Middlesex v Nottinghamshire County Championship match report

Ged writes:

Late season, I always try to take in a day of county cricket with my old friend, Charley “The Gent” Malloy.  It helps us both to prepare for the inevitable winter withdrawal symptoms to come.

By 11am we were already tucking in to sesame bagels stuffed with honey roasted salmon, washed down with a perfumed Austrian Riesling, quite similar to the German jobbie we had enjoyed at Chester-le-Street.

“I did something very metrosexual the other week; about as metrosexual as it gets”, said Charley. “Can you guess what it was?”

I looked him up and down carefully. “Nothing to do with hair gel?” I stated, more than asked. “But was it something to do with clothes?”

“Listen carefully to what I said,” instructed Charley. “I DID something. Not wore something. But that’s more than enough clues. You have until one o’clock to guess what it was.”

The puzzle felt a bit light on clues, actually, but then Charley is like a TV quiz master without quiz structure. And without prizes.

Around 12:15, Charley said to me: “Any idea yet what my uber-metrosexual deed was, then?”

“Still, pondering, Charley, still pondering,” I said. “I’ve got until one o’clock anyway, so plenty of time to mull some more and possibly even watch some cricket just now.”

“You’ve got until 12:30,” said Charley. “That’s when lunch is being taken.”

“But you said one o’clock, Charley,” I protested. “I forgot that everything is half-an-hour earlier in September,” he replied.

Just shy of 12:30, I decided to distract Charley by changing the subject. “By the way, I saw your boy on the TV the other evening, right at the end of the Women’s Ashes T20 at Chelmsford. I’m certain it was him.” Charley smiled and said: “Yup, all three of us were there; the missus too. Well done. Had you worked it out all along then?”

“Worked it out? Oh…” I winked at Charley and secretly winked at myself.

“Taking the family to women’s cricket. It doesn’t get much more metrosexual than that, does it?” effused Charley. “Shame you spotted the boy on the TV – made my puzzle too easy for you.”

“I’m sure you’ll find something more challenging for next season, Charley,” I replied.

Demanding loyalty or earning support

‘How about we put together a nice cosy environment where everyone goes along with everything Alastair says?’

Imagine we’re not talking about cricket for a second and put yourself in a position where someone’s just said that to you. How do you feel? Do you think that sounds like a good idea? Some bloke called Alastair? Does he know best?

As ever, there’s the fact that we DON’T KNOW ANYTHING AT ALL, but if you overlook that minor detail and read the words of yesterday’s ECB statement, that first paragraph feels like the subtext.

“We must invest in our captain Alastair Cook and we must support him in creating a culture in which we can be confident he will have the full support of all players, with everyone pulling in the same direction and able to trust each other.”

No. You earn support. You earn support by making good decisions. Did England lose because the captain didn’t have the full support of his team, or did the captain not have the full support of the team because they were losing?

People should be challenged. Leaders, in particular, need to be challenged – if only because they tend to be the kinds of people who think they know best. The kinds of people who see themselves as leaders are, by and large, less open to other opinions than your average sentient human.

We’ll be honest, our opinion is coloured by our own experiences, but we’ve been in enough work situations where someone has demanded loyalty to know that it is almost always a sign that they have lost control – usually because that person doesn’t really know what they’re doing.

The disappointing part is that we’d kind of warmed to Alastair Cook’s captaincy. Back when he was the anointed one, we were far from onside, but the more Shane Warne slagged him off, the more we thought he was doing plenty right. The on-field tactics were often a bit wobbly, but that’s the kind of thing you can pick up over time. The off-field stuff’s harder and Cook appeared to be keeping things together.

That view would now appear to be massively, massively wrong. A week or so ago, we really felt like this winter battering might have been the making of Cook. They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, but apparently it can also make you weaker and a little bit insecure.

