King Cricket

October 24, 2013 Pakistan / South Africa

Orchestration and delusion

< 1 minute readAfter losing the first Test to Pakistan, South Africa captain Graeme Smith said: “It should hurt. But this team has too much ability to make this a habit.” We immediately thought about the distinction between confidence and delusion and how the only real difference is what happens afterwards. These seemed

October 23, 2013 County cricket

Exclusive celeb gossip scoop

< 1 minute readA secret source writes: I thought this might interest you. It’s just like the 3am Girls in The Mirror, only with better grammar and more discussion about the state of County Championship wickets than they normally have. Overheard at the gym at the weekend – a regular first-team Lancashire player

October 22, 2013 Extras

A quick Cricket Badger update

< 1 minute readWe won’t do this regularly because that would be boring, but we thought we’d at least let you know how week one of Cricket Badger went. We picked up a couple of hundred subscribers – most within the first day. More pleasingly, we will have about 20 per cent more

October 20, 2013 India

Ishant Sharma’s death bowling

< 1 minute readBailout made an unusually strong and comprehensive argument in favour of Stuart Matsikenyeri when we requested names of players whose continued selection seems inexplicable. However, Ishant Sharma was mentioned more frequently. Sharma seems to be the subject of much scrutiny at the minute. A Cricinfo article about him last week

October 18, 2013 Pakistan

That Pakistan win over South Africa

< 1 minute readNo-one comes here for the clever headlines, right? As most of you know, Pakistan did indeed win the first Test against South Africa, doing so in typically Pakistani style. Chasing 40 to win, they fell to 7-3. At this point, Misbah-ul-Haq, who continually strives to be the most dour batsmen

October 17, 2013 Australia / India

Australia beat India 12-11 at sixes

< 1 minute readSo, technically, one-day cricket isn’t ‘all about hitting sixes these days’ because India won. Australia made 359-5 and India skittered to 362-1 in 43.3 overs in reply. Rohit Sharma hit a hundred and looked quite angry about it. Virat Kohli hit a 52-ball hundred and looked extraordinarily angry about it.

October 16, 2013 India

An important seat has become vacant

< 1 minute readFrank Skinner often talks about there being different ‘seats’ for public figures. The premise is that there are certain timeless jokes which require a well-known figure with certain characteristics for the punchline and there always has to be someone to fulfil that role. The person may change, but the joke

October 16, 2013 Pakistan / South Africa

Pakistan cricket likes to stay in balance

< 1 minute readThis is the conclusion we’ve reached. Far from being a see-saw on a roundabout in an earthquake, Pakistan cricket is actually very stable. It’s just that different branches of it have to compensate when there’s upheaval elsewhere so that the whole remains perfectly balanced. Last month, Pakistan lost a Test

October 15, 2013 Extras

Remember that cricket newsletter we used to write?

2 minute readIt was a weekly email we wrote to promote a cricket magazine. Some people said it was funny. Other people didn’t say anything about it, but still subscribed anyway. A few people didn’t subscribe at all – but not many. Like many things which are almost entirely about seeing Bob

October 14, 2013 South Africa

Was Graeme Smith overprepared?

< 1 minute readWe assume this was why he was just dismissed for 15 in the first Test against Pakistan. Last week, in the only warm-up match for this series, Smith made two against Pakistan A. The innings before that was for Surrey in May. You might think he’d have wanted a bit