Our XI for the first Test

Today was the first occasion in quite some time that we checked the cricket news and no-one was injured. This is partly because pretty much everyone’s injured already, but it was the first sign that things are changing for the better and makes us think that England are unquestionably going to win the Test series against India. We’re easily swayed.

It’s usually boring to pick an England XI, but there’s quite a lot of intrigue at the moment. Here’s our team for the first Test:

Andrew Strauss
Alastair Cook
Ian Bell
Kevin Pietersen
Paul Collingwood
Andrew Flintoff
Geraint Jones
Ian Blackwell
Matthew Hoggard
Steve Harmison
James Anderson

This will never happen because James Anderson’s in it and James Anderson isn’t allowed to play for the Test team. Sometimes we think that English cricket is one big Truman Show-style joke at the expense of James Anderson.

“Everybody’s injured, Jim. Looks like you’ll get a game. Good job you flew all the way round the world.”
“Great.”
“No. Wait a minute. Simon Jones can bowl from a standing position.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Well at least you didn’t pick Shaun Udal ahead of me. That would be humiliating.”

You’ll notice we’ve gone for Ian Blackwell in the end. We’re not abandoning Monty Panesar. We just think he should learn to bat and field first. We don’t see any reason why he won’t manage this. If he doesn’t, then he doesn’t deserve to play for England.

Mohammad Ashraful’s ‘demystification’ of Murali continues

Mohammad Ashraful’s ‘demystification’ of Murali continues. After walloping the bendy-armed master all over the place in the course of scoring a century on his debut, he’s only gone and done it again, although Murali eventually got him for 136.

Our opinion is that at 315-9 Bangladesh aren’t going to score quite enough in their first innings. The Murali factor will be greater when they bat again. Good effort though and good luck.

Bangladesh seem to be following Sri Lanka’s template for finding their feet in Test cricket – namely, a couple of gifted batsman providing the platform for a spinner or spinners bearing far too much of the responsibility for the team’s success. The only difference is that Sri Lanka had a Murali when they were starting out.

Still, it’s better to follow in Sri Lankan footsteps than to choose the Zimbabwe route only to find out after a while that the next step is ‘turmoil’. Even Pakistan can’t quite succeed using the ‘turmoil’ strategy.

Smith, Duckworth and Lewis defeat Australia

South Africa today beat Australia by six wickets after a Duckworth/Lewis calculation. Graeme Smith followed up his winning performance in the Twenty20 match with 119 not out. Graeme Smith's upper body is too big. Not in a muscular, body-building kind of way. He's more like a Frankenstein's monster-style composite of two different people.

Mick Lewis brushed aside comparisons with Glenn McGrath by conceding 25 runs from three overs. If Australians love Glenn now, they'll really adore him once he's retired.

Vaughan out, Jones probably out - they're queuing up to avoid the first Test

Michael Vaughan is hot on Marcus Trescothick's heels after being forced to fly home because of this irritating knee injury. Irritating for us, that is, probably agony for him. Simon Jones has been taken to hospital after twisting his knee.

Owais Shah has been called up as cover from the A-tour and he in turn is haring after Cook and Anderson in yet another injury-related international flight.

Andrew Flintoff has been named as the fill-in skipper for the first Test. A lot will be made of this, because one day Michael Vaughan will retire - probably through this knee injury - and the press will get all hot under the collar about his successor.

We're not really that interested. We're more worried about whether England will find 11 players for the first Test. We're betting that assistant coach Matthew Maynard gets a call-up.

Alastair Cook - angry or amazed?

It’s England A-tour time. We love this time of year because the tour normally throws up the next England player. Kevin Pietersen was the most obvious example. On an academy/A-tour of India he scored four hundreds in six matches and generally outperformed his team mates to a ludicrous degree.

As far as the 2006 tour is concerned, Alastair Cook is the England player in waiting and he has already been called up to the senior tour in India as cover. He scored 101 earlier in the week against an Antiguan XI and thrashed the Australians around for 214 in a two-day warm-up over the summer. So are we angry or amazed by this?

Well we’re amazed, but not so amazed that we’re going to start writing weird letters on parchment, trying to persuade the ECB that they’re the word of God. It never worked during our ‘pick Ian Austin’ phase and we’re not even inclined to try it on behalf of Alastair.

