The ball has swung in this match. There has been seam movement, some bounce and good turn. On top of that, South Africa need to win this game. Mark Boucher and Graeme Smith have been the standout batsmen. This is not surprising.

Most players play worse in these situations. A very small number play better. Boucher and Smith almost always play better when their team need them to and with every Test cap they’ve earned, this has become more and more the case.

How would we fare in the same position? Well, we sometimes freak out watching the highlights of matches we know England have won, put it that way.

Tags: Graeme Smith, Mark Boucher // 2 Appeals »

What do you mean it’s still moving? It’s as good as dead. It can’t feel pain any more.

Did England listen to all the media coverage that said they’d done well in the series even if they lost this Test and ease off as a consequence? We say no. We say that South Africa have better batsmen and bowlers and in this Test it’s been more apparent.

Did England get so caught up in Andrew Strauss’s call to ‘play positively’ that they equated defensive play with playing for a draw? Maybe a bit.

Tags: England // 5 Appeals »

If you told us that we had to use a tired cliché to describe the effort that Dale Steyn puts into bowling or you’d force us to do a dance in front of other humans, we’d hang our head, sigh softly and mutter “sinew-straining”.

Dale’s certainly wholehearted. Perhaps too wholehearted. The staring eyes betray a love of caffeine the like of which we haven’t seen since everyone in the office got caught in a nasty espresso-drinking cycle last year (you needed the pick-me-up in the morning after yet another nervy, sleepless night).

Whatever it is, Steyn skitters in, looking ever-so-slightly-deranged, and whips the ball through with a bit of away swing. It’s not a bad stock ball. Only Ian Bell was really up to it, but Steyn lodged a mirror image of the delivery in amongst his stumps by way of a reprimand.

Tags: Dale Steyn // 11 Appeals »

Atherton 0, Hussain 0, Butcher 1 and Stewart 0. Now that’s a bad start.

Morne Morkel is mint, by the way; a big gallumphing lankatron of genial ferociousness.

Tags: England, South Africa // 12 Appeals »

Panesar’s current coach at Highveld Lions, Dave Nosworthy, says:

“Somewhere along the line he had lost who Monty Panesar is.”

This does seem to be the case. Panesar says:

“What happened last year is that I had so many external voices to listen to … When I was searching for an answer I was going external … All the answers are inside.”

Why listen to other people when there are so many internal voices to listen to? Your own voices are far better informed about you and even if they tell you to set fire to things, they do it for a reason. Even if they tell you to give the financial director of your company a wedgie because he uses too many acronyms, they do it for a reason.

The police say you shouldn’t have punched that child, but they didn’t hear the American accent she was putting on. The voices did.

Tags: Monty Panesar // 4 Appeals »

If you’re not in charge of what you’re thinking, just what ARE you in charge of?

A recent interview with Monty Panesar reads like a philosophical follow-up to MS Dhoni’s comments that led us to ask: Do you control the mind or does the mind control you?

“My mind was thinking of so many things and I couldn’t actually take many wickets.”

It’s hard in that situation. What do you do? Do you shout at the mind? Tell it to belt up and stop getting distracted? Panesar has somehow managed to get a grip on the situation. Since going to play for Highveld Lions, he says:

“I’ve been responsible for my own thinking and also for my own decision-making.”

No-one wants to be a mere puppet with the mind pulling the strings.

Tags: Monty Panesar // 7 Appeals »

We all know that life is essentially just one long series of downers. You get the occasional event that gives rise to a small degree of optimism, but these are only there to discourage you from ending it all, thus ensuring that you can experience even more of the bad times.

With that in mind, does anyone think that England are going to get battered this week?

Tags: England // 11 Appeals »

Just when you think that international cricket can’t get any more like the playground, it does. It’s only a matter of time before someone breaks a window with a shit shot on goal and everyone gets bollocked for it.

There are mutterings that Umar Akmal isn’t really injured, that it’s actually a protest that his brother, Kamran, might be dropped from the Pakistan team.

Umar seems to think that Kamran being dropped is the problem. It’s not. The fact that Kamran has a pair of toasted sandwich makers instead of hands is the problem.

Tags: Kamran Akmal, Umar Akmal // 7 Appeals »

Is there no limit to Ricky Ponting’s powers?

Pakistan are currently in some disarray. Ponting says:

“I guess a lot of the stuff that is happening around their side at the moment was probably stuff they brought on themselves.”

He then adds:

“If you play really well, you can create that stuff happening around teams.”

Ponting made Pakistan bring things on themselves.

You’re probably thinking: ‘Ricky Ponting is a complete tool belt.’

You haven’t thought that yourself. Ponting’s made you think that.

Tags: Ricky Ponting // 15 Appeals »

We really hope that England weren’t tampering with the ball last week, because if they were, they’re rubbish at it.

Our stance on ball tampering is that players should do whatever they can get away with. To us, that’s the divide: if you’re caught, you’ve crossed the line.

There’s a similar situation in rugby, where someone like Richie McCaw regularly acquires the ball from within a melee of people when you would expect his opponents to still be in possession. He may achieve this solely through fair means, but it seems unlikely. Part of McCaw’s skill is in adapting the way he plays to each match situation. He makes allowances for who is refereeing and what can be seen at any particular moment.

We see ball tampering in the same way. Everyone knows why players are such avid fans of confectionery. Sun cream and lip balm have more than one use. Getting the ball into the right condition without being hauled in front of the match referee is a skill.

But it’s only the first step. Whatever a player does to the condition of the ball, they’ve still got to use it. First you get the ball right, then you have to swing it, then you have to direct it. Achieve all that and have a bit of luck as well and you might get an edge. Even if it’s caught, the batsman won’t walk.

Now that’s cheating.

Tags: England // 20 Appeals »