Kevin Pietersen's tenure as England captain lasted only five months © Getty Images

When Kevin Pietersen was appointed England captain, it seemed to be an enormous gamble that was likely to end in tears. Nobody, though, could have predicted the speed with which his captaincy has imploded, nor the scale of the fallout, writes Mike Atherton in the Times.

Once the story gathered pace that Pietersen could not work with Moores, neither went out of his way to deny the rift or reaffirm the promises of co-operation that had accompanied Pietersen’s elevation to the top job. Moores said nothing, while Pietersen merely said that the situation was “unhealthy” and needed resolving quickly. Pietersen had, in effect, flexed his muscles, sure of his own power. Pietersen’s mistake was to stay on holiday in South Africa instead of returning when the rift became public. By not coming home at the first opportunity, his attitude towards the captaincy was revealed as casual.

Kevin Pietersen has learned the hard way that he can't just go through his career taking people on. As England captain, you need savvy, to be streetwise and politically astute. You have to choose the right time to pick your fights and this was not the right time, writes Nasser Hussain in the Daily Mail.

The ECB wouldn't go all the way by giving him the coaching team he wanted. To do so would have made Pietersen the most powerful England skipper there has ever been and they weren't prepared to do that because he didn't understand the political game or how to play it.

With six months until the Ashes, England have no coach, a captain who can't make the one-day side and a general air of chaos, writes Duncan Fletcher in the Guardian.

What a mess. And how sad for English cricket that a year containing a home Ashes series has begun in such chaos. You have to ask why the men in suits couldn't see this situation coming. The moment Kevin Pietersen asked for his so-called clear-the-air meeting with Peter Moores last summer, the penny should have dropped at the England and Wales Cricket Board: the relationship between captain and coach was clearly a situation that needed monitoring, on a game-by-game basis, from the word go. Can they honestly say this has happened?

The feud between the former England captain and coach may have been unseemly but perhaps it was for the best, writes Mike Selvey in the Guardian.

A global view, then, might be that English cricket is a fiasco. The reality, however, which will be seen once the dust has settled and the team are ensconced on St Kitts in the Caribbean, is that out of it all the right things may have happened, at least so far as the Test team are concerned. It is, with a nice sense of timing, precisely six months until the first day of the Ashes series and, no matter how people view the forthcoming six Tests against West Indies, this will be the focus. And from the hiatus, far from having their chances diminished against a vulnerable Australian team, England's prospects have been enhanced.

Kevin Pietersen is not so brash as he looks. He comes over as upfront and in-your-face precisely because he is, underneath, insecure, writes Scyld Berry in the Telegraph.

Pietersen grew up with one younger and two older brothers in Natal. The two older ones are burly individuals or 'big units' too. A telling story about his childhood is that when his parents closed their eyes to say grace at meal times, the older brothers would try to nick the sausages – or whatever – from Kevin's plate. Hence the insecurity, and the pugnacity when he does stand up for himself.

Whatever the official line, it is now clear that the atmosphere in the England dressing room had become toxic. It had gone beyond conflicting personalities. They occur in every dressing room, in every walk of life, but distrust and favouritism were beginning to flourish, writes Stephen Brenkley in the Independent.

At the risk of contradicting my suggestion in yesterday's Times that Hugh Morris, the managing director of England cricket, should have ordered Pietersen and Peter Moores to sort out their relationship, there was no point in continuing a partnership of incompatibles, writes Christopher Martin-Jenkins in the Times.

Pietersen's intention was to undertake a silent revolution against Moores and he might just have pulled it off. But the rift became public on New Year's Eve, two days after the omission of Michael Vaughan from the squad to tour the West Indies. From that point on, Pietersen's chances of one of the most egotistical campaigns ever attempted by an England cricket captain were slim, writes David Hopps in the Guardian.

Pietersen said that it was the media speculation surrounding his public row with Moores that forced him to resign, but the realisation that he did not have the full support of the dressing room must have had a huge influence on his decision, writes Angus Fraser in the Independent.

The non-selection of Michael Vaughan to tour the West Indies was the final straw but the rift [between Pietersen and Moores] had developed long before that, writes Paul Newman in the Daily Mail.

There is an innocence about Pietersen, something he shares with another great batsman and disaster-prone England cricketer, Geoff Boycott. They share a strange bewilderment that other people fail to see the world in the same terms, as a Boycott-centric, or a KP-centric, place, writes Simon Barnes in the Times.

One admires the ECB's thoughtfulness in giving those Aussies a morale boosting chuckle within days of them losing a home series, to Mr Pietersen's native South Africa, for the first time since 1703, writes Mathew Norman in the Independent.

There is a thin line in team sport between bringing that edge, that something extra, and upsetting colleagues. Pietersen has an unhappy knack of crossing it. This time, it seems he overestimated the strength of feeling in the ranks against Peter Moores, writes Richard Hobson in the Times.

A supremely talented batsman, part of his allure to spectators is his unpredictability. He loves taking risks, but while that can be both thrilling and acceptable in the context he understands, on the cricket field, it hastened his downfall when he gambled on unseating Moores, writes Derek Pringle in the Telegraph.

Also in the Telegraph, Steve James looks at the key players in the Pietersen-Moores row. He says Andrew Flintoff is an "overlooked figure lurking in the background of this matter. It is no secret that he and Pietersen are not exactly bosom-buddies."

For most of yesterday there was only one certainty. It was that Pietersen would not be captain when England set off for the West Indies in two weeks' time and then resume the ancient battle with Australia in Cardiff in July. Behind this reality was a conclusion that could not be avoided. It was that whatever the detail, whether he jumped or was pushed, Pietersen had not only reduced himself to a parody of what an international captain should be, writes James Lawton in the Independent.

Kevin Pietersen is a contradiction. A flamboyant batsman with a pop star for a wife and Hollywood actors among his friends, Pietersen was a celebrity cricket captain in the mould of Ian Botham, Andrew Flintoff and Wally Hammond. Yet few tales of bad behaviour have emerged about Pietersen, not even unsubstantiated rumour, writes Patrick Kidd in the Times.

Also read Andrew Miller's comment that Pietersen and England need each other on cricinfo.com.

January 7, 2009

Pietersen and Moores need to eat humble pie

Posted on 01/07/2009 in English cricket

	Kevin Pietersen hasn't won many fans by going public about his disagreement with Peter Moores © Getty Images

A bit of humble pie for Kevin Pietersen and Peter Moores is required if the ridiculous mess in the England cricket team is to be cleared up before mud sticks to everyone, writes Christopher Martin-Jenkins in the Times.

Neither should lose his job, given some clear thinking and plain speaking. Neither, in fact, has much of a record: England have won seven Tests out of 22 under Moores's guidance as head coach, only one of these against a top-notch team, and that consolation victory in the last Test against South Africa in August had much to do with Pietersen's batting and captaincy.

The new captain, however, has swiftly had to learn that a flurry of one-day victories over a South Africa team content with the main prize in the bag, was delusory. The Stanford embarrassment and India's excellence in November and December put things into clearer perspective.

If Kevin Pietersen's short and controversial stint as England captain is already over, it will satisfy those who argued that Andrew Strauss was a more sensible choice to replace Michael Vaughan last August, writes Huw Turberville in the Telegraph.

Kevin Pietersen has divided opinions ever since he arrived in England as former team-mates can testify. Stephen Brenkley explores a chequered record in the Independent.

It was like that in Nottinghamshire six years ago and what happened there bears similarity to what is happening now. Pietersen had been taken to the county by Clive Rice, a South African whom he presumably respected and admired. When Rice left the county, however, things started to go wrong. He did not like the new regime and he fell out terminally with Jason Gallian, the county's captain. Gallian, the most un-Australian of Australians, is sedulous in reflecting on his relationship with Pietersen and is clearly not proud of his own part in it, which culminated in Gallian hurling some of Pietersen's kit over the dressing-room balcony at Trent Bridge.

If and when Kevin Pietersen succeeds in driving Peter Moores from office, he may find that the relief of ousting a man he did not rate is replaced by a more profound problem: how to unite a dressing room containing characters who do not necessarily regard their leader as the chosen one, writes Lawrence Booth in the Guardian.

January 6, 2009

Moores set to be the wrong casualty

Posted on 01/06/2009 in English cricket

In a post on the Wisden Cricketer blog, John Stern offers a rather interesting, and different, view on England's captain-coach crisis.

Creative differences make for healthy teams.

Strauss was the common-sense option as captain when Vaughan resigned last August and he looks an even better choice now, and not just because he’s started scoring runs again.

Leadership is not about ego or breast-beating. It is about inclusiveness, inspiration and, inevitably, compromise. The ability to do the latter is not a sign of weakness but strength.

Nuts enough to work with KP?

Posted on 01/06/2009 in English cricket

The England board could replace coach Peter Moores by the end of the week and it's time to look at some of the contenders.

The Daily Telegraph's Nick Hoult feels a foreign coach is the most likely though former England spinner Ashley Giles, who is Warwickshire's director of cricket, could be the caretaker coach for the West Indies tour.

The Guardian looks at it in a different way. Who will be nuts enough to work with KP, asks Andy Bull.

Graham Ford Age 48
Current job Kent coach
Coaching pedigree Strong: he coached South Africa to eight Test series wins out of 11 during between 1999 and 2002 and helped Kent to the Twenty20 Cup in 2007. Rating 8/10
Does his face fit?
Ford has turned down job offers from India and New Zealand in the past two years to stay with Kent. They were relegated in 2008 and he has said he is determined to stay on and lead them back to the first division. He is the outstanding candidate, if only because the hat seems to fit so well. 9/10
Luck or skill?
Having only played seven first-class matches in his life he has had to earn the opportunities that better ex-players are gifted with. He has certainly benefited from the quality of the players he has worked with though, right through from his early days, with Malcolm Marshall at Natal, to the captaincy of Rob Key at Kent. 7/10
Compatibility with KP
Hand in glove. Ford worked with Pietersen at Natal and made an effort to dissuade him from moving to England. In his autobiography Pietersen calls him: "Someone I both respect and admire". Was born in the same town as the captain — Pietermaritzberg. 10/10

Pietersen's rift with Moores has highlighted one of cricket's eternal questions: in the final analysis, who is the boss – the captain of a team or its coach? In the Independent Angus Fraser explains why there is no easy answer.

Cricket would benefit from having a similar structure to football or rugby but it is not that simple. The nature of the game does not allow it, and that is why it is not in place. The influence an all-controlling manager could have on a cricket team is limited because he cannot make substitutions and change the structure of the team. The 11 players named at the toss have to see the game through. The primary role of a cricket coach is to develop the players under his guidance and provide them with all the preparation and information they require for the contest ahead. Historically they have always had a say in team selection and accepted that, when the team leaves the dressing room and crosses the white line, responsiblity for what happens lies with the captain.

January 5, 2009

Fire the boss!

Posted on 01/05/2009 in English cricket

	It seems increasingly likely that Peter Moores will face the axe © Getty Images

As the row between Kevin Pietersen, the England cricket captain, and Peter Moores, the head coach, begins to establish some kind of rhythm, it seems increasingly likely that Moores will have to go, writes Simon Barnes in the Times:

Why? Simple: because Pietersen wants him gone. Throughout the history of sport, cricketers, more than most athletes, have been considered inferior to such people as selectors and chairmen and tour managers. A lack of deference to such people used to cost players their places, as Fred Trueman, among many others, learnt the hard way. But now, it seems, the captain is about to sack the coach, much as a writer sacks the editor or the lead violinist sacks the conductor. Fire the boss! What a thrilling concept - how wonderful it would be, whenever our careers seem to be developing along unpleasing lines, to sack the boss.

In the Independent Angus Fraser writes the row and its inevitable fall-out could undermine a huge year for English cricket. Perhaps the bravest and best decision England cricket's managing director Hugh Morris can make is to remove both.

In the next 12 months, England will compete for the Ashes and the Twenty20 world cup, as well as play several important Test and limited-over series. How the Australians must be laughing. Ricky Ponting's side, like Pietersen's, might be losing Test series, but at least their dressing-room does not appear to be imploding. But while Australia are in apparent disarray, England are at civil war ... If Pietersen gets his way, as it appears he will, should the next England coach be rubber-stamped by him? It would be a ridiculous decision because it will be nigh on impossible to find someone who can work with and satisfy Pietersen on a daily basis.

The Guardian's Mike Selvey believes Pietersen is the fulcrum of the team and will be so in the foreseeable future. In such circumstances, while it would be unwise to allow him such auto­cracy that he can, for example, effectively appoint the next coach so that it fits in with his own agenda, it would be equally unwise to risk alienating Pietersen by antagonising him further with a coach with whom he did not feel he could develop a rapport.

January 4, 2009

England shoot themselves in the foot

Posted on 01/04/2009 in English cricket

Stephen Brenkley wonders in the Independent on Sunday how the Kevin Pietersen-Peter Moores rift will be resolved.

The English game would look foolish if either man were to depart. Moores was appointed to replace Duncan Fletcher 20 months ago without interview. He was deemed to be the sole and logical choice. Pietersen was similarly ushered in when Vaughan resigned last summer. It was as if there was no alternative, but there is always an alternative.

John Stern writes in the Sunday Times that it is likely that neither Pietersen nor Moores will be sacked.

The most likely outcome is a Morris-inspired fragile peace, an agreement between all parties to muddle on through to this summer’s Ashes, the result of which will dictate the career paths of players and coaches alike.

January 2, 2009

Captain-coach rift biggest concern for England

Posted on 01/02/2009 in English cricket

Patrick Kidd writes in the Times that the ECB would rather see a reconciliation than lose either captain or coach so close to the Ashes. Yet, he writes, there is no doubt that if Pietersen pushed the issue, England would be loath to lose the one batsman whom Australia fear.

Before the second Test against South Africa at Headingley last summer, Vaughan is believed to have wanted Simon Jones to be recalled, but Moores and the selectors plumped for the untried Darren Pattinson. It may well have been one of the reasons why Vaughan decided to stand down...

... some have felt that Moores is not suited to coaching an international side, particularly in handling the egos and demands of world-class players.

Simon Hughes, writing in the Daily Telegraph, feels Peter Moores' lack of sophistication is a possible reason for the rift with Kevin Pietersen.

Pietersen cut a forlorn figure as he cast around for alternatives in Madras. As an inexperienced captain, he needed more imaginative input from the coaching staff. Moores is a decent, enthusiastic, hard-working man, and he is certainly not timid, giving a strong lead in the departure of Michael Vaughan as captain. But, as a coach who has spent most of his time around county cricket, he perhaps lacks real sophistication at the highest level. This is probably the source of Pietersen’s lack of respect.

