The cricket thread

Heartfeltdawn

When Phil Hughes died, there was a lot of comment about how it suddenly woke people up to the fact that there is danger and pain as a batsman. Short boundaries, true wickets, and bats with a bigger sweet spot had made the game easier. Bowlers on the other hand know all too much about pain. Seldom do you have batsmen undergoing the sort of operations that Graham Onions or Dennis Lillee underwent. Knee injuries are commonplace, injections and cortisone likewise. I had to quit the game after a horrific knee injury (think Simon Jones but worse. Ironically when I went in for surgery in October 2005, he was in the room next to me having surgery on the ankle that kept him out of the final Ashes Test. We had our surgeries on the same day, spent the night recovering, and then he popped his head round the door whilst I was watching cricket on television. Very nice chap indeed and far easier to face than the day he bounced me in a representative game!). I can think of several bowlers from my old minor county peer group who had back and knee injuries, a couple of bad shoulder problems. The batsmen on the other hand got off fairly lightly. 

Ryan Harris was a superb bowler. His performance in the Cape Town Test was sensational. You could see he has limping back to the start of his run up. People talk of bravery in cricket normally from a batting perspective but Harris was as courageous as any batsman I've seen that day. 

A big loss for Australia. 

Heartfeltdawn

NB: I am surprised that they've called Pat Cummins into the side. He hasn't played a first class game for nearly two years. I can only presume James Pattinson still has hamstring problems. 

scrumhalf

Even at club level I've had my share of injuries. People have only ever seemed to acknowledge ball impact injuries in cricket rather than the damage caused by schlepping up and down trying to bowl people out.

Heartfeltdawn

scrumhalf said:

Even at club level I've had my share of injuries. People have only ever seemed to acknowledge ball impact injuries in cricket rather than the damage caused by schlepping up and down trying to bowl people out.

Exactly. 

On the batting front, another Bairstow ton today. When someone is on form as he is and when they've won a game for England as he did, they should be in that damn side. 

iseverynamegone

I was just sat reading that on BBC app.

form of him life .

Heartfeltdawn

Going by the ECB website with the latest updated averages, at 1807 BST tonight, his County Championship season record read:

6 games, 9 innings, an average of 106.29 with 4 centuries including a double century.

It's sad looking at the bowling averages though. Check out the poor spinners at the wrong end of the table. There's some more than decent spinners in there. If you pull Rashid and Jeetan Patel out of there, there's really very little at the right end of that table. 

http://i.imgur.com/bRMw2wo.jpg

 

iseverynamegone

Nice piece in (insert paper I was reading) about how spinners are just bitches in the CC at the moment . And pretty much world wide since Warne and Murali retired (and yer Man there in Pakistan had to start bowling legally:-)

Heartfeltdawn

They are. As a former leg spinner it makes me sad to see how the slow bowling department has gotten so threadbare. No doubt in my mind that T20 cricket has been partly responsible.. Short boundaries and true pitches contribute. Bats with absurdly big sweet spots are a huge part of it. A much larger sweetspot and the thicker edges means you don't need to time the ball as you did before or to have the same balance at impact. Just swing hard and swing through and BANG more times than not you are safe. 

When players became fitter and stronger and clubs developed beyond recognition in golf, changes were made. Holes were lengthened. The rough was left as proper rough at some courses. Even with the huge length balls could go, greenkeepers could regulate scores by having tough greens (one reason why Augusta generally still plays hard). In cricket, we've had none of that. Bats have gotten easier to hit sixes with (one of the best articles on the matter came from asking some Australian batsmen at the time), pitches seldom offer much for bowlers in limited over games, and the boundary has gotten smaller and smaller. 

For the slow bowler, who faces wet wickets until June, it's a sodding nightmare. 

scrumhalf

As someone who was known to have a go at off-spin when bowling with a hangover I agree. Cricket (certainly the limited-over form) is now becoming a sport where the role of bowler is becoming subsidiary, possibly even to fielding.

The balance between bat and ball needs to be reset, but I fear it won't be becasue sixes are "entertainment" and bowling maidens is "boring".

I Found some Derek Underwood stuff on youtube the other day, I shudder to think what would happen to him these days on shirt-front blam-oramas.

I'm not suggesting that we flip things round the other way and allow the more chucking variety of spinner, but bats need to be the subject of the legislators.

Heartfeltdawn

Absolutely. The clampdown on the chuckers is a very good thing, although there are still those who get away with it (Jack Taylor for Gloucs the other night against Surrey in the T20 was outrageous). That same game saw Tom Curran a young guy with some potential, coming from a CC match where he'd obliterated Gloucestershire a few days earlier in the CC with 7 for 20. Come T20 time, his first overs featured three slower balls under 50mph. He disappeared for 13. None of the immaculate line and length and pace that had gotten him those wickets in the CC. T20 doesn't breed great bowlers as the ICC rankings suggests

S. Badree	WI	782
2	S.P. Narine	WI	760
3	S.M.S.M Senanayake	SL	712
4	R. Ashwin	IND	697
5	Imran Tahir	SA	662
6	Shakib Al Hasan	BAN	661
6	M.A. Starc	AUS	661
6	S.L. Malinga	SL	661
9	K.M.D.N. Kulasekara	SL	655
10	Shahid Afridi

Heartfeltdawn

Blah. Ashwin is the best out of that lot, Starc could be something special in the future but the like of the chuckers in Narine and Senanayake and the non-spinner in Badree... double blah. 

Gassage

New Aussie ODI kit has been released today.

Heartfeltdawn

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/jul/07/batsman-dies-hit-cricket-ball-chest-bavalan-pathmanathan-manipay-parish-sports-club

I haven't seen anything about whether he was struck as the striker or as a non-striker yet. 

scrumhalf

England win the toss and bat first.

Heartfeltdawn

Shane Watson. Shane Watson. Shane Watson ))))))))

crunchman

Apparently some of the balls are already getting through to Haddin on the 2nd bounce.  If the batsmen can be patient then it's probably odds on for a draw.

Heartfeltdawn

One down and that's a great ball. Moving into Lyth in the air, cuts away off the pitch, Lyth plays it a bit too square, Warner takes a good low catch... that's why Hazlewood is in the side and should have been even if Harris had been fit. 

crunchman

Oh Dear....

Getting out to Lyon???

Bairstow in for Bell please.

Heartfeltdawn

There will be no dissing of Nathan Lyon in this thread. For too long Australia treated their spinners like crap post-Warne. Lyon's got a decent record and does the job for Australia. Underestimate him at your peril. That was a classic Lyon delivery to get Cook. The way that ball drops than bounces with the overspin looked fabulous on the frame by frame reply. 

Very good progress by the Yorkshire boys. Mystifying the amount of idiots on Twitter saying England deliberately got the groundsman in Cardiff to produce a slow low wicket. It's Wales, what else are you going to get there? 

joneve

GODBLESS Joe Root and Gary Ballance! Averted potential disaster with some sublime cricket.