2 minute readHe says he doesn’t. He says the fact that he asks questions indicates only that he’s ‘a learner’. It’s hard to disagree with this assessment, but then you read his recent interview with Sidharth Monga for Cricinfo and you start to wonder. He has a way of talking about bowling
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Samit Patel’s back
< 1 minute readAs in ‘returned’. He hasn’t got ankylosing spondylitis or anything. Or maybe he has. Maybe he’s not fat and it’s chronic inflammation. Big boned and all that. He’s also back in the England squad. We’ve said it about Samit Patel before and we’ll say it again, but sometimes picking an
Continue readingIn the cold September rain
< 1 minute readApparently it’s been slatting it down all day in the South-East. Bad news for Surrey, who are pushing to become second division ‘champions’ in one of the few matters left unresolved this domestic season. We use inverted commas around ‘champions’ in much the same way as if we were saying
Continue readingGeraint Jones slashes to great effect
< 1 minute readIf, as a cricketer, you’re going to be remembered for just one moment, you might as well make that moment the climax of the most exciting passage of sport many of us will ever see. Even if it wasn’t the hardest catch, for safely taking it England fans will forever
Continue readingHave 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 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
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