England Cricketers Oversold

I don't want to get too negative about England cricket over just one dismal away series - the better team has won, and that doesn't mean England isn't talented or fun to watch. But I do have to say that England's cricketers have been overmarketed since the 2005 Ashes victory. The most egregious offenses in this regard were premature biographies by Pieterson and Strauss. And now I find that even Monty Panesar has a slick merchandising machine of a website.

In the meantime, the world of cricket moves forward. India is touring in South Africa. So far the test series is 1-1. Makhaya Ntini was the standout player in the last match. He's long been known as a great athlete (the program I bought from their Australia tour in 2001-2002 said that he was known to eschew the team bus in favor of running to and from practices), but lately he's become a very consistent bowler à la Glenn McGrath.

There's also a little thing on the way soon called the 2007 Cricket World Cup. Even without Warne the Aussies will be the favorites, but there are several teams which could step up and surprise (especially if the Aussies end up overcelebrating after a 5-0 Ashes whitewash). Of course the biggest surprise could well be the pitches, because many of the venues in the Caribbean are still under construction. I was disappointed that the bid to have a venue in Florida was rejected. It would have been a great step for spreading cricket in the U.S., and the construction would have been done on time. It's the West Indies' show, though, and there's still a chance that they will show the world that they're ready for the big time.

Good news for England and bad news for Australia

The good news for England Cricket is that no one's going to get injured playing on day 4 at the MCG. That's, of course, because it took only 3 days for Australia to thrash them. The bad news for Australia Cricket is that they have to give 100,000 day 4 ticket-holders their money back.

Other than that, things look pretty bleak for the visitors and quite sweet for the hosts. England now has an investigation to do, as well, since they had bowling plans leak out. At least they HAD plans for the bowling. I'm not sure there were any batting plans to leak.

The other bad news for England cricket is that my hero Monty Panesar did not even come close to winning BBC Sport Personality of the Year. Apparently they gave the award to the Queen's granddaughter for winning some equestrian thing. Sounds like the deck was stacked against Monty, but what really hurt was not being a part of any England team that won a match since August. Of course there were not many wins in those matches where he was left out, either - just a couple ODI wins against Pakistan, and one win in the ICC Champions. At least he's the odds-on favorite for Beard of the Year.

McGrath to Follow

Poor Glenn McGrath - even in retirement he's overshadowed by Warne. He thought he'd be clever and announce his retirement after the next test, but instead the Warne announcement started a media feeding frenzy of speculation about McGrath.

Despite Warne's shadow, McGrath has been one of the greatest fast bowlers in the history of test cricket. It will be interesting to see how Australia fare without their golden bowling tandem. They seem to have a long line of great young batsmen waiting for a shot at the big time, but I'm not sure what sort of young bowlers they have to work with. The answer to that question will shape the international cricket rankings for the next decade.

Warne Out - End of an Era

Shane Warne is retiring from international cricket. This is a big story, as he's been, and could have continued to be, a major force in the sport of cricket. It also puts the World Cup in play, though the Aussies managed to win the last one without him (and they have to be odds-on favorites to do it again).

He will play 2 more years of county cricket for Hampshire.

To me the decision seems premature, but I guess he's accomplished everything he wanted to, and now he can spend more time with his family (and mistresses?).

It's interesting that he would have retired in 2005 if Australia hadn't lost the Ashes. It really looks like losing the Ashes last year was the best thing that could have happened to Australian cricket at that time.

Accidental Fireworks

Even in a one-sided match, test cricket can create some interesting stories. Today Adam Gilchrist hit the 2nd-fastest century in the history of test cricket, rapidly crushing any but the faintest hope of England retaining the Ashes. This alone is a story, but the interesting part is that it should not have happened.

Here's what Gilchrist said:

"After I got my fifty we threw the question back to the rooms, did we want to try and have a look at them (England) if we could press on? We took it as a yes, apparently it was a no."

Translation: Gilchrist got the wrong message, and instead of grinding out a slow, safe innings until the end of the day as captain Ponting had planned he put the pedal to the metal and swung away. The way England has been batting lately, I'm not sure it would have made a difference even if Gilchrist had been caught out on 50 making an imprudent shot, but now the England team has to hold 9 wickets for 2 days or score another 538 runs in order to have any hope of keeping the Ashes. They really only have 3 batsmen left who seem capable of making a century (Bell, Collingwood and KP - Strauss is gone, Cook is too mistake-prone, Flintoff and Jones are out of form, and then you've got the bowlers). Even if all 3 make centuries England could still end up losing by more than 100 runs.

Hats off to Australia. England's Ashes victory in 2005 awakened a sleeping giant. England's team has been in some disarray since Michael Vaughan's knee injury, but this Australian side is better than the one that Vaughan's England team faced in 2005.

UPDATE: Guess I was wrong about Alastair Cook, who just got his first century vs. Australia. Well played! Too bad England hasn't been able to put all these great individual efforts together at the right moments...

Things getting back to normal

Normal is Australia holding the Ashes, as they have for something like 17 of the last 20 years.

For one day, at least, all is as it should be

Today was a great day for the Barmy Army in particular. They got back their trumpet and their Monty. And what an Ashes debut Monty gave them! While he humbly says he trusts the England selectors, by turning in the 3rd-best innings ever bowled by any Englishman at the WACA he let us know that those selectors are in fact morons.

