Topic: Cricket in the news today (Read 19474 times)

Cover_Drive · « **Reply #15 on:** March 23, 2012, 02:46:58 AM »

Quote from: Buzz on March 22, 2012, 05:43:29 PM

sorry, haven't been able to do one of these for a while.
however, the big news today is that afganistan will be at the 2020 world cup...
m.guardian.co.uk/ms/p/gnm/op/sYrWU6xX95uPe3RtcOrYA_w/view.m?id=15&gid=sport/2012/mar/22/afghanistan-world-twenty20&cat=cricket

this is a truly magnificent achievement.

They were in last World Cup too if I remember correctly.

But still big achievement for them.

charlie15 · « **Reply #16 on:** March 23, 2012, 09:06:33 AM »

That is brilliant news

Nickauger · « **Reply #17 on:** March 23, 2012, 09:30:43 AM »

Quote from: Cover_Drive on March 23, 2012, 02:46:58 AM

They were in last World Cup too if I remember correctly.

But still big achievement for them.

I read that as the 2020 world cup ie. in 8 years time lol. They were at the last one, although they seem a much better unit than then.

Bruce · « **Reply #18 on:** March 26, 2012, 12:07:03 PM »

Galyle signs a new contract with the WICB.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/west-indies-v-australia-2012/content/story/558784.html?CMP=OT

Still unsure when he will make his return...

charlie15 · « **Reply #19 on:** March 30, 2012, 02:33:50 PM »

Just come across this article about Essex bidding to become tenants for the Olympic Stadium, if they get it I see a third test venue in London not too far off!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cricket/17562300

tim2000s · « **Reply #20 on:** March 30, 2012, 02:57:58 PM »

I saw that too, and thought "C'mon"

Alvaro · « **Reply #21 on:** March 30, 2012, 03:08:52 PM »

Strauss must face up to the dog days
Despite the England captain's poor form with the bat his influence extends beyond the middle - when he goes it should be on his own terms

George Dobell

March 30, 2012
Just as the time comes when a much loved but ailing family dog must be taken to the vet, so the time has come to make difficult decisions about the future of Andrew Strauss. The signs can now longer be avoided: Strauss, metaphorically at least, is off is food. His tail has stopped wagging and he can no longer be bothered to chase the postman.

It is not beyond possibility that he could make a full recovery. His current form is a concern, certainly, but he has been down before. It pays not to write him off.

It is worth looking at the statistics. Strauss has not scored a Test century since November 2010 - 16 Tests ago - and has made only one in his last 48 innings stretching back to July 2009. In the last calendar year he has averaged only 25.50 and any suggestion he is surviving on his captaincy record is undermined by the fact that England have lost four Tests in a row. He has passed fifty50 only twice in 18 innings and England have recorded an opening stand above 31 only three times in the last 17 innings. Nine times they have failed to pass ten.

It looks grim. In a different era - an era of weak management and fickle selectors - you can bet that Strauss would have been axed already. But we live in more enlightened times. These days the selectors take a longer term view. They appreciate that even the best players suffer dips in form and they appreciate that continuity of selection is a key to coaxing the best out of players. The carrot tends to work much better than the stick.

But there is only so long even the most patient selectors can be expected to wait. Strauss' form is, unpalatable though it may be to some ears, compromising England's hopes of competing. Time is running out for him.

That is not to say he is about to be dropped. He will certainly captain at Colombo and, if he goes ahead of the West Indies series in England, it is likely to be his own decision. It may also be worth remembering that the last two permanently appointed England captains - Nasser Hussain and Michael Vaughan - were both casualties of South African home series. England entertain South Africa again this summer. Might lightning strike for a third time?

It would be wrong to judge Strauss purely by his batting statistics. While he may not be the best tactician, captaincy is about far more than that: it is about leadership, inspiration and unification. In those regards Strauss is exceptionally good and his role in the resurgence of England's cricket cannot be overstated. Besides, he has been in a similar position once before: on the tour to New Zealand in 2008 he had gone 15 Tests without a century and looked almost unrecognisable from the pleasing left-hand batsman who had scored a century on debut. He was probably within one innings of being dropped when he responded with a century in Napier that revitalised his career. If England persist with him, he may well repay their investment.

