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England v Australia, third Test, day one
Jofra Archer is a cricketer with two separate arms. This, in itself, is an unremarkable thing, because a great many cricketers have two separate arms. The striking thing about Jofra Archer’s two separate arms is that he clothes them differently.
Here is Jofra Archer’s left arm.
Here is Jofra Archer’s right arm.
They are different. And not just in which way they bend and where the thumbs are and all those sorts of things.
The left arm is a naked arm that has been tasked with being the guardian of time.
The right arm is a clothed arm and – crucially – it is also Archer’s “doing arm“.
This is the thing; this is the key. This is the thing you have to understand if you want to appreciate the difference between Jofra Archer’s two separate arms: “Doing arm” status is not clear-cut and this gives rise to a situation which has to be very carefully managed.
If you search online, you can find a number of videos of Archer bowling with his left arm. He is pretty good. He is better with his left arm than you are with either of your arms (if you have two).
If you could bowl creditably with both arms, an important thing that you would need to do is carry out a battery of tests to deduce which arm was the better out of the two available options. Jofra Archer did this and he worked out he was better with his right arm. Now he has to remember this.
Remembering things is very difficult. Think back to that time when you needed to remember something and failed to do so and you will know this to be true.
Being a smart person is largely about managing your brain. Smart people devise ploys and gambits that they use to overcome their innate mental shortcomings.
A great way to beat memory issues is for your present self to provide some sort of visual hint to your future self to jog their memory. Jofra Archer does this by tasking his left arm with being the guardian of time and by giving the right arm special work clothes. The ploy works very well and he takes a great many wickets as a consequence.
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Never really understood why players wear nice watches on the field. Firstly, they might get hit by the ball. Secondly, there are other people keeping an eye on the time. Maybe it’s something to do with ‘looking cool’.
I got beaten at golf a couple of months ago. The chap who beat me differentiated his doing arm from his non-doing arm by clothing it in existence. In fact, the very idea that someone has a single doing arm in golf ought to raise some eyebrows.
And I was beaten on the gross scores, not the net. He beat me by about 10 shots.
Got beaten at what now?
Sorry, trying to think back to that time, but I just can’t remember.
Have we definitively ruled out the possibility that Archer has a tattoo on his right arm of the WICB logo urinating on the ECB logo, or something similarly embarrasing (such as, I don’t know, “I Love Paul King”)?
That stuff on his arm is a tubular support bandage, often referred to by the trade name of the most popular brand, Tubigrip®.
I regret to inform you that I have been wearing it myself these past couple of weeks. In my case it is due to some ligament damage as a result of over-extending my forearm, which is not good news. I have not been using my so-called doing-arm for much at all. I have been using my so-called cack-arm instead.
Some cricketers wear the stuff as a precautionary measure for much of the time. Ben Stokes, for example. Nick Gubbins for another example.
Let’s hope Jofra is in the precautionary category like those guys and not the cranked category like me.
Dare we ask how you injured said arm?
Real tennis.
Initially a very minor injury from mistiming a block volley from a firmly-forced shot. A bit like that jarring-type injury you can get in cricket if you “perfectly” mistime a block of a pace bowler.
But some idiot decided that the injury was so minor that he could play through it…
…which worked fine until he heard and felt several ligament strands go pop in the forearm.
Probably still only grade one but that is three weeks at least for realers. I’m going to try out the arm on modern tennis tomorrow and probably give right-handed real tennis a miss until the week after next.
So it is still cack-handed real tennis for me today.
It’s the Participation Test! Has everyone participated yet?
I was in the pub and brought all eight wickets of the Aussie collapse while drinking three rather nice, but strong, IPAs. I felt it when Labuschagne got hit squarely in the knackers. I cheered heartily when same player was out to a filthy full toss. I definitely feel like I have now participated in this year’s Specsavers Ashes (Visibility of all ships increases by +2 diopters)
Christ on a bike. Dear Points of View, why oh why is Jason Roy opening the batting in Test match cricket. Yours etc.
Why did Sir Alastair retire again? He can’t have been worried his place was under pressure.
Dear Sam
Thank you for your letter. Roy was selected to open the batting via a rigorous process. He had to sing Amarillo to four people with their backs to him, after which he was made to live in the jungle with Katie Price and Lionel Blair. As a result of eating seven wood lice, he then went through to the final selection phase, in which he was able to cross a lake by bouncing on massive red balls.
Anticipating your next letter, Rory Burns was asked to avoid hooking a bouncer, which he did, once.
I wonder if Roy would play any differently if he were to come in at, say, oh I don’t know, maybe 34-4?
Surely the hope is that if Roy were not opening, we wouldn’t be 34-4 quite as often.
I genuinely misread that as “avoid bouncing a hooker” which I’m sure was within the bounds of his capabilities.
I’m off work today, but I’ve a few house jobs to keep me busy. I’ve done a load of washing, but it’s mostly pants. And now it’s been hung out to dry.
Lunch will be haggis, or black pudding, I’ve not decided yet. But it will be offal.
That’s the Ashes, then.
You’re not wrong.
When is the next one-day series?
His buddy, Tymal Mills, does the same nah? He sometimes throws with his right arm from the deep which is naked or a reminder as you would say.