Alastair Cook should prove himself over the next few years on what is inevitably described as ‘the county treadmill’. (It’s not a treadmill. It’s a series of cricketing fixtures against other counties. We don’t get it.)

Until he’s got stacks of runs in the bank and has made a case of Perry Mason standards, then he should remain behind our favourite foetally-featured porker, Rob Key, when he gets back from injury. Lots of cricket fans hate Rob Key. We don’t know why. He always scores more runs than anyone in county cricket and while he’s only had modest international success so far, it hasn’t been that disgraceful and he’s still only 26, so it’s not like he’s past it.

He scored a double hundred against the Windies and that was a great day. We made up Rob Key songs with a friend of ours. They all revolved around being fat and having a face like a foetus. If you’ve made up any Rob Key songs, please feel free to send them to us.

England’s batting looks weaker than weak

England’s batting looks weaker than a single hair with a monster truck hanging off it. In the second innings of the warm-up match against India A, Matthew Hoggard top scored. We’re sure even Matthew Hoggard doesn’t want that to happen again. Let’s write that again on a line of its own.

In the second innings of the warm-up match against India A, Matthew Hoggard top scored.

Marcus Trescothick has gone home for personal reasons; Michael Vaughan is waiting to see whether a cortisone injection into his knee has any effect; Kevin Pietersen retired hurt in the first innings and didn’t bat in the second; Andrew Strauss is woefully out of form, as is Andrew Flintoff; Paul Collingwood suffered a back spasm a day or so ago and just about anyone could fall victim to a bad menu selection at any moment. That leaves us with Ian Bell.

Alastair Cook has been called up, which is really annoying because it renders an article we’ve written completely redundant. Now we’re not even going to get as far as someone deleting it from their inbox without reading it.

James Anderson has also been called up. Either there’s a worry in the pace department as well or he’s being used as company for Alastair Cook on the series of long flights they’ll be taking. James Anderson is destined never to play cricket. He was on the A-tour to play some actual competitive matches, but now he’s going to hang around hotels again, same as he does every winter.

On top of all of this Dheeraj Jadhav totally let us down with 20 and 18.

One-day round-up

Bangladesh were beaten by Sri Lanka. Kumar Sangakkara contributed 109 not out to Sri Lanka’s total of 309-7. Bangladesh finished with a mediocre 231-9.

New Zealand beat the West Indies. Regular readers will know that this makes us angry, but luckily the architect of one of our favourite ever innings scored 118. Just seeing Nathan Astle’s name next to a three figure score makes us amazed. We’re going to pretend that this particular innings was just like his reason-defying innings against England all those years ago, even when it clearly wasn’t.

South Africa beat Australia in their Twenty20 match. Graeme Smith scored 89.

Our stance on Bangladesh and Zimbabwe

We think that we'd better make ourselves clear. Many people lump Bangladesh and Zimbabwe together because they're both - well - rubbish. We champion Bangladesh, yet berate Zimbabwe. How can this be? It's really quite simple and we'll explain ourselves in bold so it's even clearer. These are entirely cricketing reasons.

Bangladesh are on an upward curve.

Zimbabwe are on a downward curve.

We've kept it simple, but that could be expanded. Bangladesh are a young side at the start of an upward curve. With youth and enthusiasm on their side, they can't fail. They're a valuable addition to Test cricket.

Zimbabwe are a side in only the loosest of senses and are at the tail end of a downward curve. In fact they're looking back at the tail end of the graph thinking: 'Remember when our captain had international experience?'

It's very hard to see Zimbabwe sorting themselves out. It's hard to see Bangladesh failing to improve.

Terry Duffin is new Zimbabwe captain

That's Terrence Duffin. You know? Played two Tests against India? Hit a fifty? No, we hadn't heard of him either.

Being as he's never taken a first-class wicket, we'll have to assume that he's a batsman, although he's only ever scored one first-class century.

The best part is that he hasn't even played a one-day-international. Being as Zimbabwe have suspended their Test programme, this means they are essentially picking a debutant as their captain.

Zimbabwe - what next? We think that the next step will probably be to field fewer than seven players for an international match or something.

Ganguly Watch part 7

This was supposed to end after the Pakistan series because it's become decidedly boring - as expected. We also suspect that this might be the final act, although never say 'never' with Indian cricket selection.