After all, his long-term record remains good. Unlike Mike Brearley, who failed to score a century in a 39-Test career, only five men (Wally Hammond, Colin Cowdrey, Geoffrey Boycott, Ken Barrington and Graham Gooch) have scored more than Strauss' 19 Test centuries. But Jack Hobbs' past record is excellent, too: it hardly guarantees his performance in the next Test. The concern is that Strauss' run of poor form has been so prolonged that it represents a terminal decline.

There is no obvious reason that should be the case. He is 35 and remains fit. It is not as if he is suffering abject failure, more that he is struggling to translate those good starts into meaningful contributions. And he is not the only man struggling: Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell have endured even more grisly Test tours.

England should not stick with Strauss simply because they are unsure of their alternatives, however. There are other options. Jonathan Trott could shuffle a place up the order - he has, in effect, been opening the innings anyway - allowing England to draft any one of several contenders into the middle order. Opening candidates are less obvious, but Hampshire's Michael Carberry, who is now restored to health and scoring runs by the bucket load, and Varun Chopra, who has scored three first-class double-centuries in the last calendar year, including one in Sri Lanka, are viable options.

Captaincy alternatives now exist, too. The way Alastair Cook grew into the role in the UAE was immensely encouraging and suggested that, when the transition comes, it need not be as painful as it might have seemed only a few months ago.

That is not to say that Cook will be vying for the role. The respect with which Strauss is held by his team borders on the reverential: personal ambition does not come into this.

Indeed, no-one wants to stick the knife into Strauss. No-one wants him to fail or depart the international game under a cloud. Not even his opponents, who recognise the dignity with which he has led and the control he has exerted over a team that can, at times, become somewhat excitable.

Andy Flower, England's coach, recognises the qualities of Strauss, but Flower did not reach the top through a surfeit of sentiment. He will not be afraid to take a tough decision if he thinks the time is right.

My view? I would stick with him and allow him to go on his own terms. He knows the situation. He knows his stats and he knows that the team need him to contribute more. He is a fellow abounding with positive qualities and is surely wise enough and selfless enough to recognise when the time comes to step down. I fear it may be soon, but I hope I'm wrong.

Alvaro · « **Reply #22 on:** March 30, 2012, 03:09:46 PM »

What a great sentence to open an article!

Buzz · « **Reply #23 on:** April 05, 2012, 09:21:44 AM »

Nice article about how the current captains are doing by Mark Nicholas in Cricinfo today:
http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/559810.html

The captain makes the team
Each side is shaped in the image of the man who leads it. To undervalue the captain is to misunderstand the nature of team

It was the dance that did it. Like Laurence Olivier's acclaimed Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, whose little jig of delight - "I thank God! Is it true? Is it true?" - supremely illustrated the depth of his pleasure, Darren Sammy could not contain himself when the second T20 was won in Barbados last week. His body, slim as a girl's, moved to the rhythm of victory and around him young West Indian cricketers were showered with unconditional joy - "It is true!"

It has been a long time since Australia came and saw but failed to conquer the Caribbean. The T20s were locked at one apiece - why are there not more best-of-three series? - and the 50-over matches at two each with a crazy, memorable tie in St Vincent, another perfect illustration of the game's ability to bare humanity. Sammy cool at one end, Kemar Roach anything but at the other. With two balls still remaining, Roach put his head down and ran, all the way to Sammy, who stood rooted to his crease in shock, having pushed the ball gently and straight to the cover fielder. Enough said. So much so that he managed a smile and refused to lay blame at the post-match interview. He gives a good interview - honest, thoughtful, rather charming.