Stephen Brenkley writes in the Independent that it would be in the captain's best interests to come to terms with Moore.

If he is seen to be instrumental in getting rid of him – and he would be if Moores went – building trust with anybody again would be hard for him.

December 30, 2008

Michael Vaughan's career all but over

Posted on 12/30/2008 in English cricket

	Calls for Michael Vaughan's return are motivated more by a recognition of his past achievements, writes Michael Atherton © Getty Images

Michael Atherton, writing in the Times, feels Michael Vaughan's desire to return to international cricket appears a far-fetched one as runs have not been forthcoming to merit a selection in the side, and that calls for his comeback are motivated more by past achievements than a realistic assessment of the present. He also thinks some of the England players are fortunate to have kept their place in the side following a disappointing tour of India.

Vaughan has repeatedly stated his desire to return to international cricket and tried to structure his winter plans to that effect. But after his emotional resignation speech in August there has been little evidence that his body has responded to his mind’s desire. Both he and Geoff Miller, the national selector, accepted that a volume of runs was necessary to justify a return, but they have not been forthcoming. Those who argued for Vaughan’s return, most notably the newspaper for which he writes and Duncan Fletcher, his former coach with England, did so out of recognition of past achievements and a belief that, as an Ashes-winning captain, Vaughan would be able to sprinkle some magic Ashes-winning dust on this underachieving squad.

Michael Vaughan, in his own article in the Daily Telegraph, admits he understands the reasons for not being picked for the tour of West Indies, and feels his best way to press claims for a recall is by scoring heavily in the pre-season for Yorkshire.

I am not in the England team and Yorkshire now has to be my main concern. I have to knuckle down with them and start the season as well as I can. If that happens then I will put the guys under pressure and still have the chance to play for England again, something that I dearly would like to do during an Ashes summer.

Derek Pringle, writing in the same newspaper, is not surprised that Vaughan wasn't selected for the tour of West Indies, and feels the future prospects for his selection do not look all too encouraging.

Cricinfo's Andrew McGlashan presents his take on Vaughan's chances of a comeback here.

December 29, 2008

Vaughan for Windies?

Posted on 12/29/2008 in English cricket

England are set to pick their Test squad for West Indies on Monday and Duncan Fletcher feels former captain Michael Vaughan should be brought back because of his experience. He writes in the Guardian:

I don't buy the worries about having a former captain in the side. I had Nasser Hussain captaining Mike Atherton and Alec Stewart, and then Vaughan captaining Hussain. Michael can be very sensitive to what is needed and he will understand that his role is to quietly offer advice when it's asked for. If he is selected for the West Indies and can get his batting right over there, England simply must pick him against Australia.

Angus Fraser believes the decision the selectors take regarding Vaughan's inclusion in the squad will be criticised whatever it is. He writes in the Independent:

If Vaughan is named in the squad the reasons for his return will be questioned. The 34-year-old has done nothing to warrant inclusion since resigning as captain four months ago ... Should Vaughan be overlooked the reasons for him being offered a sought after and lucrative 12-month central contract in September will be quizzed.

December 28, 2008

Who should bat at No. 3 for England?

Posted on 12/28/2008 in English cricket

Few great sides have lacked a top-class No. 3 and few good sides have carried a No. 3 who was not making runs. And yet, today, England are unclear who should be playing there, writes Simon Wilde in the Sunday Times.

Ian Bell has averaged 15 since moving to that position when Kevin Pietersen took over as captain; before him, Michael Vaughan averaged eight there in four matches against South Africa. It is one reason England have rarely won of late.

In the Daily Telegraph, Steve James writes that Kevin Pietersen has been struggling with his technique for the first time in his career and wonders whether it is wise to burden him with captaincy.

... just imagine if Pietersen had been in nick all year. Because he still ended the year as England's leading run scorer in both Tests (with 1,015 runs) and one-dayers (658), their player of the year by some distance. He is the man. As compatriot Gary Kirsten, India's coach and generally a man of understatement, says in their local vernacular: "Jeez, he's dangerous is that oke". He sure is.

December 26, 2008

England must end mood swings

Posted on 12/26/2008 in English cricket

Geoffrey Boycott, writing in the The Daily Telegraph, feels England's batsmen need to rise to the occasion, with the team's bowling options limited by an injury-prone Ryan Sidebottom and the lack of a quality spinner, to entertain any hopes of beating a struggling Australia.

For England to beat Australia, Flintoff has to stay fit, he is the iconic figure, and Harmison needs lots of bowling between now and the Ashes so he can bowl straight and on a length. He has the ammunition but needs plenty of overs so he can train it in the right direction.

And finally we have to improve the inconsistency of the batting. The players have to remember it isn't how many shots you play, or how quickly you make runs, or how long you spend at the wicket. It is how many runs you make. That is the key.

December 25, 2008

Don't gloat about Australia's supposed decline

Posted on 12/25/2008 in English cricket

The Times' Simon Barnes is upset after Australia's defeat to South Africa in Perth.

I am cast down for several reasons. The first is that it was, well, South Africa they lost to. With Australia v South Africa, who the hell are you supposed to cheer for? “Come on, Satan!” Or do you say: “No, no, sock it to 'em, Beelzebub?”

He also believes its too soon to start wondering if Australia are in decline.

Let us simply note the result and nod. Let us refrain from sending off gloating texts and e-mails to the southern hemisphere. Let us remember that every talent Australia possess will be doubled when they are in England. So hear this, Australia: we are not gloating, all right? Just noting.

However Hamish McDouall believes the Baggy Green, which has been a symbol of dominance in cricket for two decades, is now fading and tatty. He writes in his blog Googlies & Grass Stains:

Where had the Australian top order been hiding? Matthew Hayden is now officially over the hill, his return since October reminding me of an economy slipping into recession. Mike Hussey had two failures, Ponting one and a half. Clarke and Katich, neither of them batsmen in the run-accumulating mould of Waugh or Langer, are now the only reliable source of runs. Symonds is patchy, and will always be so. Watson survives in the squad because of his bowling. The highest scorer for Australia at the WACA was Brad Haddin. If that doesn’t send shivers up the selectors spines Ponting’s captaincy should. He was surly, his body language defensive. He did away with slips. He set defensive fields. He opened up after lunch with Krejza and Siddle. He didn’t look at Symonds or Katich, relying on the nude spin of Clarke for variation. There was no paint-striping team talk, little clapping.

Patrick Kidd profiles David Boon in the Times' Ashes Heroes series.

Boon once vomited on the outfield at Adelaide before a TV audience of millions (not necessarily, we stress, because of alcohol), and then went on to make a century and be man of the match. A class act. One other thing in his favour was his lack of athleticism, meaning that he often fielded close in to the wicket in the danger areas given usually to young pups. Yet occasionally he could produce stunning chase-and-throws from the deep. They used to have a saying in England: never risk a fourth run to David Boon.

December 24, 2008

How they rate in 2008

Posted on 12/24/2008 in English cricket

	Nasser Hussain feels the time isn't right for England to recall Michael Vaughan © Getty Images

England's cricketing year was the usual blend of triumph and disaster, but how was it for the players? In the Guardian, Lawrence Booth rates the England players according to their performances this year.

Until Ian Bell consistently produces match-winning innings, England's No3 is a luxury the team can ill afford, writes Vic Marks in the Guardian.

Rather than the end, being dropped could be regarded as the trigger needed for a spurt in Bell's Test career whenever he returns. He has obvious talent so a return would almost be guaranteed. But England need him refreshed and more ruthless and a break might help. Currently Strauss, Michael Clarke and Yuvraj Singh provide good examples of the benefits of being left out. For Bell, playing for England is in danger of becoming a routine occupation and compared to his predecessors, like Derek Randall ("I always played every Test as if it was my last"), he has that wonderful safety net of the central contract.

According to latest rumours, England are thinking about recalling Michael Vaughan for the West Indies tour, but that would be a mistake. Bringing him back at this stage cannot be justified and would create more problems than it solves, writes Nasser Hussain in the Daily Mail.

Where would it leave Owais Shah? He did well in the one-day series so if Michael came into the team ahead of him it would be a real kick in the guts. The alternative would be for Shah to play instead of Bell with Michael in reserve. But having an ex-captain carrying the drinks doesn't sit well with me.

A few plusses, too many minuses

Posted on 12/24/2008 in England in India 2008-09

	Mahendra Singh Dhoni sent down the last over of the series in Mohali © Getty Images

England's tour of India was a disaster on the pitch, but sometimes results can be excused for the greater good, writes Derek Pringle in the Daily Telegraph.

A new glasnost between the England and Wales Cricket Board and their counterparts at the Board of Control for Cricket in India, was particularly evident. Suddenly, seemingly intractable problems, such as the participation of England players in the Indian Premier League, did not seem so insoluble. What the fearful thought was the sound of gunfire was actually a bout of mutual backslapping from the two boards.

By not winning a single match of significance (their lone success came in their opening warm-up match), England's players could not claim the same sense of achievement after losing both the Test and one-day series. Plaudits were due, mainly to Pietersen and Hugh Morris, but only for the pair's leadership during the Mumbai siege and its immediate aftermath.

Also in the Daily Telegraph, Simon Hughes says, What will be recalled as the Commando and Kalashnikov Test series came to a paradoxically limp end as wicketkeeper MS Dhoni sent down a few harmless deliveries to Andrew Strauss.

If there was one lesson to draw from this two-Test series, it is that chances to win do not come along very often on the sub-continent and when you get one you have to be sure to take it, writes Mike Atherton in the Times.

With the Ashes just seven months away, how is the team developing? Moores will be happy to see Andrew Strauss rehabilitated and back to his best at the top of the order, Andrew Flintoff patently fit again and beginning to find some batting form to go with his rock-solid bowling, and Matt Prior performing well enough with the gloves that the uncertainty over the wicketkeeping position can die down a while. In Graeme Swann, England have found a reliable second spinner for whom Test cricket and big reputations hold no fear.

Amjad Khan and Adil Rashid were passed over in the quest for stability, and Samit Patel misused in the one-dayers, but England must realise the attack is in transition all the same, writes David Hopps in the Guardian.

Of England's Ashes-winning quartet, Matthew Hoggard has been pensioned off and suggestions that Simon Jones might somehow return to fitness for a second Ashes series seem too fanciful by half. At least Andrew Flintoff has survived India unscathed. But what of Steve Harmison, dropped in both one-day and Test series, and whose mood was once again dragged down by life on tour? England, as has already been remarked, can't live with him and they can't live without him.

Also check out David Hopps' England's tour report in order of merit in the Guardian.

Despite hindrances England performed remarkably well, competing hard against a top outfit arguably playing the best cricket in the world. There were several times in each Test when England could have wilted but they continued to fight and they can leave India with their heads held high, writes Angus Fraser in the Independent.

If Monty Panesar was Indian, he would have been nowhere near Mohali. He would have been at one of four venues preparing for the Ranji Trophy quarter-finals, assuming the team he played for had made it that far, writes Dileep Premachandran in the Guardian

December 19, 2008

Where does Giles Clarke go from here?

Posted on 12/19/2008 in English cricket

The latest Stanford bombshell has raised questions over the deal approved by Giles Clarke, but as the ECB elections approach, his ability to bring in money to the coffers may save him, writes Paul Weaver in the Guardian.

When Giles Clarke looks in the mirror he is, like Snow White's stepmother one senses, not displeased with the view. And when a mirror is not at hand there is always Sir Allen Stanford. Clarke, the chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board, is first and foremost an entrepreneur, a bright gambler who financed his Oxford education playing backgammon and bridge, a committee member of the Society of Merchant Venturers. And in Stanford he sees a man made in his own enterprising image, a taker of calculated risks.

December 17, 2008

At what cost?

Posted on 12/17/2008 in English cricket

Vodafone's decision to cut its ties with English cricket is unconnected with a desire to save money. The company is anxious to attract more young customers and is thought to be keener on sponsoring music events. It is also keen on sponsorship with international appeal, which is why, for instance, it preferred to sponsor the Champions League rather than just Manchester United. Ian King in the Times says with the UK accounting for only 4% of Vodafone's global business, the cricket tie-up was thought to have run its course.

Cricket sources pointed out the sport in England needs £53 million “just to stand still” and to safeguard investment in grassroots programmes, including the Chance to Shine campaign to bring competitive cricket back to state schools. Ashling O'Connor in the same paper, believes the task may be tough with Sport England announcing a pot of £37.8 million as cricket's central funding for the next four years.

December 14, 2008

Boycott: a legend lampooned

Posted on 12/14/2008 in English cricket

In the Sunday Times, Simon Wilde revisits England's tour of India in 1981-82 when Geoffrey Boycott broke the world batting record but left his England team-mates underwhelmed.

The record came at 4.23pm with a leg-side single off left-arm spinner Dilip Doshi. Asked to describe the reaction in England’s dressing room, Taylor said: “It was moderate. Had it been someone else, we would have been ecstatic, but because it was ‘Sir Geoffrey’ it was somewhat different. He wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, particularly not among the England players.”

December 12, 2008

When they were students

Posted on 12/12/2008 in English cricket

It's almost 20 years since a student team containing Mike Atherton, Nasser Hussain and, er, Treherne Parker made history — and struggled to get into nightclubs, writes Rob Smyth in the Guardian.

It was a very talented squad — all were affiliated to counties at the time — and Atherton and Hussain were called into the Test squad later that summer. The strikingly mature Atherton led the team outstandingly: if not a boy among men, he was at least a postgrad among undergrads. "He was such an impressive figure," says the opening bowler Alan Hansford, who picked up the wickets of Alec Stewart, Graeme Hick, Tim Curtis and, er, Courtney Walsh during the tournament. "Even then, his sense of destiny was apparent."

December 10, 2008

No right answer for England

Posted on 12/10/2008 in English cricket

	The reason for Flintoff's yes: Team unity or IPL lure? © AFP

In his post on the Wisden Cricketer blog, Lawrence Booth says the decisions and statements made by the England team in the past few days will provoke different reactions from the media. Here's one of the three examples he provides:

Event 2: Andrew Flintoff sings the praises of team unity

Interpretation A: Flintoff’s contention that “one of the reasons I decided to go was for my team-mates” is a glowing endorsement of England’s team spirit and a sign of the increasing maturity of our sportsmen. After all, seven years ago Andy Caddick and Robert Croft pulled out of the tour to India in the aftermath of 9/11. This time, and without pressure from their bosses, England’s cricketers have embraced the bigger picture.

Interpretation B: Flintoff and his mate Steve Harmison could not afford to miss out on the opportunity to impress in the home of the Indian Premier League. A fortnight’s window in the IPL remains open to England’s players in the spring and runs and wickets in Chennai and – fingers crossed – Mohali could catch the franchise owners’ eyes. Would such unity have been on display in, say, Pakistan?

