Happy Holidays

Hello Cricket Fans!

Hope the holiday season finds you in good cheer and filled with more food and liquor than drunk Scotsman stumbling in a Soho doorway (or if you're a kiwi - ...than Jesse Ryder). May you avoid the burnt skin typical of a naive tourist to New Zealand while you bask in sunshine at any cricket ground to watch the sport that we all enjoy so much. Please avoid the need to go duck shooting like the Pakistan cricket team did in Christchurch last night - that comes in the first week of May guys!
Now I realise that I promised a last official post before the end of 2010, unfortunately unforeseen events have prevented me from finishing it in time (before you ask, nothing to do with holiday cheer/Christmas hangover - sadly). As such I will attempt to post it early next week
Just one observation to keep your addiction to reading this blog alive, at the beginning of 2010 Ricky Ponting made 200 against Pakistan in Hobart to reignite his faltering career and inspire his young, inexperienced team ahead of an Ashes season...
...how things have changed

Happy New Year everyone and I hope you join me again in 2011 for World Cup Year and the next installments in the compelling drama that is Cricket

The necessary media round-up

Hello and welcome back to my blog

Although not quite as carrion-bird-like as post-Bangladesh the media machine has offered up various opinions and 'experts' thoughts following a disappointing ODI series loss in India. Now before I get to some specific articles I want to clear up one mistake that seems to appear too often and that is the notion of the opposition being the Indian B side. This is almost true in that several top players were not playing (Tendulkar, Sehwag, Dhoni and Harbhajan) - although any person who considered Dravid and Laxman part of the A Side shouldn't be reporting for the Dannevirke News let alone any other. The fact that the Indian team on show performed far better than the Black Caps says more about Indian depth than New Zealand's frailty. So let's have no more of that!

Of all the opinions presented this week I found the following article best matched mine: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/cricket/news/article.cfm?c_id=29&objectid=10693724 by Andrew Alderson. He looks at several important details surrounding the coach/management structure and highlights the lack of preparation IN India before the series began. In another article the same writer brings up other issues that I think need mentioning:

• Kane Williamson has played 9 ODIs with only 1 victory and 8 losses - what must this do to his development?
• Just as damaging may have been the decision to place him at 3 (instead of Taylor) - a position he is clearly not ready for just yet

From this I couldn't help but question whether Ross Taylor's development is being poisoned by the label of, not just A senior batsman but, THE senior batsman. Vettori is still a bowling-captain and this leaves Taylor to be the inspiration, the leader and/or the target of the top order; at least Crowe had other batsmen around him in the early 1980s. The other reason I begin to worry about this possibility is what Martin Crowe said himself when referring to Stephen Fleming's career. He suspected that, burdened by captaincy at such a young age, Fleming was robbed of crucial years of batting development that may explain the inability to convert 50s that remained for the entirety of his career. The sad thing is, if this proves to be true of Taylor, there would be little that could be done to reverse/prevent it. Not until Ryder and McCullum establish themselves can the pressure come off Ross Taylor I fear
Finally Alderson's article above ends with, almost a plea, the realisation that Vettori MUST captain on after the World Cup (not currently his intention). The batting is only just beginning to find some structure and the last thing needed is to foist the captaincy on one of them

Now for the dregs

• Mark Richardson (largely a good article by his standards) doesn't want to hear the term 'our world-class players' used anymore. Well sir perhaps you shouldn't have used the term in your commentary/advertising of the team in the first place.
• Similar to this would be the description of Vettori's role as a selector as a 'controversial' appointment - a term used ONLY by the media who failed to realise that most captains are selectors in all but name anyway. Former players were willing to give it a chance - that chance may well have occurred and produced nothing but the experiment was worth it
• Now sadly, before you subscribe to Andrew Alderson (see above) he also suggested that Chris Martin be drafted in to the World Cup squad if Tuffey remains injured. Well I have one question, is there possibly a reason that Martin hasn't been playing ODI cricket this whole time anyway? (I'm not referring exclusively to his batting either)

And here is Jonathan Millmow for his second appearance on this blog. His first appearance here was almost as unpleasant for him as it was for the people reading his article. http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/opinion/4450685/Changes-sorely-needed-to-grab-that-elusive-W Here he picks his ODI team going forward and thoughts regarding the World Cup and strangely enough I AGREE with most of his selection. In particular his moving of Brendon McCullum back to 6 or 7 which is long overdue (I don't have time to expand on this now but I believe I covered it in previous posts). Having said that I do have a some thoughts after reading his article:

• Was the 5-0 result in India equivalent to the 4-0 to Bangladesh? Serious question but my inclination is to say no the latter was more embarrassing given that the rot hadn't set in at that point and the Black Caps were expected to win (whereas winning the India series was always a tough ask - competency was what I wanted)
• The big disagreement I have with Millmow's team is the dropping of McKay who seems to be a wicket taker with pace and reverse swing; you have other bowlers to be tight, wicket taking is the key in Asia

A couple of statistical points by David Leggat sum up the problems for me though:

“New Zealand's batsmen managed five half centuries, two by Franklin batting at No 6. India produced four centuries and four fifties, and all bar Yusuf Pathan's spanking 123 not out in the fourth ODI came from batsmen in the top three.