New Zealand surrender almost all of their advantage

Leading India by 301 runs after the first innings, New Zealand frittered away all but 40 of them in the second innings to ensure an unexpectedly exciting finish to the first Test. If you’re in an almost unassailable position and want to make things interesting for yourself, get bowled out for 105 and invite India to chase a target.

As we said on Friday, India will be tough opponents for England this summer. The fact that they’re losing masks how they’re losing. They’re losing with grit and running good teams very close where once they were just sort of having a bit of a sit-down and waiting for matches to end. They’re genuinely rebuilding rather than just using that word as a meaningless excuse for being beaten.

New Zealand are more building than rebuilding. You could say that they’re exploiting India while they’re in a state of flux, but we suspect there’s more to it than that. They have a middle-order and a well organised seam attack, although they could still do with some reliable opening batsmen.

Another weakness is that they’re full of Trents, Coreys and Kanes. In an ideal world, all Kiwi cricketers would be called Chris, Martin or both.

Mominul Haque hits a hundred

Well that was easily the tensest sporting moment of the last 20 years. Possibly ever. There he was, on 99, and Cricinfo refreshed several times with no change to his score. Surely this moment couldn’t be ripped away from us so cruelly? We were absolutely on tenterhooks.

But huzzah! After the next refresh, his score did change and Mominul Haque has another Test hundred. They’ll be dancing in the streets of Cox’s Bazar tonight. There’d be dancing here too if it weren’t for the fact that we don’t dance and wouldn’t dream of celebrating anything in such a ridiculous way, let alone the achievements of a 22-year-old Bangladeshi batsman whose career we’re following largely because we think his name sounds kind of funny.

Mominul is currently batting with Shakib al Hasan who newer readers may not know we’ve been following since 2006. That should probably be considered a warning that Mominul coverage is unlikely to die down any time soon.

Meanwhile in cricket…

It’s a week in which teams have been relying on their big name, 30-something batsmen. This isn’t a coincidence. That’s just the way Test cricket works.

Kumar Sangakkara has indulged in some average bolsteration by hitting 424 runs in the second Test against Bangladesh. For their part, Bangladesh managed two runs more than that in their first innings, which isn’t a bad effort.

In New Zealand, Brendon McCullum made 224 against India, who are now 130-4 in reply. India of course tour England in the summer and after seeing real fight from their batsmen in South Africa, we think they’ll provide stern opposition. Then again, you wonder who wouldn’t fancy their chances of steamrollering England at the minute. No-one even knows who plays for them any more. Cook, Bell, Broad, Anderson…

India’s pace bowling is still pretty wonky, but New Zealand’s is looking stronger these days. At the time of writing, Trent Boult had 74 Test wickets at 26.09 and rarely seems to let them down, home or away, while Tim Southee’s passed 100 wickets by the age of 25. Neil Wagner also bowls for New Zealand.

The art of being a team player, Pietersen-style

In our experience, the employees most likely to be considered ‘team players’ are the obedient, unquestioning ones. Management may make great show of inviting feedback – and they may honestly believe that they’re open to it – but the truth is that no-one makes a decision thinking it is the wrong one.

Most of us, when our thinking is questioned, are liable to grow defensive. We’re also likely to somewhat take against the person who is challenging us. A manager might think: “Why are you trying to undermine me? Why can’t you be more of a team player, like Alan or Deano?”

This sort of situation is compounded when the questioner reads social situations badly and when the person being criticised is feeling vulnerable anyway. We wonder to what extent this might be what happened with Kevin Pietersen, Alastair Cook and Andy Flower in Australia.

Motives and execution

The Telegraph is reporting a Pietersen ‘rant’ about Andy Flower during a players’ meeting. You can easily imagine that he might have gone about things the wrong way, but was what he was saying really so radically different to what the rest of the players were feeling?

Cook and Prior called the meeting because they felt they were relying too heavily on Flower. It seems Pietersen was of a similar mind, but felt that this was Flower’s fault. This is a distinction, but his motives for speaking up were the same: the team weren’t playing well and he had identified a lack of self-reliance among the players.

