The Long Handle
Take the money and run
Why all the coyness about the IPL being a cash-farming opportunity like no other?
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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Like many of the ugly sisters at the IPL ball, Graeme Swann failed to catch the eye of a Prince Charming or even a Chief Executive Charming and remained unpurchased. Many of the English debutantes were rendered even less attractive than usual because they will not be around for much of IPL 2010 due to a prior engagement in Bangladesh. This contractual requirement to play Test cricket is frustrating for the poor dears, as Graeme Swann explained this week:
“…I think if we are going to develop, then in an ideal world, we would be made more available for the IPL…”
Indeed, Graeme. I had been hoping that success in last Friday’s Euro Lottery would have enabled me to develop in all manner of directions. I had intended to develop a taste for expensive cigars, powerful cars and fine wines for a start. A holiday mansion in Tuscany, a string of sordid affairs and a swimming pool in the shape of the Ashes urn were amongst other developments I could foresee.
Full postDown with free speech. Free pitches instead
Paul Collingwood and Chris Gayle present watertight cases for curtailing players' right to open their mouths; and a prediction for the Kumble-Tayfield trophy
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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Some weeks ago, I suggested that gagging orders for professional cricketers might contribute to the advancement of humankind. Not everyone thought it was a good idea, but it was gratifying to read last week that two more of the species have confirmed my faith in the benefits of an immediate restriction of their right to free or indeed un-free speech. In a moment, Paul Collingwood. But first, I give you Mystic Chris Gayle.
Last week he announced that West Indies would beat Australia 4-1 in a one-day series. Now, we all like a little bit of pre-game trash talk, Chris, and we all like fairy stories, but I’m not sure the two really mix. I mean, there’s got to be at least a hint of reality in there or the kids will lose interest. If you’d announced that you’d been kidnapped by aliens or developed the ability to travel through time by twitching your nose, then maybe you’d have had a little more credibility, but 4-1? In Australia?
It gets worse. In between packing suitcases, practising his forward defensives and having five lie-downs (or burnout-reducers) a day, it’s Paul "Chuckles" Collingwood, doing his bit to bring back the good old days, when pale-skinned types travelled the world, sticking their flag where it ought not to be and having a good old giggle at how jolly backward Johnny Foreigner really was.
Full postThe battle for No. 1 (sans the shouting)
Marigolds on the players’ balcony
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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Sometimes it is worth reminding ourselves how fortunate we are to be able to enjoy the Victorian anachronism that is Test match cricket. The best team in the world are taking on their nearest rivals in what would, if it took place in the English Premier League, be labelled a “top-of-the-table clash” and be played out in a maelstrom of tripping, diving, rolling, gesticulating and screaming. And that just from the coaches.
India against South Africa has been a treat so far. Awesome laser-guided fast bowling from Steyn; impossible jagging bounce from the gangling Morkel; Sehwag restraining his instincts in a clammy-palmed innings that almost rescued his team, before cutting loose and falling into a trap. And all this on top of Amla’s Old Testament batting and the delights of watching Mishra’s delicate but unrewarded curvers and dippers.
Yet it has been devoid of bile and belligerence. Perhaps that is partly due to the surroundings. The stadium in Nagpur has the atmosphere of a sleepy provincial town square. The polished white steps up to the pavilion are covered with a graceful summer awning. Spectators eat ice cream and chat to one another at leisure. There are even potted marigolds on the ledge of the players' balcony.
Full postNeuroscience insights from the G
Twenty20 has got faster, the MCG has got bigger, and commentators have become scientifically challenged
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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The G (I understand there are other Gs, but this apparently is The G) remains utterly enormous. When the camera drew back to capture the stadium’s full height, I felt my vertigo coming on. There are other gargantuan grounds in the world, of course, but I have not seen a better Twenty20 venue. It’s a spaceship, a cavernous superstructure designed to concentrate sound, colour and light.