Beautiful to watch, frustrating to captain

Posted on 12/10/2008 in English cricket

Chris Lewis, the former England allrounder, has been accused of attempting to smuggle cocaine with an estimated street value of £200,000 into the United Kingdom. Mike Atherton, in the Times, says Lewis was the supreme athlete who underachieved; the intelligent man who more than once punctured a hole in his career through sheer stupidity; the warm, friendly face who was also a committed loner, for whom controversy was never far away.

In the Daily Telegraph, Derek Pringle recalls touring with Lewis.

Talented, narcissistic (he once posed naked in a magazine), frustrating, though never anything but unfailingly polite, Lewie, as he was then known, had the anti-social habit of ordering just about everything on the room-service menu, tasting a mouthful of each, and then leaving it to smell out the room. He also owned a hairdryer that gave off electric shocks, but he didn't tell me that until after it had made me and my hair stand to attention one day.

In the Independent, Stephen Brenkley offers another view.

He was one of many cricketers in the decade following Ian Botham's decline who was dubbed the new Botham. Lewis was one of the few who had the all-round gifts to succeed. He could bowl fast and with swing, his batting was swashbuckling, his fielding both in the deep and at gully was almost ahead of its time. But he never came close. Nobody seemed truly to know him in the dressing room. He was hardly aloof but he did not give much of himself; he was not unfriendly but he did not show much inclination to make friends.

December 7, 2008

Highlights of 2008

Posted on 12/07/2008 in English cricket

In the Sunday Telegraph, Scyld Berry looks back at some key cricketing events from 2008 and casts his eye on the year to come. He wonders whether Graeme Smith's 154* in the Edgbaston Test is the finest captain's innings of all time and whether Kevin Pietersen will still be captain if England lose the Ashes next year.

December 3, 2008

The Barnacle turns 85

Posted on 12/03/2008 in English cricket

Trevor Bailey is 85, without a driving license, but with a firm opinion that England should be captained by an Englishman. The Guardian's Frank Keating calls him up to wish him Happy Birthday.

Ring back in an hour, he says - he's in the middle of cooking lunch (lamb chops and all the trimmings) for himself and his beloved Greta, wife of 60 years. English cricket's one-time doughtiest dead-bat seems in fine nick, except they've refused to renew his driving licence - "far too old," they said. So, car-less, he was unable to attend this summer the 90th birthday party of his long-time new-ball partner and England's most venerable surviving Test alumnus, Sir Alec Bedser.

Bailey's barn-door dead bat had led to a tremendous surge of national jubilation when at Lord's in the Coronation month of 1953 he and Willie Watson had clung together on the burning deck for half a day to save the second Test and so, by August of that year, allow the Ashes to be won. Complete strangers still regularly quiz Trevor for full details. No wonder, for as the onliest Neville Cardus all-hailed in these very pages: "Bailey's bat was not made of the stuff of which lost causes are compounded. It was a truly great vigil, a stand of noble martyrdom on an everlasting afternoon of immense strain."

November 27, 2008

Ed Smith's retirement is a loss to professional cricket

Posted on 11/27/2008 in English cricket

Without Ed Smith, the Middlesex dressing room, and by extension the professional game, will be that little bit more uniform, that little less diverse, writes Mike Atherton in the Times.

Smith is too good a batsman to be lost to professional cricket at such a tender age. It is clearly a source of intense irritation to him that the focus is always on the other bits of his life. “When it came to cricket, I was never a dilettante,” he says. His record proves it: he averaged more than 40, scored 34 first-class hundreds and in excess of 12,000 first-class runs. With experience and youth on his side, he ought to be entering his prime years; another crack at international cricket should not be beyond him.

November 26, 2008

Bring back Banger

Posted on 11/26/2008 in English cricket

There would have been pleasure at watching Marcus Trescothick win the £20,000 prize for his autobiography Coming Back To Me. Yet, even as the applause rang round the room, the thought was inescapable: how the current England team could do with him back. Tom Fordyce in his blog on BBC Sport reflects on what a difference a fit, happy Trescothick could make to today's struggling line-up.

Trescothick is still only 32 years old, two years younger than Vaughan and a year younger than Ricky Ponting. By rights he should be at his peak.

Instead, he'll see out the remainder of his playing days at his beloved Somerset, determined to never again be more than a car journey away from wife Hayley and daughters Ellie and Millie. England fans can yearn all they like. He's not coming back.

Ed Smith's new chapter

Posted on 11/26/2008 in English cricket

If I wanted to annoy Ed Smith, I would tell him he is a better writer than he ever was a cricketer. All the same, it's a pretty compliment: Smith played three Tests for England and scored 34 first-class hundreds for Kent and Middlesex, with a top score of 213. You have to write fairly decent books to top that," writes Simon Barnes in the Times.

He has written three well-received books. His 'prentice piece, Playing Hard Ball, compared his experiences in cricket and baseball. He then did a season's diary, one with an awful lot of meat, On And Off The Field. His present book is in many ways remarkable, entitled boldly What Sport Tells Us About Life. The diary deals with 2003, the year he played for England. He made 64 in his first innings; in his last, he was given out leg-before to a ball that would have comfortably cleared the stumps. What sport tells us here is that life is a bitch. He never played for England again.

Thus it was that England lost a player who might have been up for the long haul. He was, in some eyes, a Future England Captain who never made it, a Mike Brearley come again, but better off the back foot. He couldn't break back in; what some call consistency of selection, others call a clique. Smith's was a career that missed its trajectory.

November 23, 2008

Games on the field, and off it

Posted on 11/23/2008 in English cricket

Nothing is going right for England. Defeat on the field is being accompanied by desperate – and, so far, similarly successful – brinkmanship off it, writes Stephen Brenkley in the Independent on Sunday.

At the core of fractious negotiations is Twenty20 cricket: the Indian Premier League and whether England's players appear in it, the so-called England Premier League and Indian involvement, and the future format of the Champions League. Everyone wants a share of the money, but in essence it is up to India whether they get it. England must have Indian players, and many other nationalities, taking part in their Premier League due to start in 2010, otherwise it could face serious trouble under trade description regulations, let alone crowd resistance. But in return India want more involvement by English players in the IPL.

Watching how the Indian players have gone about their skills in the current one-day series it is clear to me that playing in the IPL has helped them improve in vital areas and had a huge benefit on their team, writes Steve Harmison in the Mail on Sunday.

And the danger for England is that if our players are not involved in the IPL in future we could get left far behind in certain areas. Yuvraj Singh has been fantastic, of course, but other less well known batsmen, such as Suresh Raina and Yusuf Pathan, have shown what they've learned from the high-pressure demands and challenges of regular Twenty20 cricket against top opposition in the IPL. Batsmen are no longer content to look for 260-275 as par scores, and are now looking for a minimum of 290-300 every time.

November 20, 2008

Check please!

Posted on 11/20/2008 in English cricket

The career of a sportsman is relatively short and the attitude of most is to grasp what is on offer when it is there. Angus Fraser in the Independent believes though England's top players could earn in excess of £1.5 million over the course of the next 15 months, the workload may take its toll on the players with injuries and more casualties.

Injury is an occupational hazard for a sportsman and, sadly, there will be the occasional player whose body cannot cope with the constant demands that are placed on it. Fast bowlers are the most prone to injury. The physically trying nature of the job means that a pull, strain, tear or stress fracture is never far away.

November 13, 2008

Simon says

Posted on 11/13/2008 in English cricket

There is a chance that Simon Jones' career could be over. The fast bowler has already begun planning for the cricketing afterlife and taken the first tentative steps on his latest comeback trail. He admits international cricket is "something you miss terribly" but the crowning of Pietersen – who is godfather to Harvey, the eldest of Jones' two young sons – will not harm his chances of a recall. Wayne Veysey has more in the Telegraph.

The bowler many judges rate as the most skilful in England has not played international cricket since breaking down during the 2005 Trent Bridge Test even though his form last summer – he took 42 Championship wickets at 18 apiece – was surely good enough for him to be selected ahead of Darren Pattinson for the second Test against South Africa at Headingley.

"I heard I was close," said Jones. "I was told I was close, not officially. I don't know whether the wrong message had gone round because I was rotated by Worcester sometimes but I was fit to play."

November 11, 2008

Why a benefit year hurts

Posted on 11/11/2008 in English cricket

Robin Martin-Jenkins explains in the Wisden Cricketer how the distractions brought about by a benefit year cause a player's form to deteriorate.

Suddenly, having only ever been good at playing cricket, he is thrust into the cut-throat world of the local business community. He has to become an expert networker, party planner and public speaker all at once. He has to buy a laptop and a printer. Most alien of all to him, he has to buy a diary and fill it with appointments to meet sponsors, caterers and tie designers. He has to plan his life and it becomes more complicated than at any time since those long-gone school days.

Sniffing an opportunity

Posted on 11/11/2008 in English cricket

Australia’s 2-0 defeat was their first in a series since 2005 and their biggest since 1988-89, and has perhaps offered England hope of exploiting Australia’s frailties in the Ashes. For that, England will have to build the same momentum this winter that they did when overcoming West Indies and South Africa in 2004 writes Christopher Martin-Jenkins in the Times. He also believes Monty Panesar might prove to be the trump card both in India and against Australia.

Anyone rushing to take yesterday’s shortened odds of 15-8 against England regaining the Ashes next year should remember how Ponting responded to his team’s previous defeat in a series. They won 19 of their next 20 Tests, including five out of five against England.

November 9, 2008

What if...

Posted on 11/09/2008 in English cricket

England left Antigua empty-handed after being thrashed by the Stanford Super Stars, with Kevin Pietersen saying he was happy that the money will make such a difference to the West Indian players. However, surely the England stars would have found some uses for US$1 million. In the Sunday Telegraph, Andrew Baker looks at how the squad could have spent their winnings.

Peter Moores [coach]: I would have invested any such windfall proceedings in the acquisition of a personality. I would also have purchased a quantity of "focus" for the team to take with them to India.

Matt Prior: A full-time bodyguard for my wife.

Ian Bell: Pot noodles. Lots and lots of pot noodles. No disrespect to the people of India, but while their cricketers are tasty, the food there mings.

November 7, 2008

It's all in the name

Posted on 11/07/2008 in English cricket

Nick Compton carries the weight of one of cricket's most famous surnames on his shoulders. After eight years at Middlesex he is looking to start afresh with a new county, but first has headed out to Australia to spend a winter with coach Neil D'Costa, who has played a major part in Michael Clarke's career. The early results are promising after Compton hit a century for his club side and he is keen to make his own name for himself as he tells Ray Gatt in the Australian

I've been at Middlesex for eight seasons now and Compton is obviously a household name in that part of the world. It is something I got used to. Maybe it has been a sub-conscious thing, perhaps it was more pressure than I needed. I'm my own player and people realise that. I think one of the reasons was to get away from that, disconnect with the UK. Come here in relative obscurity.

November 6, 2008

Get your moaning in order, England

Posted on 11/06/2008 in English cricket

Alan Tyers casts his cynical, satirical eye over Peter Moores' would-be diary, reflecting on the Stanford Super Series at The Wisden Cricketer's blog:

As I said, the most important thing about Stanford was not the money but actually getting the players tuned up for India. One of the key skills about an England tour to the sub-continent is having your moaning in really tip-top order, so that when you arrive, you’re ready to hit the ground complaining.

“Bang… The hotel’s not up to scratch… bang… That bloke’s looking at my missus… bang… This foreign muck don’t half play havoc with my guts…”

At the same blog, Miles Jupp questions the excuses England gave for their performance in the Stanford money match:

Peter Moores said it was all about attitude, and that our thinking had all been wrong. He even implied there might have been too much thinking (which sounds dangerously like bollocks). It is hard to imagine anybody being able to use that excuse convincingly anywhere. “Your honour, although my client’s actions may appear thoughtless, the truth is in fact quite the opposite. At the very moment he took the staff of that depot hostage he was, if anything, thinking too much…”

The idea that England allowed themselves to think too much about the nature of the game and the contradictions it threw up seems far-fetched. Moores made it sound as if each and every member of the team went out to bat and immediately suffered an existential crisis. As if someone as happy-go-lucky as Paul Collingwood would suddenly raise an arm during the bowler’s delivery stride and howl plaintively “Oh never mind the cricket - what are any of us actually put on this world for?”

Financial crisis could jolt England's Ashes hopes

Posted on 11/06/2008 in English cricket

In his blog, Line and Length blog on Times Online, Patrick Kidd comes up with a very interesting theory, one which could harm England's prospects in next year's Ashes.

Kidd's Law of Economics part 1a: Australia always do well out of an economic crisis. Plus, Kidd's Law of Economics part 1b: There is nothing like a recession to stimulate the arrival of some all-time great Ozzie cricketer on the world stage. For some reason, they thrive on it. Maybe because there is nothing else to do during a depression than to become really good at cricket. Plus it depresses the English even more. So don't view their troubles in India as the beginning of a decline. Instead, be afraid that some new hero is about to emerge. Here's the evidence.

Here's one of the four example he offers to prove his theory:

1992 As if you needed any more proof for my "Australia flourishes in a recession" theory, I offer up Black Wednesday on September 16, when sterling collapsed and John Major had to pull us out of the ERM, costing Britain £3.4 million. A couple of days beforehand, a young spinner named Warne had just completed his first Test series for Australia in Sri Lanka and had not been all that effective. He was selected for the next summer's Ashes tour, however, and turned out OK in the long run.

So there you are, a theory that can be explained thus: unfulfilled Australian cricketer + economic crisis = All-time Aussie Hero + Demoralised Poms.

Come on, England. It's entertainment

Posted on 11/06/2008 in Stanford 20/20 for 20

	Shane Warne: "Stanford is somebody we should want to be involved" © Getty Images

England surely missed a trick during their one-week outing in Antigua for the Stanford Super Series, says Shane Warne in the Times. He says they failed to embrace the entertainment.

Saturday was always going to be a great occasion and I think that England missed a trick. They could have said that they were looking forward to a carnival atmosphere, to an evening of great entertainment for the crowd with a fantastic chance to earn $1million. They could have talked up the whole spectacle - yes, acknowledging the money, but emphasising how it would generate a really exciting game.

.......................................

Let's take the example of Allen Stanford walking into the dressing-room. That wasn't exactly a spying mission in the middle of a tense Ashes decider. Instead of getting uptight, players could have said something like, “Hello, mate, how are you going?” They might have asked him about his love of cricket or his businesses. Who knows - they might even have picked up a tip or two for the longer term.

