The Long Handle
A visit to Saeed's supermarket of spin
Where England glug down bottles of Chateau Sour
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Thursday, 19th January
As a fan of the three-day game, it was great to see England doing their bit to promote one of cricket’s classic formats. There were no wacky declarations in their homage to 1980s county cricket, but they did bring on Jonathan Trott for some joke bowling and they managed to wrap the whole thing up by the third evening. Well done, chaps.
Saeed Ajmal was their nemesis, a smiling purveyor of psychological cricket warfare and cunningly fashioned straightish ones that kind of do a little bit. On the face of it, there doesn’t appear to be much devil in the Ajmal style. If he sold his deliveries in a high street shop, the customers would soon be complaining about the lack of choice.
“Saeed, where are the teesras you said you were getting in? And these doosras here look very similar to your offbreaks over there.”
Full postHow to win like a dog
And a case for VVS's retirement
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Sunday, 15th January
So 3-0 then. But the fallout from this little run of unfortunate results has been relatively mild. There’s been no talk of ditching Fletch, no declarations of discontent from the upper echelons of Indian cricket and, remaining true to their anti-review policy, the BCCI have not announced their equivalent of the Argus Report. Indeed, a suspicious onlooker might conclude that they don’t seem to care all that much.
Even the players seem to be remarkably sanguine about the way things are going down under. Responding to the merest hint of a suggestion that perhaps it might be time to consider removing one of the batsmen; VVS Laxman, for example, Gautam has hit back at the naysayers.
“There should not be anyone who should be deciding about his retirement. It should be him.”
Full postDecoding playerspeak
What do "we're in transition" and "we weren't really there" mean?
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Wednesday, 11th January
How best to describe Sri Lanka’s batting today? Mere words can only begin to convey the wretchedness of their willow-wafting. It was more horrifying than Rick Santorum wearing a Newt Gingrich mask; messier than the state of Italy’s finances, and uglier to watch than the unveiling of the new pavilion at Headingley.
But not, I suspect, as ugly as the mood of the ordinary Sri Lankan spectator who has been asked to swallow an awful lot of ineptitude of late and who might be starting to suspect that the phrase “We’re in transition” is in fact top sports administrator code for “Help, we really don’t know what to do without Murali!”
And just what is it with the modern batsman? Accustomed to nice, well-behaved pitches, where the bounce is always ankle height and the runs flow easy, he turns into a dainty, timorous creature when faced with deliveries that deviate a millimetre from a straight line or which threaten to bounce up and tickle his tummy.
Full postCashing in on the possibility of the 100th
All sorts of business opportunities arise from Tendulkar's impending milestone
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Saturday, 7th January
Although India’s rickety cart, minus wheels, driver and horses, did eventually come to a crashing halt, the prayers offered to the God of Revenue Maximisation by the SCG treasurer were answered and the mirage of the golden century was still flickering come the morning of the fourth day.
I reckon if you could calculate it, you’d find that Sachin’s failure to score a hundred is one of Test cricket’s most valuable assets. Cricket boards around the world will soon start factoring it into their budgets, wondering if they can get away with charging a “Sachin Century Possibility Premium” when India arrive.
I feel about the Sachin ton a little bit like I used to feel about Christmas as a child. It took so long to arrive that by the time it did, there was no possible way it could live up to the anticipation and you knew that it probably wouldn’t, but still that didn’t prevent you from giving your fevered imagination free rein.
Full postThe Sachin v Don debate
Andrew Hughes reluctantly wades in and offers his two-bit
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Wednesday, 4th January
Catching up with old news today, I came across something I’d missed just before the holidays. It was a piece of work by an Australian economist. Now, normally speaking I’d give no more credence to the analysis of an economist than I would to the man who predicted that the world would end last May or to the theory that all the major nations are secretly ruled by moustachioed reptiles from another planet.
This is because, as far as I can tell, economics is about as scientific as water divining, creationism or the sticking-a-pin-in-the-sports-pages method of betting on the horses (a method which, coincidentally, is very popular in Wall Street stock-trading circles).
But this economist wasn’t banging on about the usual mumbo jumbo; fiscal restraint, quantitative easing and suchlike. He was talking about something that really mattered: namely, whether or not Sachin Tendulkar or Don Bradman was the best.
Full postIs retirement contagious?
What if all four of India’s batting mainstays decided to call it a day – on the same day?
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Sunday, 1st January
Hobart’s purpley heroes continue to sweep all before them. Today they overcame the Sydney Gayle and they were steered home by Owais Shah, one of my favourite batsmen. I liked him when he was the future of English batting, and I still like him now that he’s a footnote to an earlier chapter in the history of English batting.
