< 1 minute readThe 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
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Simon Katich plays a nice innings
< 1 minute readPeople 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 readJust 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 readWe 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 readDaniel 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 readShakib 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
Continue readingJesse Ryder’s back
< 1 minute readIs broad and pudgy and malleable like plasticine. It’s an amorphous, wobbling built-in cushion so he can lie down anywhere and feel comfortable. It’s also a trap. When Jesse Ryder needs to take all that weight off his feet, he plonks himself down and leans into his back’s exquisitely welcoming
Continue readingEngland v New Zealand: it’s been…
< 1 minute read…of a lengthy duration. We’re not the kind of cricket site that’s ashamed when we completely overlook an England one-day international and the nineteenth match in a row between England and New Zealand was no time to adopt professionalism. When England were in New Zealand, they won the Tests and
Continue readingRunning out a player who’s on the deck
< 1 minute readWe like a bit of ruthlessness, but there’s a fairly clear line between ‘ruthlessness’ and ‘being a dick’. We call it the ‘being a dick line’ and we always try and stay the right side of it. England didn’t. Ryan Sidebottom went after the ball and inadvertently decked Grant Elliott
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