October 30, 2008

Stanford's game isn't cricket, so what is it?

Posted on 10/30/2008 in Stanford 20/20 for 20

	© The Mirror

Another day, and the disquiet over the whole Stanford venture rumbles on, with particular attention now being paid to the role of the ECB in the whole affair.

In the Times Michael Atherton cuts to the quick.

With developments this week suggesting that the contract is more about Stanford and his brand than any altruistic concerns about West Indies cricket, it is clear that the ECB has been, at best, naive and at worst outmanoeuvred again.

Briefings were given yesterday by officials from the governing body indicating how uneasy they have become at the sight of the England team being used as a prop for a rich man's ego.

Stephen Brenkley, writing in the Independent, was just as forthright.

The Stanford Twenty20 Super Series has been a public relations disaster. Whatever the complications of the deal and however apparently irresistible the money was, the tournament has become less and less desirable by the day.

From the moment that the ECB and Sir Allen unveiled a case filled with $20m in cash at Lord's last June to be paid for an exhibition match between England and the Stanford Superstars it has been plain that this event has been almost exclusively about the cash and the rich man supplying it.

Paul Newman in the Daily Mail quotes Michael Holding, a former Stanford ambassador: “Allen Stanford is just in it for himself, not West Indian cricket. Everyone will see.” Newman continues:

How could the English game's rulers be so naive in jumping into bed with an American billionaire and expect him to be the answer to their prayers as they find themselves increasingly isolated in a cricket world dominated by India?

This week was only ever going to be about Stanford and the huge amount of money he is throwing at the winners of Saturday's exhibition match between the England cricket team and a group of West Indian cricketers who go by the name of the Stanford Superstars, as everything here has to be prefixed with the name of the man who virtually rules this Caribbean island.

Dean Wilson in the Mirror ponders how the man himself will react to the opprobrium heading his way.

It is not the sort of response Stanford is used to and he will be either completely taken aback by the strength of feeling in the England camp or he will be fuming at the lack of kow-towing from his guests that his money usually affords him. But he should appreciate that a large part of the anger stems from his behaviour that has made a mockery of the game of cricket.

Andy Bull in his blog for the Guardian wonders if Stanford can recoup his investment.

Certainly the 20/20 for 20 has put him in a much better position to grow his business in the City. As for the money to be made directly from the match itself, the ceiling of the potential profits sits far lower than his expenditure on it all. As long as he is in partnership with the ECB rather than the BCCI, then it is going to stay that way. The huge money in cricket comes with a presence in India, not England.

As long as the project to convert Americans to cricket remains a pipedream and Stanford is in cahoots with the English, the tournament is never going to make the kinds of blockbuster sums associated with the future of Twenty20. He invited India, remember, to play this challenge match after they won the World Twenty20, but they turned him down.

Allen Stanford's millions are not a solution for English cricket - the solution lies in India and a deal which will make England's best players available to the IPL, writes Mihir Bose on BBC Sport. The ECB must come to terms with Indian cricket. If it does not, it will be in danger of getting bogged down in matches that may generate publicity and bring some money but will do nothing for its cricket in the long term.

October 29, 2008

England selling soul of the game

Posted on 10/29/2008 in Stanford 20/20 for 20

As the media anger over the sight of Allen Stanford with Emily Prior perched on his knees dies down, there is also a growing tide of thinking that the whole 20/20 for 20 venture is looking increasingly tawdry.

There were more than a few raised eyebrows last June when Stanford’s helicopter landed at Lord’s and he was almost treated as a saviour by fawning ECB executives. The unveiling of US$20 million is hard currency inside the indoor school for many signalled that English cricket had sold out.

Now that the eight-day feast of Stanford’s cash-driven Twenty20 is underway, it has proved too rich for many of those watching it.

In today’s Daily Mail, Paul Newman wrote that “English cricket has clearly jumped into a very uncomfortable bed by so eagerly accepting Stanford's millions and now everyone involved with our game has to lie in it. The ECB may have made sure that their players become very wealthy this week but the price being paid is an expensive one. English cricket is selling its soul.”

According to Newman, those comments have registered with the players, one (unnamed) member of the England squad saying: “If that's what people back home are thinking then we can't get out of here quick enough.”

In the Times on Monday, Simon Barnes described the tournament as “pornography”. He added: “It is not, then, the pursuit of excellence. Nor is it the pursuit of money. Rather, it is the pursuit of squirming. It is a billionaire's malicious joke at the expense of people he never could be, even if he had a billion billion. He will make a group of richly gifted international athletes squirm and grovel before the altars of money.”

In the Sunday Times Simon Wilde also showed he is no fan. “What a vision it is: a toytown stadium, black bats, silver stumps, vulgar amounts of money and a contraction of the game’s skills into the time it takes to consume a jumbo burger, a tub of popcorn and a bucket of Pepsi. Bad taste, just another toxic asset the United States has given the world.”

Steve James in the Guardian would not disagree. “The match is a disgrace at almost every level, and not just because its Texas billionaire backer, Sir Allen Stanford, has spent the past week on a dollar-driven ego trip, parading around his private ground, hogging the limelight and cavorting with the England players' wives. November 1 will be the night cricket is turned into reality TV, where some grisly voyeuristic fare is served up for those of a short attention span. Big Brother has finished: roll up instead to watch the nervous antics of the England cricket team. Who will drop a catch to cost his mates half a million quid?”

Perhaps more surprising, given the vast sums poured into the venture, are the facilities. The pitches have been slow and low, exactly what is not needed for high-scoring, big-hitting matches, and the low-level floodlights, necessary because of the proximity of the ground to the airport, has made catching a lottery, with some of the world’s best fielders left looking like club duffers.

“The cricketing reality is the pitch and outfield mean the games will be dull, dull, dull,” wrote John Ethridge in the Sun. “Certainly the loot available is inversely proportional to the quality of the product, although the ground is pretty.”

It is possible to find those still who are prepared to enthuse. Here’s Nasser Hussain on Emilygate. “It was pretty harmless, to be honest, and the wives must remember that their husbands are potentially earning a fortune by being here and they are in a lovely place having a lovely time in the sunshine. If the man who is putting up all the money wants to give them a quick cuddle for the cameras is that really a big problem?”

It should be remembered, however, that Hussain fronted the ECB/Stanford announcement at Lord’s last summer and is also covering the tournament for Sky … and the broadcasters have invested heavily in their coverage of the event.

October 27, 2008

Matt Prior: 'I wasn't sledging Tendulkar'

Posted on 10/27/2008 in English cricket

Matt Prior speaks to Brian Viner in the Independent on various topics - the move from South Africa to England, his mother's illness, the Stanford 20/20 for 20, the number of South-African born players in the England team, the jellybean incident ... and the infamous Porsche sledge.

"People who do know me know that if I muck up I hold my hand up and admit it," he [Prior] continues, "but I was being accused of stuff I hadn't even done. That Porsche comment ... why would I say that to Tendulkar? He's got aeroplanes.

"What happened was that we'd had a long day in the field the day before, and I said something about keeping our npower energy up, which was picked up by the stump mic, and because npower were the sponsors, there was a bottle of champagne in my kit bag the next day. Well, at the time Alastair Cook wanted a new TV, so next day he's at short leg going 'Bang & Olufsen, Bang & Olufsen, great televisions' and I think Porsche Carreras are great cars, so that's why I mentioned Porsche. It wasn't a sledge but that quote made me look such an average person. I don't mind if people think I'm an average cricketer, but I don't like to be thought an average person."

October 26, 2008

Money shot cheapens the appeal of cricket

Posted on 10/26/2008 in Stanford 20/20 for 20

	© Getty Images

Simon Barnes writing in The Times makes clear that he has no time for Allen Stanford and his multi-million dollar jamboree in Antigua, voicing the opinion that "sport has become the new pornography".

I won't be watching out of partisanship, loyalty or patriotism, or the pursuit of excellence. If I watch - and I feel no pressing need to - I will do so for reasons that are furtive and shaming. The spectacle may be briefly compelling, but it will soon lose its charm, leaving behind only a kind of embarrassment for the grotesque contortions of the participants. In short, pornography.

This is not, then, the pursuit of excellence. Nor is it the pursuit of money. Rather, it is the pursuit of squirming. It is a billionaire's malicious joke at the expense of people he never could be, even if he had a billion billion. He will make a group of richly gifted international athletes squirm and grovel before the altars of money.

October 16, 2008

Sate my appetite

Posted on 10/16/2008 in English cricket

The actor and comedian, Miles Jupp, is a frustrated man. The lack of cricket might be considered a blessing by some, but not for Jupp in his latest blog at The Wisden Cricketer magazine's site:

In the meantime, my appetite for cricket discussion has to be sated by any means possible. I’m currently trying to drop a cricket reference into nearly every conversation I have in the hope that someone will take the bait. Ideally you do it in such a way that if the person you’re talking to isn’t a cricket fan then they don’t notice what you’re doing, but it’s a hard thing to nail. Twice this week people that I’ve only just met have said, “you talk about cricket a lot, don’t you?”

I’m not deterred by such failures though, because when you can identify them, cricket lovers will stick together. We’re like the Freemasons. Recently I went to an audition for a small part in a film, and once I’d had a go at the script I thought I’d unleash the secret handshake and so dropped in a cricketing reference. While everyone else in Soho panicked about the credit crunch and sent out for sushi, the two of us stood and talked about cricket.

And it worked. I got the part. And so it was that on Sunday morning, I was sitting nervously on the steps of a London gentlemen’s Club waiting to film a scene with Jude Law and Robert Downey Jr. I’d like to think that the reason I was there was because another man and I have exactly the same concerns about Michael Vaughan.

Lucre who's talking

Posted on 10/16/2008 in English cricket

Sri Lanka's decision to accept Lalit Modi's $70m offer is comeuppance for the ECB's reluctance to grant the nation Test matches in England, writes Gideon Haigh in the Guardian.

So, too, is the England and Wales Cricket Board hemmed in that little bit tighter. For which country's cricketers will be content to accept second billing in an English summer when they can see their names up in the razzle-dazzling Indian Premier League lights? The ECB also gets its comeuppance for decades of neglect: Sri Lanka, in their quarter century as a Test nation, have been granted only 10 Tests in England ...

... The multi-million dollar endowment for Sri Lanka Cricket projects the BCCI into a new position: that of cricket's lender of last resort. And Sri Lanka, of course, is far from alone in having rising expenses to meet and restive cricketers to placate: more benefactions are perfectly possible.

Warne is right: Monty has not learnt since day one

Posted on 10/16/2008 in English cricket

Monty Panesar is a commendable bowler, yet his inability to learn from his own mistakes has been to his detriment, writes Mike Selvey in the Guardian.

There is a particular image to be carried from England's last tour of Sri Lanka and it is this: Monty Panesar is bowling to Mahela Jayawardene, off-stumpish and good length. Jayawardene plonks his left leg forward and waits until the ball is under his nose, at which point his left hand rotates the bat blade clockwise an eighth of a turn, his right deftly imparts a little energy and the ball slides away through point in the direction of a distant fielder. The batsmen stroll a single and the scoreboard clicks round. It happened time after time after time ...

He appeared to learn not one single thing from the trip, which rather sums up his international career: he began it as a very good bowler and he remains just that, stuck on the same level at which he started. Shane Warne, who is no Bertrand Russell when it comes to philosophy, nevertheless got it absolutely right with his observation that Panesar, rather than having played 33 Tests, had merely played his first one 33 times.

October 14, 2008

Joining Botham on his walks

Posted on 10/14/2008 in English cricket

In the Daily Mail, Lee Clayton joins Ian Botham during one of his charity walks, and discusses how he [Clayton] fared.

I managed to last nine miles at his shoulder, walking at a pace of 4.5mph, which is around three times normal walking speed.

I'm not sure what hurt first - burning calves, sore shins, aching thighs or screaming feet.

'A man ran with us on Sunday with his two sons,' Beefy reports. 'Fourteen years ago, he was given no chance of survival; that's why I do this. The pain you feel is nothing compared to what these people endure. We're making a difference.'

And he won't be quitting - a 25th anniversary walk is being planned for 2010.

October 9, 2008

Flintoff fights back

Posted on 10/09/2008 in English cricket

The Daily Mail's Paul Newman meets Andrew Flintoff in a frank and open chat about his comeback to international cricket.

'I was sat on the balcony at Lord's after we had gone four up in the one-day series against South Africa,' said relaxed and rejuvenated Flintoff.

'Everybody had gone, I had a beer in my hand and I just sat there and thought about everything I'd gone through over the last 10 months. I couldn't believe how pleased I was. How much I'd enjoyed being part of that, to be back in the England team winning games.

'There were so many low moments, so many times when I wondered if I would ever be sat there again like that.'

The return of a fully-fit and firing Flintoff was the story of the summer.

October 8, 2008

'Who gives a damn? It's not cricket'

Posted on 10/08/2008 in English cricket

Angus Fraser, in the Independent, writes that the rest of the cricketing world, or even the vast majority of England supporters, could not care if the US $20 million match between Stanford All-Star XI and England gets cancelled. Fraser feels the match is nothing more than an exhibition game, as it is just a move by Allen Stanford to promote himself and his company, but provides the ECB an opportunity to have greater control over its players.

Teams play matches to be successful and win trophies for the country they represent and the fans who passionately follow them. For a player, fortune is amassed and fame is gained as a direct result of excelling in these events and winning trophies.

Stanford's match, however, is different. It has been arranged almost as a "Big Brother" experiment, so that a billionaire can promote himself and his company while watching how players react when playing under a huge and falsely created amount of pressure. The game is an irrelevance. No trophy of any value will be won and the performances of the players will not appear in their career records. It is nothing more than an exhibition game.

October 6, 2008

Giles Clarke keen to extend reign

Posted on 10/06/2008 in English cricket

Giles Clarke reflects on his first year in office as chairman of the ECB. Read his interview with Ivo Tennant in the Times.

Clarke, 55, says that much of his job is about networking and socialising for the good of the game. “I am also very proud that we have secured a new broadcasting deal until 2013, particularly given the crisis in the economy, that there has been so much unprecedented investment in amateur and professional facilities, and that we have a much better relationship with Pakistan now,” he said. “In future years I want to see them play in the Midlands and the North in particular, where there are large Asian communities.”

October 5, 2008

'I'm mad to get back into the England team'

Posted on 10/05/2008 in English cricket

	'I'm dedicating the next year to getting back into the England team': Vaughan © Getty Images

Michael Vaughan, in the Sunday Telegraph, writes about the reasons that contributed to his resignation as England captain and his determination to get back into the England team.

