Beyond Cow Corner

. . . because why should those who actually play sport have all the fun of talking about it?

17 December 2010

12 December 2010

Broad's Loss Is XXX's Gain

Members of the Fast Bowlers' Union have been the focus this week, as an injury to Stuart Broad has ended his first overseas Ashes.

Or rather, they were the focus, until they failed to take a wicket in the final 124.4 overs of the match billed as a shoot-out for the vacated Test place.

Matt Prior, instead, took the headlines, in a game that provided little in the way of cricketing interest; little, that is, apart from a surge, at 55-4 in the second innings, in the old feeling -- familiar to any fan of England cricket between 1987 and 2003 -- that England were about to come unstuck. High/lowlights included 3 wickets for Paul 'God' Collingwood, and combined figures of 7 overs for 88 from Strauss and Morgan, with the captain doing his best attempt to polish faecal matter by taking his 3rd first-class wicket (and thus leading to the pub quiz question 'what ignominious cricketing fate links Kevin Pietersen, Stephen Fleming, and Michael Hill?').

So, in the interests of--well, interest, here are 3 alternative -- not entirely serious -- options for the Andies to consider as they ponder filling the Ashes hole.

1. Give Morgan a Go: Colly has proved beyond reasonable doubt that he's a world-class bowler, capable of tearing thro--or, at the very least, conjuring devastat--listen, at least his recent first-class record is better than Mitchell Johnson's, ok? England don't need another bowler. 5-man attack? Pah. 4-man? So last year. Morgan in at 5, Colly the superstar all-rounder at 6, Bell, Prior, and 3 bowlers.

2. Why not Monty? Rub it in the Aussies' faces: trouble finding one spinner, eh? We've got so many, we don't know what to do with them. Granted, playing two spinners on the bouncing, swinging deck at the WACA may not be a great idea, but it could just be a stroke of genius. Besides, Finn and Anderson will have them 7 down before lunch on the first day, anyway.

3. Go Local: there must be an England-qualified medium-fast journeyman languishing somewhere in Australian grade cricket. (Does the name Darren Pattinson ring any bells?) No, we don't need to go looking, but it might make the Aussies feel a bit better about their selectorial machinations. (Isn't Schadenfreude great?)

Not that it really matters. After Stuart Broad's golden duck and MJ's 32-ball 0 at Brisbane, Ryan Harris's Adelaide pair, and 4 wickets in 7 innings between the three of them, England's new no. 8 doesn't have a lot to live up to.

7 December 2010

Things We Have Learnt from the Ashes So Far (Part Two)

  • Cook must be loving this Ashes lark: after two Tests, though his average has plummeted from 302 to a measly 225, the young opener appears to be doing his best to grind my gloomy comments into the dust; the horrific 2009 series, in which a first innings 95 was the only score above 32, and he failed 5 times on a score of smaller than 11, is a distant memory.
  • KP is back to his confident, nay, obnoxiously arrogant best: the wicket of Michael Clarke on the fourth evening was the unnecessary cherry on the cake of an English double-centurion who has finally banished the demons that have plagued him in recent years -- not only did he spend much of his 227 taking apart one Australian left-arm spinner, but the dismissal of Clarke, fittingly, saw him dismiss another.
  • Swann is bowling like a match-winner: not that this is particularly unexpected, but I thought it was worthy of note, if only because I was very close to including something along the lines of 'Swanny needs to buck his ideas up' in my last post. Good job I decided not to, then.

