The Surfer
A milestone unlikely to be reached again
Spectators watching Worcestershire play Warwickshire in England's county championship very likely had the privilege of seeing a cricket feat performed for the last time, writes Huw Richards in The International Herald Tribune
George Binoy
25-Feb-2013
Spectators watching Worcestershire play Warwickshire in England's county championship very likely had the privilege of seeing a cricket feat performed for the last time, writes Huw Richards in The International Herald Tribune. He was referring to Graeme Hick reaching 40,000 first-class runs.
To reach his landmark Hick, who started at 16, has had to play until he is 41 and the oldest active player. He has averaged more than 52 runs per innings. He has never, though, played more than 40 innings in a single season - and not since 1991 has he played more than 30. Compare this with Jack Hobbs, who sits at the very top of the list with 61,237 runs. Hobbs played until he was 51. In 11 seasons he had the opportunity to bat 50 or more times, in three he had 60 or more innings.
The wild knight
David Gower pays tribute to his team-mate Sir Ian Botham in The Sunday Times .
ESPNcricinfo staff
25-Feb-2013
David Gower pays tribute to his team-mate Sir Ian Botham in The
Sunday Times.
Come that knock on the door at five he would be straight out of bed, into the shower and off to the dining room for a cup of strong black coffee, while I grabbed a few more minutes of peace. That is how he lives his life – full on.
Gower also reminisces his duels with Botham while playing county cricket.
Full postBedi arm-balls Gavaskar
"Gavaskar's bete noire Bishan Singh Bedi says the 58-year-old wants to be the ultimate god of Indian cricket, thinks of himself as bigger than the game," writes G Rajaraman in scathing piece at OutlookIndia .
Sriram Veera
25-Feb-2013
"Gavaskar's bete noire Bishan Singh Bedi says the 58-year-old wants to be the ultimate god of Indian cricket, thinks of himself as bigger than the game," writes G Rajaraman in scathing piece at OutlookIndia.
Bedi guffaws when you ask him how Gavaskar has contributed to Indian cricket. "I had a lot of time for his batting but never as a thought leader. You tell me what his contribution has been. He is destructive, there is nothing positive"
Who's next in line?
Hamish Marshall has become the first New Zealand player to turn his back on a national contract
Jamie Alter
25-Feb-2013
Hamish Marshall has become the first New Zealand player to turn his back on a national contract. The Northern Districts batsman has made "the most difficult decision of my life" and, armed with a British passport, will play his cricket in England for the foreseeable future.
Writing in the New Zealand Herald, Dylan Cleaver looks at the three players who appear to have the inside running to take the New Zealand Cricket (NZC) contract vacated by Marshall.
Click here to read on.
Full post Behind the headlines
Siddhartha Vaidyanathan
25-Feb-2013
In the Woolmer episode, speculation took a vicious turn, fed by sensationalism, racism and lazy thinking, writes Mike Marqusee in The Hindu.
Newspapers across the world leapt from bald facts to elaborate conspiracy theories. The Pakistanis had thrown the Ireland match, or perhaps the West Indies match; Woolmer had been about to blow the whistle and paid the price. There was no evidence to support any of these far-fetched plot-turns, but that didn’t stop some of Britain’s foremost cricket journalists from drawing the most damning conclusions about Pakistan and its cricketers.
Also read Peter Roebuck's piece in Cricinfo on the same issue.
Full postNation on Film: West Indies 1976 tour of England
A Nation on Film special on the BBC (UK) aired this evening, looking back at West Indies' tour of England in 1976.
Will Luke
25-Feb-2013
A Nation on Film special on the BBC (UK) aired this evening, looking back at West Indies' tour of England in 1976.
Documentary about the 1976 Test series between England and West Indies; when the Caribbeans trounced the home nation and emerged as one of the greatest cricket teams to ever play the game. Before a ball had been bowled; the South African-born England captain Tony Greig declared that he intended to make the West Indies team 'grovel'; and the scene was set for a series that went beyond the boundary. Viv Richards; Michael Holding; Clive Lloyd; Tony Greig; Brian Close and Darcus Howe reminisce.
