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November 21, 2009
Time for England to come good
Posted 13 hours, 54 minutes ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
While the Ashes triumph continues to hog the headlines, England’s inconsistent ODI performances are not taken seriously by fans and cricketers alike. Simon Barnes would like to see the side adopt of a fresh guard when they take on South Africa in the second ODI. England are more likely to succeed if they take the battle to the South Africans who are “determined to inject a bit of nastiness” into the proceedings, he writes in Times.
Test match victories come along often enough to keep us interested. One-day success, in any sustained sense — or any significant trophy sense — eludes Our Boys. Perhaps it’s a bit like the Eurovision Song Contest: we’d be more likely to win if we all took it seriously.
November 19, 2009
South Africa's wily ways are more of a let-down
Posted 2 days, 17 hours ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
South Africa have tried to inspire antagonism, but are England too nice to sledge? asks Emma John in the Guardian.
They are trying to pick a fight with Andrew Strauss and Andy Flower. You have to admire them for this. It's the equivalent of trying to goad a right hook from a Carmelite nun. England's cricket captain, who has the impeccable manners and smiling geniality of Lord Peter Wimsey and Boris Johnson combined, is generally acknowledged to be the nicest man in sport. The mild-mannered Flower, meanwhile, he who made the stand of his life against Robert Mugabe's wicked rule in Zimbabwe, is presumably rather beyond such trivialities as what Arthur thinks of his coaching style.
At a rough estimate, Paul Collingwood's career has consisted of 10% talent and 90% perspiration. He could not have done it without the sweat, writes Stephen Brenkley in the Independent.
No player of any sport anywhere has so epitomised the notion of making the most of the ability at his disposal. In its way it has been a miracle because when the well, never full, has run dry, he has somehow been able to re-stock it. Sometimes he has needed a dowsing rod as much as a bat.
November 15, 2009
Jacques of all trades, and the master too
Posted 6 days, 16 hours ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
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"I have come a long way in the Twenty20 game"
© Associated Press
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Jacques Kallis is an old dog who has learnt new tricks thanks to Twenty20 but blushes at Kevin Pietersen's claim that he's the best ever, writes Stephen Brenkley in the Independent. Sometime in the next few weeks when he takes his second wicket in the one-day series, he will become the only player to have scored 10,000 runs and taken 250 wickets in both Tests and one-dayers.
Today Kallis plays his 10th Twenty20 match for South Africa. It is a form of the game that many would have spurned to preserve their careers elsewhere. In his case T20 might not only have prolonged his career but embellished it. He has become a different type of cricketer, particularly as a batsman, though he has added new tricks to his muscular seam bowling to confound what is said about old dogs.
Steven Davies: sending Matt Prior a warning
Posted 6 days, 17 hours ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
Steven Davies, in line to be England’s first left-handed Test keeper since Jack Russell, has wintered with national teams of one kind or another every year since first playing for the Under-19s at the age of 17. This will be Davies’s first full England tour and he must expect to spend it playing understudy to Matt Prior, even though the Surrey wicketkeeper has set his sights on his friend’s Test place. He spoke to the Sunday Times.
He will be required to be a senior professional at Surrey, a club going through a rebuilding process, where young players will be looking to him for guidance. “When I first played for Worcestershire it was quite hard coming into a professional team full of adults. It was just an honour to be on the field. I’m more vocal now but at Surrey the young bowlers will be looking to me for advice. That will be good. I was pretty comfortable at Worcester. This will be a challenge.”
November 13, 2009
Strauss should be Twenty20 captain
Posted 1 week, 1 day ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
England should not panic after their defeat on Tuesday, believes the former coach Duncan Fletcher, though the split captaincy is a cause for concern. Andrew Strauss will not be involved in the Twenty20 games against South Africa but he should be, writes Fletcher in his Guardian blog.
Strauss is an underrated limited-overs player. He is England's leading run-scorer in one-day internationals this year. Many people would never guess it, but in that time he has also scored more boundaries than anyone else in the team, too. Tactically he is an extremely shrewd judge of how to pace an innings.
Those skills should cross over. There is not much difference between the structure of 50-over cricket and Twenty20. It is just that the windows which make up the different phases of the match are tighter. Strauss is the ideal man to cement the innings together. Essentially, in the ODIs England have played this year the team have been batting around him. Leaving him out is a little like pulling the keystone from the arch.
November 11, 2009
Time for revenge
Posted 1 week, 3 days ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
South Africa have much at stake when the ODI series against England starts at the Wanderers later this month. The old rivalry and the recent spat between the two captains will also spice up the occasion, writes Arthur Turner on Sport24.
Another aspect that is important for coach Mickey Arthur is to start developing a squad for the next World Cup that is now less than two years away. There are certain positions that he will have to get clarity on before the tournament. A good example of this is the role of Albie Morkel. Will he be considered as an all-rounder or as a batsman?
November 10, 2009
KP's back, but will he get a hero's welcome?
Posted 1 week, 4 days ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
As England's biggest talent (and ego) arrives in South Africa, the Independent's Stephen Brenkley gauges the mood of the dressing room, from a side that won the Ashes without him.
