< 1 minute read We nearly laid into England after their limp defeat in the first one-day international, but thought: ‘No. Wait. Let’s give them the benefit of the doubt for the minute.’ What a waste of an update. England have only gone and played just as pathetically in the second one-dayer. Feeble total
Continue readingMonth: February 2008
Who are India’s best fast bowlers?
< 1 minute read It’s great to have strength in depth, but surely you want some idea who your best bowlers are. India have had five quick bowlers performing well on this tour alone. The picture’s murkier than our imaginary, more colourful past. Zaheer Khan, RP Singh and Irfan Pathan provided some sort of
Continue readingProfessional cricketers fail to act their age
< 1 minute read A top score of 31 and a third of the team getting run out? A fielding side that dives around after everything like it’s tanked-up on E numbers? It’s under-11s cricket, isn’t it? There was a disappointingly small number of wides and the match wasn’t decided by the one kid
Continue readingMarston’s Pedigree Six
< 1 minute read Marston’s have brought out a new beer because they sponsor England. It’s called Pedigree Six on account of it being 6%. Mmm, boozy. We’re going to drink four ‘Sixes’ in honour of Dimitri Mascarenhas’s four sixes the other day (and with perhaps a nod towards our own alcohol dependence as
Continue readingNathan Bracken bowling people out despite his flaw
< 1 minute read Sickeningly wrong-handed purveyor of off-cutters, Nathan Bracken, has once again ended a one-day international with disgustingly flattering figures. Bracken took 5-46 as Sri Lanka were bowled out for just 125, chasing Australia’s 253. We’ve long since accepted that Nathan Bracken is a more-than-useful one-day bowler, but we don’t have to
Continue readingTwenty20 takes 22 players
< 1 minute read We really like Twenty20, but it can be difficult to report on. It’s more difficult to identify that one, stand-out performance from a player. Twenty20’s more of a team game than you might think. With only 20 overs, it makes sense that one big innings from a batsman decides the
Continue readingEngland adopt subtle form of mental disintegration
< 1 minute read So-called mental disintegration can take many forms. You might play on a batsman’s confidence or you might try and aggravate him into losing his cool. In this picture, Kevin Pietersen, Ian Bell and Ryan Sidebottom have teamed up in an effort to make Ross Taylor jealous. Ross Taylor considers himself
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Dimitri Mascarenhas is handy down the order
< 1 minute read England don’t often find batsman who are pretty good. They have good and great batsmen at the top of the order and they have rubbish and not awful batsmen down the order, but there always seems to be a number eight-shaped hole in the batting card. In one-day cricket at
Continue readingEngland v New Zealand – masterful cricket scheduling
< 1 minute read Great news for fans of England v New Zealand matches – today’s Twenty20 match was the first of 19 consecutive international fixtures between the two sides. Surely what everyone’s hoping is that one team gets on top early on and shows itself to be vastly superior to the other team.
Continue readingAlastair Cook in one-day cricket
2 minute read Alastair Cook hit a hundred in England’s latest warm-up. The bowlers he had to face might not have been the world’s finest, but he hit 138 not out off 140 balls and every time he does that he’ll be getting a little bit more comfortable with one-day cricket. There are
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