Sammy is the unlikeliest international captain of the moment and will lead West Indies against Australia in the Test series that begins this weekend. The first St Lucian to represent his islands, he has played 21 Test matches with four five-wicket bags to sustain his selection but not the merest hint of a hundred to cement it. He averages 17 with the bat and 30 with the ball. Neither is he Mike Brearley.

By trade, Sammy knits young men together, and the selectors have backed this skill against all others. He cares not a jot for what pundits and past players think, nor for the claim of those left out, some of whom make for dangerous foes. He was appointed almost two years ago now, and against the odds, to do a job for West Indian cricket at a time when nobody else could make the damndest thing of it. Like Brazilian football the legacy is impossible, so he simply tells it as it is. Young cricketers make mistakes but they have energy and desire. These are attributes that make up for talent and experience. He has some bowlers, fast and slow, with exciting ability, who further compromise his own place in the team. He desperately needs some batsmen who stay in, something he too finds fiendishly difficult. Somehow the proud St Lucian stands above all this and, instead, concerns himself with shaking off the past. The team is smiling again, trademark toothy West Indian smiles. It is a start and Sammy deserves respect for making it.

Contrast Andrew Strauss, who has played 93 Test matches with 19 hundreds at an average of 41. Strauss led England to be the best team in the world, and by the end of the last English summer added four consecutive wins over India to his portfolio (at the time such a performance wasn't considered a sinecure). Now, after a bad run in the Middle East and a silly batting effort in the first innings in Galle, he is under the cosh. Can the game really be this fickle? If Strauss was making more runs, would the knives be out? Would a right-minded selector hear the cries of the fourth estate and respond so irrationally?

Strauss may feel a little betrayed. His outward serenity makes it hard to be sure of anything but his equilibrium. Only cricket captains can know this forensic examination. Football managers don't have to play. There must have been days when Sammy has felt worthless - so often has his pedigree been slandered by those who have gone before him. Now Strauss is seeing the other side too, the side that puts a doubt in every step. It may have been a mistake to pull away from one-day cricket, which so often releases the mind. This doubt makes strokeplay unconvincing and tactics uncertain. England's team for the Galle Test lacked its usual clarity. Big Brother is watching and don't cricket captains know it. It explains the shelf life.

Mahela Jayawardene appears better second time round. Perhaps because of hindsight, a rare privilege. His natural batting has its freedom and beauty back. His leadership seems less intense and more experimental. In one-day cricket he has attacked at defining moments, while in Galle he defended when wise heads in media boxes thought he ought to have done otherwise. To what degree did England lose in Galle and/or Mahela win? He played a genuinely great innings and then plotted a few downfalls with a pretty ordinary attack. Rangana Herath is shaped a little like Bishan Bedi but it ends there. After 129 Test matches, 30 hundreds and an average of 50, the Sri Lankan captain has the job for as long as he can live with it.
So too Michael Clarke, at least if Australia continue their standard of backing a captain till he drops. Clarke is so perfect for the job it's not funny. After a decade of narrow eyes, bright eyes is at the helm and scoring as heavily as Bradman. Clarke rages against a game that drifts, and uses his sense of optimism to galvanise those around him. After an insular couple of years them Aussies are up and at it again, cock of the walk. One or two can still lighten up, mind you. At times in the Caribbean that unattractive snarl reared its head but Clarke was back home in Sydney regenerating. Doubtless he took note and will make his point.

And finally to the Test team of the Northern Hemisphere winter and to Misbah-ul-Haq. Not since Imran Khan has a group of Pakistani cricketers looked so comfortable with one another. Probably it was the winning but there was something quite patrician about Misbah's leadership - aloof and yet complicit. He never looks much of a batsman but averages 45 in 34 tests. He knows how to get it done and has passed this instinct to the others. How he loved it when they swarmed upon England, gloaters all. It was at Lord's that the storm clouds of spot-fixing had gathered and on supposedly neutral ground that the score was settled. How England must have suffered from this glaring portrayal of redemption. Misbah may not last, at least not like Clarke surely will, but he will not forget 3-0 against the colonial father in the Middle East. That was the Pakistan dream.