Saurav Ganguly is not even in the squad for the first Test against England.

That's a live webcam on the right. Look how sad he probably looks. Look at him.

It's not really a webcam. You can tell because (a) he's got an India hat on; (b) it never changes; and (c) we're far far far too ignorant to manage anything as high-tech as a webcam. Our car stereo only plays tapes for God's sake.

Great cricketers we have known: Paul Allott

To help with our coverage of the Under-19 World Cup, we dispatched a special correspondent, who we call 'dad'.

'Dad' neglected to find out the start time of the final, so when he bumped into Paul Allott in a supermarket in Colombo, he asked him. Paul Allott told him and everyone lived happily ever after.

Paul Allott was a middling international cricketer, but he's from really close to where we're from, so we like him. When we're with people who are from the same place as us, we like people from as far away as possible. When we're with foreigners or we're on the internet, we like people from home. We're a bit mental like that.

It's all go

Well it's all happening in England's second warm-up match against a President's XI. Michael Vaughan's knee has 'flared up'. We can't be bothered describing it in a different way. Paul Collingwood's back has 'gone'. Kevin Pietersen's back has a 'niggle'.

On top of that Shaun Udal, Ian Blackwell, Monty Panesar and Simon Jones have got the runs. They probably tried to order some Western food like complete sub-continental amateurs. It's a schoolboy error. Go with what everyone else in town is eating - they're not ill. Novices.

The big news as far as we're concerned is that our man Dheeraj Jadhav is playing.

We tipped Jadhav for greatness a while back. Here's his chance.

Bangladesh win. We start to procure ingredients for the humble pie.

We were fighting off a lethal bout of bronchitis or pneumonia or something yesterday, so we're a bit late on this. Bangladesh won.

We'll resist the temptation to write 'hurrah' like we usually do, because it's giving the whole enterprise an amateurish feel that is wholly undeserved. Only that's how we really feel.

We've established before how we think that Bangladesh are going to be a decent side in a few years. Read about it here - we wish we'd written it without the Zimbabwe bit at the start. It'll be literally years before they're particularly threatening, but we're going to celebrate every step they take.

Yesterday Bangladesh beat Sri Lanka. A Sri Lanka without Murali or Vaas, but Sri Lanka nonetheless. They even managed to win in spite of 96 from Benevolent Uncle Sanath.

The state of fast bowling then and now

Fast bowling – don’t you just love it? Snarling, uprooting stumps and propelling a little leather projectile into batsmen’s lardy bellies. Great fun.

The problem is – they’re a dying breed. If we use 100 wickets as qualification, here are the fast bowlers operating on the 1st January 2000 and their averages at the time compared with the fast bowlers operating now.

Australia

Then:
Glenn McGrath, 266 wickets at 22.88.

Now:

There’s still only Glenn who’s worth talking about. His record has improved with 536 wickets at 21.48, but even he’s not a fast bowler, more a medium-pace robot. Brett Lee’s fast. Brett Lee’s also rubbish.

Bangladesh

Then:
Not a Test-playing nation.

Now:
While a crop of young spinners are coming through the ranks, Bangladesh’s pace bowling is still a distinct weakness. A weakness? It’s dreadful.

England

Then:
Andrew Caddick, 106 wickets at 29.55 and Darren Gough, 135 wickets at 29.07. These were pretty decent times for England. These two were great opening bowlers and we thought that England were going to become the best in the world. We kid ourselves a lot.

Now:
England’s pace bowling is arguably the strongest in the world, featuring Steve Harmison, 154 wickets at 28.71 and Andrew Flintoff, 163 wickets at 31.51. Simon Jones hasn’t yet taken 100 wickets, so strictly speaking, he’s not included and Matthew Hoggard’s average isn’t up to much – plus he’s not fast enough.

India

Then:
Javagal Srinath, 162 wickets at 30.20. We’ve included him because he had to do a good deal of his bowling on unfriendly Indian pitches. He was really quite good; great moustache and hair too; great name for that matter. We’re going to get a cat and call it Javagal.

Now:
Irfan Pathan hasn’t taken many wickets, but we’re starting to regret the 100 wicket minimum, so we’re mentioning him. He’s ‘decent’ at the minute, rather than ‘deadly’.

New Zealand

Then:
Chris Cairns 150 at 29.30.

