< 1 minute readWe’ve got behind Australia to a quite sickening degree in recent days. We’ve intimated that South African defeats can be enjoyable and we’ve sympathised – SYMPATHISED – with Australians when they weren’t able to win a Test series after one little catastrophe. Well enough of that. Let’s get back to
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A two match Test series that was a success on every level
< 1 minute readAustralian defeats, South African defeats, brilliant fast bowling, feisty batting, 47 all out and everyone feeling profoundly irritated at being massively short-changed by there only being two matches – this was the perfect Test series. It was better than anything. It was better than turning up at a restaurant and
Continue readingWhen the fifth day of a Test match has the right ingredients
< 1 minute readThe fifth day of a Test can be dreadful. It can also be the best thing ever. When you get the right ingredients, it’s rich and intoxicating, like a creamy mustard sauce laced with smack. The second (and final) Test between South Africa and Australia is set up perfectly. South
Continue readingOne down in a two Test series
< 1 minute readIt’s a generalisation to say that long-term cricket fans gravitate towards the longest format, but it’s not an outrageous generalisation, like saying that all left-handed people are agents of Lucifer. We’ve twice this year had perfectly civil interaction with someone who has later revealed themselves to be sickeningly wrong-handed, but
Continue readingThere is nothing big or clever or grown-up about wallowing in other people’s misery
2 minute readSo says Bert, who continues: Fortunately, nobody here has ever claimed to be big or clever or grown-up? Anyone like to take a guess at what the following sequence of numbers is? 245, 304, 268, 309, 98, 258, 280, 281, 273, 210, 411, 316, 488, 284, 47 Yes, that’s right
Continue readingBrad Haddin’s wicket was our favourite
< 1 minute readWhen they manufacture a girl band or a boy band, they often work on a simple principle: put enough reasonably attractive people in one place and it’s hard to assess the visual merits of any one individual. When it comes to girl bands, we subconsciously take the best features of
Continue readingAustralia’s lowest Test total of all time
< 1 minute readAs we write, Australia are 22-9 in 12.5 overs. Their lowest total ever is 36 and the lowest Test total of all time is New Zealand’s 26 (both those scores were against England, incidentally). Bizarrely, Australia are actually 210 ahead, thanks to Michael Clarke’s increasingly spectacular 151 in the first
Continue readingA good pitch in Galle in Sri Lanka
< 1 minute readWe haven’t seen today’s play in the first Test between Sri Lanka and Australia, but having seen yesterday’s we’re opting to be quietly impressed rather than blown away by Nathan Lyon’s debut, despite the fact that he took 5-34 in Sri Lanka’s first innings. Why? Because he is bowling on
Continue readingThis has to be the last Matthew Hayden post
< 1 minute readIn 2006, we started writing about how Matthew Hayden spoke bollocks. At that point, his batting drew most people’s attention and it hadn’t been widely acknowledged that the man was sucking all meaning out of words and then piling them together arbitrarily. Now everyone has noticed. Even Michael Atherton’s slagging
Continue readingAustralia have found the new Warne
< 1 minute readSouth Australia off-spinner, Nathan Lyon, has been called up to the Australia Test squad after just four first-class matches. Can we be the first to brand him ‘the next Shane Warne’? You have to get that in early with your Aussie spinners these days, what with the rapid turnover and
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