Posted by Golden ducks are always funny, but some are funnier than others. We’ve had two absolute classics in the last 24 hours and we honestly can’t choose between them.
Imagine you’re a tennis player. You drive down to the club where you play. You get changed. You walk on court. Your opponent serves. You miss it. You immediately go home.
That scenario seems absolutely ludicrous, but, fielding aside, it’s more or less what a golden duck amounts to. And that’s why they’re magical.
Jamie Overton 0(1)
If you’re not up to speed with the Jamie Overton situation, allow us to accelerate you. England like Jamie Overton because he can bowl really quite quickly and they aren’t going to let a piffling matter like ‘not currently being fit to bowl’ prevent them from picking him.
So it was that Overton played a couple of T20 internationals against Australia as a specialist batter this summer – even though he is very definitely not a specialist batter. He came in at number seven, which is sort of a batting spot when you’ve got a bunch of all-rounders. He made 15 off 9 balls in the first match and 4 not out off 4 balls in the second.
Now Overton’s in the Caribbean where he was picked for a 50-over match even though he still can’t bowl. He came in at number eight, which isn’t even sort of a batting spot. After a long walk out to do his specialist job, he missed a sweep shot first ball and then had to walk back again.
Mohammed Siraj 0(1)
Mohammed Siraj is not a specialist batter and no-one is trying to pretend that he is. He has made 108 runs in 31 Test matches. India asked him to bat at number four today because it was late afternoon and asking your number 11 to come in at four if a wicket falls late afternoon is a standard thing in cricket because cricket is mental.
Maybe they were persuaded by that dynamite performance of his in the first Test.
Anyway, after a long walk out to watch the night, Siraj missed his first ball and was given out LBW. Perhaps keen to make the most of his time as a middle-order batter, he then reviewed the decision. But it was still out.
Siraj’s role was to prevent Virat Kohli from having to face any late afternoon deliveries (which are of course uniquely difficult for middle-order batters) so that Kohli could instead come out and score runs against the morning bowling to which he is apparently more accustomed.
Alas, the single delivery that Kohli was successfully protected from did not prove pivotal because just a few balls later he ran himself out.
Kohli has now been out of form for five years and a bit.
Discussion
It feels like the setup for Overton’s (picking a number eight batter who isn’t actually a batter) was stronger. Set against that, India really ran with things once the golden duck had been secured.
Siraj’s wasn’t merely a nightwatchduck, he threw a review in there too. And then the man he was supposedly protecting (who was Virat Kohli) ran himself out for good measure.
But then much of the beauty of the golden duck is that instant and definitive hammer blow of bathos. We’re not sure stringing people along adding further context via an epilogue is really in the spirit of things.
In short, we can’t choose. Both were delightful.
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Similar deliveries:
Liam Livingstone’s golden duck was one of the finest
The Overtons: England ponder samey attack
Why South Africa couldn’t possibly have come up with a more appropriate end to their tour of India than Lungi Ngidi’s bizarre golden duck
Did you see… Virat Kohli after Moeen Ali clean bowled him for a duck?
I’m with you on golden ducks not needing an epilogue, but I commentated on the Siraj one live, and it didn’t end with Virat doing a stoopid.
The camera kept showing Siraj standing in the dressing room, forlornly staring through the glass doors, and absolutely everyone else avoiding him.
Poor guy just stood there in his white, arms crossed, staring out into the middle contemplating what he had just done.
Maybe it’s my love of epic science fiction series that seem to go on for decades and entire woods worth of printed paper, but I just absolutely love a good long epilogue!
Or I may just be a bit weird.
We can surely all agree that both were of the highest quality in their own different ways.
Oh absolutely!
My own golden duck experience, more than 20 years ago, was latterly reported on this website:
https://www.kingcricket.co.uk/ged-ladd-co-v-childrens-society-xi-match-report-wagon-wheel/2021/04/14/
For sure that one had an epilogue, as Daisy’s mum, The Duchess of Castlebar, has formed the unswerving view that I have no ability at cricket whatsoever. The old dragon remembers very little now, sadly, but she does “remember” that!
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a golden duck by an Australian batter against the Netherlands is inherently funnier than a golden duck by a Dutch batter against Australia.
Both have happened by the way, Mitchell Starc and Roelof van der Merwe in their 2023 World Cup match. And coincidentally both dismissals being “two in two” for the respective bowlers, Logan van Beek and Adam Zampa, both of whom failed to complete the hat-trick next ball. https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/icc-cricket-world-cup-2023-24-1367856/australia-vs-netherlands-24th-match-1384415/full-scorecard
Looking at the wider context here, an Indian golden duck against NZ as part of their first ever 3-0 home whitewash is not quite Australia vs Netherlands level but the feat of the dismissal is clearly augmented both in status and humour value by its role in bringing about the wider shock, and a seismic shock at that. Indeed I think an element of shock or surprise underlies much of our sense of humour.