Pietersen himself may feel somewhat unburdened and although he has always paid generous lip service to the team ethos in the past, there has always been the suspicion – because it was based on reality – that if he did not do it they might not. Equally some players are transformed by Pietersen at the other end and Paul Collingwood, for instance, looks a better batsman with Pietersen around. As the off-spinning all-rounder Graeme Swann put it yesterday: "It's exciting for us that he's coming back, and, you never know, he might have to fight for his place." Swann was being typically jocular but it was a joke imbued with a certain seriousness. The top-of-the-bill act has not been indispensable.
November 8, 2009
Ashes hero and all-round good bloke
Posted 1 week, 6 days ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
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"I want to play 100 Tests"
© Getty Images
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In the Independent, David Lloyd speaks to Stuart Broad. The England allrounder, seen by many as a very central player in England's future, talks about a summer that changed his life and how he is desperate to help his country reach No. 1 in the world.
The stirring deeds of July and August – collectively and individually – are history now, however, and we will soon discover if they were the start of something big or, as happened four years ago when Australia were last sent home empty-handed, a terrific but pretty much isolated success story. "We are very conscious of the fact that winning the Ashes is not the be-all and end-all," says Broad. "We won them, brilliant, but now we have to build on that if we want to be the best team in the world."
Simon Wilde, in the Sunday Times, says Kevin Pietersen will do well to tread cautiously in South Africa, and not just until he is sure that his repaired Achilles tendon is sturdy enough to withstand everything he wants to put it through.
The main challenge he faces is that even before his lay-off he no longer looked the player he once was. His technique looked a mess, his footwork and decision-making were uncertain and he was not dictating terms as he once had. Opponents had wised up to him and a ploy of bowling to a fuller length on off-stump was paying dividends. The strategy was based on Pietersen’s high backlift — always a potential area of weakness early in an innings — and his penchant for playing across the line.
November 7, 2009
Pietersen has style of original Brylcreem Boy
Posted 2 weeks ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
He's not held a cricket bat on an international playing field for months now, but Kevin Pietersen has a lot of focus on him as England go into a highly anticipated series against South Africa. Pietersen should receive a 'warm' welcome from South Africans when he joins up with the England party next week, but don't expect that to bother him one bit, writes Brian Viner in the Independent.
Now he is five years older and wiser, witness the disappearance of that preposterous white stripe from his hair. It has been replaced, moreover, by an eminently sensible Brylcreem bounce, which augurs well, because the last Brylcreem Boy to play cricket in South Africa, in 1948-49, scored what remains the fastest triple century in first-class cricket.
November 5, 2009
Trott shows his true colours for England
Posted 2 weeks, 2 days ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
Jonathan Trott has been in the news lately for reasons he will eagerly wish be doused by runs from his bat. Trott's performances are what count for England, not his place of birth. But until he plays some more emphatic innings for England, says Simon Hughes in the Telegraph, Michael Vaughan's caustic observations will continue to ring in Trott's ears.
Trott, reared in a suburb of Cape Town, grew up playing in the same Western Province team as Jacques Kallis, Graeme Smith, Herschelle Gibbs and Ashwell Prince and will feel added motivation when he plays against them this month. The pinnacle of achievement for a professional sportsman is total respect from your peers. Trott, whose English father, Ian, is a cricket coach in Leatherhead, inherited his parent's passion for the game and always striven to be as good as he could be. That ambition often leads South Africans here. The money now in the county game is attractive. But what also drives them is the intensity and frequency of our cricket. It is a fast track to maturity.
November 4, 2009
Two major questions still surround Proteas
Posted 2 weeks, 3 days ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
South Africa will start as favourites for the Test series against England but they have two issues to address before the series begins. They need to settle on an opening partner for Graeme Smith and a pace bowling partner for Dale Steyn, writes Patrick Compton in the Mercury.
There are also doubts about Steyn's regular pace partner, Morne Morkel. Morkel at his best is a huge asset but he lacks consistency, a failing that resulted in him being dropped for the final Test against Australia in 2008. The big man bowls some devastating deliveries but he doesn't hit the "right areas" nearly as often as he should.
In the Cape Times, Zaahier Adams writes that the South African crowd should have a go at Jonathan Trott because of his strong South African connections.
So when the South African fans, undoubtedly, have a go at KP this summer, they might just want to rein it in a bit for Trott who, but for the lure of the pound, possibly still wants to be sitting in the other dressing-room with his boyhood pals.
Following the runner controversy during the Champions Trophy, Smith will have a score to settle with Strauss, writes Paul Newman in the Daily Mail.
November 3, 2009
What if it doesn't swing for England?
Posted 2 weeks, 4 days ago in England in South Africa 2009-10
‘If it doesn’t swing,’ Andy Flower said, ‘we can still win the series. We’ve got the attack to take 20 wickets.’ This is a bold statement for any England coach to make at the best of times. And, Ashes or no Ashes, it’s fair to say these are not the best of times, writes Lawrence Booth in the Daily Mail.
In their last 28 Tests overseas – beginning with the previous visit to South Africa five years ago – England have taken 20 wickets only seven times, including twice against a weak New Zealand side in seam-friendly conditions. One in four is not a ratio to set the pulse racing, let alone beat the best team in the world. There’s more. During that period England were able to field possibly their most incisive seam attack ever. Now they arrive in South Africa without any of the Fab Four of Steve Harmison, Matthew Hoggard, Andrew Flintoff and Simon Jones that delivered the 2005 Ashes. Flower possibly knows something we don’t.
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