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Simon Jones on the comeback trail
By Will 2 months ago, 4 Comments »
Some people are getting really very excited about Simon Jones. He’s been injured since the 2005 Ashes, since moving to Worcestershire from Glamorgan, and last week took a five-fer against Hampshire. Big deal, right? Well, yes and no. It’s encouraging to hear he’s fit and able to play, and even more so that he “hurried” the Hampshire batsmen so regularly. But let’s be realistic - how can England accomodate him in a four-man attack? And if Flintoff comes back to make it a five-man, allowing Jones to play - we’ll have two injury-prone fast bowlers in our lineup. It’s not good, is it?
Better judges than I reckon he’s a shoo-in for some of the one-dayers this summer against either New Zealand (squad to be announced on Friday, incidentally) or South Africa later in the season. Steve James made some interesting comments in his Sunday Telegraph column:
It is no exaggeration to say that Jones’s initial six-over spell for Worcestershire on Tuesday might prove to be one of the important passages of domestic cricket this season. It screeched the message that Jones is back. It stated emphatically that light has at last flooded Jones’s injury-crammed tunnel. And it raised the intoxicating possibility that Flintoff and Jones, reverse-swing destroyers of Australia in 2005, might yet join forces in England shirts again. It was truly uplifting.
It was the pace that caught the eye. In his first spell Jones averaged nearly 88mph. On a hat-trick, he delivered a ball at 91mph. Remarkably, Jones admitted afterwards that he reckoned this spell was consistently quicker than any he bowled in the 2005 Ashes. We doubted that his body would again permit such exertions. We thought that if he did ever return, his skills but not the zip would survive the litany of injuries (just two county championship and seven one-day appearances in the past two seasons). We were wrong.
Have you seen him bowl this season? Any comments to make? If you have a video of his five-fer, do leave a comment or mail me.
4 Comments »Do we need counties?
By Jonathan Liew 3 months ago, 22 Comments »
There are 18 counties playing first-class cricket. That’s quite a lot. There are more domestic teams in England than in any other country. Yet they’re not evenly spread around - London and its environs has an embarrassment of teams, while parts such as the south west, the far north and most of Eastern England have none at all.
Now partly, that’s due to population: cricket teams are concentrated around the biggest cities. And yet, we persist in clinging to the county apparatus, a hotchpotch of hazily-defined localities that has very little relevance to the social geography of today. Counties don’t really exist in any meaningful sense any more; in fact, for four of the 18 counties, that’s literally true. The county system is rooted in a long gone past, and it hasn’t changed, even though everything around it has. Does the idea of ‘Warwickshire’ mean anything to anyone any more? Certainly not for someone like Ian Bell, who was born in Coventry - which since 1974 has been part of the West Midlands.
If it were only a quibble about names and boundaries, we could probably let it go. But this archaic system has a more serious effect on the domestic game. With large shifts in population and wealth away from rural England and towards the towns, some counties clearly have an inherent advantage over others. A county like Lancashire, with a catchment area of Liverpool and Manchester, the surrounding towns, Cheshire and Cumbria, have far more resource to draw on than the likes of Leicestershire, which has one medium sized town and four rival cricketing counties on its borders. It may always have been this way to an extent - pre-reform Yorkshire was bloody huge - but that doesn’t necessarily make it fair.
As a result, prosperity - and thus success - is distorted by the fact that some counties will always be struggling to prosper, regardless of cricketing merit, and some will always be comfortable. Test grounds - a major source of potential revenue - are concentrated almost exclusively around big cities. Look at the list of county champions: the top four are Yorkshire, Surrey, Middlesex and Lancashire - areas with high populations and a Test ground. Then look at who has come bottom most often: Derbyshire, Somerset, Northamptonshire, Glamorgan. When Leicestershire can’t hang on to a player like Stuart Broad, who was born in the county and has played all his cricket there, it’s clear the playing field is not level. The influx of Kolpak players have counteracted population factors to an extent - but they still need to be paid, and the biggest counties will always jostle their way to the front in this respect.
It’s possible teams like Leicestershire and Derbyshire will never again reach the pinnacle of English cricket. The best they can hope for is the odd promotion or a dart at a one-day trophy here and there, but it’s equally likely they’ll wane and recede slowly into the background. That is, unless something is done about it.
If domestic cricket is ever to make proper money - and, who knows, provide a higher standard? - it needs to brand itself in more familiar terms. In short, we need fewer teams, more fairly distributed. The quickest way of doing this would be to merge counties; in short, persuading them to vote themselves out of business. That’s not going to happen. Instead, reorganisation of domestic cricket could be craftily disguised as a PR exercise.
Ironically, the IPL might be able to teach English cricket a thing or two in this respect. Moneyed franchises they may be, but the teams in the League are based in - and upon - very real localities. The players may not be sourced locally, but that will come in time. What’s important is that a bond is being forged betwen a cricket team and a town. In England, those bonds already exist in large part: Gloucestershire is by and large a Bristol team, Hampshire a Southampton-based club, Warwickshire is a Birmingham team, and so on. Towns have a far greater emotional and economic pull than counties these days, and are far more relevant in today’s society.