29 November 2010

Things We Have Learnt from the Ashes So Far

  • Cook's place is probably not under threat: an average of 310 in the 2010 Ashes to date will do wonders for a batsman's self-confidence.
  • Trott is yet to play an Ashes test without making a hundred: statistics never lie. Ok, so it's a fairly small sample, but it's the sort of thing to get up the collective nose of an Ozzie attack. Speaking of which...
  • Doherty and Johnson are no Warne and McGrath: with combined match figures of 90.5-15-318-2 (an amalgam that actually does Xavier Doherty a disservice, as both the wickets were his), these two are unlikely to give England's batsmen any sleepless nights. I'd say Doherty's place is safe for now (Smith's single wicket against WA is unlikely to have XD [isn't that a smiley face of some sort?] quaking in his boots), but Harris and Bollinger are breathing down Johnson's neck -- I'd expect at least one of them to come in (with, possibly, Hilfenhaus making way as well).
  • An England series win is still a possibility: ok, so that was hardly going to be overturned by a single test, but I'll take any opportunity to put a positive spin on things -- my prediciton is still on. (I'm going for 2-1.)
EDIT: Cook's average is 302, not 310, not that it matters much...

24 November 2010

Why I Want Ricky Ponting to Win the Ashes...Maybe

Don't get me wrong.

Come midnight tonight -- well, that's if I can be bothered to stay up into the night for a contest between the teams world-ranked, as Andy Zaltzman puts it, fourth [and] fifth. Out of, basically, 8 -- I'll be cheering Strauss & Co. on like your next cricket-obsessed English loon. (Incidentally, doesn't 'Strauss & Co.' sound like a gentlemen's outfitters from the late 19th century?)

And if there's one figure in world cricket I truly despise, it is Ricky 'sour grapes' Ponting, with his face like a constipated bulldog chewing a wasp wrapped in a cow-pat. (Actually, maybe that's what he has been chewing, all these years. Would explain a lot.)

The fact is, though, that Ricky Ponting, loath him or dislike him, is one of the greatest cricketers to walk the face of the earth. Yes, he whinges a fair bit, but he's second only to The Don in the batting rankings of a country that has produced a fair few good cricketers; ok, so he has a slight weakness on the legside, now that his flexibility and footwork aren't what they used to be, but he scored so many runs at under-13 level club cricket (507 in 7 innings, with an average of 507) that they had to change the rules governing when a batter should retire.* And he may not appear to be the most dazzling of Ozzie captains -- his propensity to bat when winning the toss is reaching near-pathological levels -- he is still, as David Boots argues, one of the most successful skippers ever.

I don't particularly want to see such greatness -- the word is overused, but not, I believe, in this case -- trashed because Punter happens to be only the third Australian captain in history to lose 3 Ashes series. Firstly, given the current ICC standings, does The Ashes really matter all that much? And secondly, it's not like Australia were trounced in either of the other two: in 2005, England were handed a giant stroke of luck when a cricket ball, for once, didn't do what Glenn McGrath wanted it to; in 2009, Australia were not so much beaten into submission as bored into it by a dogged 10/11 partnership.

So it is with mixed emotions that I predict an England series win this time around.** It will be great if we do inflict another defeat on a faltering long-term adversary; I just wish the losing captain had scored a few fewer than 12,250 Test runs.





*Sorry, you're relying on my memory for this, as I can't find a link to the article -- it was in one of the UK national broadsheets at the weekend, though.

**Given the success of my last prediction, in which I failed to even predict the number of players England would take on tour, let alone their names, I'd take this with a huge lump of salt.

20 August 2010

Past Achievement vs. Future Promise

It's been a mixed couple of days for England's cricketers.

Graeme Swann's fortunes appeared to have continued on a downward spiral, post-Catgate, as his name was left off the ICC longlist for cricketer of the year. This snub -- and any resulting effects -- lasted barely 24 hours, though, as he was added to the list, and promptly picked up his 98th, 99th, 100th, and 101st Test wickets.

At the other end of the scale, Alastair Cook continued his rather ignominious battle with Salman Butt (batting totals in last five innings: 1, 8, 7, 0, 17) for the title of 'least in form left-handed opener of the series' by adding a meagre 6 runs to his aggregate of 41 in 4 previous innings.

I'm more than prepared to eat a whole dish of humble pie this evening, following a gritty 120 from Cookie that forms the backbone of an eventually-match-winning 200+ lead. The trouble is, I don't think he's going to deliver. Yes, Cook may be the second-youngest batsman in the world, after a certain ST, to reach 4000 Test runs. But past achievement, even when compared with the current greatness of a batsman such as Tendulkar, is not necessarily an indicator of future success.