Now:
Shane Bond has 56 wickets at 20.80 – the lowest average of all current fast bowlers, but his career is almost over before it has begun thanks to a late start and a succession of injuries. Plus the 100 wicket thing again.

Pakistan

Then:
Wasim Akram with 363 wickets at 23.04 and Waqar Younis with 279 wickets at 22.09. Fast-bowling pornography. Every day a masterclass. Waqar’s figures should include broken toes as well as wickets.

Now:
Shoaib Akhtar has 165 wickets at 25.69. Being as Brett Lee is ‘fast-yet-rubbish’, Shoaib is ploughing a lone ‘fast-and-good’ furrow. Good ploughing, you lank-haired psycho.

South Africa

Then:
Allan Donald, 284 wickets at 21.83 and Shaun Pollock, 161 wickets at 20.46.

Now:
Pollock now has 385 wickets but his average has climbed to 22.34 and he’s not fast any more. Makhaya Ntini plays the role of the strike bowler, but 230 wickets at 29.22 isn’t Allan Donald standard. Plus, he doesn’t do the warpaint and mad faces thing like Allan did and he rarely bowls at top pace.

Sri Lanka

Then:
Chaminda Vaas 108 wickets at 29.31

Now:
Chaminda Vaas now has 301 wickets at 28.81. Chaminda’s not all that fast.

West Indies

Then:
Curtly Ambrose, 369 wickets at 21.31 and Courtney Walsh, 410 wickets at 25.23.

Now:
Fidel Edwards, Tino and Jermaine are all pretty quick, but rubbish. It’s like they’ve been watching Brett Lee videos instead of Malcolm Marshall ones.

Zimbabwe

Then:
Heath Streak had taken 111 wickets at 24.56 at this stage in his career. Yes he had. Unbelievable.

Now:
Fast bowlers? No. Cricketers? Not really.

Conclusion

So what’s going on? Quicker scoring rates, better batsmen and too much cricket. We’re not explaining that. This has been too lengthy as it is.

Ian Blackwell for the first Test

Previously, we decided that Monty Panesar should be England's spinner come the first Test against India. We think that we decided that. It was hard to tell as we didn't really have a strong opinion.

Now we've changed our mind. We think that Ian Blackwell should play. Last time around we said Panesar should play, but concluded that he probably wasn't yet up to the pressures of a Test, effectively contradicting ourself.

We're really against knee-jerk selections based on recent performances. Warm-up games are the worst for this. Players should never have their fates decided on the basis of a warm-up game. They should be rated over a much greater period of time and just given a chance to acclimatise and practice in warm-ups. We're not changing our mind on the basis of the first warm up where Blackwell took 4-57, scored 59 and then took 2 for nothing.

Ian Blackwell will make a solid lower order batsman and he's played 28 one-day internationals, so we don't think he'll be overawed. That's all. We knew all this before, but we went for Monty. We don't know why. Ultimately, we're happier about Monty, but for the minute we're with Duncan Fletcher and his appreciation of 'three-dimensional cricketers' - ie, Blackwell can bat.

Our main point remains the same: Teach Monty Panesar to bat, then the decision's easy.

Pakistan under-19s - amazed; Windies - angry; Dhoni - amazed

Well there's no point having a system if we're not going to use it. It'll make the weekend round-up quicker.

Pakistan retained the Under-19 World Cup against India. On balance, this made us amazed. Although Bangladesh and England's failures made us angry.

New Zealand beat the West Indies in a one-day international. Occasionally we try and write a proper, grown-up article for someone. Whoever we send it to is usually singularly unimpressed as it's inevitably as dull as sitting on Redcar seafront in December underneath a tartan blanket. In the last one we wrote: "Nowhere is the decline in fast bowling so marked as in the West Indies". That's the kind of humourless rubbish we write when we're really trying. It makes us sad. Anyway, the point is that the West Indies continuing rubbishness makes us angry, therefore the defeat to New Zealand made us angry.

Finally, India beat Pakistan in the final one-dayer. Yuvraj Singh made 107 off 93 balls and Mahendra Dhoni treated us to another over-paced slap around with 77 off 56 balls. All of this made us amazed, especially Dhoni. We're really warming to him.

India wrap up one-day series

India today clinched the one-day series against Pakistan after winning the fourth match by five wickets. The most important contribution came from Rudra Pratap Singh, who took four Pakistani wickets for only 40 runs.