At heart, he still wanted the team to improve, but expressed himself badly with the effect perhaps magnified by his frustration at being marginalised.

Threat to sense of self

Andy Flower is a strong man. Few would question that. Could a man who took a stand against Robert Mugabe ever feel threatened by someone like Kevin Pietersen?

Well, perhaps. Taking a stand against a dictator takes courage, but if anything it is an act which adds to your sense of self. You can take pride in what you’ve done. It is not easier to do than accepting you were wrong about something – but it is a different thing. Accepting you were wrong means acknowledging your own fallibility and who can readily take pride in that? Flower might well not be that kind of person.

It’s the flipside of having conviction. When things are going badly, conviction might manifest itself as greater certainty that you are right and a belief that what is going wrong is that people aren’t doing exactly what you want them to do. All your repressed insecurities and self-doubt might therefore become focused on those who question you the most (and in the clumsiest manner).

A strong, confident, self-assured leader of men

Alastair Cook was perhaps in a similar position. He will certainly have been having doubts about his ability to lead the team – he’s said as much himself. That’s not a strong base from which to withstand questions about the way you’re going about things. It’s easy to say that valid points should be taken on board by those in authority, but insecurity can affect us all – particularly when the defeats are piling up.

Further reading

We’ve done another Pietersen piece for Cricinfo. You’re probably a bit weary of it all by now, but if you’re not, it’s about the ECB information vacuum and the concept of ‘rebuilding’.

How do you carry out long-term planning? (a Pietersen post)

Remember when England dropped Nick Compton? At the time, we thought maybe they were getting a little bit ahead of themselves. People said Joe Root was amazing and there were loads of other amazing batsmen queuing up to play for England and come on, come on, bring us the future; the future’s going to be amazing multiplied by amazing!

A few months later, 33-year-old Mike Carberry made 78 against a Western Australia Chairman’s XI and England were now in a position where they thought: “Oh, okay, er, maybe he could open the batting? And then Joe Root could move back down the order? Yeah? Yeah?”

Sometimes you can overestimate the quality of what you have in reserve. Particularly if you’re cocky and kind of stupid.

But of course we’re in a completely different situation now. Back then, England were planning for a glorious future and ushering in talented youngsters in a bid to experience it sooner. Now England are shit. Now it’s time to rebuild with talented youngsters. You know, like Australia did earlier in the year.

Because surely that should be the template for how to turn a team around? Except for the likes of Chris Rogers, Mitchell Johnson, Brad Haddin, Ryan Harris and a few others, Australia started afresh, didn’t they? They gave youth its head.

When times are tough, you have to move on. It’s vital to start rebuilding and the first step in that process is to chuck any half-decent bricks you find into a skip. It’s not sinful waste, you see – it’s long-term planning. You can’t really judge the wisdom of these decisions now because it’s a long-term thing. It’s all going to be fine. Stop questioning the ECB’s wisdom, okay? Just stop.

Kevin Pietersen and the lost specifics

Granted, we work for them, but we’ve been very impressed with Cricinfo recently – specifically with regards to their near-refusal to report on the latest ‘Kevin Pietersen situation’. They’ve pretty much restricted themselves to one ‘it’s being reported that senior figures are to meet on Tuesday to decide the future of Kevin Pietersen’ article, when they could easily have produced daily non-news on the subject, adding to the general nowtstorm that’s been raging of late.

If you don’t know what’s happening, you’re not alone. Even those of us who have been foolish enough to try and follow this saga don’t know what’s happening because there have been very few specifics.

The Guardian has been most guilty, churning out article after article dotted with ‘it is thought’ and ‘there is a belief/feeling’ with very little in the way of actual detail. It’s been infuriating to read. When the writer appears to know something, but feels they cannot put it across using specifics, it’s immensely frustrating.