In a way, the selectors did Monty Panesar a favor by not selecting him until now. He's untainted by the debacles in Brisbane and Adelaide. He also gets to feed off a resurgent Steve Harmison. The two make a great "good-cop, bad-cop" pair. Harmy scares the batsmen, and then when they relax or get aggressive against Monty he catches them off guard.

I don't know whether Monty could have turned either of the last 2 matches in England's favor - we'll never know. I don't even know if his efforts will be enough to prevent them from losing the whole series this week. But he was already my pick for England's Sporting Personality of the Year award (or he would be if I were English and could vote in it), and this just makes his case stronger.

Controversial Cricket Happenings

It's been an eventful week, with 3 controversies raging.

1) The Ashes. Australia was able to snatch away a match that should have been England's, and England's fans have given up hope of retaining the Ashes. The principle scapegoat seems to be Ashley Giles. It's true that he did not bat well, his bowling was mostly mediocre, and he dropped a catch which could have turned the match in England's favor. I think it's a mistake to blame Giles. His bowling was not much different than it was in the Ashes-winning effort last year, when he was the King of Sp(a)in. It's just that two things have changed on the bowling side: his teammates aren't bowling as well, and England now has a better spin bowler in Monty Panesar. It's not fair to blame Giles for not being Monty. Blame Fletcher for choosing Giles over Panesar and Flintoff for not insisting on having the best bowling attack possible under the circumstances. As for the batting, while he's supposedly a better batsman than Panesar, there were many more acclaimed batsmen in the England side who failed. If Flintoff had batted well no one would be concerned about Giles's batting failure. And as for the catch, KP dropped 7 catches in the 2005 series. All a player can do is practice taking all sorts of catches and hope that the technique developed will work at the right moment. It's like in figure skating where the skater who can hit the triple lutz 8 times out of ten because of years of effort hopes that one of the bad ones isn't during the Olympics. That's big-time sports. England fans had a good emotional high from last year's win, and now a few of them are looking to lash out because their high has crashed.

England blew this opportunity not because Giles failed but because of weak strategic coherency. They chose some tactics which were designed to bring a draw (like choosing Giles over Panesar for batsmanship and experience) and some tactics which were designed to pursue victory (like the declaration on 550-6). It's unfortunate that Collingwood's brilliant fighting effort was in vain, but the fish rotted from the head. I should also say that, even though I was hoping England would win, it was a fascinating match and a brilliant win for Australia.

2) Drug tests. Pakistan has overturned the steroid bans of Akhtar and Asif. I don't know whether the cases were genuinely deserving of mercy, but this is the second time this year that Pakistan has threatened the rule of law in the sport. The reason given for the overturn was that the PCB had not done enough to educate the players about the dangers of supplements. Since the PCB signed on to WADA (the World Anti-Doping Agency) and the ICC policies, it means the PCB failed to live up to its agreements. They need to get their act together and act like a great sporting nation instead of a backwater.

3) The run-out of Murali. Today New Zealand was able to beat Sri Lanka, and they were helped by a controversial run-out which ended Sri Lanka's batting. Sangakkara had just completed a century, and Murali left his ground to congratulate him before the throw came in to the keeper. The keeper then took off the bails and Murali was out. Sri Lankan players said this was against the spirit of the game, but I tend to disagree. The spirit of the game is that when you're playing you're playing. As Fleming pointed out, if the throw had gone wide they might have taken an overthrow. If the throw had gone really astray and all the way to the boundary, would it have been in the spirit of the game to award Sri Lanka the extra runs?

It was a lapse in concentration on the part of Murali. Murali is a great bowler against whom no batsman can afford a lapse in focus, and I don't think he should be let off for his own lapse.

I have to say that cricket would be dull if there were never any controversies like this, but it does seem like 2006 has had more than its share of cricket controversy.
In 2003 there was Shane Warne's diet pill and England's refusal to play in Zimbabwe, in 2000 there was the huge match-fixing scandal. In 1981 there was the big underarm ball controversy, and in the 70's there was the Packer rebellion and aluminum bats. And it seems there's always some controversy about someone's bowling action (often Murali's). But this has been quite a week and quite a year.

Double Snubs in Australia

Today was the first day of the second Ashes test, and while it was a good day for England's batsmen, there were two bits of disappointing news:
1) No Monty again. Monty Panesar is the best finger spinner in the world, according to England coach Fletcher, but for the second match in a row they chose Ashley Giles instead, presumably because of his experience and batting ability. I've never coached a cricket side, but England needs to win a test. Why not trust Strauss, KP, Collingwood, Bell and Flintoff to take care of the batting and put the best bowling attack you can muster. It seems like both sides selected players with a draw in mind. Given the slowness of the pitch, a draw seems like the most likely result, but Monty has shown the ability to take wickets on unfriendly pitches.
2) No bugle again. I haven't actually heard the Barmy Army bugler (perhaps I'll get the chance next summer at the Oval), but I understand he's actually talented (a classically trained musician). For the second straight match Cricket Australia has not allowed him to bring his bugle. I don't quite understand this policy. I fear the result will be more drunken ditties from the Barmy Army.