3 minute readBert writes: There is a law around these parts, that match reports must not UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES mention the actual cricket. Normally, this presents few problems. Cricket is largely incidental, both to a day at the match and to this website. “About the cricket, but not ABOUT the cricket”, best
Continue readingMonth: September 2015
Have you seen Zafar Ansari play? Any good?
2 minute readWe’ve always had a theory that Surrey England players are, in general, worse than those provided by other counties. The thinking is that you don’t have to do quite as much to get noticed if you play for Surrey. Surrey is a big club and the ground seems to be
Continue readingBrian Close hadn’t heard of flinching
< 1 minute readWe’re not really old enough to know Brian Close the cricketer, but we know the legend. He was the youngest man to play for England and he will also be remembered as the bravest. In light of what’s happened to other cricketers since Close, it isn’t really right to glorify
Continue readingEoin Morgan hit on the head with a bouncer
< 1 minute readWe’re proud to say that we were at the worst international match of the summer yesterday. We sensed it wasn’t going to be a rip-snorter from the moment when Jason Roy was given out for the second time in the first over. At least it was sunny. We’ll do a
Continue readingEngland’s one-day matches result in runs, apparently
< 1 minute readHere’s a freakish stat via Cricinfo’s S Rajesh: Since 2006, matches hosted in England have seen the third-highest run-rates in one-day internationals (ODIs). It doesn’t seem right, does it? Granted there are only a handful of countries hosting ODIs, so it’s not third out of a big bunch, but England
Continue readingYorkshire take the second of a hat-trick of County Championship titles
2 minute readIt’s oddly reassuring that Yorkshire should win the title again. It provides the kind of clarity that is rarely seen in English domestic cricket. We can state with some conviction that they are the strongest county at the minute – stronger even than Herefordshire. When a team does well one
Continue readingSteven Finn leaps like a crested salmon
< 1 minute readMany things happened in the third one-dayer between England and Australia. James Taylor made a hundred. Alex Hales put a fake walrus head on. Good shots were hit, good balls were bowled. There may even have been a six at one point. We don’t know. Sixes are passé. We don’t
Continue readingUK considering military action in wake of Stokes dismissal
< 1 minute readDavid Cameron has not ruled out bombing raids against Australia in response to Ben Stokes being given out obstructing the field in the first one-day international. However, the UK Prime Minister says that a large-scale deployment of ground troops is unlikely. “Maybe if it had been a mankad and they
Continue readingBen Stokes out obstructing the field
< 1 minute readWe haven’t seen this incident yet, but it appears to be big news. That happens whenever someone’s dismissed in a weird way and when there’s also a ‘should he have been given out?’ element, you effectively get two stories for the price of one. As far as we can tell,
Continue readingPromotion day in the County Championship
< 1 minute readThere are still two matches to go in the second division of the County Championship, but somehow we already know both the counties who will be promoted. What this basically means is that the other seven teams in that division were sufficiently crap that they failed by a distance. There
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