Cricket thread, summer 2013: England, NZ, and Clarke plus 10 random Australians

I thought it would be good to have a thread for what should be an excellent northern-hemisphere summer of cricket. NZ perhaps a sterner test for England than Australia? We shall see...

... excellent sledging of the Aussies there

thx, expecting that to come back and bite me!

In other news I am going to Lord's tomorrow, heavy winter overcoat and scarf being readied!

bit of a slog for england so far. i'll be there on sunday, hope there's more to cheer about than the last time i went to the cricket (day 4 of the oval last year)...

doesn't look like the pitch is a belter, and a slow outfield. Thinking it'll be a low-ish scoring game but will go on for at least 4 days.

I was at Lord's last year for a couple of days, saw SA get the upper hand in that Test with a silken Amla century and some great bowling from Steyn & Philander. Proper cricket!

napier going ham in thr yb40 rn

0WWWW0

picked up ponting in an earlier spell, ends 7-32

And yet Dernbach plays for England

lol. at least finn was unavailable as opposed to watching dernbach etc. picked in front of him over the last few years

napier has definitely deserved a twenty20 international or two, at the very least

so am I the guest commentator here or what

yes please! So will Guptil triple down today? Wouldn't bet against it!

4/50 after 15ov!

MITCHELL/STARC ATTACK 4EVA

#starcredwedding

FYI today is twenty years to the day of BALL OF THE CENTURY.

as featured here dear cricket, what are your greatest plays?

Not allowed to post on ILC :-(

A shame really, had the most racist Greg Ritchie vid ever lined up.

aw

nice batting dhoni/karthik

:D

o australia

David Warner should stick to Twitter

Today's not an official ODI, but Australia's lowest ODI score is 70. Come on Voges-y!

ouch

Yadav 5 for 18!

Sad that Ashraful has been done for corruption.

whelp time to find a high bridge

Narine and Roach killing them atm. Imagine we'll still contrive a way to lose, but it's nice to enjoy for now.

Great to see Shikhar Dhawan getting a century for India too.

omg gayle in flight

The eight Pakistani batsmen who weren't Misbah or Jamshed managed to rack up 18 runs between them.

Nine, even

...and Misbah had the jammiest start to an innings I've seen in a while

Dave Warner finally displaying some good hitting. Sort of.

http://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/warner-stood-down-over-altercation-with-england-player-20130612-2o431.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2013/jun/12/cricket-australia-david-warner-incident

First of all, any bloke called "Joe Root" would be manna from heaven for Australian copywriters. Secondly, a drunken fight in a WALKABOUT!

You're going to recall Phil Jacques at this rate

or ricky, cuz there's no way Warner isnt being sent home

xxp glad to see Australians shrugging off those national stereotypes.

Word on Root was that he was using a wig as a false beard and that Warner took offence at the perceived insult to his "good mate" Hashim Amla. We're at Fredaloe levels of comedy, basically.

Dying at "a brief history of David Warner tweets": http://thewastedafternoons.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/a-brief-history-of-david-warner-tweets.html

yeah that is all time

So Warner is banned for all matches until the 1st Test. Good planning, Cricket Australia management team!

Fined $11,500 / 7000 pounds as well. He'll have to work in that Walkabout in between Tests to keep that working holiday visa going.

Can't wait to hear the crowd reaction when he walks out to bat in that 1st Test

and the reaction when he's out 10mins later

tbf he'll show you what for when he his that six, that will be like two thirds of his innings

some wonderful batting by sri lanka in this chase. hope they pull off the win.

england's substituting a tired batsmen with a good fielder, basically cheating, which has being going since it helped them win the ashes in 2005, really pisses me off.

been going on longer than that!

anyway, great stuff from kulasekara. left me feeling hollow, man

*selfbans*

Ponting retires

No Ashes swansong from him either ;_;

Good work guys!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cricket/23026163

Seriously wtf do they think they're doing? Mother Cricket might not be the man for the job but to sack him 2 weeks before the Ashes starts is madness...

Are you kidding? We replaced a guy who is a) useless and b) South African with the awesome leadership of BOOF.

This means WE'RE BACK, BABY.

omg steve smith drop gif pls

Sam Sheringham, BBC Sport at Chester-le-Street

"Now, here's something to liven up the atmosphere. A man dressed as the Honey Monster is running up and down the steps of one of the stands chasing another man who is dressed as Kermit the Frog. The stewards soon put an end to the fun, much to the crowd's annoyance. Ten minutes later, they are back, to huge cheers..."

Anyone seen Neil around today?

hiya! Warner out...

clarke's the key

and he's gone!

game on now! would not like to predict this one way or the other tbh

I'm saying England

haha the games changed so quickly! Get haddin now and I'll agree with you

there we go!

this is nuts. I think charlie h went to bed thinking Aus were waltzing it.

lolstralia

That was like watching England in the 90s but in reverse. Charlie h wont believe his eyes when he wakes up.