The idea, then, is this, although the details are less important than the diagnosis behind them. Cut the number of teams to, say, 12, and base each one around a large town. Let’s call them, for sake of argument: Newcastle, Leeds, Manchester, Bristol, Southampton, Birmingham, Nottingham, North London, South London, East London, Cardiff and Brighton. The South East has a quarter of England’s population, so it should have a quarter of the teams. The names, as I say, are largely irrelevant.
What English cricket would then have, essentially, is the Australian system in all but name. Teams would be able to draw on the emotional and financial clout of the major town, but talent-wise the spread would be far wider - and far fairer. It provides the best balance between levelling the playing field and preserving some semblance of geographical integrity. And the standard would improve.
Anyway, well done for getting through all that - any thoughts?
22 Comments »Notes from the pavilion for October 17th
By Will last year, mid-October, 1 Comment »
Links of note from the past 24 hours:
- Cricinfo - Monkey chants controversy in Mumbai too - This is becoming increasingly uncomfortable…
- Cricinfo - Jones set for Worcestershire move - Is this the most expensive hospital pass in cricket transfer history? Come on…how long will he last, seriously?
- Cricinfo - Harmison signs for Lions - This will be worth keeping a close eye on
- The ageless Kim Barnett - He’s still going strong. At 47
Going domestic…
By Emma 2 years ago, at the start of September, 6 Comments »
I didn’t get to see much of the one-day international yesterday because of work, and it doesn’t seem to have been much of a loss. So, with a brief congratulatory note to Pakistan for yet another fine bowling performance, I’m moving onto county cricket.
As much as the Championship can ever be viewed as hotting up, the Division One title race is providing as close a race as last year. A quick bit of maths suggests that unless Sussex avoid the likely draw against Hampshire today, they will remain level with Lancashire. Comparing the teams’ fixture lists for September, this weekend’s rain could prove to be decisive. Down in Division Two, Surrey have cruised their way through to automatic promotion. However, the fight between Essex and Worcestershire for the final place up will provide some tail-end tension for the season. The match between the two was rained off yesterday, leaving Essex ahead by the barest of margins with two games left to play.
In the meantime, I’m going to my last home Pro40 of the season. Who needs international cricket?
6 Comments »Ramprakash reaches 2000 runs
By Will 2 years ago, mid-August, 7 Comments »
Good grief. 2000 runs is a lot of runs. He last did it in 1995, a season I remember well and I watched much of his batting then too. Somehow, his form this year seems even more fluid than back in '95.
He reached the landmark against Worcestershire, the second time this season he has scored one against them. It was his 8th in Championship cricket and he is now just 13 away from a century of centuries.
7 Comments »We are all thankful to Darren Gough
By Will 2 years ago, mid-June, 3 Comments »
Never again (not this week at least) will I make disparaging remarks about Darren Gough. Essex today were nine down, with Zaheer Khan looking for his tenth in the innings for Worcesterhisre. He blitzed 50 from 33 balls before falling to Matt Mason. Good old twinkle-toes. Khan’s astonishing figures last night of 9 for 28 in 69 balls look rather less special after Gough laid into him: 9 for 138!
Not a bad effort, Zaheer.
3 Comments »Flintoff stretches his legs (and arms)
By Will 3 years ago, at the end of April, No Comments; be the first!
Good news for all - Flintoff’s back. Well - if not 100% fully fit, he’s at least making excellent progress, and today hit an 83 in quick time. Stuart Law (now British) matched him run for run, but their stats make enjoyable reading:
Law:
83(r) 201(m) 152(b) 15(4s) 0(6s)
Flintoff:
83(r) 121(m) 101(b) 10(4s) 4(6s)
Good job, too, that he found some form as Lancashire needed to combat Worcestershire’s decent score, on a difficult pitch. Theirs was only thanks to Graeme Hick who hit a Hick-like 176 (next highest score? 27), and who overtook W.G.Grace in making his 127th first class hundred. Graham Gooch is next on 128……………………
(Will shakes his head, mutters into the night, wondering just how the hell this guy never made more than 6 Test hundreds)
No Comments »Harmison warms up with a hat-trick
By Will 3 years ago, mid-April, No Comments; be the first!
Despite being overshadowed initially by 2 other bowlers - Davies in the first innings and Plunkett taking 3 top-order wickets - Harmison today took his first 5-for for Durham against Worcestershire in 2 years, including a hat-trick (his second in his career - first being last year in an ODI). As excellent news this is, it should be noted that four of his wickets (including the hat-trick) were numbers 7, 9, 10 and jack.
It’s still very encouraging news - especially since he’s hitting the stumps. Four out of his five second innings wickets were bowled, and he took eight in the match. It’s early days, and means virtually nothing in terms of his form - but will give his confidence a massive boost, as it will David Graveney, chairman of selectors, who apparently was watching.
Perhaps more importantly, this was a crushing victory for Durham to go along with their other one against Leicestershire. If only Cricinfo was up, I could check Durham’s stats…
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