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As in ‘returned’. It hasn’t got ankylosing spondylitis or anything. (Although it is changing form a little. Metamorphosising, if you will.)
Back in 2009, we started an irreverent weekly newsletter with Edward Craig, who was at that time deputy editor of The Wisden Cricketer. It went pretty well. We made fun of cricket and the things cricket people say, we ran ‘Momentum Watch’ and we asked people to send in their most mundane sightings of cricketers. The readership grew considerably and people seemed to like it very much.
We produced The Wisden Cricketer Newsletter (great name) for a few years, then did it for The Cricketer after the magazine changed its name.
They binned us eventually, but the two of us resurrected the email as Cricket Badger and ran it independently for a year or so until early last year when we shifted to Wisden (confusing, we know) and started sending it out as Wisden Cricket Weekly.
Our version of Wisden Cricket Weekly finished last week. They’re going to do something themselves instead, possibly folding several of their weekly emails into one (because they have a few).
Where does that leave our newsletter?
The good news is that Cricket 365 have agreed to sponsor us. The slightly less good news is that they can only commit to a couple of emails a month at the minute.
So two emails a month it is!
We’re also having a rebrand so that we can send the email from this website. Instead of Cricket Badger, it’s going to be King Cricket’s Edge.
If you’d like to catch King Cricket’s Edge, you can sign up to receive it here.
(If you used to get Cricket Badger, it’s the same mailing list, so just keep your eye on your junk mail on Wednesday.)
Why, why, why would you agree to that name?
Other than that, yay!
Is it that bad a name? We prefer it to Cricket Badger, which we never liked.
Yes, Cricket Badger is a horrible name, but I am at least used to it. Why do you have to throw new things at us? Why can’t things be like they were back in 2008 or so when I started reading this site?
I like badgers, they’re cute and stripey.
I’m sure I’ll get used to the new name, but right now it feels a bit like that recent cricket film wot someone gone done. What’s the origin story of the new title?
Well the old Cricket Badger website expired while we were at Wisden and we figured it was simpler if we sent the email from the King Cricket website from now on.
As we said, we never much liked the Cricket Badger name and Cricket 365 are also sponsoring the Cricket Badger podcast – which isn’t us – so it was all very confusing.
At least this way it’s associated with this website and if Cricket 365 want us long term and want to build their own mailing list, we can maybe make it The Cricket 365 Edge or something.
It’s fine, although it’s a shame you overlooked ‘KC and the Ballshine Brand.’
That’s very good.
I was confused by the Dr. Whoesque reincarnations so I tried to sign up. It told me I was already subscribed to Cricket Badger, so I suppose it has turned out for the best. I’ll rather look forward to it.
Sounds like there some confirmation text we need to amend somewhere in the system…
The full 3-hour live-stream of Sunday’s tense Thailand vs Namibia T20 World Cup Qualifier is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x36uxIHH9Lc complete with surprisingly good commentary (the ICC hired Isobel Joyce for this one, Niall O’Brien and Holly Colvin have also been doing a few this tournament) and confusingly dodgy electronic scorecard. An over’s worth of observations:
(1) The Thai team are super-enthusiastic. I think they are even more incredibly passionate than Afghanistan. It’s surprisingly infectious.
(2) They run like whippets between the wickets. When they first started their remarkable ascent up the ICC rankings, they weren’t big hitters and relied on nurdling and actually running their runs. To start competing with the bigger teams, they’ve started hitting the ball much harder, but the extra power in their shots is taking balls to fielders faster and somewhat negating their fast-running game. From a viewer’s perspective, this guarantees suicidal singles and clouds of dust from desperate dives, which to me has always been a big part of the appeal of limited overs cricket.
(3) Thai names aren’t just a nightmare for the commentators, but several of them don’t even fit on the video graphics – Wongpaka Liengprasert and Nannapat Koncharoenkai are particularly hard-done by. I think the ICC graphics people need to invest in whatever fancy software is used to shrink the font-size a little for longer names – from memory this is how Channel 4/5 coped with some of the fancier Sri Lankan names in the past.
(4) They actually look like cricketers when batting and bowling. Due to the lack of a domestic cricket scene, the Cricket Association of Thailand performed a smash-and-grab raid on the local softball leagues. Lots of the squad only switched to cricket as adults, but the only time they struck me as “softball players trying to play cricket” was in their very sharp fielding. (The younger players are apparently drawn largely from Thai hill-tribes and given scholarships to cricket-playing schools near Thai Cricket HQ, so grew up with the game a bit more.)
(5) Is leg-spinner Suleeporn Laomi the shortest player in international cricket? She just about comes up to the umpire’s shoulder.
(6) When the Thai players are interviewed, they are not only unfailingly polite, but are very diligent about waiing (bowing with palms pressed together) to the interviewer. They also wai the umpires and supporters at the end of the game. It’s a nice touch. I can’t see it in the ICC footage but apparently the team have a tradition at the end of all matches of lining up by the sight-screen and bowing to the pitch, because “We want to say thank you to cricket, to the ground and to the facilities”.
The ground at Forfarshire CC is overlooked by a house of Thai people who have been supporting their team during the qualifiers. So after winning their match against the Netherlands, the Thai team went to celebrate with them. And wai to them too, of course…
https://twitter.com/T20WorldCup/status/1167785496984084481
For many years (probably the same 11-12 years I’ve been hanging around here) I have subscribed to a fascinating intellectual site named edge.org:
https://www.edge.org/
Some of it goes over my head, some of it is a bit pseud, but much of it is truly fascinating/interesting; it has become a very useful source of thought material for me in my real world life.
Anyway, I hope there is no danger of confusing King Cricket’s Edge with Edge.org – that could be mind-blowing for me.
Seems highly unlikely you’d get the content of the two confused.
“Your genome doesn’t store anywhere that you have five fingers. It stores a developmental program, and when you run it, you get five fingers. It’s one of the oldest parts of the genome”
It may not have an overlap with your newsletter, but I’m pretty sure I’ve read that already in the Justin Langer one I’m signed up to.
Actually, this “propeller-head-fest” match report about a 2008 match has a curious overlap between the two, not least because the essay, The Fourth Quadrant, linked therein, is published on edge.org:
http://ianlouisharris.com/2008/07/24/middlesex-v-worcestershire-days-1-and-3-at-lords-co-starring-ed-smith-22-and-24-july-2008/
Is Ed Smith still deploying his learnings from that strange period when he selects the England team, I find myself constantly asking myself?
King Cricket’s ‘Edge: A newsletter about the leafy borders separating the gardens of northern houses
Strap line:
“It’s reet gradely”.
Love it, Sam.