For years I've been waiting to post this, this seems like the perfect moment.

Britishers! I'm a real happy for you and I'm a let you finish, but:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AOqSj8HJl4

is that supposed to be humour?

Oh dear... Thought anyone in the UK could appreciate that - yes, humor - but I forgot about you eh.

Carry on lads.

:)

Hi Kerr :)

lolstralia

― Neil S, Monday, August 12, 2013 2:48 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

3-0 is a bit harsh on Aus cuz apart from one test theyve been in the game and ran England close. But that was one hell of a collapse.

Btw what does Ian Bell need to do to get man of the match!

Props need to go to Bresnan for getting warner and keeping that end tight and shoring up the runs. Him and Broad were immense after tea.

I bet the Aussies waking up to news of defeat wont believe it after being 109-0

Sidenote: I just finished reading two cricket-themed books by P.G. Wodehouse, Mike at Wrykyn and Mike and Psmith. I knew very little about the sport before reading them, but very much enjoyed them (especially the second book). How widely read are these by all you cricket buffs?

I like Wodehouse but have stuck largely to Jeeves & Wooster tbh.

xp AG: I think Bell will be happy enough with his Man of the Series award!

Bell's Ashes!

particularly if he gets another century in the final test (I'm there days three and four so may witness that) which is by no means beyond the realm of possibility.

Thanks for jinxing that.

even if he doesn't he'll be far and away the most prolific batsmen of the series, with the best average, which is currently 40 above his closest rival on the England team (73 to KP's 34)

Look, you won the series, there's no need to take the piss.

butthurt Englanders on the radio this morning calling for the abolition of Test cricket - i lolled

i mean i lol now, but i'm sure i'll have to listen to my old man giving it the "let's secede from the ICC" speech in full Alf Garnett mode at some point this week

hadn't posted this yet

http://i26.tinypic.com/2ajucf4.jpg

my heart's not really in it, though, because I kinda loathe this England team, KP and Anderson aside

might support Australia for the home series

god I miss the days of Caddick and Gough, Atherton and Hussain and Trescothick - days when you could actually root for the blokes out there

now turn'd faceless automatons laser-engineered against risk, experimentation, eccentricity, admission of weakness or basic sportsmanship

gonna watch the video of yuvraj singh hitting stuart broad for six sixes and laugh and laugh and laugh

when KP is the likeable one, you really gotta work on your PR

real talk

Joe Root is kind of adorable tbf

Admittedly, there's a lot to dislike about Australia (Watto, Warner) but there's also honest toilers and cult heroes (Siddle, Lyon, DEVEREUX!!) to balance it out.

KP is so the most unlikeable person. And how is Trecothick one of the blokes? depression is very unblokey.

Obv I don't care as long as they do the job. So the most likeable is Ian Bell, by some distance.

Really this should've been 4-0, what a clueless decision by Clarke that was. Wonder if his job would've been on the line this morning if the light held up.

what decision by Clarke?

I didn't like those players because they were 'blokey' but because they were clearly playing in a good spirit and not getting ahead of themselves. Broad, to harp on a theme, is a good international bowler who does well against limited batsmen and puffs around like he's the bloody Roman Emperor. I think KP is actually quite a quirky and affable figure who shows the opposition far more respect than some of his teammates

lol that last sentence works both ways

As for Eng's supposed conservatism I don't see the problem. Eng are actually really attacking when they want to be.

Above all they have a core of ppl with a ton of experience who know when to do both. Its such a cliche to say how robotic and efficient they are. In the main this Eng side are good but not amazing. They have to make the best of what they have, and they seem to be doing that. Which, from an England side in any sport, is what we should be amazed about. They are competent!

xxxp = Clarke's declaration?

As for KP that's bollocks. KP " shows the opposition far more respect" is waffle based on nothing I'm afraid.

I'm judging England, as you all should, on their recent performances against South Africa, the only team in world cricket with 4 or 5 classic cricketers

My opinion on KP is personal and derived purely from subjective observation

I think KP's character is very similar to Geoff Boycott's, so I guess if you loathe one you'll loathe the other. Boycott's obviously fucked up a little more (thus far)

Then what's the point of posting on this thread at all if the perfs against a piss-weak Aussie side don't change your judgement either way? yes SA are the best at the moment, no one is going to contest that.

Can you not share your views on KP then? I mean I'll just keep taking the piss. In an objective way, of course.

you're all determinism, j

tbh I'm radge at England for not giving Kerrigan a bowl in the second innings and basically handing the cheap wickets to Billy Big Bollocks instead

this is my favourite stuart broad moment btw, better even than the six sixes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twJ7RvYF8WA

was there 'n all

anyway less than three months until England are placed in the tropical colosseum that is the GABBA and are put to the sword by Ryan Harris

get excited