I’ve given myself until November 10 to decide my best way back. To be the best player I can be, my decision-making has to be spot-on, and I felt recently I was making some wrong decisions as captain and a batsman. The hunger is still there all right – I’m mad to get back into the England team.

Four out of the five England captains in the past 20 years, when every Test match has been televised and media scrutiny has never been greater, have resigned in highly-stressed circumstances, writes Scyld Berry in the Sunday Telegraph.

Part of the reason for Vaughan’s resignation can be traced to the England tour of New Zealand. When he arrived there for the Test series, he found the England one-day players already 'jaded’. Partly this was the consequence of touring: the longer a tour, Vaughan believes, the less effective the players are. But the objective reader, wishing the England captaincy to be a more sustainable job, can also take this as a veiled criticism of the management style of Peter Moores, as it was then, when highly focused on training. After two Twenty20 internationals in New Zealand, and five one-day games, the players should have been livelier, instead of producing flat performances which were only just sufficient to win the Test series 2-1.

England selector Geoff Miller, in an interview with Stephen Brenkley in the Independent on Sunday, talks about Michael Vaughan’s resignation, the surprising selection of Darren Pattinson, and English cricket’s new phase under Kevin Pietersen’s leadership.

About Pattinson's selection

"I was surprised at the reaction because it was unwarranted from Darren's viewpoint," he said. "There was a logical reason behind it. We'd had a special meeting about it and gone through all the contenders, everybody in the frame. He had proved himself at that stage, had created a feeling and was the kind of bowler we wanted. On the morning, circumstances conspired and as the swing bowler he was the choice. Will it be a long time before we make a selection like that again? The natural answer would be yes but I can't really say because a situation can crop up. What I do know is that what Darren had to deal with was unfair and that the buck stops with me."

October 4, 2008

'I felt like a foreigner in the England dressing-room'- Graeme Hick

Posted on 10/04/2008 in English cricket

Simon Hughes speaks to Graeme Hick about his illustrious career, its highs and lows, and reasons for his limited international success. Read his article in the Telegraph.

“I grew up on a tobacco farm in Zimbabwe,” he said. “The first time I walked into the England dressing room was the first time I’d spent a day in the company of all those guys. I didn’t know anyone really. I did feel like a foreigner in the dressing room.

“There were one or two who resented me being there and we were competing for places. There was one guy with a good Test record – Allan Lamb – and he wanted to say something but he didn’t know what to say or how to say it because I already had more first-class runs than him.”

October 3, 2008

Durham's triumphant season

Posted on 10/03/2008 in English cricket

The Third Umpire blog hosts a review of Durham’s triumphant county season. It also includes season reviews for Northamptonshire and Nottighamshire.

After the euphoria of 2007 and the club’s first piece of silverware, it was always going to be hard to live up to the expectations, some of it optimistic, of its supporters in 2008. Yet that is precisely what Durham did, by winning their maiden county championship title, just 16 years after gaining first-class status.

October 2, 2008

Why English spinners are an endangered species

Posted on 10/02/2008 in English cricket

A day after Derek Underwood took over as MCC president and vowed to use his position to promote spin in England, Mike Atherton writes in Times that the influence of home-grown slow bowlers has been waning by the season. Atherton traces the decline of spin bowling in England and feels there has been no recovery. Yet, he says, there are grounds for hope.

A week spent watching the denouement of the LV County Championship at Trent Bridge last week highlighted the issue. There were four spinners on view, bowling on a pitch that, while slow, was bare and dry. There were two left-armers (Samit Patel and Liam Dawson), an off spinner (Graeme Swann) and a leg spinner (Imran Tahir): three home-produced players and one from overseas; three orthodox spinners and one with more “mystery”. Between them, the home-grown spinners took four wickets and Tahir took eight.

October 1, 2008

One-day win highlight of Essex's season

Posted on 10/01/2008 in English cricket

Philip Oliver reviews Essex’s 2008 season in the blog Third Umpire. He lauds them for their one-day performances, and is optimistic about the county’s chances of promotion to Division One in the Championship next season. The blog also has season reviews for Worcestershire and Hampshire.

Essex enjoyed a successful 2008 season, confirming themselves as one of the premier limited overs teams in the country. Unfortunately a similar winning formula continues to evade them in the championship, where they will start 2009 in division two for the eighth time in 10 years of the two division structure.

On the Sky Sports website, Ian Ward, the former England batsman, provides a comprehensive review of the 2008 county season.

When I was at Surrey you'd see Alec Stewart, Mark Butcher, Graham Thorpe and the rest going off and playing for England and that made you realise you had to improve if you wanted to stay in the side. You start thinking like an international cricketer and trying to emulate what they were achieving. Durham have had Harmison, Collingwood and Plunkett going into international cricket and that will have motivated the other players. They've been the stars for the last few seasons and it's all culminated this year.

September 29, 2008

Pattinson wouldn't pick himself

Posted on 09/29/2008 in English cricket

Many cricketers have protested against their omission from Test sides, but precious few have criticised their own inclusion. Darren Pattinson tells Alex Brown in the Age that he had disagreed with the England selectors' decision to play him in the second Test against South Africa at Headingley.

'If I never played another international, I'd be OK with that. As far as the England players were concerned, they were nice and very welcoming. I guess (Michael) Vaughan was coming to the end of his captaincy at the time, so there might have been a few issues there. I didn't get all the stuff he said, but I take it, it was mostly to do with the selection'

Somerset miss out yet again

Posted on 09/29/2008 in English cricket

	Justin Langer: "There hasn't been a single game I have been involved in this summer that hasn't felt like a cup final" © Getty Images

Andy Bull, in his blog in the Guardian, laments another loss for Somerset in the County Championship. The anguish is greater this time as the ultimate victory eluded the team despite Justin Langer’s spirited leadership. Somerset have never won the Country Championship in the tournament's long history.

Durham, of course, just won the championship for the first time themselves, but they've only been trying for 16 years. Somerset have been imagining that each new season could be the season for 117.

There isn't another record quite like it in cricket. Northamptonshire are the only other team never to have won the league, but they didn't join until 1905. Gloucestershire have had a miserable time since the championship was founded in 1890, but at least they enjoyed the age of Grace in the 1870s when they won the unofficial version four times. I suppose Bolton Wanderers, who helped found the football league in 1888 but have never won the championship, have a kinship of a kind.

Justin Langer, in his column for the BBC, says "English cricket should be proud of the standards in Division One - and I can see absolutely no need to change anything about it."

There hasn't been a single game I have been involved in this summer that hasn't felt like a cup final and the pressure associated with this is sure to produce better cricket and therefore tougher cricketers.

The best from the County Championship

Posted on 09/29/2008 in English cricket

	Hampshire's Imran Tahir was the best overseas signing of the season, according to Angus Fraser © Getty Images

The Guardian's writers pick their best moments, favourite incidents, and heroes from the English season.

David Hopps' highlight of the season: Sitting on the popular bank at Scarborough at Festival time watching Yorkshire v Kent with, I kid you not, the sun shining from a cloudless sky. And KP's first press conference as captain, which was so full of love it gave me an insight into what the 1960s must have been like.

Paul Weaver's lowlight of the season: The greed with which Twenty20 cricket was pursued could be one of sport's great morality tales. Also, giving Michael Vaughan a new central contact when he's not good enough for Yorkshire.

Angus Fraser has also reviewed the season in the Independent.

Best overseas signing Imran Tahir. Hampshire were looking at Second Division cricket when Tahir joined the county. They have not lost a Championship game since.

Worst overseas signing Shoaib Akhtar. The signing of the controversial and unreliable fast bowler highlighted the depth of Surrey's desperation. In two games he took 1 for 117.

September 28, 2008

Reviews of the English season

Posted on 09/28/2008 in English cricket

	Shoaib Akhtar swept the "Worst overseas signing" category © Getty Images

After Durham clinched their first county championship, the papers look back at the season’s cricket. The Sunday Telegraph’s Steve James picks his dream-team of the season, gives Mark Ramprakash the nod for “Best Excuse” and “Worst-Directed Tantrum”, and anoints Shoaib Akhtar the “Worst Overseas Player”.

Year's Biggest Illusion
The standard of the county championship. It was not that good … No spinners until Imran Tahir emerged. Great finish, but that's what happens when it rains a lot. And the intermittent presence of quickies like Steve Harmison and Andrew Flintoff altered the landscape too discernibly. Otherwise attacks were rather ordinary.

And if you want to find out what the “Most intemperate answer to a media question”, or what the “Most surprising confession” of the season was, read Simon Wilde in the Sunday Times

Why Durham have done the business

Posted on 09/28/2008 in English cricket

Durham's success has been based on a business model which the other first-class counties, the Test-playing countries and the International Cricket Council would do well to heed, then follow, says Scyld Berry in the Sunday Telegraph.

And in the Sunday Times Simon Wilde looks at Durham's spectacular rise to become county champions a mere 16 years after they first participated in it.

On the BBC Test Match Special blog, Oliver Brett reveals how England football legend Kevin Keegan helped Durham during it's early years in the top flight.

MCC not keeping with the times

Posted on 09/28/2008 in English cricket

The MCC has too few female members, despite ending its men-only rule ten years ago, writes Emily Dugan in the Independent on Sunday.

In the past 10 years, Lords has received millions of pounds in funding from private investment, as well as £200,000 in direct Lottery grants.

But over that same decade the number of women allowed to join its 18,000 members has increased to just 62, 0.3 per cent of the club's membership.

September 25, 2008

Surrey's most miserable season

Posted on 09/25/2008 in English cricket

Surrey have been relegated to the County Championship second division after a grim campaign in which they have so far failed to win a single game. A meeting of the Surrey Cricket Management Board on Monday is now expected to confirm the departure of manager Alan Butcher, assistant Nadeem Shahid and bowling coach Geoff Arnold. The Third Umpire blog has a review of Surrey's season, in which it is written:

It is axiomatic that Surrey are a club in need of big changes, with the appointment of Graham Thorpe as batting coach appearing a shrewd start. But years of muddled thinking and short-termism will not be easy to rectify, especially with so many serial under-performers still contracted.

And the award goes to...

Posted on 09/25/2008 in English cricket

As the County Championship draws to a nailbiting close, the PCA have named a four-man shortlist for the PCA Player of the Year award, encompassing Marcus Trescothick, Ravi Bopara, Steve Harmison and Martin van Jaarsveld. The panel at The Wisden Cricketer draws up its 'hit' list as well from this season and debates the PCA's picks for Player of the Year.

The Dazzler accepts the dying of his light

Posted on 09/25/2008 in English cricket

	Darren Gough had an open mind and a desire to change © PA Photos

With the career of one of cricket's colourful characters, Darren Gough, coming to an end, the tributes continue to pour in. In the Times, Michael Atherton hails him as England's most important and influential fast bowler since Ian Botham.

Gough does not stray too far from the classic caricature, the look-at-me-aren't-I-great school of Yorkshire cricket, but in the most important aspect of his game, his bowling, he soaked up information so that he became, within five years, an unrecognisable performer from the one who embarked on a first-class career just as Australia's 16-year domination of the Ashes began.

In the Guardian, Mike Selvey says: "In his going I can see Turner's wonderfully evocative painting of the Fighting Temeraire, battle deeds done, being towed to the breakers' yard in Rotherhithe."

September 24, 2008

English cricket's premier domestic competition

Posted on 09/24/2008 in English cricket

In his column in the Independent, Angus Fraser stresses the significance of the County Championship for the overall development of cricketers.

For all its many faults, with perhaps the biggest two probably being that there are a couple more counties than there ideally should be and that there are too many non-England qualified players, the Championship plays an absolutely crucial role in the development of cricketers. The education system in this country does not make money. It is an investment. And it is on overcast Thursdays in front of meagre crowds at Taunton or Chester-le-Street that the next Pietersen or Andrew Flintoff are to be found learning their trade.

Bloodaxe insists 'it was not my show'

Posted on 09/24/2008 in English cricket

	Mark Ramprakash doing what he does best ... scoring runs © Getty Images

Mark Ramprakash uses his column in the Daily Telegraph to speak honestly about Surrey’s dire season … and gets his excuses in early.

We lost Mark Butcher early on and I was asked to stand in as captain. Right from the very beginning I said I was happy to carry out the orders on the field but I was conscious that I was a stand-in captain and that it was not my show. Policy and selection was still down to the coach and Mark Butcher.

He also touches on rumours that he might be heading to India this winter.

Times have changed and the winter now provides other opportunities in the form of Twenty20 cricket in India. I was contacted by the Indian Cricket League at one point and asked if I would be interested in joining an England team they were thinking of setting up.

I’ve heard nothing since and I have not received any offers from the Indian Premier League. There is a lot of competition for places because every overseas cricketer now wants to play in the IPL and would relish the challenge of being involved. But at the moment a trip to Disneyland is my only overseas posting this winter.

Doubt burst for the Championship

Posted on 09/24/2008 in English cricket

	ECB plans to have two Twenty20 tournaments from the 2010 season and onwards © Getty Images

Despite being poised for a thrilling finale, the County Championship is under greater threat than ever. But, Angus Fraser in the Independent believes it remains vital to the game.

The Championship may be enjoying one of its more captivating seasons, but life for domestic cricket's premier competition is not going to get any easier, and the number of people who question the worthiness of playing midweek four-day cricket in front of sparse crowds is only set to increase. The rise, rise and rise of Twenty20 cricket, a frantic, consumer friendly and ever more lucrative form of the game has ensured just that.

Goodbye Gough

Posted on 09/24/2008 in English cricket

Darren Gough was left out of the Yorkshire lineup for the final championship game against Sussex. Oliver Brett in his blog in BBC Sport bids farewell to the model professional.

The subsequent, protracted failure of the team from that point up to the 2007 World Cup tended to prove Gough right. As he said: "You can't buy bowlers like me at a local superstore - it takes years and years."

September 23, 2008

A cricketing Eden caught in no man's land

Posted on 09/23/2008 in English cricket

The Guardian's blog says that Harold Pinter's love of the game suggests that the names of his characters are more than mere coincidence.

One day at drama school Pinter skipped classes to go to Lord's, running through the gate at the Nursery End to see Cyril Washbrook late-cutting for four. His abiding memory of that truant day, expressed in six simple words towards the end of that 1969 essay, is of an Eden familiar to all cricket-lovers: "that beautiful evening Compton made 70".

Is there a more evocative sentence in cricket literature? Even those who never saw Compton in his prime may feel, reading those words, that "I have known this before". It is one of those moments frozen in time. So, as the light fails on an autumn afternoon, history is now and England. Here's to a great playwright, to all our summers, and to the players whose deeds coloured them.

