Posted by Right. Looks like we’re properly underway when it comes to people talking bollocks about the Ashes, so we may as well start reporting on it.
If you write a book about the Ashes with an Australian, one of the things you both notice is that you tend to have very different perceptions of things. A lot of supposedly unforgettable moments turn out to be entirely forgettable for those in the opposite hemisphere.
It’s a continuum, obviously. At the other end of the scale, sometimes everyone agrees some particular event was a big thing. And then in the middle there’s all the other stuff that was extremely big for people in one nation but sort of “Oh, that was a big deal to you guys, was it?” for people in the other.
We’d say “crease-gate” is roughly on the threshold of those latter two categories. Here in the northern hemisphere, people generally remember Alex Carey running Jonny Bairstow out and the resultant knobheadery from some of the Lord’s members, but the general feeling is that it was big at the time, but now it’s all done and dusted. For some Australians though, it’s symbolic of English entitlement to the extent they assume everyone up here is still stewing about it daily.
For example, the newspaper The West Australian has this week labelled Ben Stokes “Cocky Captain Complainer” and suggested he’s “still smarting from crease-gate” when honestly he’s probably got a few other things on his mind.
But that’s not how it works. In the minds of The West Australian editorial team, Stokes is still going on about Bairstow’s run-out (and other perceived injustices) every chance he gets.
“Despite the hype, England’s cavalier style has been overshadowed by their persistent whingeing – about the Australians in the infamous crease-gate scandal or more recently when Stokes and his mates tried to bully India into ending a game early ‘in the spirit of cricket’.”
We’re not sure this lands too well. Stokes can certainly get het up about stuff, but he generally moves on from stuff pretty quickly.
Breaking [wind]: Sam Konstas hasn’t farted for ages!
Australia have dropped Sam Konstas for Jake Weatherald. But that’s not the big news about the young opener.
Commenting on Konstas’s omission, chair of selectors George Bailey said: “I feel for Sammy because at the moment, if he farts, it’s a headline.”
Has anyone seen a headline about Sam Konstas farting any time recently? No. Ergo, Sam Konstas hasn’t farted.
Probably wise to leave him out, given the pressure to which he’s subjecting himself.
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This is a fantastic BOGOF article, KC.
The first part of it, “Cocky Captain Complainer”, I had spotted on the newswires this morning and thought it would make a great KC article.
“If only King Cricket did requests”, I thought to myself, before spending the rest of the day constantly inwardly-whingeing about the Western Australian press, rather than paying heed to the several meetings I attended and the simultaneously burgeoning e-mail inbox.
But I needn’t have worried. Of course you covered the topic. Of course you did.
On the other hand, the Sam Konstas fart story had entirely passed me by. Well done.
Has Cricket Australia concluded that Konstas is a flatulent track bully, I wonder? I’ll stop gassing and leave it at that.
As a West Australian, this is highly embarrassing. I apologise to all.
Merely a West Australian though. Not The West Australian. That gives you a bit of distance.