On the other hand, not many England supporters would begrudge the West Indies a wicket these days, given the current state of the game over there, even though they remain a serious limited-overs outfit (which itself removed some of the surprise from the situation). The inexplicable selection of Overton rather seems to have riled up some England fans so his duck could even be seen as a form of cosmic justice issued against the national selectors through the medium of Gudakesh Motie’s left arm. And Shai Hope for reviewing by the way – Overton didn’t quite walk straight off as this article suggests, since Rod Tucker initially gave it not out. In contrast, I’m sure millions of Indians were yelling “WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU DOING?!” at Siraj on their TV. Surely this makes it all the funnier?
One little thing is swaying me the other way, though, another detail omitted from this otherwise fine article. According to Cricinfo’s scorecard notes, Overton was dismissed after a missed paddle sweep (itself inherently funny first ball) that hit him high on the fore-arm. Siraj was struck on the more conventional back leg. The fact that for the purposes of the lbw law your upper fore-arm counts as a “leg” will never stop being funny, even though in this case it’s an accurate statement of evolutionary homologues. Not as good as the lesser spotted “head before wicket” but still glorious enough to promote Overton’s effort to joint first prize with Siraj. https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/west-indies-vs-england-2024-25-1433354/west-indies-vs-england-1st-odi-1433370/full-scorecard
While researching an unnecessarily detailed reply to this wonderful piece, I discovered an error in Cricinfo’s scorecard for the WI vs England ODI in Antigua.
https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/west-indies-vs-england-2024-25-1433354/west-indies-vs-england-1st-odi-1433370/full-scorecard
Go to the bottom of the scorecard and click the DRS symbol next to Rod Tucker’s name. A pop-up will come up showing that in the 38th over of England’s innings, G Modie had a shout turned down against J Overton, which the Windies reviewed. But Original → DRS is listed as Not Out → Not Out and the Review Result is stated to be Unsuccessful. Had that been the case, Overton would have survived his first ball and we would have missed out on the fun of comparing his golden duck to Siraj.
Anyone want to contact Cricinfo to tell them they made a boo-boo?
Funny that this error on the DRS stats flagrantly contradicts the outcome listed on their own scorecard. Wonder how often that happens.
Well done NZ. Hopefully they’re ‘due’ to fail dramatically in their next series now.
Also an interesting series for Washington Sundar. Awkward to have made your most brilliant contribution to date in a series where your side was thrashed. You’d imagine Indian fans won’t be that keen on him reminiscing about it in years to come.
It was good to see an underdog not just win a test, but then own the whole series. I get/got the feeling India are/were a bit full of themselves and felt they would never be beaten. The whole (mini-)series was a good one. Long live test cricket.
Now I’m having the joy of Pakistan walloping Australia at the moment, even if it is an ODI.
Well, almost walloping.
It developed into a bit of an anti-wallop, or miswallop.
https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/australia-vs-pakistan-2024-25-1426544/australia-vs-pakistan-1st-odi-1426549/full-scorecard
Indeed. Too many mis-fields, extras (mis-bowls?), and other mis-stuff. It was Pakistan’s to lose after the 0 for 3 phase, so they did. 🙁
Nonetheless, it was a pleasure to see Maxwell go for a golden duck (to keep this comment in line with the context of this wonderful article).
On a side-note (and beyond the context of this wonderful article), it was sad to see that Pakistan will be playing no less than 9 ODIs and 9 T20’s before playing proper cricket again, a two (what’s-the-point-of-two) match test ‘series’ against South Africa before a two (what’s-the-point-of-two) match test ‘series’ against the WI. But that’s a rant for another day.
Some more random cricket news: Rwanda just completed a 3-2 victory over Kenya in their WT20I series. Rwanda’s Marie Bimenyimana took 11 wickets across the 5 matches at an average of 5.90, economy of 3.25 RPO and strike rate of 10.9 balls per wicket. Not a high-scoring series, but one more country that England could feasibly lose to within our lifetimes, so that’s something to look forward to if life is getting you down 🙂
And surprisingly not a single duck scored by any player in the series, let alone a golden duck, despite teams being bowled out for 50, 67 and 73 and other team totals (including some successful chases) of 51/5, 71/7, 75/9, 95/7, 98/5, 115/8 and 126/6.
https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/kenya-women-in-rwanda-2024-25-1457352