R P Singh joins a growing list of cack-handed Indian pace bowlers. For non-British readers, cack-handedness is the harrowing genetic flaw where a person has a preference for using their left hand.

Fellow favourers of the inferior arm in India's pace bowling legion are Zaheer Khan, Ashish Nehra and Irfan Pathan. Pathan is so good it doesn't bear thinking about what he could achieve if he bowled properly using his right arm.

Those are 'special' left-handed scissors, by the way - specially designed so that ham-fisted southpaws don't hurt themselves.

Losses to sport: Cairns to cricket; Richardson to sprinting

Chris Cairns' final international appearance ended with victory in New Zealand's Twenty20 match against the West Indies. Unusually, it went to a bowl out in which the Kiwis triumphed.

We've been waiting for quite a while to pour scorn on New Zealand's habit of picking four middle-order batsmen/medium pace bowlers and four medium pace bowlers/middle-order batsmen in their side. We were going to make a point about how this was probably not a bad tactic for Twenty20, only we looked at the team and they didn't really make that kind of selection here. So why write about it? Why indeed?

The match also marked Mark Richardson's sprinting retirement. Fittingly, he lost.

This post was boring. Someone important will come and read King Cricket today and see this. They will leave immediately and some fantasy opportunity will evade us once again. We're still going to publish it though. We're our own second-worst enemy (after that guy with the thin moustache and the knife who always follows us around after dark).

England under-19s try our patience yet further

We don't think that it's overstating things to say that the England under-19s (pictured in the field, right) were humiliated in their semi final against India today. Can a team be comprehensively humiliated? If it's possible, then they were.

India racked up 292 for the loss of only four wickets. England were bowled out for 58, with number 11, H T Waters, stranded on a promising 0 not out.

It pretty much goes without saying that this makes us ‘angry’.

Of course every single one of the England under-19s is infinitely more talented than we are and also younger. That's why we made the hilarious joke with the picture of the cricketing children. Age is the only thing that we can 'beat' them at (ageing being such a skill).

We're thinking of embracing loserdom and cultivating an interest in cars. That way someone will hopefully punch us really hard when we ask, 'so what you driving these days?' and end our miserable existence.

Mahendra Dhoni powers India over the finish line

How did we feel about Mahendra Dhoni’s innings of 72 off 46 balls? Given a choice between being ‘angry’ or ‘amazed’, we were ‘amazed’.

The VB Series is over

Hurrah. Rejoice. Time does pass after all. Here we were thinking that Australia were going to play Sri Lanka until we were as old as the average Australian Test cricketer, but it’s over. They’ve finished.

Australia won.

Dreams - reality - dreams - reality

We swear we didn't know about him when we wrote this.

Peter Parker, aka Spider-man, IS a Test match official.

How will we know if we're awake or not now? Our 'sure-fire' test is fatally flawed.

Maybe we weren't dreaming. Maybe we do play for England. Hurray. We can't wait to tour India and eat loads of puri bhaji and mattar paneer.

King Cricket - new rating system explained

After going throught the emotional mincer over the weekend, we have decided to simplify things. From now on, we will be either 'angry' or 'amazed' at every cricketing event. There are no other options.

The credit for this complex rating system should go to the UK's Channel 4. During David Blaine's interminable stunt where he hung in a box over the Thames, viewers were asked to vote through their remote control as to how they felt about it. The options were (a) angry or (b) amazed.

We tried to hammer in 'nonplussed' in the form of binary code, but only succeeding in switching to BBC1 which was pretty much the best result we could have hoped for.

Hopefully we'll have more success applying this system to cricket.

Andrew Symonds: Not English

Australia won the second VB series final against Sri Lanka earlier today after Ricky Ponting and Andrew Symonds both posted centuries.

Symonds' effort was apparently the more impressive of the two. He scored 151 off 127 balls. Andrew Symonds was born in Birmingham and used to represent England at some of the junior levels, but he isn't English. If we're having Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Strauss etc then we can't lay claim to Symonds, so that's the last time we're going to mention it.

Australian man, Andrew Symonds of Australia is a fantastic batsmen and while time is against him, he has every chance of one day making the King Cricket top ten.

As a deeply unsettling footnote to today's match, Murali took 0-99 off his ten overs. We feel physically sick with this together with Bangladesh under-19s defeat.