More details (and possibly "watch it again" clips) at BBC's website.
Full postThe Bell Curve?
Writing in The Guardian , Ian Bell stumbles across a statistic:
ESPNcricinfo staff
25-Feb-2013
Writing in The Guardian, Ian Bell stumbles across a statistic:
Apparently, I average 64 in the first innings in Test cricket and 23 in the second. While I'm delighted to be averaging so many in the first dig, the other figure is probably something I need to look at. Mind the gap, as they say.
Bell finds parallels in greats like Steve Waugh, who had two half-centuries in the fourth innings of a Test.
Full postProfessionals don't need to warm-up
While commenting on the Ford fiasco , Harsha Bhogle also brings up other concerns in his column in the Indian Express .
Sriram Veera
25-Feb-2013
While commenting on the Ford fiasco, Harsha Bhogle also brings up other concerns in his column in the Indian Express.
India's captain has asked for three games before the first Test in Australia, a perfectly valid request since India have always struggled with the bounce when they go there after having played in our conditions just before. Instead, the captain has been told by the secretary that, being professionals, they should be able to adjust with the one they have been provided.
I am flabbergasted. If I was Rahul Dravid I would have bowed and said "excuse me sir, I play for India. Whose side are you on?" I suspect Dravid is trying harder to win in Australia than the secretary! India are in Australia for more than seventy days and it is difficult to keep the intensity up for so long (talking of which, how come Australia don't come to India for seventy days?). If they lose the first Test, it will be a very very long tour.
Full postThe Full Monty
Sport may be trivial, however it doesn't mean we have to trivialise people's names, be it Mudhsuden or Sonny, Femi or Muhammad, writes Fazeer Mohammed in The Trinidad Express
Sriram Veera
25-Feb-2013
Sport may be trivial, however it doesn't mean we have to trivialise people's names, be it Mudhsuden or Sonny, Femi or Muhammad, writes Fazeer Mohammed in The Trinidad Express.
As someone obsessed with maintaining an audience, the occasional appearance of this column on Cricinfo, the world's most popular cricket website, has served to further inflate an already disproportionately large ego.
I was taken aback, though, to see a minor alteration to Monday's piece which focused on the excellent rearguard by the West Indies batsmen on the fourth day of the third Test in Manchester. In highlighting the threat posed by England's specialist spinner, I deliberately referred to him by his proper name, Mudhsuden Panesar (it's actually Mudhsuden Singh Panesar), only for the web editor to replace that first name with the one that he is universally known by, "Monty".
Full postNarcissism or simply fun?
Michael Henderson, writing in The Daily Telegraph , has slammed spectators at Old Trafford for their behaviour during the recent Test.
Martin Williamson
25-Feb-2013
Michael Henderson, writing in The Daily Telegraph, has slammed spectators at Old Trafford for their behaviour during the recent Test.
“Good as it was to see the ground full last weekend, too many people had come to admire themselves. This is not a problem exclusive to Old Trafford. The narcissism encouraged by television, which likes to identify 'colourful characters', and people 'having fun', is evident everywhere. It just seems more apparent in Manchester, where the heavy-handed stewarding continues to offend regular patrons.
“What can be done about the increasingly unpleasant atmosphere inside Test grounds? Not much, I'm afraid. Where once spectators were sober observers (in both senses of the word), immersed in the game's history, we now have thousands of people for whom a Test match offers a splendid opportunity to get riotously drunk, and possibly the chance to disrobe and charge on to the field of play.”
Henderson, who has a track record of taking swipes at Old Trafford, writes that when Shiv Chanderpaul completed his half century “thousands of revellers ignored his achievement, preferring to hurl their beer trays higher and higher. The only ground where these high jinks do not take place is Lord's, where MCC members are often mocked for being snobs. Anybody who was at Manchester last week would say that snobbery has much to commend it.”
Full post