< 1 minute readRoll up, roll up for the fifth and somehow not final Test of the 1981 Ridiculous Ashes. This one’s got Chris Tavaré in it, failing to keep pace with Geoff Boycott as the Yorkshireman tore along at just under two an over. It wasn’t just Boycott who outscored Tavaré in
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Richie Benaud’s hair cannot go unremarked upon
2 minute readOne thing we have not at any point touched upon in our podcasts about the 1981 Ashes has been Richie Benaud’s hair. And that’s a shame. Richie Benaud’s hair in 1981 is worthy of comment. If you’re old enough, Richie Benaud’s “morning everyone” is a thing that will instantly take
Continue readingThat time when Ian Botham “slogged bad Australian bowling, pitched halfway down the wicket”
2 minute readIt is oddly reassuring to read the letters page in an old cricket magazine and learn that making a real point of being totally unimpressed with incredible sporting feats isn’t some new social media era affectation. In reality, it was ever thus. In November of 1981, John Drummond of Stoke
Continue readingIan Botham’s last Test as captain was remarkable for another reason too
2 minute readWe’ve written about Ian Botham’s record as England captain before and we’ve now reached his final Test in charge in our podcast looking back on the most ridiculous moments of the 1981 Ashes. Beefy’s resignation/sacking wasn’t the only significant event in that match though. We feel we must draw your
Continue readingNo offence to Tilak Varma or Nathan Ellis but these India v Australia T20s are probably even less of a big deal than the last “irrelevant” post World Cup series
3 minute readWhere were you when Ruturaj Gaikwad was run out by Nathan Ellis? You almost certainly have no idea because you almost certainly weren’t paying attention and quite possibly don’t even realise that it happened in an India v Australia match. International cricket teams aren’t guitars: in an ideal world you’d
Continue readingThe 1981 Ridiculous Ashes
2 minute readAfter losing out to the BBC and The Independent after being shortlisted in two categories of the Sports Podcast Awards earlier this year, ourself and Dan Liebke have dusted ourselves down and climbed back on our (pantomime) horse for another series of the Ridiculous Ashes. This time around we’ve gone
Continue readingWhen Glenn Maxwell went largely unseen and the Narendra Modi Stadium went anticlimactically unheard – the surprisingly good World Cup final that no-one asked for
4 minute readIf you’d asked anyone, at any point in the last year, how this ever-so-predictable World Cup would climax, they’d have all given exactly the same answer. It was always going to end with Welcome to the Jungle blaring out over the PA as Marnus Labuschagne punched the air with 58
Continue readingDid you see… Steve Smith’s skyer?
2 minute readCommentators often say that a ball has gone “straight up” but few have gone up quite so straight as the one that resulted in Steve Smith’s dismissal against South Africa in today’s World Cup semi-final. It is astonishingly hard to propel a ball straight up. Hit a ball any serious
Continue readingGlenn Maxwell’s complete commitment to hitting from mad positions
3 minute readToday Glenn Maxwell spent one ball in the 90s and it was a no-ball. There’s not much cause to be nervous in the 90s when it’s so vanishingly unlikely you’ll be dismissed in them. When weird looking batters score a lot of runs, there are two main things people tend
Continue readingInnings of the day: Marnus Labuschagne nrrdling 46 off 74 balls
< 1 minute read2023 World Cup, Game 10, Australia v South Africa A familiar, weird and, in its own peculiar way, quite wonderful feature of World Cup group stage games is when a fundamentally beaten team sets itself the unambitious goal of making things slightly less awful. So it was that Marnus Labuschagne’s
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