Hashim Amla

As we write, Hashim Amla is, dare we say it, closing in on a century. Superstitious South Africans can contact us by e-mail if we've knackered it up for him by saying that.

You might expect us to write about how Hashim Amla has an important ambassadorial role to play as a South African Muslim of Indian descent; how he may be able to more subtly transmit the Republic of South Africa's overt message of racial equality; how he might one day be able to communicate that message to a proportion of the population who are still resistant to the idea, having been immersed in the apartheid system during their formative years; how his actions may speak louder than a thousand well-meant words.

Regular readers will know that we're just going to talk about his smashing beard.

Very regular readers - those who've gone and read every word we've written on King Cricket - will know that we're going to go on and on and on about his smashing beard.

Facial furniture is very much on the wane in international cricket. Allan Border's Australia had Border himself, David Boon and Merv Hughes with first-rate moustaches. More recently, India have had a number of classic moustaches on the faces of Javagal Srinath, Anil Kumble and Saurav Ganguly. Sadly, neither team, nor any other in world cricket can really offer much these days.

Hashim Amla: Standard bearer in so many ways.

James Franklin - a most unwelcome hundred

We get a lot of visitors who have searched 'James Franklin'. This baffles us. We try and imagine that we're from New Zealand and who our heroes would be and they're never James Franklin.

James Franklin hit his first Test century against South Africa a day or so ago. Eagle-eyed readers (Totally inappropriate. Eagles detect movement from great height. They don't pick out details from passages of text.) will have noticed that we're a bit late on this and that we don't update so frequently at the weekends. This is because our computer is a malicious dictator and we can only do what it lets us do. In fact we'd better not criticise it in case it punishes us further.

Ordinarily we'd be at least pleased, possibly delighted or at worst ambivalent about James Franklin's achievement, but frankly this has come too hot on the heels of Jason Gillespie's double hundred against Bangladesh. Where will the tail-end madness end? You might say that we can't blame a batsman for trying to score runs. Well, we can and we will.

Is it pushing it to say that this makes our first Test predictions weirdly prescient. Kallis is batting for a draw at least. Not sure if this quite qualifies James Franklin as New Zealand's latest medium-pace all-rounder though.

Double hundred for Stephen Fleming

There's been a bit of a county feel to this site recently and that's no good. We think of ourself as being international. We're not, but we like to think that we are. So here goes.

Elsewhere in the world, man from New Zealand, Stephen Fleming, has reached 203 not out against eleven South Africans in an INTERNATIONAL match. We're slightly concerned about the damage to South African man, Makhaya Ntini's figures, but with 4-106, he's not in bad shape. Ntini's the most consistent quick bowler in the world at the moment and we're hoping that he carries the torch for fast-bowlers by showing the WORLD'S batsmen what an easy time they've had over the last few years. For more information about our feelings regarding the decline in fast-bowling, read the whole of this website. We can't really remember where we've written stuff before and we certainly can' t be bothered searching for it.

Amazingly, this is only Fleming's ninth century in his 101st Test. He's got a decent average - 38.75 before this game. Maybe this will herald a rich vein of form for the guy. Maybe it won't. We don't really have strong opinions on this topic. We probably shouldn't have included this last paragraph, but there you go.

We have a girlfriend and she once said that she liked Stephen Fleming. We remember this, even though she's doubtless forgotten or changed her mind. In any case we've included a picture where you can see his naked shoulders just for her benefit. It's probably not a particularly 'nice' picture. We don't know. We don't fancy Stephen Fleming.

This is why we're not as international as we like to think. We've tried to appeal to the whole world and ended up writing solely for someone we live with.

Strike one for King Cricket's Ones To Watch

That didn't take long. Andy Wilson in the Guardian says that Tom Smith is 'already highly rated by England'. He's not going so far as to say that he's highly rated by Andy Wilson though, is he? Eh..? Eh..? Andy..? What do YOU think about Tom Smith..?

We think he's ace.

Tom Smith can bowl - ask Durham

Mystery man Tom Smith's not had a bad game yet. He's taken 4-68 so far in Durham's first innings. We still haven't come across any journalists who've mentioned him as a 'promising potential future England hopeful, maybe,' or anything else similarly definitive. If you do find an allusion to his being a potential full England international, please let us know.

See if you can find confirmation that he isn't medium-pace as well. After seeing him on the first day of the season, we would say that he was 'brisk'. We actually thought that he was quicker than that, but we don't want to go overboard in case it makes us look like a rank amateur.

