Free Hit
How much of a loss are Pooran's and Klaasen's retirements to international cricket?
Not as much as many might think: only a fraction of their white-ball internationals were games of real consequence
Osman Samiuddin
12-Jun-2025 • 33 mins ago
Nicholas Pooran has retired from international cricket. Heinrich Klaasen beat him to it by a week. Their retirements may not feel as seismic as some recent ones, but as two of the game's most fearsome and effective middle-order hitters, they're far from insignificant. Their work has always been valued in very modern currencies. Last year, Pooran broke Chris Gayle's record for the most sixes hit in T20s in a calendar year.
Actually, he obliterated it, ending with 170, well past Gayle's 135 in 2015 (Pooran played 38 more innings, which feels at least as relevant a metric). Klaasen ended the same year with 105 sixes, the sixth-most hit in a calendar year.
Between them on that list it is all Gayle, a marker of the esteemed company they are in, as well as a reminder of how far ahead of the game Gayle was back then. Gayle never officially retired from the game; he just kept going until there was nowhere for him to go. But in that too he was presaging.
Full postA tale of two IPL tunes
The tournament has embedded a couple of bits of music in the consciousness of millions
Kaustubh Kumar
09-Apr-2025
Music is central to sporting culture across the globe. From ESPN's SportsCenter jingle to football fans chanting to the tune of "When The Saints Go Marching In", no experience of a game (be it in a stadium or consumed via broadcast), is complete without music. The IPL is no exception.
Over the years, two pieces have been ingrained in the subconscious of anyone who follows the tournament: one that is heard repeatedly at the ground, and one about which much isn't known publicly but which features at various points on every broadcast.
The 0:04-second trumpet riff that is heard through stadiums across India come summer jumped through many hoops before featuring in the IPL. The sound was first heard in a sports context in French rugby matches, and then heavily used during the 2007 rugby World Cup, hosted in France. It comes from the intro of a 1970s Spanish instrumental pasodoble track called "En Er Mundo", composed by Juan Quintero Muñoz.
Full postA Sri Lankan in Lahore: remembering that life-changing night in 1996
Sri Lanka are not playing in this Champions Trophy, but it's hard to feel sad at a venue with such hallowed memories of Aravinda and Co
Andrew Fidel Fernando
03-Mar-2025
I wanted to bring all 5ft 2in of him to mind. Aravinda de Silva, emerging out of the Lahore stadium's pavilion, his mongoose eyes dancing on the night of March 17, 1996.
It was my first time at the scene of Sri Lanka's finest national moments, not just one of Sri Lanka's great cricketing moments. This one cuts across genre, race, class, caste, recency of arrival on the island, and even proximity to established political elites (one of the out groups right now). Sri Lankans fight about plenty, but we are pretty uniformly agreed on this: the 1996 World Cup final was one of the most incredible nights in the history of our nation.
It has cast it shadow on politics, diplomacy, economy, livelihoods… If Sri Lanka had not won the 1996 World Cup, would I ever have had a career in cricket journalism?
Full postSpin cycle: the day Australia's tweakers wrung 23 wickets out
On Saturday, in two Tests thousands of miles apart, four fine spinners gathered a rich harvest
Andrew McGlashan
04-Feb-2025
Has there ever been a day quite like it for Australian spin bowling?
Before you all start shouting with standout moments and performances from the game's history, some of which are, of course, obvious, that first sentence is meant as a reference to the collective.
On Saturday, at the MCG and in Galle, Australia spinners took 23 wickets across two Tests that ran in almost complete parallel, right down to the winning moments that came roughly 90 seconds apart.
Full postHail Steve Smith, the last of the 10k giants
He is the 15th to get to the mark, and no one else looks likely to get there anytime soon - or ever
Osman Samiuddin
31-Jan-2025
Smith-esque. That is to say, the shot that brought Steve Smith his 10,000th Test run was not pretty or ugly. It was just very Smith: a whole lot of fidgety movement, teasing a flamingo, all very compelling, all very watchable for its enduring weirdness, all for a single to wide mid-on. In doing so he became the 15th batter to make it to 10,000 runs. He could be the last.
Kane Williamson and Virat Kohli are, respectively, 724 and 770 runs short, and on the surface, not that far. But the modern cricket calendar is working against Williamson getting there. He is 34, has a maximum of four Tests this year, his 15th as a Test player, and has presently opted out of a central contract. Meanwhile, invisible stumps outside off as well as general bad juju seem to be conspiring against Kohli. He has nine Tests potentially this year, although five this summer in England loom first as decisive.