It also includes a small room fitted with microphones, via which several men take it in turns to tell us what we are looking at and what we have just seen. On Friday, I was introduced to a man by the name of James Brayshaw. Besides being a cricket expert, it turns out that he is fully up to speed on recent breakthroughs in the field of neuroscience. Earlier this week, scientists communicated with a man by monitoring his brainwaves. Brayshaw was keen to apply this new knowledge.
“David Warner, let’s have a look at his mindset.”
Full postThose manly men of Australian commentary
Tubs, Slats, Heals and Gilly's axis of machismo would no doubt be in admiration of Afridi's all-male way of ball-tampering
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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It’s always a pleasure to listen to the modern Australian commentators and by “a pleasure”, I mean “aural torture of a particularly gruelling kind”. I comfort myself with the thought that we are nearer the end than the beginning of the Australian season and that only a few one-day games with West Indies lie between me and a respite from the output of Tubs, Slats and Heals.
Australian sportsmen appear to be bound by a code of machismo, which prevents them from uttering any word or phrase that might contain anything a viewer could possibly construe as a) poetic or b) a bit girlie.
The word ‘beautiful’ only gets a look in because they mangle the vowels to such an extent that it is no longer recognisable to the human ear. During Sunday’s game, Tubs did venture off-piste with the phrase, ‘a windy woof’, but it was a bloke’s ‘windy woof’, more of a bark than a woof and anyway, it is essentially gibberish and gibberish is firmly bloke territory. Even helium-voiced guest star Gilly, only the second Australian man ever to cry, was keeping it strictly manly.
In the midst of this tight-lipped, hairy-chested working men’s club, in which jargon like Gees (G-Force) and Kays (Kilometres) is the only concession to verbal inventiveness, it is left to dear old Mark Nicholas to fly the flag for showbiz. So I was dismayed to hear this Noel Coward of cricket commentators at one point describing Australia as ‘almost rampant’. Almost? I guarantee, if he had been safely back in old Blighty, there would have been no adverb involved and the ‘r’ of rampant would have rolled on for several seconds. Don’t let the testosterone get to you, Mark, be loud and be proud!
Full postThe British summer pastime that is the IPL
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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So the IPL will be available to British viewers on YouTube. Like a Sreesanth celebration jig, this is both cheering and yet at the same time a little unsettling. Last year, I watched the IPL on Setanta, that yellow-hued disaster zone masquerading as a sports channel. Sadly, Setanta, with its plastic studio, nervous presenters and no-thrills approach is no longer with us. So that’s a step forward.
But YouTube? YouTube is fine if you want to watch homemade videos on how to eat crisps, trailers for films you aren’t interested in and grainy, wobbly footage of computer games playing on someone else’s television, but is this really the setting for live sport? If several million people access it once, will it cope? Will IPL watchers be forced to put up with five minute buffering pauses between the delivery of Munaf’s slower ball and its arrival?
Still, you can’t fault the logic behind this attempt to ensure that everyone on the planet gets to see a little bit of the IPL. I don’t often quote Lalit Modi and I may never have cause to do it again, but this sentence is worth repeating.
Full postTeens gone wild
Adolescent cricket with the ridiculous shots and the irritating antics of senior cricket, and Nick Knight thrown in for good measure
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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I’ll be honest. I don’t like teenagers. Their music is dumb, their hair is too long, they are having way, way too much fun and most irritatingly of all, I’m not one of them. So, the Under-19 World Cup, an entire tournament confined to adolescents, was never going to appeal as a prospect. Still, if Sky has gone to the trouble of sending an outside broadcast unit all the way to a field in New Zealand, it is the least I can do to tune in and pretend to take an interest.
So on Saturday, I sat down to watch the highlights of the India versus Pakistan quarter-final. It was a little disorienting. A 50-over game, reduced to 23 overs per side, then squeezed into a half-hour transmission. Take out the ad breaks, the replays and the waffle and it boiled down to a collection of sixes, wickets and the more amusing cock-ups. Every piece of action seemed only vaguely related to what had gone before. It was like watching a French film.