Glen Chapple and Mal Loye - commending Lancashire's under-appreciated

A quick note about two of Lancashire's players who are neither young nor up-and-coming. Glen Chapple hit 82 off 73 balls, which is a typically impatient Glen Chapple innings. About five or six years ago, Glen Chapple batted at number 10. He had a couple of good innings and has since inked himself in as their number six instead. We actually think that he's not quite good enough to be a number six. He's a seven in our book and Lancashire's batting looks lightweight with him a place higher, but still, he deserves a lot of respect for making such a leap from being a tail-ender to a recognised batsman.

Secondly, Mal Loye's Lancashire's best batsman. We'd like to go on record as saying that. He's too old for England, but he deserves two sentences in a totally non-influential blog. He's head and shoulders above most of Lancashire's top six and we now rate him a better batsman than Stuart Law, who seems to be on the wane a bit. We could be wrong.

This has been totally self-indulgent. There's barely anybody interested in Lancashire's batting in Lancashire, let alone on the whole of the internet. We've got it off our chest now though. We can go back to writing about Rob Key again.

Ones To Watch bulletin

That was quite stupid of us. We loaded this onto the wrong site. Maybe this is why we're scratching a living in the underworld rather than dropping bags of gold on people from our magic balloon.

Mixed fortunes for our Ones To Watch. Rob Key has again failed, lbw for 4, but Sajid Mahmood has been allowed to open the bowling for Lancashire. This is quite something. Saj usually comes on after about sixty overs or something. That's what it feels like, anyway. Glen Chapple and Dominic Cork are usually entrusted with the new ball, so this could be a turning point in his Lancashire struggles. Heaps of wickets await.

With this and Afridi's change of heart, we're almost buoyant enough to get through our working day without a huge, heartfelt sigh every time we're forced to answer the phone.

(Update - it turns out that Dominic Cork's twisted his ankle or something. Still, it gives Saj an opportunity.)

England to play Champions Trophy matches in Jaipur

England are set to play India and Australia in Jaipur in the opening phase of the Champions Trophy in October. They will also play one match against one of two qualifiers in Ahmedabad.

When we were in Jaipur we ended up spending most of our time with a "diamond merchant". He delighted in telling us all of his problems with the English. Specifically, how private we are and how unsociable. Maybe all of the English people you've ever met have been unsociable because you spend the whole time slagging them off, Mr Diamond Merchant. It's no fun being with you. No fun at all.

Those who know us well will be aware of our love of all things of the genre, 'world's biggest...' Jaipur is the home of the world's biggest sundial, pictured.

Shahid Afridi DOESN'T take a break from Tests

Hurray. Break out the bunting. Crack open the cheap imitation champagne. Take two drags of a cigar and then throw up. Organise an open-top bus tour of your friends' houses. Shahid Afridi's changed his mind. He's not taking a break from Tests.

We're going to be basking in this good news all day. Right up until the point where our boss walks in and asks what we're doing. We tell him that we're 'basking in the great news about Shahid Afridi' and then he threatens to break our kneecaps. He always does that. It's done affectionately though.

Holy Crap: Andy Flower

Who's the best wicketkeeper-batsman of modern times? Well it's Adam Gilchrist isn't it? The dashing Australian number seven has rescued Australian innings on numerous occasions and driven home advantages even more frequently. He has scored 5,124 Test runs at 48.79 with 16 centuries. Plus, there's his contribution to Warne's bowling. See if you can managed to drawl, 'baaaaaahled Warner' throughout an entire working day. Go on. Do it. Everyone's looking at you, aren't they? It takes great mental resilience to stand up to that kind of social pressure. Gilchrist does it on TV, you big coward. So there it is: Gilchrist's the best.

Well what about Andy Flower? The former Zimbabwe captain's average exceeds Gilchrist's. Over his Test career Andy Flower hit 4,794 runs at 51.54 with 12 centuries. That average alone puts him up with the greats, but Flower played for Zimbabwe, crappest of all the Test nations. Only two other Zimbabweans have ever averaged over forty - Dave Houghton and Murray Goodwin. The pressure was on Flower to produce every time he batted and this after long stints behind the stumps while Zimbabwe's bowlers kidded themselves that they could ever get the opposition out. Plus he had the responsibility of captaincy for much of the time. We're surprised that he didn't fill in time between overs learning to moonwalk or building some sort of spacecraft. Take a break, Andy.

There's a lot of respect for Flower within the game, but he deserves more. So it is that we say:

Holy Crap! Andy Flower's one of the all-time greats!

