. Just move my head into his. Alpha him.’

It failed to impress and Bancroft’s bigger head usurped the move of faux-superiority from the gentile Englishman. If you are bigger than someone in any capacity, you are more alpha than them.

Cameron Bancroft (L) and Jonny Bairstow shake hands after Australia win the first Test. Source: Getty Images

The fact that Bancroft apparently has the biggest head in the WA side and subsequently a bigger head than Mitchell Marsh is overwhelmingly alpha.

The English wicketkeeper would have woken the next morning, safe in the knowledge that he’d probably never see the West Australian again.

But then he would have seen Bancroft score runs against the Australian/NSW attack. Then the news that Renshaw is out of favour.

Australia looking for a new opener, Bancroft scores a double ton. Suddenly he’s picked. The name, the face, the head — it all comes hurtling back to Bairstow. His world begins to crumble as he realises his attempt at an alpha power play is about to see him become the victim of one of the greatest alpha moves in Ashes history.

And by the rules of western society, Bairstow is now Bancroft’s submissive.