Bangladesh under-19s - let's get on with our lives

Ah nads. At least they were knocked out by England.

We should really have posted this earlier, but after receiving the bad news off Ceefax yesterday morning, we went straight back to bed and cried our eyes out for seven straight hours.

When we eventually emerged we caught sight of something green and red on the way down the stairs and all the horror came flooding back.

Our friends and family have gathered round and made us cups of tea and tried to distract us with idle chit-chat. It's helping, but it's always there in the background as a constant undercurrent of misery.

We wish we'd vested some of our emotional load into the Ugandan under-11s after all.

The VB Series - still not boring

Sri Lanka beat Australia today in the first of the VB series finals. The VB series is so astoundingly entertaining that after approximately 40 games between the three nations, they have to have multiple finals as well. It's not overly drawn-out. It's just THAT entertaining.

So, to confirm: Not boring.

Anyway, Sri Lanka won largely due to 83 from Kumar Sangakkara, 3-40 from our representative Murali and impressively, three run-outs by Tillekaratne Dilshan. Well fielded, sir.

The picture in this post is stolen from umpire Daryl Harper's website, where he likes to take pictures of cricketers holding Aussie rules footballs. He just really likes the Adelaide Crows apparently. Great stuff, Daryl.

Click here to see more pictures of cricketers holding Daryl's balls

Bangladesh under-19s march on

Hurray. Bangladesh under-19s triumphed against the cricketing might of Uganda, a nation most famous for the tyrannical rule of 'His Excellency President for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Idi Amin, VC, DSO, MC, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea, and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular', or plain old Idi Amin, nutter, as we know him. He did ban hippies, mind, so he wasn't all bad.

Bangladesh, 255 all out
Uganda, 84 all out

We feel kind of bad about caricaturing Uganda. We could start championing their under-11 cricket team or something, but it's hard enough finding out stuff about Bangladesh under-19s. Instead we'll try and end on a positive note.

Uganda: Why not visit the unimprovably named Bwindi Impenetrable Forest - it's great.

Tip: Sakib al Hasan/Shakib al Hasan/Saqibul Hasan

Sakib's one of those guys on the right. We're not telling you which one because that would be too easy. It's not that we don't know - we do. We're very serious about what we do and research extensively for these features.

Sakib Al Hasan is representing the Bangladesh under-19s at the moment. He's 16 (or 18 - it's never simple) and he's a left-handed, top order batsman and left arm spinner. He was out for 20 off 16 balls against Uganda under-19s this morning, so this isn't the most timely of tips, but he is good. Really good.

He got the top four Pakistan batsmen out in Bangladesh's first match of the Under-19 World Cup. He also took 3-39 and then scored 100 off 86 balls against Sri Lanka in the final of an under-19 tri-nation tournament before Christmas.

He's also helping the under-19s in their bid to field at least three Hasans in every match they play.

- As a footnote to this, we do now know which one Sakib is in the picture above because we found a picture on cricinfo. We were going to steal it, but the warnings about stealing it are a little bit too clear, so instead we're going to make do with pointing out that cricinfo think that he's a medium-fast bowler when he isn't.

Click here to laugh heartily at cricinfo and their poor research/airtight legal warnings about image theft.

King Cricket's other tips.

England's spin reserves

We've been embiggening Monty Panesar of late and with good reason, but we're not too sure who should play in India.

We don't think that England should play two spinners because it never works. The idea is that spinners who are fairly innocuous in England will become world-beaters in helpful conditions. This is as true as most of our conversations with our boss. Murali, Saqlain et al. all prove that a good spinner is a good spinner when they make their county cricket cameos.

So that rules out 'innocuosos' (we should get paid for a coining as good as that) Udal and Blackwell, right?

Well, yes, but we have another point. It takes a while before most players can perform under the extra scrutiny of a Test. It's like when you're trying to use a urinal and some guy with a six-foot sabre is screaming: 'Come on! Come on! Do it!', at you, only there's millions of people (and none of them have sabres and you're chucking a ball rather than pissing).

Anyway, we don't think that Monty has really experienced that kind of pressure yet and while we don't think he'll crack, we do think he'll struggle.