King Cricket made captain

King Cricket himself, Brian Lara, has been, er, crowned West Indies captain for the third time. While we obviously think more of Brian Lara than our own elbows (and if you don't think much of your elbows, imagine the big unwieldy, rigid rods of arm you'd have without them) we're not sure about his captaincy.

Brian Lara as batsman is a force of nature, scything through everything in his path. Brian Lara as captain is hesitant, laboured and if we're honest, a touch moody. Why Ramnaresh Sarwan wasn't made captain, we don't know. He must have rejected the idea for some reason. Probably because the West Indies needs more than just a strong captain at the moment. All the same, a near 37-year-old in his third stint in the job wouldn't be everyone's first choice, even if he is a king.

Australian man, Andrew Symonds of Australia leads Australia to victory

103 not out from Australian man, Andrew Symonds of Australia was enough to consign Bangladesh to defeat in the second one-dayer.

Symonds was a decent overseas player for Lancashire last year. We're not so sure about Brad Hodge. He's great and all, but he's no Wasim Akram or Murali. Besides, half the batsmen in the county championship are Aussies. Pick a name you don't recognise. Is it some young up-and-coming Englishman? No. It's another Aussie. At least Symonds is a bit of an entertainer.

Rob Key to captain England A against Sri Lanka

Way back in January we worried that King Cricket would eventually become a series of posts about Shahid Afridi hitting a quick forty-odd. Now we're worried that it's going to be reduced to a big Rob Key love-in.

Rob Key was named captain of the England A team to play Sri Lanka. Fellow One To Watch Sajid Mahmood will also play. If this truly is an England version of the A-Team, then that means Rob Key's Hannibal. We don't really know what that means.

We're glad that the ECB have finally started scheduling A team matches against touring sides. Other nations do it all the time. It's a great place to test out young players and it can also put the touring side on the back foot and shake their confidence if the A team wins.

Rob Key posts:
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Ones To Watch: Tom Smith, Lancashire

Is this your website? Do you make the rules? No. It's ours and we say that we can still squeeze in another One To Watch, even though the season's already started. Besides, this one's based on our own first-hand judgement during the first day of the season.

Everywhere we can find a mention of him, Tom Smith's described as medium-pace, but we thought he looked quite quick. We could be wrong. He's lauded for his batting on the ECB website, which is encouraging, although his bowling isn't mentioned at all.

Essentially, we don't know a great deal about him at all. We just wanted to be first off the mark in tipping a player for success. Our grounds for this are that he looked good when we saw him and then his taking 3-8 off eight overs against Leicestershire today, in the C&G Trophy. We think that's plenty to go off and we stand by his addition to the Ones To Watch pantheon. And yes, we know it's not strictly speaking a pantheon, but we've not had much to eat today, we're a bit short-tempered and frankly, we're feeling antagonistic towards our own readership - such as it is.

God. This reads terribly. We really shouldn't post anything on days like today.

C&G Trophy round-up

Miraculously, the Somerset v Kent match has made us both angry and amazed. Marcus Trescothick reassured England fans throughout the land by larruping 158 off only 132 balls. Unfortunately, it was at the expense of a Kent side who, thus far, are flirting with the word 'hapless' under the leadership of King Cricket muse/dumpling, Rob Key. Rob further ruined our day by scoring only 11. An England call does not look to be in the offing.

Elsewhere, Jon Lewis continued to make us ponder whether he's in magnificent form or whether he's of magnificent class by taking 4-14 against Middlesex. We reckon he's a decidedly good county bowler in great form. We aren't backing him for international duty unless there's some huge crisis. In the interests of efficiency we'll link to the previous post commenting on a good Jon Lewis performance, but if we're honest, it's not worth reading. Masochists click here.

A Rob Key progress report

So how's our guy's first match as Kent captain? Er, it's rubbish. First of all Kent concede 575 and then he's out for 23 and 1 in each innings.

He's lost weight, apparently. Clearly, Rob Key's batting skill was all in his belly. Eat Rob, eat. It's the only way. Regain your stamina through consuming boiled-down pigs' trotters. Recapture your immaculate cover-driving by imbibing gargantuan quantities of fondue.

To make us feel better maybe some of you could add some Rob Key songs to this post.

Rob Key posts:
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The EA Cricket 2005 saga

In no way is it a saga. Who'd have thought that three of our favourite links would be about a game which we didn't even end up playing that much. Here's a brief review of the game to suit the irritable, impatient internet generation:

Bowling: Easier than hating Matthew Hayden
Batting: Harder than Steve Waugh encased in adamantium

Actually, that's a bit unfair and simplistic, but we spend enough time writing balanced computer game reviews for someone else, so we're not going to start doing it here where no-one's interested anyway.