September 21, 2008

Hick's 405: The biggest innings in England in 93 years

Posted on 09/21/2008 in English cricket

In 1988, Vic Marks was part of a Somerset attack that Graeme Hick hammered around Taunton. With the help of team-mates and opponents Marks, now cricket correspondent for the Guardian, recalls that famous innings and examines why Hick, who retires this week, never achieved his expected dominance of the international game.

I was there. Twenty years on after a momentous sporting event there are usually enough first-hand witnesses around to fill the relevant stadium five times over. But I was bloody there all right - along with about 1500 others - when Graeme Hick scored 405 not out. I have the bowling figures to prove it (50-6-141-1, since you ask).

And I was grumpy. All that guff about being involved, however peripherally, in a little bit of history, was no consolation for another thrashing around Taunton. No one had scored 400 in the County Championship since 1895, when Archie MacLaren had hit 424 not out for Lancashire, also against Somerset at Taunton. All the other quadruple centurions had scored their runs on distant fields: Karachi, Sydney, Poona and Melbourne. Hick was sparking a new era of mammoth scores.

In the Sunday Times, David Gower pays tribute and offers a little sympathy.

It was not easy for Hick that the qualification period he had to serve to “become English” dealt him a tough hand in that his debut had to be against a rampant West Indies in 1991. Again a sympathetic comparison: I walked out for my first Test at Edgbaston against Pakistan in 1978 to face Sarfraz, Liaqat Ali, Mudassar, Iqbal Qasim, Sikander Bakht and Wasim Raja; Hick had Ambrose, Patterson, Walsh and Marshall. Maybe if Hick had been lucky enough to ease himself into Test cricket it would have given him a better chance of fulfilling all those expectations that the world had of him at the time.

September 20, 2008

What has happened to my cricket?

Posted on 09/20/2008 in English cricket

British comedian and cricket fan, Miles Jupp, reflects on some of the radical changes the England team underwent this summer. Ranging from Michael Vaughan’s resignation to his beloved Matthew Hoggard’s exclusion from the Test series against South Africa, Flintoff’s return to form and Harmison’s comeback, Jupp regrets his absence from an eventful cricketing season in England as he was occupied with other commitments. Click here to read his blog in the Wisden Cricketer.

Some people compare English cricket to a soap opera. Wrong. If you miss a soap for a few weeks you can turn it on again and within minutes you’re up to speed. I have turned my back for the briefest of whiles and I’ve missed Armageddon. No soap scriptwriter would dare to make all these changes at once.

The unflappable Michael Vaughan suddenly flapping. Harmison returning before Hoggard after their Hamilton hiatus - now Hoggard may never return. KP being captain in both forms of the game - I wouldn’t have bet a penny. How could a man who for the last three years has looked as if he is acting in another movie be so capable of bringing people together? He has England playing at a totally different heart-rate.

September 19, 2008

The sun's the limit for Trescothick

Posted on 09/19/2008 in English cricket

It's sometimes easy to forget that Marcus Trescothick is one of the leading run-scorers in the County Championship, despite him being in the news for his off-field troubles. He's enjoying his cricket, no doubt, but nothing can convince him to return to the England fold, not even friendly nudges from Kevin Pietersen to reconsider. Paul Newman of the Daily Mail caught up with him.

'I went to watch the one-dayer at Lord’s a few weeks ago. It was the first game of international cricket I’d ever watched and although it felt a bit strange, I didn’t say to myself “I’ve got to be back doing this”. I enjoyed England while it lasted but I’ve moved on now.’

The giant who lacked fire

Posted on 09/19/2008 in English cricket

Graeme Hick has played his last county match and views and comments on the Worcestershire legend will undoubtedly spill over for some time. In the Guardian Mike Selvey ponders whether there was something just a little too mechanical or formulaic in Hick's approach to an innings, one blurring into another. Selvey recalls a couple contrasting Hick innings, and believes that he was a giant cricketer who needed more ruthlessness.

Hick says he was not ruthless enough, which those many bowlers who have been on the receiving end may find an odd thing, but I think he means that the fire did not rage as it might. He is just too nice a fellow. Maybe there was something just a little too mechanical or formulaic in his approach to an innings, one blurring into another. Few hundreds were memorable in the sense that the mind can distinguish between them. I didn't see his 178 in India — his maiden Test hundred and one of his favourites — but another, 141 at Centurion, I did. Yet apart from a vague recollection of a thunderous pull shot, I can't recall a further thing about it.

September 18, 2008

County contrast with Premier League elite

Posted on 09/18/2008 in English cricket

Comparing the English football scene with its cricket counterparts, Michael Atherton writes in the Times that the most wealthy clubs in the LV County Championship have failed to prosper.

Atherton looks at Leicestershire chairman Neil Davidson's paper of last year which suggested that county cricket was heading down the football route, where the only determining factor to success would be the health of a club's balance sheet, and picks out a glitch in the argument.

Look at the shambolic state of Lancashire, Yorkshire, Surrey and Warwickshire, all of whom are failing to exploit their power and the weakness of others. These are the counties with the most financial muscle, the greatest traditions and the biggest pools of talent to draw from, yet they are failing to deliver silverware and locally produced players in sufficient numbers, surely the twin aims of any self-respecting county.

Ashes Hero No. 43: Andrew Flintoff

Posted on 09/18/2008 in English cricket

In the Times, Patrick Kidd continues his year-long exploration of the men who made the Ashes what they are. The eighth installment features Andrew Flintoff, the only member from the Ashes-winning side of 2005 to make the cut in Kidd's list of 50 players.

Without the runs of Strauss and Trescothick or the bowling of Jones, Hoggard and Harmison, without key performances at crucial moments from various members of the squad (and not to mention without a healthy dose of luck), England would not have won, but the person they could have least afforded to lose was Flintoff.

September 17, 2008

The end of the road for Dazzler

Posted on 09/17/2008 in English cricket

	Darren Gough was always determined to enjoy his game © Getty Images

As Darren Gough calls time on a nearly two-decade career, Rob Bagchi pays tribute in the Guardian.

It is difficult to overstate how bad Yorkshire cricket was until Gough came along. In the 1970s and 80s, the club was mired in the Boycott wars and an obsession with past glories. Nostalgics talked about charismatic characters like Fred Trueman and Brian Close and pointed to the obvious shortcomings of the brittle and diffident Chris Old and the enigmatic Jim Love. Every few years there would be a promising discovery, such as Paul Jarvis, whose youthful vigour and talent would be crushed by the weight of expectation.

And in the Wisden Cricketer, Rob Smyth calls him England's best fast bowler in 25 years, better than the much-touted Fab Four which won the 2005 Ashes. "Gough was statistically and actually superior to all of them: Harmison with heart; Hoggard with real nip; Jones with a new-ball threat; Flintoff with variety and a consistent wicket-taking threat."

September 16, 2008

'I never had a cut-throat edge, that's why I fell short'

Posted on 09/16/2008 in English cricket

	"I wouldn't change anything because I've always tried to stay true to myself" © Getty Images

In his last season of county cricket, Worcestershire stalwart and former England batsman Graeme Hick looks back on the highs and lows of an eventful career, in an interview with the Guardian's Donald McRae.

Recalling his first season, when he alternated between playing for Worcestershire Seconds and for Kidderminster in the Birmingham League, Hick says that as a wide-eyed 17-year-old he didn't know a soul in England.

"I remember how daunted I was getting from Heathrow to Worcester on my own. I got the train and I was met at the railway station by the club secretary. He dropped me off at the hotel near the cathedral and I spent the whole weekend on my own. It was early April and bitterly cold and all I did that weekend was walk into town, get a burger, walk back to my room, watch TV, and then walk down into town to get another burger in the evening."

Hick cites missing out on a Test century against West Indies in 1994 by four runs, but being reassured by England coach Keith Fletcher that if he could score runs against that attack he could score runs anywhere. He credits that as one of the times he was managed well by England, but also acknowledges his own failings.

I was gutted because those four runs would have meant a lot. It's all speculation but maybe completing those two centuries might have taken away some pressure. I came from a country [Zimbabwe] where we had no professional sport and so I had a naive philosophy. I saw it as a game that should be enjoyed. I never had that cut-throat edge. Maybe that's why I sometimes fell short.

September 15, 2008

It's county cricket v ICL

Posted on 09/15/2008 in Indian Cricket League

With most players on seven-month contracts, Steve James in the Telegraph believes the counties must ditch their efforts to control players all year round. He believes the introduction of year-long contracts might not be enough to hold back cricketers from the lure of tournaments like the unofficial ICL.

The simple reason the counties want their players on twelve-month contracts is control. They do not want them signing up for so-called 'rebel' tournaments like the Indian Cricket League. They're not really sure what they're going to do with them all winter, but they want them only doing things of which they approve. They want them on extended contracts, but they do not want to pay them much more.

September 14, 2008

A reality show of sickening vulgarity

Posted on 09/14/2008 in English cricket

Steve James is appalled about the future of the game as the Stanford 20/20 for 20 draws closer. In the Sunday Telegraph he outlines his fears for the future.

Indeed to call it cricket at all will be difficult. For November 1 will be the night cricket is turned into reality TV, where some grisly voyeuristic fare is served up for those of a short attention span. Big Brother has finished: roll up instead to watch the nervous antics of the England cricket team … this match has immeasurable potential for division and discord. Win bonuses in cricket always do. Always pity the poor county cricketer in charge of the players' kitty. It is an impossible task, forever leaping into a viper's nest of egos and irrational claims.

Already the Stanford selection has raised hackles. Why on earth are 15 players required for a week's work, even if the same squad only touch down for 24 hours afterwards en route to India? How is Alastair Cook included? The omission of so-called domestic Twenty20 experts is correct – where is Chris Schofield now? But why no Dimitri Mascarenhas? He played in England's last Twenty20 match, a win over New Zealand at Old Trafford. "It's a kick in the teeth," he has said publicly. Privately his ire is much stronger.

Redemption song

Posted on 09/14/2008 in English cricket

Stephen Brenkley, in the Independent on Sunday, reveals how county cricket has offered solace to Marcus Trecothick and Steve Harmison after both endured tough times after the highs of the 2005 Ashes triumph.

It might have been that only playing for Somerset, and knowing that was all he [Trescothick] had, would lead to inexorable decline. But he responded with the unmistakable sledgehammer of his bat. His 1,238 runs, making him the leading scorer in the competition, have taken Somerset to the brink of their first title. He is at home again in every sense.

Harmison needed county cricket badly. He had to learn to bowl again and has taken 50 wickets for Durham. It has been the remaking of him. He recognised it by insisting he play in the last round of matches. He is a sensitive man and he knew he owed it to himself and to Durham to play. Both men realised what their counties had done for them.

Meanwhile, Simon Wilde, in the Sunday Times, looks at the decline of Surrey, who, despite being one of the richest clubs in England, are on the verge of being relegated to Division Two of the County Championship.

The contrast between the commercial and cricketing sides is stark. Not long ago, Surrey were the main provider of players to the England team. That river has long since run dry. Figures produced by Leicestershire’s chairman, Neil Davidson, reveal Surrey as among the worst offenders when it comes to giving opportunities to young home-grown players. It is five years since a Surrey player won a first Test cap for England. Even though they own one of the best county academies, there is no sign of that drought ending. Surrey have an unhappy knack of turning stars into black holes. Witness the fates of Rikki Clarke, Scott Newman and James Benning.

September 13, 2008

Britain's best village cricket grounds

Posted on 09/13/2008 in Miscellaneous

	Village cricket at West End, Esher in Surrey © Martin Williamson

The Daily Telegraph selected the best ten among readers' entries for cricket grounds that are quintessentially British. David Robson writes:

If the England cricket team were as spoiled for talent as England is spoiled for picturesque cricket grounds, it would never lose another match.

Test cricket is played in some of the most beautiful places on earth, from Barbados to Cape Town, but no Test Match ground can hold a candle to the real thing - the English village green, unchanged in centuries.

Bridgetown Cricket Club in Somerset, located in the Exmoor National Park, was adjudged the winner.

It was the eccentric detail that made this little ground, accessible by a wooden footbridge over a river, sound so heart-warmingly English. "There is a swallows' nest in the dressing-room, a wrens' nest above the front door... showers non-existent, though it is possible to take a dip in the river Exe to cool off after the match...a boiler fired by gas bottles for that most essential cricketing ingredient - tea." You can almost hear the kettle whistling as the players plod off the field.

Click here to read about the other grounds.

September 12, 2008

Why Northants shouldn't retain Klusener

Posted on 09/12/2008 in English cricket

Despite topping the Northamptonshire batting charts this season, Lance Klusener wasn't offered a new contract by the county - a decision that has surprised many. A post on the Tim Walton's bandana blog (self-styled unofficial home of Northants cricket) explains that given Klusener's wages, his poor bowling and lack of match-winning performances, Northamptonshire have made the right decision in letting him go.

In 2008 Northamptonshire have won three matches (to date). Klusener was absent for the first, scored 0 and 10* in the second and despite scoring 65 in the third was overshadowed by a stunning century from [David] Sales that thwarted Leicestershire’s bowlers in distinctly unfriendly conditions for batting.

Klusener may have scored consistently in the Championship but he has not proved to be a difference-maker in leading Northamptonshire to wins against the odds. He may have been the difference between defeat and a draw on occasion, but ultimately he has not been able to swing games in the County’s favours.

Farewell Mushie

Posted on 09/12/2008 in English cricket

With Mushtaq Ahmed calling time on his first-class career, his Sussex team-mate Robin Martin-Jenkins recalls their first encounter on a cricket pitch:

A fizzing legspinner ripped past my forward prod first ball. I can still clearly recall that extraordinary sound as the seam ripped through the air ... I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw it (the next ball) was short and wide outside the off stump. I thought they said this guy was a genius? As I shaped to cut and get off the mark with a glorious four past point, the ball dipped and ripped back past my back foot. I think my bat was still at the top of its back-lift, MCC coaching book style, when the googly cannoned into middle stump.

Read the full post in the Wisden Cricketer.

September 11, 2008

The wonder years for Atherton

Posted on 09/11/2008 in English cricket

The celebration match at Lord's for the 60th anniversary of English Schools Cricket Association (ESCA) leads Michael Atherton to believe that the ECB must support young talent. In his column in the Times, he revisits the summer of 1983, where he represented the North of England Under-15s at the ESCA festival, doing battle against Nasser Hussain, Mark Ramprakash.

Despite their reputations, I knew Nasser had the yips and could not bowl and I reckoned that I could score as many runs as Ramps. The possibilities seemed endless.

Swann keeps his feet on the ground

Posted on 09/11/2008 in English cricket

In an interview with Lawrence Booth in the Guardian, offspinner Graeme Swann insists he hasn't been thinking of how he'd spend his million dollars (if he is selected and England win the Stanford match) and that he is looking forward more to visiting the "far-out places" in India during the one-day series than the one-off game in Antigua.

