King Cricket

October 18, 2007 South Africa

Impotent miserliness or profligate wicket-taking, which wins a one-day match?

< 1 minute readWell obviously wicket-taking miserliness is what you’re aiming for. But there was a fire-and-ice, chalk-and-cheese, black-guy-and-ginger-guy contrast between South Africa’s opening bowlers in the first one-day international against Pakistan. Shaun Pollock didn’t get a wicket but only went for three an over from his full allocation. Makhaya Ntini went at

October 18, 2007 Australia / India

Murali Kartik has a good day

< 1 minute readIndia beat Australia in a dead match at the end of an overlong one-day series about as far away from a World Cup as it’s possible to be. Could we have some Test cricket now, please? Murali Kartik took 6-27, which are pretty astonishing one-day figures. He then hit 21

October 17, 2007 County cricket

Rikki Clarke joins Derbyshire as captain

< 1 minute readIn the county cricket club fashion stakes, Derbyshire languish somewhere near the bottom. Whenever anyone needs to depict the mundane, life’s-going-on-elsewhere nature of early-season County Championship matches, they always pick on Derbyshire. That’s unfair in much the same way as ‘it rains in Manchester’ jibes are. The whole bloody island’s

October 16, 2007 Australia / Regulars

Matthew Hayden attaches a mirror to the back of his bat

< 1 minute readIt’s to more closely monitor the ageing process. ‘Still a few wisps of hair at the front there. Not time to retire yet’.

October 15, 2007 Regulars

Captain fails to learn second fielding position

< 1 minute read“And you: You go and field at, er, slip.”

October 14, 2007 England / Sri Lanka

Dilhara Fernando’s slower ball

< 1 minute readEvery bowler’s got a slower ball nowadays. Some have got several. Sajid Mahmood bowls about 20, but appears to have absolutely no clue when he should use them or what they’re supposed to achieve. Dilhara Fernando bowls one, as far as we can tell. He spreads his fingers widely so

October 12, 2007 Pakistan

Inzy falls four runs short

< 1 minute readInzamam-ul-Haq managed to get himself stumped four runs short of becoming Pakistan’s highest-ever run-scorer. Patrick will be pleased. We’re of a similar mind. Four runs (or rather their absence) here really doesn’t make a blind bit of difference in terms of great a player he was, although we wouldn’t have

October 12, 2007 England / Regulars

Graeme Swann fails to conquer his bail addiction

< 1 minute readFor years Graeme Swann has secretly suffered from a rare and debilitating disease. Graeme is addicted to bails. Graeme’s been through a number of treatments – enforced withdrawal, hypnosis, various types of medication – but in the end he just has to accept it. He’s a bail addict and he’ll

October 12, 2007 South Africa

Don’t drop Jacques Kallis

< 1 minute readBecause paradoxically we end up having to watch even more of him. The South African selectors felt they could do without the world’s most willing batsman and least willing bowler for the Twenty20 World Cup. Jacques Kallis was a little irritated by this and resigned the vice-captaincy. He also claimed

October 11, 2007 Australia

Mitchell Johnson clouds the future

< 1 minute readWe’ve always had a desire to balance out the names of this world. Some people have two first names, like Brett Lee for example. It’s only right that there’s a yang to Lee’s yin and that’s where Mitchell Johnson comes in. Mitchell Johnson’s got two surnames, so he can swap