Readers who are interested in what our hands and trousers look like, head straight for the third and final post:

The waiting is over
Last of our free time frittered away
EA Cricket 2005 update

You can buy EA Cricket 2005 here, if you so desire.

More cricket games

Great Cricketers We Have Known

Pretty self-explanatory this one. These are great cricketers we have known. Hope you're all impressed by how we've explained the title using the exact same words in the exact same order.

World Cup winner, Andy Bichel
Paul Allott
Ehsan Mani

King Cricket's tips for the future

The list of Royal Posts on the left is starting to look more congested than 2001's Kumbh Mela in Allahabad. (See, we don't just go on about Transformers and fat cricketers. We're well-read.) We've decided to consolidate some of the more obvious themes.

We've decided to start with the tips section. We'll add names to this post each time we tip someone.

Dheeraj Jadhav
Saqibul Hasan
Andy Solomons
Adil Rashid

A good day for Jon Lewis

Is it fair to call Jon Lewis a 'forgotten man'? We're not sure. He doesn't seem to get mentioned all that much these days, but he's one of county cricket's most consistent performers. Perhaps it's his age. He's 30 now.

He ruined Marcus Trescothick's comeback match trapping him lbw for 11 (why is it always a 'trap'?) on his way to 7-38 in Somerset's first innings. Gloucestershire enforced the follow-on and he's got 2-13 in the second innings.

Gloucestershire reached 437 in their first innings. Bad bowling? A fast deteriorating pitch? We don't know. We haven't seen any coverage, but Lewis' figures are far better than anyone else in the match.

Sophia Gardens gets Ashes Test

Glamorgan's Sophia Gardens in Cardiff has been awarded one of the 2009 Ashes Tests. Many people are emphasising how this is great for Wales and Welsh cricket and all that. Balls to that.

Sophia Gardens is getting an Ashes Test at the expense of neglected, decrepit Old Trafford - OUR ground. This means that we'll have to go into Yorkshire or somewhere to see an Ashes match. Mancunians aren't welcome in Yorkshire. We wear different style flat caps and have different flattened vowel sounds. It's an entirely different culture.

Come on. Everyone aim a big silent boo at the ECB. A silent boo is exactly the same as an ordinary boo, but you don't make any sound - self-explanatory really. It's the greatest weapon in the critic's armoury.

That's a picture of Old Trafford. It'll probably get a Zimbabwe match. We can't think of anything worse than that. We'll still go, but we'll be silent booing our way through the whole day.

Irfan Pathan: 'Tidy'

Irfan Pathan's really good. That's our opinion. We think he's India's best new-ball bowler in a long while and the fact that he can bat gives the team a whole new dimension. With spin being their strength, India are sometimes short of pace bowling when they're away from home, but with Pathan and Dhoni, the batting has more depth and they can pick five bowlers: Three seamers and two spinners.

What surprises us is the occasional indifference to Pathan that we find in some Indian coverage of the team. He's sometimes depicted as a bits and pieces kind of a bowler, but he averages 30.43 in Tests and has even managed a first over hat trick. If that's not strike bowling, what is? India's other pace bowlers are the likes of Zaheer Khan, who averages 36.34 in Tests and Ajit Agarkar who averages 47.32.

Maybe it's our English tendency to somehow look on Test cricket as a more accurate depiction of a player's worth. Maybe it's these writers' own preferences for bowlers from their own states. Somebody tell us that we're not being naive in overlooking the fact that Pathan's a muslim.

Whatever it might be, Indian fans should recognise that with Pathan being only 21, the India side is going to be built around him for the next ten years. The new Kapil Dev, you say? We wouldn't dream of jumping on that bandwagon. That would be like calling Flintoff the new Botham and that's something that we're NEVER GOING TO DO. They're different people. How hard is it to grasp that?

The 'tidy' part of the header, incidentally, is because it's the most accurate adjective that we could muster. He's not 'great' yet, but he's better than 'good'. Maybe we should steer clear of using British slang in posts that will only be of interest to Indian readers. Nah. Pathan's tidy. Tell your friends.

India v Pakistan, second one-dayer

India v Pakistan or Pakistan v India? The matches are taking place in Abu Dhabi, so we're not sure. We've gone alphabetically.

In the first match, India were all out for only 197 and Pakistan overhauled that with few alarms. In this match, India posted 269-5 and it was Pakistan's turn to crumble. They were eventually all out for 218, despite a masterful innings from Inzamam-ul-Haq. He's one of those players who can play when all around him is falling apart. His 79 sustained hope until he was run out.