To undervalue the captain is to misunderstand the nature of team. Each side is shaped in the image of those who lead it - if the fish is rotten, look at its head. There are some gems around at present - we have not touched upon the immense contributions of Graeme Smith or MS Dhoni here - all of whom appear to understand their responsibility to the past without missing a beat in their quest to shape the future. It is not by coincidence that international cricket in all its formats continues to hold our attention.

Cover_Drive · « **Reply #24 on:** April 05, 2012, 03:18:01 PM »

Quite good bit on Misbah Ul Haq, I think him being educated sets him apart from others. He knows how to talk in the media and how to handle situation, our other captains just go and start lashing others lol.

Buzz · « **Reply #25 on:** April 23, 2012, 08:51:50 AM »

Kevin Pietersen�s electrifying show for Delhi Daredevils against Deccan Chargers was pure theatre
It all began innocuously enough with slide 40. In 2001, Stuart Robertson, the marketing manager of the England and Wales Cricket Board, was making a presentation to county chairmen at Lord�s, proposing the introduction of a new form of 20-over cricket.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/cricket/kevinpietersen/9219761/Kevin-Pietersens-electrifying-show-for-Delhi-Daredevils-against-Deccan-Chargers-was-pure-theatre.html
Many were unimpressed, or ambivalent to the idea. Then Robertson showed them slide 40 � his age-based market research. It revealed that the only age group significantly opposed to the new game was the over-55s.

Robertson�s proposals were narrowly approved.

American pop star Katy Perry has, in all likelihood, never heard of Robertson. But as Australian fast bowler Doug Bollinger awkwardly ground his robust frame against hers last month, she was unwittingly extrapolating Robertson�s vision. It was the launch of the fifth edition of the Indian Premier League and Perry was the star performer.

There is an Indian word: tamasha. Often it is loosely translated into English as �entertainment�, but its meaning is far richer than that. It denotes fun in the most chaotic, all-encompassing sense. It implies singing and dancing, music and colour, west and east, old and new, hedonism and fulfilment, the meticulously-planned and the gloriously spontaneous.

Tamasha underpins the IPL. The annual outbreak of moneyed bish-bash-bosh is largely derided on these shores. �The Indian Pensioners� League�, it has been dubbed, while the latest edition of Wisden was also critical.

Understandably too, for the IPL�s bewitching brew of pyjama cricket, cheap thrills and aggressive capitalism is an all too alien one to the mindset of conservative Englishmen. (When one-day cricket emerged in the 1960s, Neville Cardus wanted it called �snicket� or �slogget� � anything other than �cricket�.)

Yet to dismiss Twenty20 as cricket cheapened by entertainment is to approach it from the wrong angle. It is, instead, entertainment enriched by cricket.

Take Thursday�s game between Delhi Daredevils and Deccan Chargers. Delhi had lost an early wicket in pursuit of their target of 158, but that merely brought a talented No 3 by the name of Kevin Pietersen to the crease.

Deccan, meanwhile, had a tearaway fast bowler called Dale Steyn. What followed was some of the most electrifying televised sport imaginable.

Steyn�s second delivery to Pietersen was near-perfect, pitching on middle stump, sharply seaming away. Pietersen blew out his cheeks, grateful to have missed it. Next, Steyn bowled a fuller delivery, searching for the edge. Instead, Pietersen shuffled across his stumps and with a wicked flick of the wrists turned the ball through square leg for four. Steyn�s nostrils flared a little.

The first ball of Steyn�s next over was short and quick. Pietersen got into position to pull, but not quickly enough. The ball skewed off the splice and flew to Bharat Chipli at midwicket. Dropped! To the banging of drums, the home fans roared in delight. This was the ultimate in cricketing tamasha.

Pietersen went on to score a century, but faced just 13 balls from Steyn in that innings. Therein, cry the purists, lies the deep flaw of Twenty20. It is a sugary snack rather than a nourishing meal, a clumsy fumble in a dark alley compared to the lifetime�s embrace of Test cricket.