I am not qualified to say whether the teams were any good, although after witnessing a particularly horrendous slog across the line, I had to drape a handkerchief over my marble bust of Peter May, lest it start to weep. But all told, they did a fair impression of a proper grown-up one-day game, albeit with more hair and fewer beer bellies. They even managed a few circus shots (I counted at least two Dilscoops, one of which actually worked).
Full postWhy I had to watch the Chittagong Test
You don't watch India-Bangladesh to find out who is going to win like you don't listen to Virender Sehwag if you're looking for a crash course in diplomacy
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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Be warned, fellow cricket lovers, there are some odd folk about. Some of them may even be living under the same roof as you. Earlier this week, having set my alarm for a refreshingly early hour of Sunday morning, I was met with a quizzical look from Mrs H. I explained that it was necessary to rise at such a time, lest I miss the toss in Chittagong.
“Chitta-what?”
“Chittagong. It’s in Bangladesh.”
Full postUncomfortably close
Collingwood, Bollinger, Siddle and Co, so in your face you can see their pores
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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I recently went through one of those significant changes, a milestone in anyone’s life that can alter forever the way you look at the world around you. Last week I had a new television delivered. Three Ashes series, a World Cup, two World Twenty20s, Bhajjigates I and II: Old Faithful and I have been through them together. But there’s no room for sentiment in the modern game. He’s spending some time in the garage now, a call-up looking about as likely as a Monty Panesar comeback.
A bigger television requires a different watching technique. The altered proportions can catch you off guard. On Thursday morning, the multi-tiered Bull Ring loomed ominously. As did David Gower’s head - a disconcerting prospect to a man still easing himself into breakfast. A day or two spent wrestling with a multi-lingual manual has also left me with an insight into Daryl Harper’s little difficulties. Those volume controls are slippery blighters. Throw in the issues of contrast, sharpness, brightness and colour temperature and its no wonder the poor old boy was confused.
On Sunday morning I felt uncomfortably close to the action, as Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel proceeded to trap and beat up the pale, defeated tourists like a couple of angry bears cornering some hapless picnickers. In heartfelt sympathy, I mouthed Paul Collingwood’s anguished “Or Nu!” as he snicked a short one through the air. Reruns caught not just his forlorn cry but also the open-mouthed expressions of the phalanx of South African catchers, eyes fixed skywards on the tantalising arc of the ball as though it were a Faberge egg with wings, fluttering just out of reach.
Full postEnglishmen behaving badly
Stroppy reactions to allegations, tantrums on the balcony – welcome to the toy-tossing session
Andrew Hughes
25-Feb-2013
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Take the upcoming tour of Bangladesh. A good opportunity to get some experience of Asian conditions? A chance to support the newest Test nation and give their supporters something to cheer about? Nope. It wasn’t so long ago, Mr Strauss that you were out in the wilderness of the shires, contemplating the futility of existence as you toiled away in front of two men and a dog. A handful of Test wins later and you’re suddenly too showbiz to go to Bangladesh. You need a rest. From what, exactly?
And there was something else I was going to talk about. Now what was it? It’s on the tip of my tongue ... Ah yes, I remember. Ball-tampering! I’m sorry, was that me? I don’t know what came over me. I sometimes have these explosive outbursts, usually involving highly inappropriate and profane language. Most unfortunate, particularly when it relates to something so seedy, so disreputable and so utterly un-British as the aforementioned interference with spherical objects. Ball- tampering! There I go again. Excuse me.
Still, I’m not the only one who’s said it. Some people were saying it on the television. Some ex-players, who really should know better, wrote it in newspapers. What was Michael Vaughan thinking? Children might have been reading! AB de Villiers said it at a press conference, but then he is South African and can be relied upon to completely misjudge the public mood. In fact, he used the phrase, “a little bit naughty”, which sounds delightfully camp when uttered in an Afrikaans accent (go on, try it).
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