We once watched Pakistan against Australia in the World Cup at Headingley. We remember the then Yousuf Youhana standing calmly at one end as a throw came in from the boundary. He looked behind him and was quite surprised to see Inzy standing at the same end, not moving a muscle, presumably not even saying: 'Hey - I'm at the same end. You'd better run.'

Everyone's got a favourite Inzamam run-out story.

Bilal Shafayat hits century

One of our Ones To Watch, Bilal Shafayat, hit a century in his first innings of the season. Congratulations Bilal. Thanks for kicking things off. He scored 118 off 290 balls against Essex.

There's too much cricket going on at the moment. Having started this in the dark days of January, we're now overfaced with scorecards. Don't be surprised if we miss something.

South Africa v New Zealand, first Test - Excellent Ntini forces us to comment

If there's one thing we like, it's fast-bowlers decimating batting line-ups. Batsmen have it all their own way and we love it when someone gives them a damn good hiding.

Stand forward Makhaya Ntini. Don't say it too loudly, but Ntini finally seems to be becoming the kind of strike bowler that Test cricket's been sorely missing. After concussing Justin Langer in the last Test against Australia, he knocked the stuffing out of New Zealand's first innings earlier this week and then he only went and did it again in their second innings.

Take a look at the top of that New Zealand scorecard in the second innings. Take that batsmen. Only single figure scores for you from now on.

We're linking to the BBC's scorecard today rather than Cricinfo's in the interests of equality.

Jason Gillespie hits double hundred against Bangladesh

We don't know what to say about this. We really don't. It's kind of heart-warming, because Gillespie seemed all washed-up last summer. It's also a bit annoying because of our whole 'Bangladesh are great' thing. Letting any nightwatchman hit a double hundred is pretty damning whoever he is. Gillespie's not ordinarily a candidate for run-scoring, just crease occupation.

Let's feel all warm inside on behalf of pitiful Jason Gillespie from the Ashes and yet subtly ignore the part where he succeeds against Bangladesh. [Dusts hands off in 'job done' style like they do in children's comics.]

Our e-mail policy

King Cricket's probably busy enough to warrant an e-mail policy now. We say 'policy' but really it's just an address. It sounds more professional if we call it a policy though. We're nothing if not professional.

A couple of people have tried to contact us recently through the comments and while commenting's more than welcome, we can't write back and on one occasion we wanted to because the person was really nice about us.

So here you go:

kingcricket@hotmail.co.uk

The first time you e-mail you have to authenticate that you're a real human. From then on, things work as normal. It's not a Bladerunner-style replicant test or anything. It's just a 'yes' or 'no' authentication. It pretty much takes your word for it if you say that you're a real person.

First day of the cricket season: A photo journal

It's the first day of the cricket season. The nation's buzzing. We went down to Old Trafford for Lancashire against Hampshire to sample the party atmosphere.

This was what the sky looked like this morning. We Mancunians pride ourselves on knowing the local weather. These aren't rain clouds.

Hmm. We're not in north Lancashire or south-west Cheshire. We're in the bit without "brighter, drier intervals".

This picture tells us two things: That we're still in our house at 13:06 because of the rain and that we like to pile CDs on top of our stereo.

Woolly hat. Check. Ski socks. Check. It's officially a 'double trousers day' too. Readers in warmer climes may be unfamiliar with the concept of wearing two pairs of trousers simultaneously. Believe us, sometimes it can and must be done.

Play eventually started at 3pm. Lancashire asked Hampshire to bat which meant that we didn't have to endure Iain Sutcliffe's batting. Even Iain Sutcliffe's mum's favourite cricketer isn't Iain Sutcliffe.

Lancashire opened the bowling with ageing medium-pace all-rounder, Glenn Chapple...

...and ageing medium-pace all-rounder, Dominic Cork.

We missed John Crawley's wicket. This is where they put the big screen when there's a Test match.

Glenn Chapple enjoys a bit of banter with the crowd.

Here are a few notable names who could have been playing in this fixture, but weren't: Kevin Pietersen, Shane Warne, James Anderson, Andrew Flintoff, Brad Hodge and Sajid Mahmood. Not to worry though, because the Old Trafford faithful were treated to Dominic Thornely and Nic Pothas instead...

We hadn't seen Tom Smith before, but we were impressed. He consistently made the batsmen play and on occasions beat them for pace. He fully deserved his 3-29. Are we the first off the mark in lauding him? What do we win?

We were slightly disappointed that nobody spoke to us, like World Cup winner, Andy Bichel did, but we still had a good day, largely due to Lancashire's success and partly due to the large amount of clothes we wore.