He is fascinating because he has two distinct batting personalities, between which he alternates in phases, as though his technique is affected by high tides or the position of the stars. Perhaps in a desperate attempt to relaunch his England career, he once purchased a magic potion from a mad scientist, an elixir guaranteed to render any man invincible at the crease, but only for three overs at a time.
One moment he’s a harmless nudger and pusher, always in peril of tripping over his bootlaces whilst going for an easy single, and then, kapow! He is transformed into a biffing machine, despatching the ball with an angry snarl and a Pietersen strut, before reverting without warning to mild-mannered Owais, unable to say boo to the proverbial goose or even to the goose’s timid little gosling, Gary.
Full postHere's hoping for a Great Batting Depression
Because it makes for some exciting cricket, doesn't it?
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Thursday, 29th December
Last week, Sri Lanka looked like a contingent of nervous schoolboys who’d just discovered they’d been booked to fight the lions in the Coliseum. But as any Roman Coliseum-goer would tell you, lions are notoriously inconsistent performers; savage powerful beasts one day; harmless sleepy pussycats the next.
And today, the Sri Lankans had the home side lying on their backs with their legs in the air, having their tummies tickled. The defining moment came when Big Jacques, who never gets a double pair, got a double pair; diverting the ball onto his helmet from where it rebounded with the dismal clunk of failure into the palms of short leg.
As the probability of defeat became a certainty, I watched a succession of South Africans miss a succession of straightish ones in a parade of increasing ineptitude until Marchant de Lange’s bails exploded and the Sri Lankans began whooping and screaming like I would do if I’d won the lottery after having been widely ridiculed for my inability to pick a single correct number in the last six months.
Full postTwo new characters in cricket’s soap opera
Cowan and de Lange, you say
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Monday, 26th December
The 21st century cricket watcher lives a blessed existence. If our forbears wanted to see that new South African with the daring haircut or India’s latest medium-paced fast bowler, they had to wait half a decade or so, until the tour schedule brought the team in question to home soil. A fresh-faced and sprightly protégé could become a gnarled and stooped veteran before half the cricket world had seen him in action.
But now, with simultaneous broadcasts, highlights, extended highlights, and the frankly unnatural capacity to record two things at the same time, the cricket fan can see every ball of a man’s career, from that first nervous push outside off to the tears he wipes away at his final press conference. In 3D.
So today, weighed down by too many helpings of fruit-based steamed puddings, it was my pleasure to be able to contemplate, from the depths of my sofa, two intriguing new characters in the international cricket soap opera: Ed Cowan and Marchant de Lange.
Full postThe thoughts of Glenn McGrath
And why the colour purple gets Andrew Hughes' vote in cricket
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Wednesday, 21st December
Every year, at around this time, a respected figure addresses the faithful. As two Commonwealth nations prepare to do battle on the cricket field, what better time for a Christmas speech from fast-bowling royalty. It is time, ladies and gentlemen for HRH Glenn McGrath to give us his state of the cricket nation address.
What does Glenn think of it so far? Well, he’s quite upbeat. He thinks Ricky has got a big score not far away (I assume he means not far away in the future). He reckons the Aussie batting line-up will “do the business” (presumably a different kind of business to the business they did in Hobart, which was the sort of business that Lehman brothers were doing in 2008). And he thinks the Indian team will be surprised by Nathan Lyon (because nothing terrifies those veteran Indian batsmen like an inexperienced spinner).
But that is the beauty of the annual McGrath Oration. It doesn’t have to make sense, and unlike the mealy-mouthed bias that you get from a lot of ex-pros, it is unashamedly and gloriously partisan. And it always makes me smile. Sadly, the interviewer did not press Glenn for his series score prediction, but if I had to hazard a guess, I’d say there was a strong chance of it ending in nil.
Full postSixes? Spare us
Yet another Twenty20 league is upon us, and nudges and glances are at a premium
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
Saturday, 17th December
I enjoy a good batting collapse. It’s like the final act of a Jacobean play, when the bodies start piling up and the plot gallops on. But like the eye-gouging scene in King Lear, it can be brutal, and I bet there are a few Sri Lankan fans who watched the denouement in Centurion through the gaps between their fingers.
Paranavitana’s plight was particularly sad. Having witnessed the demise of his captain, he spent most of his 32 minutes at the crease attempting to play at an imaginary ball that was always two inches away from the real ball. In the end he was out to an edge that was almost impossible for human senses to detect.
This was a recurring theme in the second innings; some of the dismissals were the nickiest nicks I’ve ever seen. Only just making contact like that takes real skill. Perhaps now that the ICC is going to pay the Sri Lankan players 46% of their wages, they might manage to get 46% of the bat on the ball.
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