Graeme Swann's achievements provide an interesting point of comparison. The third of Swann's four wickets yesterday placed him on an intriguing list of players to take 100 wickets in 23 Tests. The names Mankad, Underwood, Warne, McGrath, Mushtaq, and Kaneria will no doubt catch the eye, but it is another English name that is of note, here: nestled between the two great Pakistani spinners is one Stephen James Harmison.

In his prime, Harmison was undeniably a good -- even, on a certain March morning at Sabina Park in 2004, a great -- bowler. But he will never be lauded along with the Indian, English, Australian, and Pakistani names that he and Swann both join at 23 on the 100 list.

Swann's performances over the next years -- not his achievements over the past 23 matches -- will determine whether he goes the way, in English bowling terms, of Underwood or Harmison. Cook's fortunes, similarly, hang in the balance; though a decision on his future may come sooner rather than later.

[POSTSCRIPT, 3pm: Cook falls, 10 runs short of the fairly arbitrary total I set him. Mmmm, tasty.]

17 August 2010

On the Kelvin Scale

Graeme Swann's drink-driving charges this week might have been seen as a distraction from the task in hand, as the no. 3 in the World Test bowling rankings was forced to miss training a mere 48 hours before the third Test against Pakistan. What caught the eye in the Cricinfo report on Swann's absence on Monday, however, was the input from the no. 3 in the England T20 batting lineup, one 'Kelvin' Pietersen.

The form of Kaypee, former captain and once the first name on [insert England coach here]'s team-sheet, has been a worry of late. Stephen Brenkley has written about the dipping Test average that will soon plumb depths from which even a Man of the Series Twenty20 performance won't be able to drag him. What this story about Swann shows, however, to the English media and -- equally importantly -- the Australian dressing-room alike, is that here is a cricketer who remains at the heart of (*yuk*) 'Team England': it is KP's twitted comments on Swannee's predicament that make the headlines, ahead of the more professional summary of the team captain.

And it reveals something about Swann, too: even within the England team there are grumblings about the South-African-born contingent. I wonder how Andrew Strauss feels about that?

7 August 2010

Why Cricket Doesn't Matter

Umar Gul and Yasir Hameed are two players who have not been at the centre of the Pakistani cricket uproar in recent weeks, but they are significant for two reasons. Firstly, they have provided the Pakistani team with some rare high points in a lacklustre all-round performance in the little-more-than-five days of Test cricket in the series so far: Gul's 65* from no. 9 was not only the team's highest score of the first innings of the first Test, it came at a S/R comfortably higher than those around him, a stat that he reproduced in the second innings; his stats as a bowler have been pretty good, too, with 4 wickets at a respectable 31.5. Hameed's single contribution had less of an impact, but his ability to do what very few of his team-mates had done -- actually hold onto a catch -- makes his role in the side a noteworthy one.

Secondly, however, there is the question of the provenance of these two men. Whilst most of the squad are Punjabi by birth -- nearly half were born in Lahore, in the east of the country -- these two hail from Peshawar, in North-Western Frontier Province. For those of you who've been living under a rock, Gul and Hameed could be forgiven for having things other than the thwack of leather on willow on their mind at present: with current statistics for the flooding in Pakistan touching 12 million affected out of a population of 166 million, it doesn't take a vast imaginative leap to consider that these two -- if not a greater number of the tourists -- might have been directly affected in some way.

It seems to be the done thing at the moment, after successive batting collapses of monumentally inept proportions, to lambast the Pakistani cricket team. Well, after five years that have seen a major earthquake in the vicinity, a terrorist attack on a fellow international cricket team in Lahore, and now this month's floods -- not to mention, within the sport, match-fixing allegations, international bans and the rest -- is it any wonder that they're a bit . . . ermm . . . out of sorts?

