England adopt subtle form of mental disintegration

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So-called mental disintegration can take many forms. You might play on a batsman’s confidence or you might try and aggravate him into losing his cool.

In this picture, Kevin Pietersen, Ian Bell and Ryan Sidebottom have teamed up in an effort to make Ross Taylor jealous.

It's the hair

Ross Taylor considers himself something of a looker, but here Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell are visibly expressing a strong preference for Ryan Sidebottom.

Kevin’s cruel, taunting eyes must cut deeper than any mere sledge.

OH NO!

Roelof van der Merwe just heard you haven't yet signed up for the King Cricket email...

...so he's on his way to see you!

13 comments

  1. You may be on to something here, again. The silent sledge! What forms could it take? – no jelly beans please.

  2. It’s the grammar police here…aggravate means make worse. People often use it when they mean irritate (or goad, as here).

  3. We’re not having that one. From Merriam-Webster:

    “Aggravate… 3a: to rouse to displeasure or anger by usually persistent and often petty goading”

    Shouldn’t you be the semantic police anyway?

  4. Well now we’re just plain offended. Highbrow indeed.

    We pride ourselves on how lowbrow we are here at King Cricket.

  5. Lowbrow? It’s positively monobrow ’round here.

    Should the Grammar Police be wasting their time on matters of vocabulary?

    When did Miriam get her own dictionary? And who’s the enigmatic Webster?

  6. I obviously spelt my name wrong on my own dictionary. Isn’t that ironic (in the Alanis Morrisette sense only, not in the dictionary sense).

  7. Don’t know about that. As someone publishing a dictionary, there’s a strong ironic element in spelling your own name incorrectly on that very book’s cover.

    That’s far too ironic to be classed as Morrisette-irony.

  8. On further reflection, I agree, actually. I’m so steeled against the misuse of the word that I fail to recognise it when it genuinely exists.

    Is that ironic?

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