"The whole reason to have a game like this is to get people talking about it, and in that respect it's worked. But some of the questions I've dealt with from the press have had a cynical edge. Whenever there are large sums of money involved it brings out the worst in people."

Hoggard keeps his chin up

Posted on 09/11/2008 in English cricket

	The end of the road for Matthew Hoggard? © Getty Images

With Matthew Hoggard missing out on a central contract, his international career appears to be over. Hoggard, though, thinks there's a comeback left in him. "I am only 31, not quite ready to draw my pension or reach for the pipe and slippers just yet, thanks very much," he says as he looks on the bright side, rather unconvincingly, in his column in the Times.

I won't, for example, have to travel to Loughborough quite so often to undergo yet another fitness test or bowl another few hundred balls in the nets. Instead, I can just nip down to Headingley, do my stuff there and be back home for my tea in 20 minutes.

Mercifully, nor will I have to travel to London to sit through long, drawn-out meetings, such as the one that the England players had to attend this year when we were getting our new kit

In the Guardian, Mike Selvey isn't as optimistic about Hoggard returning to the national side.

September 10, 2008

The day captaincy changes forever

Posted on 09/10/2008 in English cricket

	A challenge for captain KP © Getty Images

Lawrence Booth writes in the Guardian that captain Kevin Pietersen will face an unprecedented set of problems when the Stanford match takes place. He points out that besides Pietersen's man-management skills being tested to the full due to the massive amount of money at stake, the Stanford series makes it tough for him in another way:

The selectors and Pietersen must now be utterly ruthless because the format leaves them no option. There can be no planning for the future, no experimenting with batting line-ups, no sentiment, no fun - all of which take place even in Test cricket. We will discover which players are considered the big-game cricketers and which the captain regards as flaky.

In the same paper, Andy Bull says the right squads were chosen and that the incremental contracts handed to Tim Ambrose, Ravi Bopara, Samit Patel, Matthew Prior, Owais Shah, Graeme Swann and Luke Wright could be a pointer to the nucleus of the future England side.

And Kevin Eason wonders in the Times whether England will be as much of a team when they fly home after the extravagant one-off contest as when they arrive.

Also read Rob Smyth's take on the England selection on his blog in the Wisden Cricketer.

Stanford stands for ostentatiousness, razzmatazz and affluence, but none of that was on show at Lord’s. There was just an everyday squad announcement, delivered by Geoff Miller with all the zest of a bingo club manager announcing who had made the team for next weekend’s fixture away to the Grimsby Septuagenarians. There was no showbiz: dancing girls, no boxing-style nicknames for the players. And no surprises among the names.

September 9, 2008

All hail the thinking man's swashbuckler

Posted on 09/09/2008 in English cricket

Simon Barnes writes in the Times that the reason behind Kevin Pietersen's success is his ability to adapt, his ambition and his relentless pursuit of success.

Pointless to ask whether Pietersen has achieved these things (establish a college of senior players, instill a culture of shared responsibility, get Flintoff and Harmison back near their best) in spite of or because of his narcissism. Pietersen is aware that what matters in sport is success and he is prepared to do anything it takes to be successful. And if that involves thinking about other people, well, he's even prepared to go to these extreme lengths.

September 7, 2008

Dave English and the next generation of cricketers

Posted on 09/07/2008 in English cricket

"Dave English managed the Bee Gees, handled publicity for Eric Clapton and the Rolling Stones, was involved in the launch of the film Grease and had a (very minor) role in A Bridge Too Far, alongside Robert Redford, right. English used the money and contacts he made in the music industry to set up the Bunbury cricket organisation," writes David Walsh in the Sunday Times.

Where do you begin to tell this man’s story? Perhaps as a boy, a year or so younger than Cowdrey is now, being awoken in the early hours by his father. “Look, Stinker,” his dad said, using the codename that spoke of their closeness. “I’ve got to go. Your mum is a good woman who loves you; look after her and your sister. You’re the boss now.” He understood why his dad left, even empathised with the zest for life that tempted him from their London home. He didn’t hear from him for two years. Though he coped remarkably well, there were times when he needed to work things out and he would head down to nearby Hendon Park with his cricket bat over his shoulder. Tomorrow could wait. Today he would improve his batting. He made it onto the ground staff at Lord’s, played two games for the Middlesex second team, but he didn’t have that touch of greatness. Instead he had a talent for enabling those who did. Eric Clapton and Barry Gibb would soon become two of his favourite people and two of his best mates.

England settle after summer of storms

Posted on 09/07/2008 in English cricket

The defining moments of the international season came in a couple of text messages. Well, it has been a dreadfully wet summer and we are all slaves of the mobile phone now, western Vic Marks in the Observer.

On Sunday 3 August, the day after the Edgbaston Test, this appeared: 'Michael Vaughan will be giving a press conference at Loughborough today at 1pm.' The moment we received that we all knew he was going, but he had taken us by surprise. The text received at 10.15am on Friday 18 July at Headingley seemed even more prosaic. The ECB kindly deliver the final XI to our mobile phones on the morning of a Test match a few minutes before the toss. This particular message seemed routine enough until we alighted upon the name of Darren Pattinson. Both these texts suggested an England regime in disarray, with no idea which direction to take.

In the Independent on Sunday, Stephen Brenkley looks ahead to August 2009 and says that "Kevin Pietersen raising above his head a small urn on the boundary at The Oval" is a possible scenario.

September 6, 2008

A joyless tale

Posted on 09/06/2008 in Books

Marcus Trescothick's ghosted autobiography, Coming Back to Me, belongs to an increasingly popular genre, one that admits to the notion that cricket and the cricketers themselves are not inherently interesting enough to sell, writes Mike Atherton in the Times.

To invest the pages with more bite and, no doubt, more marketability, the player admits to some previously unrevealed trauma, or, in Trescothick's case, a trauma that had been only half-revealed ... Other than moments of dark humour, such as when Peter Gregory, the England team doctor, tried his hand, unsuccessfully, at acupuncture, and when Trescothick was taken in by a fraudster of a hypnotist, this is a joyless book. There is little of the thrill of playing sport at the highest level, none of the humour, nor the fascinating details or character sketches of dressing-room figures that make a sporting life worthwhile.

In its Ashes Heroes countdown, the Times lists Craig McDermott as No. 45.

Meanwhile, the Independent's Brian Viner attends a black-tie dinner at Lord's Taverners to celebrate cricket's 10 surviving centurions – the men who made at least 100 first-class hundreds.

Geoffrey Boycott had other tactics for staying in all day. The scorer of 151 first-class hundreds recalled the advice of his Uncle Algy, that "when two people get involved in a run-out, one of t'buggers is going to be unhappy. Make sure it isn't you." Amid much knowing laughter, he added: "I followed that advice all my life until I met that bastard Amiss." I don't know how Dennis Amiss, another of the centurions, reacted to being called a bastard. And I couldn't quite see whether the mother and grandmother of a young lad at the table next to mine winced at such salty Boycottian language.

September 5, 2008

KP - the odd man out

Posted on 09/05/2008 in English cricket

	With the backing of the captain, Flintoff is back to being the nightmare batsman for the opposition © Getty Images

Kevin Pietersen, England's new captain, has evolved in an environment where he has always been the odd man out and without the self-belief he so clearly exudes, he would have been lost, writes Harsha Bhogle in the Indian Express.

By being open about the mediocrity in the English cricket system, often alluded to but rarely taken head-on, he has sent out a message about the kind of players he wants to work with. “I want players who perform day-in-day-out” he said. He is looking for match-winners, not cosy players who do enough to stay in the side. When you apply that condition, it is not difficult to see who he is after ... With the backing of the captain, Flintoff is back to being the nightmare batsman for the opposition ... Next he worked on Harmison, a man of fragile temperament but enormous ability. England, much to everyone’s glee, were ready to give up on him. But sometimes the biggest brutes have soft cores, feel the same need for reassurance as average strugglers.

In the Guardian Duncan Fletcher writes that while England flourished against South Africa, their handling of India's pitches will give us a better idea of their progression.

We will find out about certain individuals' variations after the plane lands in India, where I expect Paul Collingwood and Luke Wright to do more bowling. The key to batting over there is the ability to gauge the pace of the pitch, play the ball late, and manoeuvre it into gaps with flexible wrists. Owais Shah - preferably lower down the order - and Pietersen are key and others will have to learn quickly, because the English tendency is to go hard at the ball. A shot in England that will bring you runs might go straight to a fielder in India because the ball comes off the pitch more slowly. Go too early at the ball on the subcontinent and you don't give yourself time to pick up the variations in pace and bounce.

Despite the losses to New Zealand in one-day cricket and to South Africa in Test cricket and the departures of Michael Vaughan and Paul Collingwood as Test and one-day captain respectively, the England who completed the summer were more settled and confident than the one who began it, writes Mike Atherton in the Times.

Pietersen has been a revelation. Very few people would have expected him to have such a positive and immediate impact, writes Angus Fraser in the Independent.

September 4, 2008

A tribute to Len Hutton

Posted on 09/04/2008 in English cricket

	Len Hutton died on September 6, 1990 © Getty Images

The Guardian unearths from their vault a column dedicated to Len Hutton by the Labour politician and Yorkshire native Roy Hattersley following the death of the legendary batsman. He wrote:

Perhaps Hutton was never quite the happy warrior whom every boy in pads would wish him to be. But in 1946 having adjusted to the short left arm and learned how to play with a bat of a size usually only to be found in youth clubs the whole burden of English cricket was piled on his shoulders. He had to open the batting against Lindwall and Miller. He had to hang on whilst more glamorous batsmen got themselves out with flashy shots.

Then he had to take on the England captaincy and win back the Ashes. He did it all with professional dedication. But, since he was not a boisterous man or noted for the wit of his after dinner speeches, we are entitled to ask ourselves how funny he believed his most famous indeed his only publicised joke to be? Whilst resisting one particularly savage spell of pace and lift, he walked down the wicket for what commentators undoubtedly called 'consultations' with Dennis Compton. 'There must,' said Hutton, 'be a better way of earning your living than this.'

One of a fading breed

Posted on 09/04/2008 in English cricket

The jazz musician and cricket lover Benny Green once wrote that he knew he was heading for middle age the day Denis Compton, one of the greatest players of the mid-20th century, retired. The same sense of mortality will tickle thirty-something cricket fans with the retirement of Graeme Hick, who announced this week that this season would be his last, says Huw Richards in the International Herald Tribune.

The international failure and overseas origins have clouded the underlying truth, which is that Hick was a throwback, one of a perhaps dying breed. He has given 25 years of unstinting, exemplary service to a single club, Worcestershire, playing on long after international ambitions had departed, for the sheer enjoyment of the game and because he is still an asset - averaging 46 runs per innings this season. It will not be only Worcestershire fans who wish him well in retirement.

No will to go with grace

Posted on 09/04/2008 in English cricket

Ian Bell is probably the England player who receives the most criticism but behind most of the criticism lies respect for, and frustration with, an abundant natural talent, writes Rob Smyth in his blog on the Wisden Cricketer website.

Not since David Gower has an Englishman so gifted proved so exasperating. Bell will never elicit quite the same level of trust as more mundane, blue-collar batsmen like Paul Collingwood, because the nature of his talent is so unusual to us and more difficult to comprehend, but that does not mean his underachievement is relished. Quite the opposite. It is simply that many feel he does not have the will to go with his grace.

Long live Anglo-Australian dissing

Posted on 09/04/2008 in English cricket

Marcus Trescothick's Murray Mints revelations ensured that Australians can still indulge in the atavistic pleasure of sledging the Poms, writes Gideon Haigh in the Guardian.

Rupert Murdoch's Australian, which can always be relied on for sober and dispassionate coverage of cricket issues, laid it out with typical restraint: "The secret behind the devastating swing bowling that took England to its historic 2005 Ashes win has been revealed. They cheated." What a relief for the country to be confirmed in its most deeply embedded prejudices - that any English ascendancy, however brief, must be an outcome of trickery or luck.

You might imagine that a grown-up relationship between England and Australia would result in less puerile point-scoring; but it's precisely because the relationship is so mature that it permits such harmless silliness. In fact, in this era of instant umbrage, it seems an almost unseemly luxury to be able to diss any country, and an act of delicious fun to give it back.

In the same paper Mike Selvey writes that Pietersen and the new England ODI side's real test will come in India:

Here, on sluggish pitches, it is the spinners rather than wrecking balls such as Flintoff and Harmison who boss the middle overs, while the capacity of seamers to take the pace from the ball is also crucial ... Ultimately, success, particularly in one-day cricket, will come in the development of a squad capable of adapting to all conditions and circumstances. One size does not fit all.

September 3, 2008

The run machine calls time

Posted on 09/03/2008 in English cricket

	Graeme Hick: the great enigma © Getty Images

For more than two decades now, Graeme Hick has tormented county attacks all across England. On his retirement, the tributes are led by the Independent's Angus Fraser and the Telegraph's Derek Pringle, two bowlers who have first-hand experience of Hick's batting expertise. And in the Guardian, David Foot recalls one of Hick's totemic innings - the unbeaten 405 in 1988 - and wonders how Hick turned out to be a relative failure on the international stage.

Those of us privileged to watch him in his best years have marvelled at the risible ease with which he has played the game. At country level, he has made so many contemporaries look ordinary. His bat was broader than anyone else's. Nothing seemed to get past it. There was always a respect for orthodoxy; with an hypnotic efficiency he took on the bowlers in rotation. The strokes were always clean. For a big man, he was imposing rather than handsome in execution.

George Dobell writes in the Birmingham Post:

His reputation is impeccable; his record immaculate. He has been a credit to his family, his club and his sport. No cricketer can achieve more.

September 2, 2008

Toast Mushie but raise a glass to the true greats

Posted on 09/02/2008 in English cricket

No sooner had Mushtaq Ahmed announced his retirement from English cricket last week than the tributes poured like vintage hock. "Mushtaq Ahmed, the finest Sussex player ever" it was said, followed by another toast to "the finest of all overseas players". Michael Henderson, in the Guardian, too lauds Mushie for his feats but disagrees that he was finest ever. After sifting through a list of county legends, he lists five of his best.

Procter is one of the five men I submit for consideration. He gets in because English spectators saw him at his best over a decade, and best in his case means being one of the most supremely gifted - and watchable - all-round cricketers the world has known.

In the same paper, Paul Collingwood talks of the circumstances which led him quitting the captaincy and how the decision has changed his life.

