Jarrod Kimber
Not a Sachin article
This one's about his fans and what they must do now to protect the game he loved
Jarrod Kimber
17-Nov-2013
I think we can all agree the problem of recent times is a lack of Sachin Tendulkar articles. But this is not a Sachin Tendulkar article.
Not because I couldn't retell my story about the day I almost saw him bat at the MCG in front of 300 people, any anecdote involving him and Jesse Ryder sharing the same field, or even how a woman once told me that Sachin doesn't much care for cheese. It's just that if there is an angle on Sachin Tendulkar, I am sure by now it has been covered. Here's an interesting fact: the story of Tendulkar driving his sports car late at night to avoid Mumbai traffic has now been told ten million times more than he ever actually drove late at night.
But this is not a Sachin Tendulkar article.
Full postWelcome back, Jesse
Billions of one-day runs and administrative goof-ups getting you down? Big J comes to warm the cockles of your heart
Jarrod Kimber
04-Nov-2013
People smiled this week. They smiled as they went about the mundane regularity of this prison-like experience we all live in. And it wasn't even about Sachin Tendulkar. Most of the people in the world who smiled this week did so because Jesse Ryder is back. And because he is Jesse Ryder, he didn't just come back and say hello, he came back and said hundred. HUNDRED. That is how you come back from a life-threatening attack. That is how you spit in the eye of a coma. Take that, attackers. Every other comeback in history shall now be rated on the Jesse Ryder scale in my heart.
Dan Vettori's 15-month break from first-class cricket was also ended in style when he took a five-wicket haul. That is a semi-Jesse on the scale.
Sadly for Darryn Randall, there will be no comebacks. Randall (who played four first-class matches for Border in South Africa) was playing club cricket, wearing a helmet and playing a pull shot - all things many cricketers around the world have done. Horrifically, the ball struck him on his head and he never recovered. He was pronounced dead in the hospital. Randall was only 32.
Full postZip-a-du-Pless-i
This week we look at trouser-related crimes, administrator spats, and everything that's dominated by Indians
Jarrod Kimber
27-Oct-2013
It's not far from the M Chinnaswamy Stadium to the HAL (Hindustan Aeronautics Limited) Sports ground. But if you want to play for the Bangalore United Cricket Club, you'd have to make your way to the Old Airport Road for the game. It won't be televised or tweeted about, and billions won't live or die by the result. But there was Rahul Dravid, far from the Royal Rajasthan rampallions, just making a hundred in a Karnataka State Cricket Association Group 1, Division 2 match. Rumour has it, if you cut Rahul Dravid, he bleeds linseed oil.
With the amount of rain following Indian matches at the moment, Dravid's next match might be a sellout. Despite the last match being washed out, Dhoni's house was still stoned. Perhaps because throwing the stones at the clouds would have required an arm like Tom Moody. Australia lead 2-1 in that series, which should be cricket's dullest scoreline, but Bangladesh and New Zealand's 0-0 Test series was pretty dull. Especially when you include the fact that New Zealand's warm-up match was also abandoned without a ball being bowled.
Luckily, and always, Pakistan saved the day. It was enough that they rode the Misbah to the top of the mountain to cut the head off the lion in the first Test. Beating South Africa once should have been enough to at least get the Misbah haters and fickle Pakistan fans to shut up for a minute, but instead they played the next Test. That turned out to be a big mistake. Misbah failed once in the whole series (no, two Tests is not really a series), and Pakistan gave up any chance of winning the series with a total of 99 runs. In the end, they lost by an innings and 92 runs, despite Misbah and Asad Shafiq trying to save their team in the second innings.
Full postSachin special supplement
Where you only get the biggest news of the era
Jarrod Kimber
13-Oct-2013
Every now and then an event happens that is so momentous that the normal news hurl is almost forced to be about just that issue. But the thing is, when everyone in the world is writing about it, it seems silly to focus on it as well. Plus, it wouldn't be honouring cricket properly if we just focused on one man, so instead we will not focus too much on perhaps one of the biggest things to ever happen to cricket. We will just say this: Steve Harmison, you will be missed.
Australia scored lots of runs against India in the only T20 of the series. India scored more. There are now seven ODIs to come. You know what they say about a seven-match ODI series: "Make it stop, make it stop, MAKE IT STOP".
Bangladesh are currently hosting New Zealand in a runfest. Both teams put on huge first-innings totals. To make the tedium even thicker it then started to rain. Late on the fifth day many alternative folk female singers sang with quirky voices about funny things that happened to them that weren't that funny.
Full postThe ICC fails to beat Afghanistan
Mean cricket administrators make the best soap operas, don't they?
Jarrod Kimber
06-Oct-2013
Pravin Tambe is the sort of spinner Australia would pick, except he's good. A 41-year-old not good enough for regional cricket sends his team into the final of a tournament we may forget in three years' time, but for now is important enough to have Dwayne Bravo and Suresh Raina in it. Tambe has no written bio on ESPNcricinfo, but I'm working on his. So far all I have is "superawesomeolddude". Tambe is the perfect start to a news hurl.
Although this column may have to change its name as cricket is no longer news if an interim order from the Indian Supreme Court becomes more than interim. The ongoing argument between Star India, backed up in court by the BCCI, and mobile cricket score providers and the website cricbuzz, is about Star India believing the exclusive rights it bought off the BCCI mean that no one else can make money from live cricket scores. If the Supreme Court upholds this decision, then cricket takes one major leap towards becoming something cricket boards can own. One day, if we are lucky, cricket will be an upsizable commodity we can get a groupon for.
