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Taking the Mickey

Cricket very rarely makes me angry. Horrible losses, shocking umpiring, bad sportsmanship, sure it might get me momentarily fired up, but it doesn’t make me truly angry. Australia’s defeat in the first test didn’t make me angry. The dropping of first-choice spinner Lyon for the second test didn’t make me angry, it just left me very confused. But this evening cricket has me angry.

Fawad Thinking

He’s only just played his maiden first-class game in this country, yet people have already been talking him up as the next great Australian spin hope for months now. His recently concluded Shield debut ended with him collecting 7 wickets for the match including a 5-fa in the second innings – across both innings he bowled a hefty 58.3 overs, especially when compared to fellow debutant spinner Clive Rose’s 23.1 overs (which included just 6 over for the second innings – after picking up 3 wickets in the first – compared to Ahmed’s 32.3 overs).

The A Team

The curious case of selection and resting strikes again. With absolutely no disrespect to the guys that have been picked – because it’s still a good side, and I’m genuinely excited to see guys like Aaron Finch and Phil Hughes getting a run in the coloured clothing – Australia will be fielding what resembles an A-team in the first two One Day Internationals against Sri Lanka. It’s simply because of the names that are missing, and there are a few.

2013 will be interesting

This time next year we’ll be approaching the end of the second Ashes series inside 6 months, and we will have been required to do it without Ricky Ponting or Mike Hussey. While many had their doubts that Punter was ever going to make it to England for one last Ashes tour, on the back of his recent form Mr Cricket was considered a certainty … right up until he suddenly announced his retirement following the Boxing Day test.

Not the expansion you’d expect

In part one of this piece I’ve already looked at why expansion of the current tournament is off the table for the time being. Now I’m going to propose a way that the Big Bash League could be expanded in a way that would require little or no change to the current format. I’m suggesting that the Women’s National T20 competition be transformed into the Women’s Big Bash League and played along side the current Men’s comp – in a way that could benefit both.

Expansion still off the table

Ever since the 8-team Big Bash League was announced a couple of years ago the prospect of further expansion of the competition has never been too far away from the headlines. Despite the reality that the Big Bash wouldn’t expand after its inaugural year, towards the back half of last year’s installment – following better than expected crowds and ratings – expansion talk inevitably started to build. Year 2 has seen more expansion talk, although most of it seemed to take place before a ball had been bowled in BBL:02.

Robbed by the rulebook

On Wednesday night Aaron Finch was robbed of probably the biggest six of the summer when his massive strike bounced off one of the main supporting beams at Etihad Stadium. At first everyone thought is must be six, how could such a massive strike not be, then the umpires – after conferring with each other – signaled dead ball. Boo.

Confusion rains

Last night I called it a disgraceful end to good game. “Disgraceful” was probably a bit harsh, “terribly confusing” probably would have been better. Regardless of how the result came about, the Scorchers didn’t deserve a no-result against the Stars last night. Perhaps you could argue that they might have pulled off a similar bowling display, but you’d have to think that was very unlikely at best. The way the result came about confused people, it angered people. I too was confused, but as things were explained it made more sense, I’ve tried to sum-up and simplify it.

Stop the nonsense

One thing is for sure, when Shane Warne speaks to the media they listen. And generally read way too much into whatever he says. Either that or they’ll twist his answers so get themselves a few good headlines. Shane Warne won’t be making a comeback, so let’s stop pretending that he will. We’re closing in on 6 years since he retired from international cricket, it’s time to move on.

Where to from here?

You don’t simply replace Ricky Ponting, so where does the Australian team go from here. It’s not simply going to be a matter of picking a new batsman for the squad – the batting order and team composition must surely be also up for grabs.

End of an era

17 years is a long time. Next week Ricky Ponting will end his Test career just a handful of days short of that figure. He’ll end it at the same ground where he made 96 on debut against the Sri Lankans in 1995. He, no doubt, be wanting to provide the best contribution that he can to make sure the Australians get the victory they are seeking to take them back to being the number 1 ranked Test nation. That would be a fitting exit for true champion.

Tahir troubles

Imran Tahir was left out of the 1st Test in Brisbane, this puzzled many people. In my wrap up I mentioned that while his exclusion was odd that I didn’t think that he would have actually made much difference to the result. It’s now lunch on day 4 of the 2nd Test, and Tahir has match figures of 0/249 off 35 overs (yes, 7.11 rpo), and he’s bowled just one maiden. I feel my comments have, at this point, been validated.

It’s elementary, Watson.

Should Watson give up bowling? Is Watson good enough to be selected as specialist batsman with a test average of only 37? Should Watson be opening or batting down the order? Why hasn’t Watson scored more test centuries? Should Watson give up the short forms to focus on staying fit for test matches? The questions come with relative ease, the answers on the other hand aren’t as straight-forward.

No Balls, No Glory

International cricketers needs to sort their shit out. Front foot no-balls are inexcusably amateur, and ‘thanks’ to technology they are ruining the flow of a game, and most critically the thrill of a dismissal.

Do we need the Champions League?

I complained yesterday on Twitter that the Champions League is ‘silly’, you see, the problem I have is that it isn’t really a ‘champions’ league, it’s more like an IPL invitational. 4 of the 10 teams in the final draw are from the IPL, all automatically into the ‘main’ draw despite 2 of them having never even been ‘champions’ of the IPL – one of these, the Mumbai Indians, has however won the Champions League, so make of that what you will.