Graeme Swann’s selection for England has opened up an old, rancid can of worms. Worms of spelling. Spelling worms.

To rid the world of these vile spelling worms once and for all, Graeme Swann is a Graeme, not a Graham.

Here are some more famous cricketing Grahams/Graemes:

Graham Gooch
Graeme Hick
Graham Thorpe
Graeme Smith

We’ve long had a belief that people who use Yahoo! Answers are the dregs of humanity, so imagine our delight when we found that there was a Graham/Graeme issue on there.

Yahoo! Answers is a website where people ask a question and ‘the public’ provide answers. It’s a massively flawed concept - as with anything involving the public. It seems to attract the kinds of people who are moved to answer questions when they don’t actually have answers.

If you enjoy being irritated and hating all of humanity (like we do) it’s well worth a read. People will actually answer a direct question with ‘don’t know’, as if the world can’t get enough of their words.

In answer to the question, ‘should I name my son Graham or Graeme?’ the user ‘graybear’ (no capital) answers:

“I had no clue how to say Graeme when I first read it. I left off the R and thought, ‘Gay-me?’ The next thought was Gray-me. You and he will get really sick of correcting people.”

graybear eventually concludes that the child shouldn’t be called Graeme, because “it’s not worth it.”

Tags: England, Graeme Swann by King Cricket
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For 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 never be fully cured.

During the second one-day international between Sri Lanka and England at Dambulla, Graeme fell spectacularly from the bail wagon.

Standing at third-man, he was suddenly overcome by bail lust. He charged in and snatched the bails before the astonished eyes of his team mates.

His latest treatment is to always carry two small pieces of dowel as a substitute for his beloved bails.

Tags: Graeme Swann, lies about pictures by King Cricket
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We’ve been waiting to write that headline since March 31st last year, when we made Graeme Swann one to watch for that season. Graeme let us down then, but since being given a chance in the England side, he’s been encouragingly solid at a time when solidity has been at a premium.

4-34 is a tidy day’s work for an England spinner, even if you are in Sri Lanka. In fact being in Sri Lanka is of arguable benefit. In Sri Lanka, toddlers’ first steps typically involve coming down the pitch to off-breaks. Speaking of walking, it was nice to see Kumar Sangakkara doing so. He’s a different man to the gobby one who Nasser Hussain rapidly came to hate.

To return to Graeme Swann, he also made a nice 25 (the second highest score for England) before permitting Stuart Broad centre stage for his customary low-scoring one-dayer victory batting. Whatever the pitch, England’s batting’s still fragile in one-day cricket. Worryingly so. At least we would worry, if one-day cricket seemed at all relevant at this exact moment.

Sri Lanka v England, third one-day international at Dambulla
Sri Lanka 164 (Tillekeratne Dilshan 70, Graeme Swann 4-34, Ryan Sidebottom 3-19)
England 164 (Farveez Maharoof 3-34)
England won via Duckworth-Lewis calculations

Tags: England, Graeme Swann, Sri Lanka by King Cricket
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