2 minute read There have been a few stats of late about James Anderson and Stuart Broad as a bowling partnership. Something about lots of wickets. We forget how many. On paper, they’re a wonderfully complementary duo. One’s a devious swing bowler; the other’s rangly and hits the deck hard (a phrase which
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Steven Finn’s back
< 1 minute read As in ‘returned’. He hasn’t got ankylosing spondylitis or anything. He’s also only back in the squad, not necessarily the team. Plus he hasn’t been away that long. If we’re honest, we’re only doing this joke because we know we’ll get complaints if we don’t. But it does feel like
Continue readingSack Dhoni
< 1 minute read Might as well call for at least one of the captains to be sacked. His batsmen have crumbled against bowling they should be comfortable against, his senior players aren’t ‘standing up’, he’s insisting on fielding a part-time spinner instead of a specialist and he hasn’t made a hundred in his
Continue readingMoeen Ali won’t tie up an end
2 minute read There are two types of spin bowlers: The first kind is the attacking kind. They bat at number 11, but with the ball in their hand, they can take wickets. Early in their career, they can be a bit hit and miss, going for a few boundaries, but you try
Continue readingChange bowlers and mourning spilt honey
< 1 minute read The day in summary: James Anderson earned two wickets through being James Anderson, Moeen Ali earned two wickets through not being James Anderson and Chris Jordan earned nothing. Oh, and Stuart Broad got three. Word of the day – “displacement” Play was reminiscent of the later days of Curtly Ambrose
Continue readingWe just want to watch Jos Buttler bat
< 1 minute read Whatever his keeping’s like and no matter whether or not he’s ‘ready’ for Test cricket, we’re very pleased that Jos Buttler is now in England’s Test team. We like skittishness in a number seven batsman. It is always worth watching Buttler at the crease and when he bats with Ian
Continue readingFour bowlers, five runs and one Gary Ballance
2 minute read After winning the previous Test with four-and-a-bit bowlers, India could have gone either way for this one. Unsurprisingly, they went with four bowlers, not five. Sometimes you can determine a lot from these fifty-fifty calls and MS Dhoni does seem to be a bit of a ‘pick the extra batsman’
Continue readingTest match start days and the concept of ‘appointment to view’
< 1 minute read This year they moved the Twenty20 Cup to Friday nights to create an ‘appointment to view’. The premise is if people know when matches are being played, there’s a better chance they’ll watch. This year also sees a five-Test series taking place between England and India which boasts four different
Continue readingAlastair Cook should stick to the day job
2 minute read Captaincy is an odd thing. It always strikes us that becoming captain is like being a writer promoted to a management position. We’ve had jobs where a senior colleague with a stupid job title has come up to us and basically said: “Your writing and editing is so good that
Continue readingAnother England cricketer eroded
< 1 minute read After Matt Prior missed one particular catch in the second Test, a Sky commentator – possibly Mike Atherton – suggested that the wicketkeeper might be having trouble moving to his right due to all his accumulated injury problems. In his statement announcing that he was standing down for the rest
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