Even if either or both get there, they'll be the last for a while. Angelo Mathews and Dimuth Karunaratne are the next two in line, but neither will get there, if only because they won't play enough Tests to score the 2000-odd runs they need. Even Marnus Labuschagne, who is 30, has played 56 Tests, and plays for a country that plays enough Tests, is over 5000 runs away currently.
Full postThe problem with Ben Stokes' problem with over-rates penalties
It's not so much an all-teams issue as an England issue
Andrew Fidel Fernando
08-Dec-2024
Hey, stop it! No sniggering over there. This is serious.
The first charge, essentially, is that in places where spinners are more-frequently used, teams tend not to have problems getting through their overs smartly, but the rate of play is necessarily slower on tracks where a huge proportion of overs are bowled by seamers. Spin-bowling overs take less time than seam-bowling ones.
Full postWith Jasprit Bumrah, now I know what it's like to have Wasim Akram play for you
Their actions might differ, but the results are the same - no batter feels safe when they are bowling
George Binoy
04-Dec-2024
The dread began with him at the top of his mark. It intensified as he ran in, manifesting as a knot in the stomach. Fingers were crossed and prayers whispered that the next few seconds would pass without his quick turn and confident appeal - arms aimed at the sky, fingers splayed, ready to be high-fived. Or that spirited celebratory run after disarraying stumps, fists clenched, another batter done.
It felt like even Sachin Tendulkar was especially careful against him (only four dismissals in 31 internationals) to the extent that he took more chances against, and became susceptible to, mortals like Abdul Razzaq and Ata-ur-Rahman.
He knocked out Rahul Dravid with that 1-2-3 combo. Two inswingers (the bowling gods refused him the lbw with the first one so that we could witness that third ball) and an unearthly one that shimmied and shook past the most reliable defence in the game to kiss off stump.
Full postIn Pakistan cricket, glory is temporary, toxicity permanent
After Shan Masood led his side to a redeeming win, the knives and jibes came out
Osman Samiuddin
28-Oct-2024
The way of modern cricket broadcasts is that Shan Masood would barely have finished following through on the winning six he hit that he hadn't quite middled over long-off, before he was being wheeled into various media obligations. Post-match presentation, photos of the winning team, a cameo on the broadcaster's post-match analysis, and then a press conference with the wider media.
Usually these happen almost by rote: the same people asking the same questions, and the same answers delivered in different ways (of late, by many different people), the whole thing a little familiar, sometimes a little pally. On Saturday, though, the PCB's post-match analysis show, Pitch Side, put a harsh and revelatory spotlight on the toxic hinterlands in which Pakistan cricket is wallowing currently.
The presenter, Zainab Abbas, began a question to Masood about the impact six successive losses has on a captain. Began but never completed because she was interrupted by Ramiz Raja, who, as if only then realising it had been six successive losses, pounced on Masood: "By the way how did you achieve this? Six losses in a row. I mean, even if you try to…"
Full postDavid Warner's latest headline grab has underlined Australia's opener problem
A year on from the generational opener's final series, the side are still trying to get their batting line-up right
Andrew McGlashan
23-Oct-2024
Oh, hello David. Thought you were done with international cricket (apart from the offer to play the Champions Trophy if Australia were desperate) after the year-long retirement tour?
But wait, Australia need a Test opener to face India. "I'm always available, just got to pick up the phone," Warner told the Daily Telegraph. "Honestly, if they really needed myself for this series, I'm more than happy to play the next Shield game and go out there and play."
It almost goes without saying that it won't be happening. "You retired," was the coach Andrew McDonald's reported response from a text exchange. But apart from Warner making himself the headline again, it does reinforce that Australia are trying to fill a major hole ahead of the India series.
Full postDoes the cricket audience matter? Only if they're at home, watching on TV
This year's T20 World Cup was a rough deal if you were a travelling fan
Sidharth Monga
16-Sep-2024
The ICC recently released figures of an "economic impact assessment" of the men's ODI World Cup in 2023. It said the event generated an economic benefit of US$1.39 billion for India. More than a million people are said to have attended the matches.
All this despite the shambolic organisation of the event: there was hardly any time for fans to plan travel, given the delayed schedule announcement; there were ticketing troubles; facilities at the venues were poor; and the general lack of ease in getting around Indian cities is well known.
The ICC CEO, Geoff Allardice, called this the "significant economic power of cricket". Don't hold your breath for reports of a similar impact for the men's T20 World Cup in the US and the Caribbean this year. For that World Cup was the most emphatic statement that the economic impact on a host nation, if any, or even the atmosphere at the grounds, is purely incidental. Cricket's No. 1 stakeholder is the audience watching on their TVs or streaming devices.
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