King Cricket

January 23, 2013 England / India

Acquiescence and the art of securing an unremarkable defeat

< 1 minute readEngland scored not-enough-runs and then India made slightly more. England’s wasn’t so much a one-day innings as an impression of a one-day innings; an approximation involving steady accumulation and later acceleration, only without either segment being quite what it should have been. We get the impression that Alastair Cook had

January 22, 2013 New Zealand / South Africa

New Zealand beat a South Africa team

< 1 minute readWell played Kane Williamson for scoring 145 not out and well played the rest of you for fielding competently. We’re sure he’ll be delighted about it, but we’re not too sure that Captain Brendon McCullum can take enormous pride in beating a South Africa side featuring the following luminaries: Quinton

January 21, 2013 India

Ravindra Jadeja, school cricket and playing for the turn

2 minute readIn some parts of England, they talk about ‘schools cricket’ – note the plural. This is a bizarre, alien form of the game in which posh 15-year-olds play on immaculate grounds in exquisite locations having been expertly coached by former internationals. ‘School cricket’ (singular) is rather different. In school cricket,

January 18, 2013 Australia / Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka’s new ball attack

< 1 minute readAustralians aren’t always particularly polite about the standard of the opposition. In a way, this is okay, because they’re equally happy to wheel out brutal opinions about their own team when they don’t do well. On the other hand, it does mean that the rest of us can portray dismissive

January 17, 2013 England

England seam bowling stock-take

2 minute readThe problem with giving people names is that we tend to associate certain qualities with those names. This doesn’t happen with bananas. Bananas are interchangeable and are evaluated for what they are. If they’re at peak ripeness, hurray! If they’re bruised and old, we replace them with new bananas. This

January 16, 2013 Extras

On this site five years ago

< 1 minute readThe great thing about making no discernible progress in life is that when there isn’t anything you want to write about, you know where to look to find what you wrote five years ago. On the 16th January, 2008, this website was updated not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES.

January 15, 2013 England / India

Jade Dernbach – where do we all stand on this at the minute?

2 minute readBack when everyone was going mental about Jade Dernbach and his ‘variations’ we pointed out that he was essentially half a bowler. He did the eye-catching things well, but he was fairly useless at the everyday stuff that’s equally important. Shortly after that, we argued that he shouldn’t be dropped,

January 14, 2013 New Zealand / South Africa

New Zealand welcome opportunity to pretend they would have liked the opportunity to salvage some pride

< 1 minute readThis website is against two-Test series, but some people like them. Secretly, New Zealand will be delighted that they don’t have to adopt stern facial expressions in order to state that they are desperate to make amends for previous performances in the third Test. Instead, the players can claim to

January 11, 2013 England / India

James Tredwell brings more wonders

< 1 minute readWhen England won a Test series in India, we felt moved to ask: “Will wonders never cease?” It wasn’t a rhetorical question, so in light of England winning a high-scoring one-day international in India, we now have an answer: WONDERS WILL NEVER CEASE. England don’t do high-scoring one-day matches well.

January 11, 2013 Extras

ODI fielding restrictions – four men outside the circle

< 1 minute readA one-day international (ODI) rule change is nothing new. They fiddle with the regulations more often than Sir Jimmy fiddled with… no, that’s not an acceptable analogy. While rule changes are rarely in themselves interesting, they do just about become worthy of discussion when you think about the impact on