Cricket did feel like news when millions watched, tweeted, called their friends, and even stopped strangers on the bus, thrusting their mobile devices with live cricket "product" on them, to say Afghanistan would be in the World Cup. Yes, that country with the fast bowlers, sloggers and the world's best Hamid Hassan. It "truly proves the power of sport" and this win is "more than just sport" and also that "cricket is the only game where Afghanistan are any good, so if not this, they'd be useless at everything".
Full postCricket fixes Twitter problems
Cricket administrators turn into suited crusaders, and Mike Hussey and Andrew Strauss reveal some drama
Jarrod Kimber
29-Sep-2013
There should be a TV channel devoted to Jesse Ryder, Gary Wilson, Andre Russell and legspin. There isn't. Cricket on TV is very limited. It's actual cricket (which there is a lot of), the odd themed cricket show, and cricket on the news when it is seen as worthy. But this week there was no election coverage for the most important cricket event of the year.
It made the news and was talked about on the cricket-themed shows, although weirdly not as much on the cricket itself. But what I'd have liked were hours of panel shows talking about Mr N Srinivasan's history, potential spoilers to run for the top job, what the exit polls were saying, spirited discussions between Harsha Bhogle and Gideon Haigh with graphs and logos behind them. How, or if, @altcricket's banning from Twitter was BCCI-related. And pictures of what exactly a third of the BCCI officials were wearing when Srinivasan took them to Mahabalipuram for their beach holiday.
That is how important I think the president of the BCCI is. But not everyone thinks like me. Jagmohan Dalmiya, Niranjan Shah, Arun Jaitley, Jyotiraditya Scindia and Anil Kumble did not turn up to the AGM. The person in charge of the BCCI is in charge of, in one way or another, at least 70% of the game's wealth. The people are voting on who the most powerful person in our sport is, and some of them didn't turn up. And unopposed, the king bullied his way back to the throne. Now he'll fight a potentially bloodier battle with the Supreme Court to keep his seat.
Full postCroc, pus, ambassador
No really, there is some cricket news in there too
Jarrod Kimber
22-Sep-2013
Andre Russell took four wickets in four balls for West Indies A against India A. That is a double hat-trick, yet everyone calls it four wickets in four balls. It takes the magic away from it. Andre Russell does not have magic in his fingers; his fingers, hands, wrists and forearms are made of pure magic.
Mumbai Indians made even more magic this week when they unveiled their new hashtag for the Champions League. #ThisTimeFor10dulkar. They replaced "ten", with 10, which shortened it by a character, and made it 104 times more annoying. It's also unnecessarily didactic. As we are already doing everything for Sachin. Rock Hudson dedicated his performance in Seconds to Sachin. The ghost of a mischievous girl put a post box on the side of a bridge for Sachin. And I personally brush my teeth for Sachin every day, just in case I meet him.
The hashtag isn't the only exciting thing from the IPL. Former ICC elite panel umpire Asad Rauf and current son-in-law and former Chennai Super Kings enthusiast Gurunath Meiyappan have both been charged in the IPL fixing case. It's not great timing for Mr N Srinivasan as he tries to seek re-election as the chairman of the BCCI. There was also a court order restraining their special general meeting. There will be no cheerleaders in the CLT20 due to corruption (?) and morality concerns, unless the multi-year contracts cause trouble. And also an entire case coming back to life about IPL 2 and foreign-exchange regulations I wouldn't pretend to understand. It's all crumbling, and there may be no one to dance 25-second boring routines to cheer Srinivasan up.
Full postIt's Misbah's fault
Bopara can't get the time of day right on a quiz show, the BCCI hates Lorgat, Clint McKay has taken a hat-trick - one man is to blame for it all
Jarrod Kimber
15-Sep-2013
It is roughly 1000 hours until Jesse Ryder comes back from his ban. You probably didn't know how many hours it was, but you felt him getting closer to your life. Jesse Ryder is like baby mugging; only good can come from him.
A win for Zimbabwe in a Test is the same. It's pure goodness. When factoring in the troublesome government, the laughable administration and the fact that the players were boycotting training only a few weeks ago, this is the sort of sporting miracle that Americans would make into a Movie of the Week. There are lots of heroes from the game. Masakadza's knock in the first innings, Brian Vittori's five-wicket haul, Richmond Mutumbami's runs at nine, and Tendai Larry Chatara's second-innings haul.
But the reason Zimbabwe won is all over Twitter, it was Misbah-ul-Haq's fault. According to @AmberHMK "Dear #Misbah, Go home. Please. We are not consistent. Its not us. Your fifties don't make us win. Sincerely, #PakistanCricketFan."
Full postThe best eight? It's only the top three who matter
Many people are happy there weren't minnows in this Champions Trophy. But maybe it's time we realised what that really means
Jarrod Kimber
22-Jun-2013
"I love this format of the eight best teams."
If you heard it once during the Champions Trophy coverage, you were probably only listening to a few minutes of the coverage. The official memo must have been pretty clear: "This is not a nothing tournament that we once cancelled due a lack of general interest. This is the best eight teams in a ring, duking it out. Sell them on that."
That is what the Champions Trophy has become. It was never meant to be that.
Full postThe honorary son-in-law
This week we look at how painful it is to have relatives, and to be an IPL franchise, but how great it is to be an Australian female cricketer right now
Jarrod Kimber
25-May-2013
Jesse Ryder has knocked back money from women's magazines to tell his story of the attack on him.
That's nice, isn't it?
I like to start with something nice, something upbeat and cheery.
Full postMost Read
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