< 1 minute readIn the first one-day international against South Africa at Bloemfontein, England, batting first, again failed to pass 400. In so doing they extended a barren run which now stretches all the way back to June. On a flat pitch, they would have expected to have done better. South Africa, Australia
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When should we start thinking about the World T20?
< 1 minute readApparently things don’t ‘hove into view’. They actually heave into view – it’s just that no-one says that. One thing’s for certain though, things that demand this verb are large and cumbersome. A cat never heaves into a view, for example (although it may well heave while in view, if
Continue readingWhich struggling England Test batsman is currently of most interest to people?
< 1 minute readWe’re not interested in anyone’s actual opinion, but we are interested in who people have opinions about. If we were a mainstream media outlet, we’d bill this as being ‘Twitter’s verdict’ as if Twitter’s a single person with a single opinion and a single voice. What we will instead say
Continue readingWhy were we going to write about Roger Telemachus?
< 1 minute readAnyone? Any idea? We’ve been doing a bit of housework around the ‘back end’ of the site and while we were doing this, we spotted a draft of an article from 2011. It was entitled, simply, “Roger Telemachus”. That’s intriguing, we thought, and so we opened the page to see
Continue readingHow many Tests before you can fairly judge a batsman?
2 minute readBased on their returns in this series, many are calling for some combination of Alex Hales, Nick Compton and James Taylor to be dropped. Then again, based on their returns in this series it’s equally valid to suggest that Alastair Cook and James Anderson should be dropped. It’s almost as
Continue readingThe incompetence deception – England’s greatest ruse
< 1 minute readTruly, it is the best of times. England have hit upon a quite brilliant ploy whereby they disguise themselves as a crap team and yet still win Test series. Expectations remain low, meaning every win is a glorious and uplifting surprise for fans. After the fourth day’s play, Rob Key
Continue readingHashim Amla – the other best batsman in the world
2 minute readCricket loves to rank things. You’d think the whole point of a cricket match was to determine which of two teams was the better, but apparently that’s not enough. Cricket also wants to know how the teams involved compare to all other current sides and how each of the players
Continue readingEngland – select patient
< 1 minute readThis would be the slogan of England under Trevor Bayliss if they went to a crappy marketing company and paid them a billion pounds for branding. That’s how you do slogans these days. You make them grammatically jarring. That’s the old rope you get for your stacks of cash. Here’s
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Shivnarine Chanderpaul – the last great West Indies cricketer
2 minute readThe world’s coaching manuals can breathe a sigh of relief because the greatest dissident of modern times has officially called it a day. No-one who remains will question them quite so persuasively. Cricket’s lost a lot. The start and end When Shivnarine Chanderpaul made his Test debut, he did so
Continue readingStephen Cook takes care of the present
< 1 minute readThere was a classic Bob Willis moment during the third Test when Charles Colvile asked the lugubrious pundit about South Africa’s then opening batsman. “Well you know my opinion on Stiaan Van Zyl, Charles,” responded Bob – because having repeatedly voiced that opinion throughout the series, he no longer needed
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