< 1 minute readPerhaps the most striking thing about Mitchell Johnson is his ridiculous cartoon character tufty hair. After that it’s his bowling. We watched quite a bit of Johnson when Australia toured India. He was their best bowler. For all the talk about Brett Lee being the fast strike bowler, Johnson’s not
Continue readingAuthor: King Cricket
Otherwise known as Alex Bowden, a lapsed cricket journalist who has written for ESPNCricinfo, wisden.com, Cricket 365, The Cricketer and plenty of other places.
Links to some non-cricket writing and a bit more background here.
Sir Allen Stanford disbands his ‘legends’
< 1 minute readIn more brand ambassador news, Sir Allen Stanford has done away with his team of ‘legends’ that he used to promote his shamtastic cricket event. A spokesperson said: “He has disbanded the legends group, but at this stage no decision has been taken on the future of the Super Series.”
Continue readingTest average maintenance
< 1 minute readMatthew Hayden 12, Ricky Ponting 0, Mike Hussey 0. Bring ’em down. Bring ’em down to a sensible level. Those three think they’re so good. They think they can bat in any conditions against any bowler. They think they’re ‘all that’, but they’re not ‘all that’. They are, at most,
Continue readingSomething about Vodafone and England
< 1 minute readWe’re not interested in sponsorship really. However, we do hate people with corporate titles and we outright loathe meaningless PR speak, so we did actually make the effort to read the news about Vodafone not sponsoring England any more. We also hate Vodafone because they have ‘-fone’ in their name,
Continue readingVirender Sehwag wins two matches
1 minute readIndia couldn’t have won the first Test without Sachin Tendulkar’s contribution, but we’re a great believer in sportsfolk affecting the opposition and influencing matches that way. We wrote about how Virender Sehwag’s approach to batting turns bowlers into smeared-panted long-hop machines, but we reckon he transformed the whole England side
Continue readingSachin Tendulkar wins the Test match
< 1 minute readWatching Sachin Tendulkar bat is always a disappointment for us. It’s not his fault. He’s had the decency to be a batting genius and we can’t really ask much more of the man. The fault lies with our own expectations. When you watch Sachin Tendulkar at work, you expect to
Continue readingA fun cricket game
< 1 minute readWhat a match. A victory for cricket being about hitting a ball with a bat as well, not it being about some middle-aged men in suits planning what car to buy next – which is what the game can often feel like these days. Nobody cares about your status symbols,
Continue readingVirender Sehwag’s batting approach
2 minute readWhen Virender Sehwag bats, bowlers go to pieces. It’s a good approach. Viv Richards used to do something similar. He’d blaze away when he first came in and then when the field went back, he’d change his approach. The fielding side were on the back foot, he’d got his eye
Continue readingJerome Taylor somehow hits a Test hundred
< 1 minute readJerome Taylor had a Test average of 13.66 before this match, a first-class average of 12.61 and a top score of 40. Somehow he hit 106 against New Zealand. After his hundred, Taylor said: “It was the sort of pitch that, once you got in, it got easier.” How did
Continue readingAndrew Strauss and Paul Collingwood in partnership
< 1 minute readIt doesn’t make the heart race, but it is brilliant. Andrew Strauss now averages 61.85 in Tests in India. Paul Collingwood averages 68.20. Kevin Pietersen averages 27.62. Sometimes you need to clog your way to success and Strauss and Collingwood can bunt singles with the best of them. Strauss has
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