< 1 minute read Bat and bat and bat. That was Shivnarine Chanderpaul’s advice to Jerome Taylor last week when the latter got a hundred. Shiv followed his own advice against New Zealand yesterday. He made 126. He was not out, obviously, because that’s the way Shiv rolls. Not that Shiv could ever roll.
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Jerome Taylor somehow hits a Test hundred
< 1 minute read Jerome Taylor had a Test average of 13.66 before this match, a first-class average of 12.61 and a top score of 40. Somehow he hit 106 against New Zealand. After his hundred, Taylor said: “It was the sort of pitch that, once you got in, it got easier.” How did
Continue readingTim McIntosh summons the spirit of Mark Richardson
< 1 minute read It strikes us that New Zealand are a side who can benefit from a good old-fashioned batting line-up with a trio of blockers at the top of the order followed by the strokemakers. Kiwi batsmen do tend to be one or the other and an early stultathon will set the
Continue readingChris Martin – not the best bowler in New Zealand
< 1 minute read The angular-elbowed, overly springy-running, Kiwi namesake of Dorset-raised, middle-class Coldplay singer, Chris Martin, has been dropped by New Zealand. What do you make of this? (Assuming you can work out what ‘this’ is from that sentence.) We partly think ‘who for?’ being as New Zealand don’t exactly have heaps of
Continue readingSimon Katich plays a nice innings
< 1 minute read People who decide man of the match awards are stupid. If there are loads of runs in the match, man of the match adjudicators think the batsmen have all batted really well and pick the guy who scored the most. If it’s a really low-scoring game, they think the bowlers
Continue readingMoving ball! Moving ball!
< 1 minute read Just close your eyes, stick your arse out, wobble your bat at a funny angle and hope. It’ll be fine. This is the technique for dealing with the moving ball. There is absolutely no way that this is the wrong approach. Three people out? Just stick with it. It’ll reap
Continue readingJesse Ryder quarantined
< 1 minute read We have never once seen someone quarantined without dire consequences for everyone on earth. It starts with vomiting. It ends with zombies or a flesh-eating virus. Maybe there’s an alien gestating inside Jesse Ryder as we speak – Lord knows, there’s room for one. It’s at times like this that
Continue readingDaniel Vettori – the premier slow left-arm all-rounder
< 1 minute read Daniel Vettori took 9-133 in this Test. Shakib al Hasan took 9-116. Daniel Vettori hit 76 in his second innings. Shakib al Hasan hit 71. Daniel Vettori hit 55 not out in his first innings. Shakib al Hasan got five. Daniel Vettori wins. New Zealand win. Shakib al Hasan loses.
Continue readingShakib al Hasan becomes a Test player
< 1 minute read Shakib al Hasan has played six Tests before this current one against New Zealand, but he hasn’t hit a fifty and before today he was averaging over a hundred with the ball. Not any more. After Bangladesh recovered from a rocky start to their innings to post a mediocre 245,
Continue readingMashrafe Mortaza takes New Zealand to the cleaners
< 1 minute read “Daniel Vettori, Brendon McCullum, Jacob Oram – this is the cleaners. The washing powder’s over there. It’s a quid for a full cycle and 20p for the dryers.” “Thanks Mashrafe.” Mashrafe Mortaza’s 4-44 today set up Bangladesh’s win. Mashrafe now has 116 ODI (one-day international) wickets at 31.78. He’s very
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