A couple of days after my recent post about Murali's status as an all-time great, I read a newspaper piece that suggested Warne's career achievements were the greater as he got a lower percentage of his wickets against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. I think if the recent travails of the Pakistanis show us anything, they serve as a reminder that the fortunes of all international cricket teams rise and fall -- West Indies after 2003 would be a good example, but England teams of the 90s and early 00s were fairly shocking, too -- and for reasons that don't always have everything to do with the sport. This is the beauty of international cricket: that it is at one and the same time a serious business for millions of people, and something that -- when faced with the natural and political disasters of certain regions of the world -- matters not a jot.

28 July 2010

Four Months to Go

Strange though it may seem, given that we're still a few days shy of August, tomorrow sees the start of England's final Test series before this winter's Ashes. Though Alec Stewart was right to call for a focus on the opponents in hand when he surveyed England's prospects against Pakistan, thoughts will inevitably -- given the English sporting media's tendency towards future-focused hype; see coverage of London 2012, f'rinstance -- be turned at least partially Brisbane-wards.

I'm willing to be proved wrong (or, indeed, argued against) here, but I reckon Messrs Cook, Strauss, Pietersen, Collingwood, Broad, Swann, and Anderson are -- barring injury -- guaranteed a place in the starting XI come the 25th of November. So who has something to prove?

Jonathan Trott
He can't dine out on that Ashes-winning century for ever; the rest of the world have since figured out his mental frailties, and Bollinger, Johnson and co. aren't likely to cut him any slack.
Prediction: in the XI at 3/4.

Ian Bell
Ok, so the Australians aren't going to lose any sleep over seeing his name on the team-sheet, but he's still England's best option to join Paul Collingwood and steady the ship and the middle order, and he's also their most technically gifted batsman of his generation. There, I said it. Shoot me.
Prediction: in the XI at 6.

Eoin Morgan
The selectors have taken a commendable gamble on Morgan's ability to adapt to Test cricket. Could still stake a place in the XI, but barring an injury to Bell I think he'll be carrying the drinks.
Prediction: in the squad.

Ravi Bopara
Behind Trott, Bell, and Morgan in the pecking order, but should get a place in the squad if he can continue his sparkling recent county form.
Prediction: in the squad.

Owais Shah
Look, some batsmen -- Nick Knight springs to mind -- are fated to base their international careers on the shorter form of the game, and their Test careers never really get going. Can Shah be once and for all consigned to that pile, please?
Prediction: a white Christmas.

Luke Wright
No, he will never be Botham; no, England don't automatically need an all-rounder (newsflash: Flintoff wasn't all that, for much of his career); yes, it's time to let him go.
Prediction: walking in a winter wonderland.

Matt Prior
His glovework has improved immeasurably, but his batting appears to have gone backwards. He's lucky Craig Kieswetter's 'keeping is nowhere near 5-day standard, yet, or he could be pushed out of the Test team as well as the shorter formats.
Prediction: in the XI.

Craig Kieswetter
Unlikely to get a chance in this series to prove that he can compete with Prior behind the stumps. Will go to Australia as back-up, if needed.
Prediction: in the squad.

Steve Finn
We have Broad and Swann at first and second changes for control; what we need from an opening partnership -- and I'm assuming Anderson will be asked to 'lead the attack' -- is, frankly, a bit of aggression. Steve Finn -- all 6'7" of him -- provides just that. He may not yet have the stifling accuracy of his idol McGrath, but on Australian pitches his pace and bounce may just be able to trouble Pigeon's old team-mates.
Prediction: in the XI.

Ajmal Shahzad
His performance in the last Test showed enough promise to suggest he'll make an excellent replacement bowler should Broad/Anderson/Finn break down.
Prediction: in the squad.

James Tredwell
England's second-choice Test spinner goes as cover for Swann.
Prediction: in the squad.

Tim Bresnan
Just about scrapes in, for his batting as well as his bowling. I know, I know, in a 4-man attack -- please, England, please -- you don't need that much of a contribution, runs-wise . . . but it just adds a bit of confidence to have someone who can do a bit of willow-wielding down the order.
Prediction: in the squad.

