The Cricket Thread

[kullibino]

Only 22, played no 1st class games and only 10 one dayers, smashed 89 off 43 balls, including some huge maximums.

[Swarley]

Anyone see Warners dig this morning?

Strangely enough, yes, it was on the tv so I watched it! Fantastic performance, 6 sixes and 7 fours or something like that. Pity he didn't get the ton. Maybe the Aussie selectors should invite more blokes off the street to join their team.

[Swarley]

Hayden retires from international cricket

Just been announced

[Swarley]

Warner not too hot tonight, skittled (if that's the right term?) for only 7

[capybara]

Hayden retires from international cricket

Just been announced

Not surprised at this. A real rebuilding time for the Aussies,if some of the young guys in the 20/20 can settle into test cricket then the future is bright. Still think it will be tough for there bowling line up.

[Fuctifano]

Hayden retires from international cricket

Just been announced

Means that only Ponting, Clarke, Katich, Lee, and Tait (if he decides he's up to it) will be survivors from the last Ashes series in England. Or to put it another way the retired players are Hayden, Langer, Martyn, Gilchrist, Warne, Gillespie, Kasprowicz, and McGrath. That's some list of talent that's gone.

Think Jaques will take Hayden's spot if he's fit but it looks like this young kid Phil Hughes will get his shot in SA to book himself a tour spot as Jaques is still injured at the moment.

Warner not too hot tonight, skittled (if that's the right term?) for only 7

Yeah, he tried to club his first ball out of the park and wore it in the stomach then was clean bowled coming down the track (to Dale Steyn!). To be expected after his heroics the other day.

Aussies won pretty comfortably, key moment was when Boucher missed a (difficult) stumping chance off M Hussey when he was on 2. After that he started swinging the bat and everything went to the fence.

Edited January 13, 2009 by Fuctifano

[Shengus Khan]

Means that only Ponting, Clarke, Katich, Lee, and Tait (if he decides he's up to it) will be survivors from the last Ashes series in England. Or to put it another way the retired players are Hayden, Langer, Martyn, Gilchrist, Warne, Gillespie, Kasprowicz, and McGrath. That's some list of talent that's gone.

England will be shy of Vaughan (probably), Trescothick, Giles, Hoggard, Simon Jones (probably) and Geraint Jones with guys like Bell and Harmison by no means certain of a place.

That certainly is a hell of a turn over in just 4 years.

[Pettigrew]

Warner not too hot tonight, skittled (if that's the right term?) for only 7

Went along last night, great atmosphere although the game never came close to reaching the heights of Sunday's. Kid sitting in front of me had a Shane Warne top on that through cunning use of a black marker pen had suddenly become a Warner top.

Might have been different outcome if Duminy had taken the catch from Hussy. His catch before that was outstanding; didn't expect him to miss the relatively easier one, maybe lost the ball in the lights a bit. Great partnership at the end between Hussey and Cameron White to see the Aussies over the line.

The Gabba outfield was in some state though, did the commentators say what the problem was?

[capybara]

The Gabba outfield was in some state though, did the commentators say what the problem was?

Some fungal problem i think,terrible state.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/cricket/4...e-chairman.html

Stuck this article on here,i would be interested on what you think. Unlikely to succeed in a international ban on 20/20.

Not sure if splitting test cricket into divs would work. Test cricket here is still very well supported.

And although i have Sky i would like to see cricket on terrestial tv,but i guess it is unlikely,the BBC never even bid for any of the packages on offer.

[Fuctifano]

Some fungal problem i think,terrible state.

Stuck this article on here,i would be interested on what you think. Unlikely to succeed in a international ban on 20/20.

Not sure if splitting test cricket into divs would work. Test cricket here is still very well supported.

And although i have Sky i would like to see cricket on terrestial tv,but i guess it is unlikely,the BBC never even bid for any of the packages on offer.

There's not a chance the amount of T20 cricket will be reduced in the near future- all the power in International Cricket is with Asia (or more specifically, India who get backup from the other Asian countries) and look how nuts they go for the IPL.

I've been saying for a couple of years now that the 50-over game should be phased out, it now looks an outdated halfway house between Test and T20. Is it this year they're tampering with the domestic competitions in England?

I don't think splitting Test cricket would work as it stands (and England would be on decidedly shaky ground to be in the top 5 if Pakistan started getting regular games). It *might* work if the ICC gave the likes of us, Ireland, Kenya, and Holland "Tier 2" test status (I made that term up myself) and lumped Bangladesh and Zimbabwe in with us. Even then, you'd have a professional level and an amateur level (how would players from Scotland get time off work for a 3-test series in Kenya?) and I wouldn't think that a team moving up to tier 1 would stay there. Not a good idea.

I can't see live cricket returning to terrestrial. The amount of rain / light interruptions leads to a lot of downtime, which a dedicated sports broadcaster can manage, but I still have memories of the BBC going off air when there was a rain delay and sticking a film on and not telling you when they might be back on, or channel 4 switching to the racing from Haydock for 10 minutes during the afternoon session. It would screw about with schedules too much for a commercial channel I reckon- the Beeb might be able to do it now with the "red button" service but I think Sky will always just out-punch them financially unless the government upgrade Test cricket back to the "protected" status it had prior to it going wholly to Sky.