We’re not sure whether it’s a sign of a journalist being disconnected from their audience, assuming they’ll pick up on whispers and allusions in the same way as their press box pals, but it makes for bad writing, lacking in value, in our eyes. Perhaps there’s a narrative to the writer, but from the reader’s point of view, hearsay has been repeated until a point at which it is then presented as fact.

A vague overview of the situation

Sorry, it can’t be anything but vague because as far as a non-journalist is concerned, dramatic things are happening for no clear reason.

• ‘Poor behaviour’ from Pietersen has been mentioned
• Being ‘high maintenance’ is another of the charges
• Pietersen is said to be ‘a bad influence’ on younger England players
• Alastair Cook, Ashley Giles and Paul Downton are apparently meeting today to decide whether Pietersen should be ejected from the team

Conclusion

Even if there does turn out to be some major issue that precipitates the end of Pietersen’s England career, it won’t negate criticisms of earlier coverage of the story.

When you were a child, there was probably an occasion when some other kid claimed to know ‘a secret’ and wouldn’t tell you what it was. They hinted and mocked you, but wouldn’t relent. Eventually, a third party whispered in your ear and everything became clear, but that didn’t mean that the first kid hadn’t been acting like a complete dick.

Travelling without wheels

It’s hard to pinpoint precisely when the final wheel fell off. It was probably a couple of months ago, but England’s cricketers have had to continue shoving “it” along anyway. No wonder they ended up going round in circles.

It’s not been the best tour. In a vain effort to gain a well-paid but pointless position at the ECB, let’s take the positives.

Ben Stokes

We can see it now. England are already drafting their excuses for when he’s injured. “We need to find another all-rounder because it’s impossible to balance the side in his absence. He’s effectively two players in one and 12 into 11 won’t go.”

His bowling’s solid but unspectacular. His batting’s surprisingly unshowy. His mental resilience appears first rate. A three-format, two-discipline cricketer – expect diminishing returns as he’s worn to a nub.

Stuart Broad

We’ve warmed to Broad quite a lot during this tour. Not that we ever disliked him, but he’s always been hard to really root for. However, it takes a certain kind of person to be bullied by an entire nation and not buckle; to in fact take pride in it.

Delusion can be a strength for an international sportsman and Broad has somehow played well in a weak side when throwing in the towel and sleepwalking through a few matches would have been infinitely easier. If only he could stop saying ‘to be fair’ in interviews.

Chris Jordan

Back when England’s pace bowling strength in depth seemed like a real thing, you could get down as far as Ajmal Shahzad and still think that he’d probably do okay given a run in the Test team. Nowadays, Steven Finn’s turned into Ishant Sharma at the end of a one-day international.

In this new and murky light, Chris Jordan somehow looked like he backed up the positive impression he made when appearing in our county cricket round-up pretty much every time we bothered to write it. He managed this despite taking six wickets at 42 in the one-day series. Honestly, what a tour.

Jos Buttler

Sort of carried on doing what he does – something almost no other England player managed. The fact that ‘what he does’ is mind-blowingly spectacular is a bonus.

In summary

Why did you push it without wheels for so long? Look what you’ve done to the axles. And the chassis. Junaid Khan (new non-blasphemous exclamation), it’s a right mess. It’s going to really cost you to get this fixed.

Honestly, you go for one lunchtime pint…

And England give their coach the boot. At least that’s the case according to ‘reports’.

We’re not actually suggesting that the two events are linked. We’re just struck by the fact that we’ve been sitting around checking the cricket news once every four minutes for the whole of the last week only for something to happen the minute we step away.

A watched Cricinfo never breaks news, as the old adage goes.

Some of you are suggesting we should have some sort of official stance on this development, but, like we say, we have had a pint. It was called ‘long hop’ funnily enough.

There’s a suggestion that Flower might take up some other job within the ECB. Doubt he’ll be running the website, so maybe he’ll become ‘mega-director’ or ‘stategist emperor’ or something, in which case his not being coach will seem less significant. We don’t know. We haven’t even finished reading the article yet. We’ve been otherwise engaged.