Bad news for Jack Russell

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< 1 minute read

Individual statistical achievements in cricket don’t always tally with ability, so it’s pleasing when a good player is rewarded. However, for every 11-60 recorded by a Dale Steyn, there’s a world record number of dismissals for an AB de Villiers.

Now AB de Villiers is great at many things. He can bat, he can play tennis, he can slap back and he can deny the existence of the letter C. However, he isn’t a wicketkeeper.

Technically, that’s completely wrong. He has a pair of gloves and he gets that dagger typography next to his name, but come on – he’s a batsman. He can catch and jump around, but being a wicketkeeper is about so much more than that. It’s about having a tatty hat and hanging tea bags on nails so that they can be reused. In short, it’s about being Jack Russell.

Technically, Jack Russell still holds the world record for most dismissals by a wicketkeeper in a Test match, only now he shares it. No-one likes sharing – particularly when they’re an only child, like we are.

Sharing is not good. If you share, you have less of the whole. Jack Russell has been fractionally diminished and he probably feels much the same way we did when John took the nose off the final slice of our pizza back in Llangollen in 1998.

The nose! Of the final slice! Poor Jack Russell.

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8 comments

  1. There’s a line in Phil Tufnell’s new book – one of only a few lines worth reading – about sharing digs with Jack Russell during a Test Match and being surrounded by “stained” jockstraps hanging around the room. This was because, explains Tuffers, all wicketkeepers have piles.

    Enjoy that image as you tuck into your spuds and gravy this evening.

  2. Is this a dagger which I see before me?
    The bat handle I now shun from my hand
    Come, ball, let me clutch thee.
    I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.

  3. Why is no-one commenting on John taking the nose off the final slice of our pizza back in Llangollen in 1998? Isn’t that pretty much the worst thing anyone has ever done?

    The nose! Of the last slice!

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