< 1 minute readSo Andrew Strauss has finally been dropped. It’s about time. We don’t mean that in the sense that he’s not good enough for England, just that it seems to have been certain to happen for altogether too many matches. Strauss has been going to the crease thinking it was his
Continue reading< 1 minute readSurvival of the fittest. Cricket has mutated again. While an early mutation, 50-over cricket, lives happily side-by-side with Test cricket, there aren’t enough natural resources to support both as well as Twenty20. In a few years time, one of these forms might have gone the way of the dodo. If
Continue reading< 1 minute readAt the age of 27. Uninjured. This is why we shouldn’t allow Old Etonians to become professional cricketers. What kind of a person gives up professional cricket in favour of ‘a career in business’? Well congratulations, Alex. You’ll be shaking hands with people for a living before you know it.
Continue reading< 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
Continue reading< 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
Continue reading< 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
Continue reading< 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’.
Continue reading< 1 minute read“And you: You go and field at, er, slip.”
Continue reading< 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
Continue reading< 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
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