[capybara]

There's not a chance the amount of T20 cricket will be reduced in the near future- all the power in International Cricket is with Asia (or more specifically, India who get backup from the other Asian countries) and look how nuts they go for the IPL.

I've been saying for a couple of years now that the 50-over game should be phased out, it now looks an outdated halfway house between Test and T20. Is it this year they're tampering with the domestic competitions in England?

I think the Pro 40 is still the same,i try to catch Surrey at the Oval during the season.

The Friends Provident is i think the old C&G. I think it is sectional and Scotland and Ireland play.

Thats it apart from 20/20

[Yoss]

Means that only Ponting, Clarke, Katich, Lee, and Tait (if he decides he's up to it) will be survivors from the last Ashes series in England. Or to put it another way the retired players are Hayden, Langer, Martyn, Gilchrist, Warne, Gillespie, Kasprowicz, and McGrath. That's some list of talent that's gone.

Think Jaques will take Hayden's spot if he's fit but it looks like this young kid Phil Hughes will get his shot in SA to book himself a tour spot as Jaques is still injured at the moment.

And that's if Lee is fit. The Ashes starts in six months and his recovery time is estimated at five so there has to be some doubt about it. Remember all the promises about how quickly Flintoff would be back from his ankle problems?

And yeah, Jaques would be first in line if fit. I don't know anything about Hughes except what was said about him during the last series.

[Fuctifano]

Liked this- 10 most vomit-inducing Hayden quotes

10. “Australia will look weaker without him but had he continued, they would have stayed weak for that much longer because he would have borrowed time from a younger man. Irrespective of all this though, he can be sure he will always have the cricket world’s respect. As a great batsman and, for some, as a decent cook.” Express Cricket gets us under way with some kitchen action.

9. “Hayden played his cricket extra hard which inevitably led to spot fires and clashes with opponents and officials over the journey. But there was no more popular figure in the Australian dressing room. Thoughtful, humble and considered, Matthew Hayden has retired and the Gray Nicolls will be replaced by the fishing rod and skillet as he contemplates where to go from here.” Sportal concedes that unless you were a member of the Australian inner sanctum, he might have been a bit of a p***k.

8. “He did not merely score runs, he scored them in a fashion that left bowlers scarred for life.” The Times of India unleashes a bit of hyperbole - but to be fair they also urged some retraint here.

7. “I remember meeting him in a gymnasium in India while he was touring India and remember vividly that evening he spent at least two hours training in the Gym after a strenuous practice session. Like most Australians he was a fitness freak and his powerful body reflected that.” Cricket Next calmly overlooks the fact that Australia is the #1 Fat Nation in the world.

6. “Cricket world will miss you, Matty…That was the great thing about ‘Mighty Matty’. You could never write him off. Throw him a challenge and he rose to the occasion.” Sify is overrun by cliches - and I think we can safely write the bloke off now.

5. “I was bowling the last over and we only had five runs to defend. Before it got under way, he ran all the way up from deep third man, he took the ball, put it in my hands and said ‘you can do this, you just have to believe in it’.” Ashley Noffke fights off tears and cheesy Hollywood-scripted advice in the Courier Mail.

4. “While this redoubtable cricket player retired yesterday as statistically Australia’s greatest opening batsman he is predominantly a spiritual character drawn to the greater forces through his love of the sea.” Mike Coward waxes lyrical in The Australian.

3. “Once, in 1999, sitting on top of a sand dune at Stradbroke Island near his beach house, he said to wife Kellie: ‘You know we can have all this but I’ll never feel completely fulfilled unless I prove to people what sort of Test cricketer I can be. It’s something I just have to do.’” ANI incites vomiting with this anecdote.

2. “I’ve not seen an attacking batsman of his calibre in my career.” Virender Sehwag forgets about himself, Brian Lara and Adam Gilchrist as he writes for Daily News Analysis.

1. “Importantly for me today I am retiring from cricket, not from life.” None other than Hayden himself shockingly confirms he is not going to play on the main road, jump off The Gap at Sydney or commit hara-kiri by ball machine.

[Yoss]

"Thoughtful, humble and considered ..."

Good lord. Obviously I don't know the man but I've never heard him described as any of that before. Number four is my favourite though.

[Yoss]

I liked this one in the Sydney Morning Herald a couple of months back.

"It must be some measure of the catastrophic decline in Australian cricket that there are blokes in the squad these days who have not even published an autobiography, let alone a barbecue cookbook."

[Shengus Khan]

"Thoughtful, humble and considered ..."

Good lord. Obviously I don't know the man but I've never heard him described as any of that before. Number four is my favourite though.

3 & 5 get my vote

[Bluenose5]

Its funny how that top 10 was from a kiwi website, oh how they wish they had him playing for them Fact is he would have walked into any cricket team in the world at ease. Great career Matty

[capybara]

Battle for the chair of the ECB hots up with Ex Tory big wig Lord Marland challenging Clarke for the top job.

Big issues such as TV Rights,Test v 20/20 on the Agenda

Clarke was fav for job but a real battle now.

Edited January 19, 2009 by capybara

[capybara]

Pietersen and Shah score hundreds,mind you i would fancy a few against St Kitts,still some show of intent.Capt failed though.

[Yoss]

I'm hoping Shah will do / have done enough to get the Test spot from Bell. And assure him he'll be given a proper run at it this time whatever happens in the first couple of Tests.