Now imagine millions of young fans watching on television, craving more, desperate to see these two champion cricketers duelling again, this time for more than 13 balls. If only a handful of them are intrigued enough to find some way of tuning in to the first Test against South Africa at The Oval in July, then the seeds will have been sown. Slide 40 will have served its purpose.

Nobody � not the players pocketing their fat cheques, not the Indian administrators, nor even the television companies queuing for a slice of the pie � would argue that the IPL is the be-all and end-all of the game.

Nobody but the most devoted fans can remember whether Owais Shah now plays for Delhi or Kolkata or Kochi or Rajasthan.

What they will remember is moments like Thursday�s, or the names of rising stars like Ajinkya Rahane. Test players like Pragyan Ojha, Subramaniam Badrinath and Shaun Marsh came to prominence as a result of the IPL, not the other way around.

Declining crowds and television audiences are being held up as a defeat of the IPL�s appalling decadence. What they more correctly allude to is a deepening of appetites. The IPL has long been accused of killing Test cricket. Instead, it could well be its salvation.

Nickauger · « **Reply #26 on:** April 23, 2012, 09:13:33 AM »

What a cracking article! Completely agee with everything in that article!

PedalsMcgrew · « **Reply #27 on:** April 23, 2012, 10:00:17 AM »

I disagree!

Suggesting that the likes of Marsh, Badrinath etc came to prominence as a result of the IPL is like suggesting that an international footballer came to prominence as a result of the Auto Windscreens trophy! These things are all relative and the quality of the opposition does play a huge part....! Playing in the IPL made no difference to their talent at all, to suggest none of the selectors were aware of these players before the competition is crazy.

I watched a game the other night where the 'celebrity mascot' of one of the teams was in tears because Shaun Marsh had been given out....she had marched into the 'dugout' to discuss matters with Adam Gilchrist....it was, quite possibly, the most amusing yet pathetic scene I have witnessed in professional cricket! A once great international cricketer, a man hugely respected by fans around the world having to placate a jumped up indian princess on the boundary edge during a match...and apparently this is all part of the game in the IPL!

Stupid competition, corrupt to the core and the decent players are ONLY there for the money....

Rant over!

Nickauger · « **Reply #28 on:** April 23, 2012, 10:50:59 AM »

I tried to delete my comment after writing that, after reading that it was written by Jonathan Lieuw and realised that it must all have been rubbish! I agree however, that if one 11/12 year old boy/girl sees the theatrical greatness of two players going at each other hammer and tong for a short period of time a la Steyn v Pietersen or Morkel v Gayle, and then tunes into watch it for longer in the test matches, then it has served the only purpose that I can see it has.

I also agree that it is only worth it for these 'clash of the titan' battles where it's international great v international great. That Steyn - Pietersen battle was one of the finest I have seen, just like Steyn's 3-12 spell earlier in the tournament and his over against Kallis yesterday (I feel a recurring theme, and reckon I'm developing a little man crush on Dale Steyn, but reckon he's the standout playerso far in this tournament); in any cricket.

The fact that average Indians like Patel, Kumar, Jadeja, Pathan, Uthappa, Tendulkar, Ganguly

etc are given huge wages for very little return however, just highlights the stupidity of the BCCI and is perhaps the reason why Indian cricket will eventually (in my opinion) focus solely on T20, if it doesn't already.

Buzz · « **Reply #29 on:** May 06, 2012, 06:24:32 AM »

All sorts of global visa issues going on at the moment � first we have MoYo in trouble with Bangladesh intelligence for allegedly submitting a fake clearance to play letter...
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/sports/cricket/top-stories/Yousuf-in-trouble-with-Bangladesh-intelligence/articleshow/13005642.cms

LAHORE: Pakistan's former captain Mohammad Yousuf is in trouble as he is being investigated by the Bangladesh intelligence agencies for allegedly submitting a fake clearance letter to play in the Dhaka league.

