3 minute read Afghanistan’s batters hit several incredible shots in their 291-5 against Australia today, but Ibrahim Zadran’s ramp shot off Pat Cummins gets the nod from us as the most incredible. Before we get into this, let’s first have a handful of honourable mentions. Firstly, Azmatullah Omarzai’s cover drive off Mitchell Starc
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Rahmanullah Gurbaz has a point to make and a point boundary to pepper
2 minute read 2023 World Cup, Game 13, Afghanistan v England England are still 2-1 up on Afghanistan in 50-over World Cup matches. Expand the head to head to include all one-day internationals and England are… 2-1 up. You wonder what sort of damage Rahmanullah Gurbaz and Mujeeb Ur Rahman would have done
Continue readingA Malahide beer tent report (Ireland v India, 2023)
3 minute read Send your match reports to king@kingcricket.co.uk. We’re only really interested in your own experience, so if it’s a professional match, on no account mention the cricket itself. (But if it’s an amateur match, feel free to go into excruciating detail.) Thanks to Chuck for this match report and apologies for
Continue readingIreland now and then and maybe again
3 minute read When England first played Ireland in a Test match four years ago, we had visions of it becoming an annual fixture with a slowly developing history. We’ve followed England cricket long enough to know there was pretty much zero chance that would happen, but the prospect has only seemed more
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2 minute read There’s a lot of joshing around. We’re now going to try and help you stay on top of it all. Tongue Josh Tongue will play for England against Ireland this week. ‘Tongue lashing’ headlines await (although we’ve been quite disappointed how infrequently he’s been described as ‘slippery’ as this does
Continue readingYou do know England are playing Ireland next week, right?
< 1 minute read England are winning a lot, Ireland are losing a lot and all the talk is about the Ashes. This is an absolutely nailed-on Ireland victory. You know it. Do you remember this situation last time around? In 2019, England thought they were warming up for the Ashes. Ireland, in contrast,
Continue readingPaul Stirling and Curtis Campher hundreds show that actually things weren’t ‘only going to get tougher’ for Ireland in Test cricket
2 minute read “It is tough and it’s only going to get tougher,” said Ireland captain Andrew Balbirnie after Sri Lanka won the first Test by an innings and 280 runs. That seemed a wildly inaccurate assessment at the time – and indeed so it has proven. Ireland conceded 591-6 in the first
Continue readingDid you see… David Warner’s suicidal switch-prod?
2 minute read ‘David Warner b Naveen-ul-Haq’ really doesn’t do it justice. You need to see it. Or at least have it described to you alongside a handful of stills. The switch hit is right up there with cricket’s most hubristic shots. It arguably even surpasses the quite-possibly-smashing-it-straight-into-your-own-face peacocking of the ramp shot.
Continue readingSlog of the Day: Paul Stirling v England
2 minute read A paean to pace, the pivot-pan and the perils of the pair of them today. If you’re unaware of the shot known as the pivot-pan, it’s probably because we only just labelled it. As you’ve no doubt guessed, the nomenclature in large part arose because we wanted to slot a
Continue readingIreland take pity on Shimron Hetmyer
< 1 minute read Imagine missing a World Cup because you literally didn’t manage to get on the plane in time. Imagine how you’d feel about that tournament. You could forgive Shimron Hetmyer for perhaps feeling a smidgeon of relief that Ireland absolutely battered the West Indies today, knocking them out of the tournament.
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