"You're always being judged as captain and as hard as you try not to read or listen to what people say, it eventually gets back to you. I tried to laugh everything off but it seeps through and hurts. But that is what being captain of the England cricket team is about. Along with being manager of the England football team it is the most scrutinised job a sportsman in this country can have."

September 1, 2008

Pietersen indebted to Flintoff

Posted on 09/01/2008 in English cricket

"Kevin Pietersen is a great England cricket captain." That bold statement comes courtesy of Simon Barnes in The Times, and doubtless others, but Pietersen's golden start to his tenure is owed to one man.

Freddie's back. And when you have Andrew Flintoff at the top of his game, you tend to look good if you are standing anywhere within shouting distance.

Time and again Flintoff has been the difference between England and the opposition. Others have played well, but they cluster around him, they draw inspiration from him, he is their rallying point, their mascot and their go-to guy. As a result of his resurgence, the most remarkable thing has happened - England are giving a fair impersonation of a crash-hot one-day team.

The Centurions – the world's greatest run-makers

Posted on 09/01/2008 in English cricket

	Tom Graveney on the attack against the West Indies in 1966 © Getty Images

Members of the 100-hundreds club are to be honoured in London on Monday. In the Independent, Tom Graveney, the oldest member of that exclusive group, recalls his dangerous hooking instincts, a never-to-be-repeated stint as England wicketkeeper and how he was almost sent home from West Indies.

"South Africa at Old Trafford in 1955," he recalls. "I scored nought and one, and caught three and dropped four at first slip. So when Godfrey Evans broke his finger in two places, Peter May said, 'You might as well keep wicket'. And the first ball I caught, down the leg side off Frank Tyson, that's what happened." Chuckling, Graveney shows me the little finger on his left hand, which he can bend back almost to the horizontal. "Can you see? The middle knuckle doesn't operate any more."

Over in the Telegraph, Bill Frindall pays tribute to the 25 men who have reached the landmark, and dubs Don Bradman the Usain Bolt of the group.

Trescothick on his personal battles

Posted on 09/01/2008 in English cricket

Marcus Trescothick has given an in-depth interview to the BBC's Jonathan Agnew where he talks on everything from his struggles with the long-term illness, to the Indian Premier League and Kevin Pietersen's captaincy. And after the furore over the use of Murray Mints, he says it isn't proven that they help the ball swing more.

No more sport for sport's sake?

Posted on 09/01/2008 in English cricket

Derek Pringle deplores the decision to strip university matches of first-class status from the next season. He fears bright cricketers will henceforth almost surely choose college over county club. He argues in the Telegraph that the contribution of the universities to cricket is being under-estimated:

Nasser Hussain, John Crawley, Ed Smith, Jason Gallian, James Dalrymple, Andrew Strauss, James Foster, Jeremy Snape, Alex Loudon and Monty Panesar all played for their country after benefiting from a university education on and off the field. How many counties can claim as many England cricketers in the last 20 years? Not many.

August 31, 2008

The many faces of Darren Gough

Posted on 08/31/2008 in English cricket

After 19 years, Darren Gough - England bowler, ballroom dancer and all-round personality - is set to retire from cricket. Observer Sport Monthly followed him as he played his final season for Yorkshire - and launched a new career in TV. Read Emma John's full piece here.

This morning, he tells me, he did a Myers-Briggs personality test; he won't find out until tomorrow whether he is, officially, an introvert or an extrovert. I propose that the answer is fairly obvious. Gough shakes his head. 'I'd say I'll be borderline. Ninety per cent of the public would say I'm extrovert, but I'm not like everybody thinks.'

August 30, 2008

The England one-day side has arrived

Posted on 08/30/2008 in English cricket

England have taken an unassailable 3-0 lead in the five-match series
against South Africa, which has convinced Paul Weaver that they are now a side to be reckoned with. Click here to read his article in the Guardian.

Some inventions are made faster than you can say serendipity. Penicillin, superglue, the microwave oven and the potato crisp were all discovered by accident. And suddenly we have an England one-day cricket team. "Suddenly" might not be the right word because one-day international cricket has been played since 1971 and England have not won a global tournament in all that time.

But after almost four decades of pick'n'mixing, of sucking and seeing, of botching and fiddling, England have a one-day side that does look the part.

Stephen Brenkley, in the Independent, says Ian Bell's change of approach during his 73 against South Africa at The Oval, was another example of his diffidence to use his "abundant natural gifts."

In short, it was a pleasure to behold. Bell hit 11 fours and a six, taking full advantage of the power plays. His 50 came in a mere 36 balls and there seemed reason to suppose that he could continue in this vein. Dead sheep have their day. But then he changed. The next 23 runs required 41 balls. It was as if he decided that he had taken the venom from the tourists and now "Mr Diffident" was tapping him on the shoulder again.

August 28, 2008

Mushtaq Ahmed retires

Posted on 08/28/2008 in English cricket

	The warm-ups of Mushtaq, Rana Naved-al-Hasan, and Yasir Arafat used to involve a game named ‘Asian Keepy-Uppy’ © Getty Images

According to The Argus in Brighton yesterday, Mushtaq [Ahmed] is the greatest player to have represented the county in their 169 years. The instinct was to snort and think of Maurice Tate, John Snow, Ranjitsinhji and Ted Dexter. Yet it took the arrival of Mushtaq for Sussex to win the championship for the first time in 2003, writes Richard Hobson in the Times.

In the Independent, Angus Fraser recalls the time he faced Mushtaq.

The 38 year-old had a beautiful high action, that made it very difficult for batsman to tell the difference between the leg break and the googly. I faced him once at Taunton when he was playing for Somerset and I have never felt more humiliated on a cricket field. For five balls I groped forward like a drunken teenager and failed to make contact with the ball. Nobody was happier than I when the final delivery of the over bowled me.

When Mushtaq Ahmed, the Pakistan spin-bowler, retired from playing this week, it meant a little-known – and highly-comical – ritual was finally ceased, writes Paul Radley in the National.

When Sussex had three Pakistani overseas players in their ranks – Mushtaq, Rana Naved-al-Hasan, and Yasir Arafat – their warm-ups used to involve a game named ‘Asian Keepy-Uppy’. The aim was to see which of the trio, none of whom seemed to have committed much time to practising the game in Pakistan, could keep the football up the longest. Yasir was the best, with a top-count of 12, while Mushtaq – all shins – was woeful, much to the mirth of his teammates.

Greig was great, but Pietersen can be better

Posted on 08/28/2008 in English cricket

He might not be as charismatic as the former England captain Tony Greig but Kevin Pietersen is the more talented player and he leads by extravagant example, writes Paul Weaver in the Guardian.

In his touchy-feely way he has, crucially, got Andrew Flintoff onside, and with him Steve Harmison. Under him, England have a substantially better chance of regaining the Ashes than they would have under Michael Vaughan, who appeared to have lost not only his form but also the dressing room, or at least important parts of it. Judging by his only Test as captain Pietersen, unlike Vaughan, also realises that Flintoff must play as one of five bowlers and bat at six; if the top five don't get enough runs change them. We can only make a proper judgment on Pietersen when things start to go wrong, which they will. And it will eventually end in tears, because it always does.

Derek Pringle, in the Telegraph, is of the opinion that it is the intimidating presence of Harmison and Flintoff, refreshed and re-united, that has changed the aura of Kevin Pietersen's one-day team from prey to predator.

August 27, 2008

England cricket's deadly weapon: Murray Mints

Posted on 08/27/2008 in English cricket

It wasn't superior bowling or more dogged batting - or even luck - that won England the little urn. Instead, it was their secret weapon: Murray Mints, writes Patrick Kidd in the Times.

But bowlers have always tried to give themselves an advantage and generally, unless it has been blatant, umpires have turned a blind eye. Suncream-laden sweat or lip balm has the same effect on leather as mint-infused saliva. Why do you think so many bowlers in the 1950s wore Brylcreem? In 1921, Johnny Douglas, the England captain, threatened to report Arthur Mailey, the Australia leg spinner, for using resin to grip the ball. Mailey countered by pointing out that Douglas's thumbnail was worn to the bone by picking at the ball's seam to aid his own bowlers.

August 26, 2008

Sidebottom may miss out on Caribbean payday

Posted on 08/26/2008 in English cricket

There are still two months to go before the Caribbean Clash For The Cash in Antigua, but Ryan Sidebottom must already be getting nervous, writes Mike Selvey in the Guardian.

He has not played since and despite selection in the squad for the one-day series - odd in itself given his condition - the ongoing groin and hip injury that has been incapacitating him means he is to play no part in the remaining four matches, the first of which is at Trent Bridge this afternoon. After this series there are no more international matches in which to re-establish his credentials before the Twenty20 game in the Stanford ground in St John's and the cricket world has a habit of moving on and leaving stragglers.

August 24, 2008

Boycott: staying alive is all that matters

Posted on 08/24/2008 in English cricket

	Geoff Boycott, now in remission © Getty Images

In a typically candid interview with Olga Craig in The Sunday Telegraph, a mellower Geoffrey Boycott looks back to his time with cancer, and surviving the disease which takes so many lives.

For Boycott, now 67 and once one of England's greatest batsmen, was one of the lucky ones. Three months ago, in May, he was given the all-clear: the aggressive, fast-growing tumour on his tongue has gone and his prognosis is good.

''Which it wasn't when I was diagnosed,'' he says, gazing across the calm blue sea off the shore of Jersey, where Boycott now lives with wife Rachel. He doesn't speak. When he does, there is a fleeting glimpse of his struggle to keep a quiver from his voice. He had discovered a lump in his neck while shaving and in September 2002 Boycott's doctor told him it was cancer. Boycott, ever blunt, asked what would happen if he did nothing. ''The doc said: 'I'd give you three months, till just after Christmas.'

''Doesn't leave a lot of time, does it?'' Boycott says dryly, as he sets a yellow capsule, legacy of his treatment, on the table before him and pours a glass of mineral water. ''No saliva glands left,'' he explains.

August 23, 2008

A fresh start

Posted on 08/23/2008 in English cricket

Stephen Brenkley, in the Independent, writes about Kevin Pietersen's impressive start as England's one-day captain, and his all-round contribution in their win against South Africa on Friday.

Ah, the sweet swish of the new broom. There is nothing quite like that mellifluous sound in sport, in politics, in life to inspire dreams of reinvigoration, of fresh prosperity.

This is so, even when the broom in question sweeps back from under the carpet the debris brushed there after previous campaigns. Thus, Kevin Pietersen's one-day captaincy has been notable so far for persuading Stephen Harmison to come out of retirement and recalling Matthew Prior to open England's innings.

Not much in common there with the cleansing of the Augean stables but his sense of anticipation seems to have been widely shared. Pietersen is perhaps attempting something as daring as his resplendent batting by this recasting. He is backing himself to galvanise players by backing them.

August 19, 2008

Does Moores mean less for England?

Posted on 08/19/2008 in English cricket

Peter Moores has been given a breather from scrutiny as England coach just for now given Michael Vaughan's resignation but, writes Lawrence Booth in his Guardian email, if England fail in their one-dayers against South Africa his future must be called into question.

This is not a witch-hunt for the sake of it. But the evidence has been unfavourable for a while now.

David 'Butch' White

Posted on 08/19/2008 in English cricket

There was never any mistaking what David "Butch" White did for a sporting living. He was, and looked in every sense, a fast bowler - with heart to match his lungs, solid shoulders, and a head not too much bothered by the technical subtleties of his trade, writes David Foot in the Guardian. He could appear fearsome as he pounded in, leaping with his legs so distinctively stretched in opposite directions that he always threatened to tear his flannels.

Late on the second day, Sussex were going well. White had earlier struggled for line and success; now he had to be persuaded by stand-in skipper Roy Marshall to bowl another over. His rediscovered form was like an optical illusion. The first three balls brought him a hat-trick, and it would have been four in a row if the normally reliable Jimmy Gray had not put down a catch in the slips. From the final ball of the over, a catch at gully gave White one more wicket. Sussex were all out for 180. It takes its place among the most spectacular overs in the county's [Hampshire] history.

August 17, 2008

Time for the real deal

Posted on 08/17/2008 in English cricket

Kevin Pietersen, after winning his first Test as England captain, could be in line for some tough times during the ODIs against South Africa, writes Vic Marks in the Observer.

The honeymoon may not be over, but the first moments of dizzying ecstasy have passed. Kevin Pietersen enjoyed a wonderful consummation of his appointment as England captain at the Oval. Everything clicked perfectly. It is unlikely to be quite so straightforward over the next fortnight when England take on South Africa in a solitary Twenty20 match (Just the one? There must be some commercial men out there grinding their teeth) and five 50-over games.

The bald facts are not encouraging for Pietersen and his team. South Africa, if they win the ODI series emphatically, can go top of the ICC's table. England, defeated by New Zealand earlier in the summer languish in sixth position. In our rush to judge Pietersen, the captain, we should moderate our expectations in the next week or two. But moderation and Pietersen rarely go hand in hand.

Stephen Brenkley, in the Independent on Sunday, is not too optimistic about England's chances in the one-dayers, saying that they "still seem uncertain of what their approach should be: whether to develop a system and ensure the players can make it work, or to pick the players and hope a method emerges. There is no sign that they are any nearer to resolving that."

"Nothing emphasises England's [one-day] travails more sharply than the ongoing problem at the top of the batting order," says Steve James. Click here to read his article in the Sunday Telegraph.

According to his colleague, Scyld Berry, England can learn from Middlesex's Twenty20 Cup success ahead of their match against the Stanford Super Stars on November 1.

August 16, 2008

Farmer Jones

Posted on 08/16/2008 in English cricket

	Geraint Jones has begun tending to sheep and pigs © Getty Images

Will Hawkes of the Independent catches up with Geraint Jones, the former England wicketkeeper, who reveals his new obsession – farming.

In terms of inspiration, Geraint Jones can take his pick when pondering the men who have gone before him as Kent wicketkeeper. There's Alan Knott, the England stalwart of the 1960s and 1970s, Godfrey Evans, whose dramatic exploits enlivened the Test scene in the 1950s, or even Les Ames, the brilliant pre-war wicketkeeper-batsman. Jones, however, has recently been inspired by someone slightly different: the television chef and food campaigner Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.

The reason is simple. Jones, who played 34 Tests for England before falling out of favour during the ill-fated Ashes tour of 2006-07, has turned his hand to farming. He owns an eight-acre smallholding a few miles east of Canterbury and was inspired to invest in a handful of sheep and pigs after watching Fearnley-Whittingstall on television. "Once I finished playing for England I realised I needed to do something outside of the game to help me deal with the pressure," he said.

August 13, 2008

Cook struggles to hit out

Posted on 08/13/2008 in English cricket