2 minute read Rohit Sharma chose to bat first against New Zealand, even though he thought it might be a bit tricky early on. Rohit didn’t perhaps consider that India might not make it as far as ‘later on’. Sharma himself did well though. He made two runs, which – until number 11
Continue readingAuthor: King Cricket
Did you see… the butter/dragonfly that tried to run out Zak Crawley?
3 minute read Look, we’re not an entomologist and grainy, low quality social media footage isn’t helping us here. All we know is a flapping insect tried to run Zak Crawley out, only for Sajid Khan to get to the stumps first, where he made a right royal hash of things. You think
Continue readingFailing failure Steve Smith to hide down the order after abject failure as Test opener
2 minute read Steve Smith’s cowardly plea to be protected from the new ball has been meekly granted by Australia’s spineless management team, less than a year after he persuaded them he really wanted to make a go of opening the batting. No official comment has yet been made on whether there is
Continue readingHats off to Harry Brook’s very particular ‘steamrollered pancake pitch’ set of skills
5 minute read This Multan pitch is flatter than a pancake that’s gone under a Looney Tunes steamroller. That doesn’t mean you can score infinite runs on it though. Even Harry Brook had to settle for a mere 317 – and he’s so far made a hundred in every Test he’s played in
Continue readingAs a batter, Joe Root honestly isn’t much fun to write about any more
3 minute read Joe Root reached his latest hundred with one of those reverse sweeps of his. We’ve seen them plenty of times before, of course. We’ve seen all of it plenty of times before. It doesn’t stop being impressive, but it’s become a nagging, cumulative impressiveness that never really leaves you, rather
Continue readingChris Woakes’s back, Jack Leach’s back, James Anderson isn’t – three obvious talking points from day one of Pakistan v England
3 minute read England did really well last time they toured Pakistan. Now they’re back without their captain or any of the quick bowlers who did well in that series. Chris Woakes’s back As in ‘returned’. He hasn’t got ankylosing spondylitis or anything. When England toured and won in 2022, they used four
Continue readingAnother Multan Test pitch preview with Fred Durst
2 minute read The first Test between Pakistan and England starts on Monday – a somewhat jarring fact, given that most of the recent England news has centred on one-day internationals (both results and squads). It will be in Multan (again). To quickly recap: In 2022 England made their first Test tour to
Continue readingLet’s pick the All-Time Greatest Middle-Aged XI
8 minute read The summer just gone brought the retirement of James Anderson at the age of 41. He took 47 Test wickets in his 40s – more than twice as many as anyone else this century. Extending that a little further, he took 224 wickets after the age of 35. In this
Continue readingIndia’s win over Bangladesh was magnificent – full credit to Ben Duckett
3 minute read You’ll have no doubt seen that India rushed to a Test victory over Bangladesh in roughly two days’ worth of cricket after only 35 overs were possible over the first three days. It was an incredible performance from the batting line-up in particular, hustling their way to 285-9 in 34.4
Continue readingLancashire change County Championship divisions for the seventh time in 13 seasons
2 minute read County Championship first division status is crossing the Pennines from Lancashire to Yorkshire and has now made it to, ooh, let’s say Todmorden. It just passed second division status going the other way. (What we’re saying here is that Lancashire have been relegated and Yorkshire have been promoted.) How did
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