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dominance
The Mohali Test
By Will 2 years ago, mid-October, 4 Comments »
It’s shaping up into a corking Test match over in Mohali. With two days to go, India lead by 301 with all second-innings wickets intact; they cantered to 100 for 0 in just 23 overs by stumps today. And, true to form, Shane Watson has said Australia “can chase down anything”, in a sub-conscious reference to his wild days on a pig farm, perhaps.
“I think we can win it,” he said. “If we’re set 430 or something in four or five sessions, I’ve got no doubt, if we bat well, we can chase down anything. The wicket is still playing well. There’s a bit of turn and the ball will go reverse. If we bat extremely well, I really believe we can chase down anything.”
It’s a good deck, for sure, but I’m far less confident than Watson. Fifth-day pitches in India are a spinners’ dream, and Amit Mishra already has five in the bag. Watch with interest.
With Australia’s predicament in mind, I was drawn to Chris Ryan’s piece on the Almighty-less side Ricky Ponting skippers:
It is too soon to guess how far Australia’s cricketers might fall. It is not easy to pinpoint the exact moment they peaked. But it seems reasonable to suppose they fielded no better team than the one they put on the park in 1997. That team had aces in most bowling departments, nigh-on infallible catchers, and just the right pinches of batting polish and grit. Underpinning all that was a keeper in Ian Healy who could pluck dragonflies with his tongue, and a fair and clever leader in Mark Taylor. Of the triumphant XI who guzzled champagne on the players’ balcony in Nottingham, only Ricky Ponting survives. Who else among the current lot might jag a spot on Tubby’s team? Mike Hussey would, coming in for graceful Greg Blewett, and Brett Lee would tip out trusty Paul Reiffel. No others.
It’s an interesting time, certainly. But if the seesaw is beginning to tilt away from Australia, it doesn’t take long for it to tip back quite dramatically. If, for example, they chase down 450 to beat India, once again Australia will be considered the all-powerful leviathon they once were. Albeit one whose cracks are widening as the years roll on.
4 Comments »West Indies need 287
By Will 2 years ago, at the end of May, 8 Comments »
What a game in Jamaica where West Indies are (somehow) putting Australia under all sorts of pressure. As I write, West Indies have begun their second-innings chase of 287 after bowling Australia out for 167 who, at one point, were 18 for 5. 5 for 18, 18 for 5 – go on, say it. It’s immense fun. I can’t remember the last time Australia’s top-order failed so spectacularly though my colleague reminded me of Edgbaston in 1997.
Is this the demise of the once great Australia? Of course it’s not – but it might be the beginning of the end, if that’s not contradicting myself. The embryo of a decline. It’s also pleasing to see Australian journalists are just as fickle as us Brits. Alex Brown, in the SMH, ponders the question and comes across all doom and gloom.
Being the West Indian fan that I am, and despising Australia as a pom’s birthright allows, I’m egging them on all 287 runs. Keep an eye on the scorecard…
8 Comments »Stanford close to luring ECB
By Will 2 years ago, at the end of April, 59 Comments »
Allen Stanford and Lalit Modi. Two entirely different characters, both from opposite ends of the world – geographically and, arguably, morally – but both with a shared love of money and cricket. Why do I worry less about the Wild West cowboy, and more about Modi’s modus operandi?
Perhaps it’s because he’s American and has no historical connection to a cricket board. Maybe it’s because he appears to have no dirty agenda to the politics of the sport: he’s seemingly happy to pile money into the flayling West Indies cricket, and anyone else who wants to join in the fun is more than welcome. This sounds naive – of course, billionaires crave and adore money: it is their driving force – but his come-follow-me attitude is refreshing and progressive, which cannot be said of Modi. Modi’s business is power and politics; the IPL has already made him millions, but it is a vehicule to global dominance. We’ve seen this season how the ECB have been tied up in knots banning (and subsequently unbanning) various players who represented the Indian Cricket League – the antichrist to the sanctioned IPL – which demonstrates just how much power the BCCI wields.
Anyway, I digress. I like Mr Stanford and am quite excited by what he could do to counter Modi’s unquenchable thirst for dominance. He has met with the ECB – significantly, the president of the West Indies Cricket Board, Dr Julian Hunte, was also present – to finalise plans for an England v West Indies All Stars XI later this year (and possibly running over five years). The matches themselves aren’t too significant, but it could signal the start of a business relationship which expands far beyond any of our imaginings. Stanford’s 20/20 in the Caribbean was a rollicking success – some say he should be in charge of ICC’s World Cups – so it’ll be fascinating to see what he and England come up with.
59 Comments »Australia are killing the game
By Will 3 years ago, mid-November, 27 Comments »
Weather permitting, at some stage on Monday Australia will beat Sri Lanka, probably by a large margin. It’s becoming an annual trend, re-discussing Australia’s dominance and why it is hurting the game so much. But I’m not going to bother mentioning India and Pakistan’s one-day series, which interests me not a lot, so let’s go round in circles and debate why you think (or not) Australia are killing the game.
The sadness of Australia continuing to raise the bar in Test cricket means the foundation of the game is becoming less and less relevant in more countries as the Twenty20 phenomenon multiplies the excitement in shorter forms of the game.
This is even so in Australia, which has the strongest tradition of Test cricket with England. If Australia was playing a one-day or Twenty20 match at the Gabba it would have sold out long ago.
But modest crowds of little more than 15,000 on the first three days, followed by just 7629 yesterday amid showers, left many empty seats among the 40,000 at the recently redeveloped, world-class Gabba.
This is despite one Queenslander, Mitchell Johnson, making his Test debut and another, Andrew Symonds, playing his first Test at the Gabba, not to mention Matthew Hayden, as Ponting and his men try to extend their winning streak to record levels.
Victory here will give Australia 13 in a row since South Africa hung on for a draw in Perth almost two years ago. It is the second-longest winning streak in history, behind the 16 in a row Steve Waugh’s side set from October 1999 to March 2001.
Australians in defence of their juggernaut will point to the all-conquering West Indians of the 70s and 80s, and they’d have a point. But was the void so great as it is now? And were they, as we are now, so flummoxed as to a solution?
27 Comments »