Ryan Sidebottom & Graham Onions
Thanks for the memories, guys, but with the current unexpected crop of young seamers neither of you should get much of a look-in. Injuries suck.
Prediction: watching on tv.

So that gives a 17-man squad -- the 1st XI, 2 back-up batsmen, a 'keeper, a spinner, and 2 seamers -- of: Strauss (c), Anderson, Bell, Bresnan, Bopara, Broad, Collingwood, Cook, Finn, Kieswetter, Morgan, Pietersen, Prior, Shahzad, Swann, Tredwell, Trott.

Now bring on the injuries.

23 July 2010

A Certain Smile

It is a truth universally acknowledged -- or, at least, it should be -- that a practising politician weighing in on a sporting topic will nearly always sound contrived. To return to recent football world cup disasters for a moment, take the hideously contrived response from David Cameron to the Frank Lampard 'goal' against Germany, or the Nigerian and French political tantrums over their respective teams' failures.

In general, such incursions on the sporting arena will generate, at most, a bemused shrug from all concerned; in some cases, however, the intrusion of a public figure can cause real damage. John Howard's 2004 description of Muttiah Muralitharan as 'a chucker' was one of these.

Six years on, Muralitharan's Test career has come to an end, and the doubters who -- silently, or vocally -- agreed with the then Australian president are likely to persist in the belief that his astonishing haul of 800 wickets was achieved by means that contravene the careful distinction between throwing and bowling in a cricketing context.

I have to admit, deep down, that I am no exception. That is not to say I believe that what he does is illegal; his birth defect, the flexible joints, and the fact that others have been shown to flex far more in delivering a cricket ball all quash any such allegations. No, I mean that, for me, what Muralitharan has achieved will forever be tainted by the accusations of others. It’s not his fault, by any means, but it did spoil my enjoyment somewhat when I saw the wild celebrations in Galle yesterday when Mahela Jayawardene took his 157th Test catch, Sri Lanka took a 1-0 lead in the series, and Murali’s career finished on a satisfyingly round number.

To set the record straight, then, in tribute to the great man, here are an over's worth of reasons why Murali should be viewed as the greatest bowler of all time.

* 800 Test wickets is an truly mind-boggling total, but the most statistically impressive aspect is the frequency with which they came: over 134 matches, he averaged 5.97 wickets a game. The only bowler in the 10 leading wicket-takers of all time to even get over 5 wpg was Sir Richard Hadlee, whose 431 in 86 averages out at 5.01.

* The pressure generated by his unnerving accuracy at one end generated an unquantifiable number of wickets for the Sri Lankans who bowled in tandem with him. But don't take my word for it; here's Chaminda Vaas: 'It was easy for me to bowl from the other end because he was so tight, I have taken so many wickets thanks to Muralitharan.'

* As much as he was taking wickets for others, he rarely had others to take wickets for him. Vaas and -- more recently -- Malinga were notable exceptions, but in general Murali went it alone. His 5- and 10-wicket hauls -- 67 and 22, respectively -- are testament to this. (Shane Warne, next on the list in both categories, barely achieved half those numbers, with 37 and 10.)

* He certainly wasn't in the side for his batting. Test and ODI high scores of 67 and 33* don't sound too shabby, but these get put into perspective when viewed alongside his batting averages: 11.67 and 6.76 (alongside a T20 average of 0.5!) show that fielding sides were hardly quaking in their boots at the thought of Muralitharan in protective gear.

* He took -- and will keep on taking -- a phenomenal number of wickets in ODIs: 515, and counting (he hasn't yet announced his pyjama retirement). And if he had been born a decade or two later, who knows how many he would have added to his fledgeling haul of 13 T20 wickets?

* Last, and in my opinion certainly not least, he played the game quite literally with a smile. If for no other reason, this is why we should cherish the memory of Murali’s game, for this is what cricket is all about. Murali, as well as being fiendish to face, played with such happiness, such a knowledge that it was all a game. The smile that conveyed that love of entertainment will be his abiding legacy, and also -- one can’t help but feel -- what John Howard would have been met with if he’d voiced his opinion to Murali’s face.


ps. Thanks, as usual, to cricinfo for the stats used in this post.

pps. In other news this week, guess who got his second Test 5-for in as many games? Elementary.