So who to pick then? Er, Paul Collingwood and then Michael Vaughan can be the spin 'attack'... No. We'll stick with Monty, although it's a moot point because the first name on the selectors' team sheet will be Shaun Udal.

We're glad that we're not a selector. All we have to do is publish this and then go and buy a sandwich - but what sandwich?

We think that's Michael Vaughan 'having just bowled' by the way. It's the best we could do. Let's say it was when he bowled Sachin Tendulkar, because that was great.

Bangladesh under 19s rub everyone's faces in poo

Yes. The boys are doing us proud.

Having seen off New Zealand and now Pakistan, it's almost as if they are actually forcing everybody's faces into a poo on the floor while saying: "See: We're great. You thought we were rubbish and we're not. Your opinions are so inaccurate that all you are fit for is having your face rubbed in poo. Nobody is going to listen to anything you have to say again, because all they'll do is run away shouting: 'urgh - he's got poo on his face - that's disgusting'."

This is what the Bangladesh under 19s' victories are saying to us anyway.

Obviously the above scenario doesn't include us. Where we're concerned, mostly the Bangladesh under 19s will be saying: "Thank you for believing in us", while giving us a big hug.

Holy Crap: Mark Richardson

Mark Richardson’s Test batting average was 44.77. Here are some players who finished their careers with lower averages:

Gordon Greenidge 44.72
Graham Thorpe 44.66
Richie Richardson 44.40
David Gower 44.25
Graham Gooch 42.58

For those who don’t know. Mark Richardson was New Zealand’s opening batsmen until he retired a year or so ago. He’s most famous for his habit of challenging slow runners from the opposition to a race at the end of every series.

He was originally a spin bowler but got the yips. This is a psychological problem whereby bowlers can’t coordinate their limbs when the pressure’s on and they wind up bowling wides.

It’s kind of like when you think somebody behind you is watching you walk and you become all too aware of your own legs and start tottering around like Shane MacGowan in high heels on an icy slope – or maybe that’s just us.

It becomes self-perpetuating as the bowler expects to bowl badly and creates pressure from nowhere. It’s a similar problem to impotence only with fewer penises.

Anyway, Mark got this problem and decided that as he could no longer bowl, he may as well open the batting for his country. So he did.

While Mark’s batting was good enough to earn him a place as a Test opener, he never quite attained the fluidity of a Mark Waugh or a Virender Sehwag. By his own admission, he had in his repertoire a grand total of three shots including the forward defensive. That’s crap. That’s the same as Matthew Hoggard and Matthew Hoggard’s crap.

This explains why he only got four one-day international caps, but wielding the prod and the leg glance, he managed to average 44.77 from 65 Test innings. He only managed three not outs, so this is no statistical aberration. Nor was it a case of several ‘fill your boots’ innings – he only scored four centuries.

Mark’s oeuvre was essentially ‘bat all day for 42’. It was dull, but it was effective and so we say:

Holy crap! Look at Mark Richardson’s Test batting average! (Is it right?)

Ganguly Watch part 6

...out again.

This is getting too easy. He'll be in again next match. You watch.

The Indian selectors' compulsion to switch between selecting Ganguly and dropping him is matched only by our obsessive compulsive need to flick the non-functioning light switch at our mum's on and off.

Ganguly Watch part 5

Okay. We think we're getting the hang of this now. It's in again, out again, in again, out again.

While the drama of his selection reaches ever more feverish levels, the quality of Saurav's cricket is wilfully, staggeringly mediocre.

Following a brace of 30 odds in his previous two Test innings. In the recent loss to Pakistan, he produced an eye-poppingly dismal 34, a downright exceptional 37 and the thoroughly deserved/outrageously fluky wicket of Salman Butt, which was lbw - the most boring of all the methods of dismissal.

Well done Saurav for giving ammunition to both camps in the interminable debate about your selection. You string us along for as long as you like, but this is only going to end one way. It's just a matter of time.

Cricket on ice

We've decided that we're not really going to cover the previous week's cricket because we're really quite lazy and besides, it's no longer news.

While we were away, however, we did discover this:

http://www.cricket-on-ice.com/

Do you enjoy standing around in the cold? Do you enjoy spending long periods of time standing on a frozen lake? Do you relish the prospect of diving to catch a cricket ball with a seam like a razor blade when it's 25 degrees below zero? Then this could be the game for you.

Stupid, stupid bastards.