3 minute readJimmy Anderson has played 179 Test matches and he was completely pissed off to lose this one by a single run. Jimmy Anderson is a quite majestically irritable cricketer. The penultimate ball of the second Test between New Zealand and England could, and probably technically should, have been called a
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3 minute readWe once joked that England’s plan for Jonny Bairstow was to keep him guessing. It always seemed like the aim was to treat him as inconsistently as possible to keep him on his toes. After scoring four hundreds and a fifty in five innings last summer, it seemed safe to
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4 minute read“It could be really entertaining, like that 2005 series, which is what made me fall in love with cricket. The prospect of that is really exciting.” – Ollie Pope, February 2023. Bless him, he’s excited. He’s also completely wrong. The fundamental mistake that Ollie Pope has made here is a
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3 minute readA year ago, during the 50-over tournament, we headlined our semi-finals preview piece, Who will lose to Australia in the World Cup final? Even if it’s a different format, it’s tempting to take the same attitude now. But if there’s one thing we’re sure of, it’s that life isn’t an
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2 minute readWith 15 minutes to go on day two, Stuart Broad walked out to bat at number four as England’s “Nighthawk”. Second ball he skied a hook that fell to earth after bowler and keeper left it for each other. It is hard to envisage a more Broad passage of play.
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< 1 minute readThere was a moment during the first Test against New Zealand when England’s number five, Harry Brook, boasted a Test average and strike-rate that were both 94. Either of those would be ridiculous. Both is preposterous. Then he got out. How did Harry Brook get out? We could have told
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3 minute readWhen the weather allows New Zealand to get onto the field for the first Test against England, their attack will be without Kyle Jamieson (stress fracture) and Matt Henry (looming child). It will also be without Trent Boult because apparently no one has really decided on a selection policy for
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4 minute readSouth Africa wanted to win this one. England were happy to loosen a few limbs. That’s kind of how it went. In many ways this South Africa v England series was the definitive pointless bilateral: a little island of three one-day internationals dropped right in the middle of another tournament
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3 minute readWho’s up for the contest then? No? Got somewhere else to be, have you? We don’t know if you’ve ever seen the highly violent Indonesian martial arts ballet, The Raid, but there’s a character in that who’s really, really, very much up for a fight. He’s called Mad Dog, so
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2 minute read“Bazball” is an ill-defined woolly-yet-squidgy concept that you can smush around to mean pretty much anything you want. We’ve been here before. Speaking ahead of South Africa’s home one-day series against England, captain Temba Bavuma spoke about his team’s way of going about things and how they might look to
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