16 July 2010

Old Kids on the Block

'Underestimating the Australian cricket team' is an activity that comes about as recommended as taking one's eye off a bouncing football at a crucial moment, even after weeks of press coverage had focused on the unpredictable aerodynamics of said missile, or daring to publicly mourn the loss of a foreign religious leader whose values were opposed to the pro-Israeli opinions held by your supposedly 'objective' and 'liberal' employers (ouch...enough with the politics). And in the time of a McGrath-Warne or Thompson-Lillee partnership, it is one in which an England team could certainly not have been accurately accused of indulging.

Yet the success of the England team in the recent ODI series over their antipodean antagonists, and the somewhat unlikely triumph at the World T20, have started murmurings about a showing in Brisbane in November fit to banish memories of a certain Harmison-Flintoff-second slip incident 4 years ago.

Luckily, such rumblings have not emanated from the two most important figures in the England set-up, The Two Andies ('It's goodbye from him...'). The plain-spoken honesty (is there any other kind? I'm slipping into journalese, myself) of Messrs Strauss and Flower has been praised in recent days by Andy Bull. Underestimating the Aussies -- like overestimating the English -- is not, on this evidence, an option.

And looking at the result from the first neutral Test at Lord's in 98 years, this appears to be a good thing. Not because of the potency of a new generation of potent young pace bowlers: the two men who almost single-handedly took apart the Pakistani team on the second and fourth afternoons at Lord's -- Shane Watson (5-40) and Marcus North (6-55) -- were a 29-year-old journeyman seamer now better known for his batting and a 30-year-old part-time tweaker. Simon Katich's battling pair of 80s won him the man-of-the-match award for Australia, but the two names to join batsmen Charles Kelleway and Warren Bardsley on the neutral Test honours board in the visitors' dressing room at The Home of Cricket were bowlers. England, watch out.

11 July 2010

Trust the Tale Over the Artist

Just a quick note on why I decided to start writing this. It took a month for me to get round to it, but looking back the inspiration came from the incomparable Simon Barnes:


'Everyone has a view: every sincere view is valid.' Well said. When he adds 'the invitation to lose perspective is always there', I couldn't agree more; this blog appears to be about little else, so far...

10 July 2010

Getting a Grip

Ok, so being beaten by Bangladesh for the first time in all competitive cricket isn't great; but it isn't the end of the world. Amid the storms of gnashing and wailing that may well follow the second failure of a national (male) sports team inside 3 weeks, here's a rather un-English suggestion: let's have a think about the positives to be gleaned from the wreckage of Ian Bell's left foot and another braking of the Craig Kieswetter bandwagon.

It had to be coming
New Zealand, the fifth nation to assume test-playing status, started their first game of international cricket on the 10th of January 1930. Twenty-six years passed before, in Auckland in March 1956, they recorded their first win over a touring West Indies team. Bangladesh's first foray into international cricket came, appropriately enough, in England, in the 1979 ICC Trophy; their first victory over England was thus 31 years in the making. So basically -- even though we're talking about the first victory ever, rather than simply over England, and disregarding the fact that the more recent span will have included far more games of cricket -- it was about time.

We haven't won the Ashes
After the first three matches of the most recent series of ODIs, an uninformed observer could have been forgiven for thinking the England team had managed a repeat of a certain 2005 and 2009 achievement, and a little replica urn was already in the bag (or trophy cabinet, depending on how mixed you like your metaphors). While the final two rubbers dampened the spirits slightly, momentum is a powerful force: a 3-2 scoreline provided ample evidence -- so the thinking inevitably went -- for a surge in English power in the game. This result may just remind the sporting hack fraternity that Brisbane in November is still a long way away.

Calm down, dear
Following on from that last point, it's less than two short months since England's much-praised victory in Barbados, and already cricket journos are talking in animated terms about England's chances in next year's World Cup. Surely a little sense of perspective is a good thing?