King Cricket

November 27, 2007 South Africa

Dale Steyn’s bowling speed

2 minute readWe remember Dale Steyn’s Test debut. For his first wicket, he arced a yorker into Marcus Trescothick‘s middle stump. Not bad. While he touched 90mph during that Test, it was rare and we sort of put him to the back of our mind in our mental draw marked ‘South African

November 26, 2007 England

Matthew Hoggard will be in the Test team then

< 1 minute readIf 240 Test wickets weren’t enough, there’s the fact that Stephen Harmison and James Anderson are both a bit injured to help Hoggy along. And if his 6-57 against India at Nagpur last year – a herculean bowling performance hewn from pure nous – wasn’t proof that he could bowl

November 26, 2007 India / Pakistan

India get home

< 1 minute readIt may have got to 93-3 chasing 200, but with Sachin Tendulkar there, it never really felt in doubt. The man’s a pro. Shoaib Akhtar did his best, taking 4-58, but this was the right result. If India’s tailenders had managed to stick around for even a moment in their

November 24, 2007 India / Pakistan

Misbah-ul-Haq ready and positioned

< 1 minute readWell, here we are again. The first Test between India and Pakistan is still poised, it could still go either way and again so much depends on Misbah-ul-Haq, who’s one of the not out batsmen. Man of the match awards hardly ever take account of context. You’ve got one batsman

November 24, 2007 Australia

Darren Lehmann knows how to say goodbye

< 1 minute readWe said that Darren Lehmann’s final match would be worth watching. Earlier this week, in his final one-day game, Lehmann played the lead role in a record run-chase in Australian domestic one-day cricket. He hit 126 not out off 104 balls as South Australia overhauled Western Australia’s 305. We could

November 23, 2007 India / Pakistan

Anil Kumble leads from the front

< 1 minute readWe have a friend who follows from the front. It’s not very productive when you’re trying to get somewhere and you realise that the person you thought was leading the way is in fact shuffling along with no clue as to where he’s going. India’s new captain, Anil Kumble, took

November 23, 2007 India / Pakistan

Misbah-ul-Haq run out failing to ground his bat

< 1 minute readOr himself for that matter. If you didn’t see Misbah-ul-Haq getting run out for 82, you’ll get an idea as to what happened from the accompanying picture. Misbah was about to make his ground after a quickish single. The throw came in from Dinesh Karhik at backward point and Misbah

November 22, 2007 India / Pakistan

Misbah-ul-Haq in Test cricket

2 minute readWe labelled Misbah-ul-Haq a Twenty20 specialist during that format’s World Cup. That was a bit misleading because we don’t particularly believe in being a specialist in one format or another. The best cricketers play the match situation and the best batsmen weigh up what to do to score runs against

November 21, 2007 England / Sri Lanka

England warm-up Sri Lanka

< 1 minute readIt’s been very generous of England to attempt to sort out Sri Lanka’s opening vacancy within 24 hours of the retirment of Marvan Atapattu. Upul Tharanga made a hundred for the Board President’s XI and Sri Lanka’s muppets would appear to have an easy decision to make. If there are

November 21, 2007 Australia