The Bangladesh Cricket Board has handed over the matter to the intelligence agencies after participating clubs in the Dhaka Premier League which remains suspended refused to resume playing in the event until the Yousuf matter was resolved.

And now we have half the WI team not available as the WICB haven�t done their pre-tour admin... It has emerged that the touring West Indies squad, due to face England in a three-Test series starting in less than two weeks' time, currently comprises only 11 fit men, with three players still to arrive in the UK. Assad Fudadin, Narsingh Deonarine and Marlon Samuels have been delayed by visa issues while Fidel Edwards has a "back niggle" and will not play in their three-day match against Sussex, which was due to begin on Saturday but fell victim to the weather. http://www.espncricinfo.com/england-v-west-indies-2012/content/current/story/563863.html

Adam Hollioake has emerged from his first cage fight with a draw to his name... A cage-fighting England captainMost cricketers take to golf after retirement. Adam Hollioake chose mixed martial arts, and came out alive and with a respectable draw, in his first professional fight
The fight certainly wasn't a bore draw, and there was no doubt in Hollioake's fizzing mind over which result he now prefers. "The nine-minute one," he tells ESPNcricinfo. "I've got four and a half days to do what I want now. Five days - or four days - to get a draw, it's like, 'What was all that about?'"
http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/563897.html

And finally we have a study on throwing/bowling in the Sunday Times

CRICKET has moved a step closer to solving one of most contentious issues in the game � whether a bowler throws or not during a match.

MCC has been working with scientists at Imperial College, London, and Griffith University in Brisbane on a system using sensors attached to the bowling arm to establish precisely how much it bends, which in international matches must be no more than 15 degrees during delivery.

Earlier this year England were posed serious problems by Pakistan�s Saeed Ajmal, the legitimacy of whose doosra delivery has been frequently questioned, and in next week�s Test at Lord�s they will face West Indies off-spinner Shane Shillingford, only recently back to playing Test cricket after his action was officially deemed suspect.

This week the cricket committee of MCC, which acts as guardian of the laws, meets to review progress and is expected to endorse the funding of a second phase of research, which should see the system tried out in match situations some time in 2013.

�There�s no more controversial or emotive point of law,� said Fraser Stewart, the MCC�s laws manager. �It gets a lot of people hot under the collar and anything that can make the issue clearer and fairer will be a service to the game. If players can be monitored in match conditions it can only help the game�s credibility and integrity.�

The next phase is to refine a wireless system that will convey data from two sensors fitted either side of the elbow joint on the forearm and upper-arm. Cameras will be used to determine the points at which the arm goes above shoulder height and the ball is released, between which the limit of flex is applied.

The International Cricket Council, which is funding the project in conjunction with MCC, is keen for the system to be introduced because it accepts that bowlers who come under suspicion can bowl in a different way when asked to demonstrate their technique in nets or laboratories.

Muttiah Muralitharan failed to convince everybody of the legitimacy of his action even after putting himself through a range of scientific trials, including one in which he wore a splint, because he was not necessarily bowling the way he would in a match situation.

Researchers are confident that the sensors are too small to hinder bowlers in their performance, although if and when the system is brought in it would probably only be applied to bowlers about whom umpires have suspicions.

In-match testing would not only create a more realistic monitoring environment but also allow bowlers to continue playing until they have been categorically shown to have thrown. At present, bowlers are usually pulled out of competitive cricket to undergo remedial work, as happened with Shillingford.

The system is due to be tested on 24 of the world�s best young bowlers after the completion of the Under-19 World Cup in Brisbane in August.
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/sport/cricket/article1031834.ece

Author Topic: Cricket in the news today (Read 19474 times)

Cover_Drive

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charlie15

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Nickauger

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Bruce

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charlie15

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tim2000s

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Alvaro

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Alvaro

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Buzz

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Cover_Drive

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Buzz

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Nickauger

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PedalsMcgrew

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Nickauger

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Buzz

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