Something intensely tragic about the death of the Australian cricketer Phillip Hughes prompted grief-stricken reaction from people who had not previously heard his name and have no particular liking for cricket.

Perhaps it was his youth and background; Hughes, a farmer’s son, was loved as a swashbuckling maverick. Perhaps it was the very public nature of the freak accident that caused injuries too severe to permit recovery. Perhaps the loss of a man tipped for stardom on the world stage, or the poignancy that the fatal ball, so hostile in sporting intent, was bowled by Hughes’s friend Sean Abbott. His anguish will be indescribable.

For those moved by, yet far removed from, the tragedy, there is little that can be done, but this is one of those occasions when social media allows people around the world to make a small gesture. Paul Taylor, a Sydney IT worker, tweeted a picture of a single cricket bat leaning against the porch of his home. “This is our way to connect and show our sadness,” he said. Since then thousands have followed suit. Google Australia later adopted the simple image of a bat leaning against a wall as its home page. We are bewildered by tragedy, but not helpless.