Spinner Ravi Ashwin's 11 wickets matched the combined return of Daryl Tuffey, Mills, Dan Vettori, Nathan McCullum and Tim Southee. Ashwin's came in 47 overs; New Zealand's quintet needed 129.5 overs”

And now for something completely different (forgive me Monty Python) a point on the Ashes before the end of the year. Although most of the last week in Australia has been spent coming up with better puns surrounding the name Michael Beer (...selectors must have had Beer goggles... OR ...Australia will hope they have finally produced a quality beer...) there was one development that struck me during Day 1 of the Perth Test. Has anyone noticed how much the New Zealand commentary team seems to have influenced the Channel 9 one? Whether its the very negative-towards-your-own-team style that Ian Healy has suddenly adopted (reminiscent of Ian Smith) or Slater's rationale of 'Hughes hasn't got the runs at First Class level of late but that just means he's due' which is straight out of our own commentary manual, there is definitely some change there. It may be sad to see the Australian team in decline but the hard days should do wonders for the famously bias and pompous team calling the game.
Lastly, an apology to anyone that was told by this writer that the Perth test would begin on Wednesday when in fact it began Thursday. I pride myself on knowing such things and am sorry for any confusion or disappointment this may have caused.

Well that's it from here and I hope you join me again
It's good bye for now

You call that analysis? This is analysis

Hello and welcome back to my blog

After 2.1 overs of the Adelaide test Australia were 3-2 with Katich, Ponting and Clarke all gone for ducks and Englishmen might have remembered what it felt like when they fell to such as score in South Africa in 1999. Here is the footage of that collapse where the tourists were quickly 4-2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaJ8-4jrCWQ

The keen observer may notice a couple differences between that day in Johannesburg and the beginning of the test in South Australia last week. For instance the bowler was Allan Donald at his best, the deliveries were swinging square at pace and the conditions were very much in favour of the bowler. Thus the English camp should be filled with pride and ambition and those next door with green caps, quite the opposite; 260 may have been an acceptable score on Day 5 of the Adelaide Oval test but not Day 1 and after this happened only rain stood in England's path to victory.

Before I get into my musings on how Australia might try to move forward and whether England will let them, I have to bring up the following article which I found while reading up on other opinions. This is from the New Zealand Herald this week about the fall of the Australian cricket team (a cliched topic in itself):
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=10692320 by Christopher Rattue and apparently not read by an editor. I thought this was a terrible piece on several levels which I will now run through by order of appearance:

• Right first of all although I can see why he needs to diminish England at the beginning to support his argument, that doesn't give him the right to prop them up again later in the article - you can't have it both ways!
• If memory serves me Australia were only narrowly beaten in the first test of the recent India tour (a mistake I have noticed in other publications) - don't just look at 2-0 and think you know what happened
• As for the picking of Xavier Doherty, I think it was quite clear they simply panicked in the face of Pietersen, a stupid move but not entirely without logic (perhaps they forgot the word 'good' in front of 'slow-left-arm-spinner' but there we are). The real reason this selection was indicative of poor planning is mentioned below and is certainly not in Rattue's piece (nor could you expect it to be)
• The mentioning of Test Cricket's eminent death seems to be the sports journalist's little toy they carry around these days. They drop it in there to try and seem all-knowing. I'm starting to think it might be a self-fulfilling prophecy - but I don't have space to go into that today sadly
• The obvious turn around in Ashes fortunes bares a better resemblance to that of the 1980s than a boxing reference. The article paints a picture of an author not well versed in Ashes history...
• ...as he proves again when talking about England's lack of significant victories in the 15 years before 2005. It wasn't that England barely won a match - there was just one victory between 1987 and 2005 (where the series was still alive) and it was Edgebaston in 1997 - a much better point of reference for comparisons and analysis (see below)

Do you see the collapsing scenery yet? Not quite well that was just the first half of the article.

• The second part is simply bizarre with no coherent structure as statements are simply dropped in without much explanation.
• "The boot is not only on the other foot, but planted firmly on Australia's throat" - a simple sigh at this point (cliche, as you know, should be avoided like the plague)
• Lastly, I don't think it wise to trust the seriousness of any writer that uses the word 'yonks' as a measure of time

I realise that by the end I was having a bit of fun at Rattue's expense but there is a serious consequence to poor analysis like this. The discussion needs to begin with more background knowledge and less knee jerk, cliche enveloped writing is required to get people thinking. Without it the public settle for questions like 'why is Brendon McCullum being so lazy?' instead of 'why don't we have a competent keeper-batsman to pick from any of the six domestic teams?'


Now for MY Ashes analysis

The scoreline reads 1-0 to England after two tests and Australia appear toothless with the ball and overpowered with the bat. Earlier I mentioned that England only won 1 Ashes match between 1987 and 2005 (while the series was alive), that match was in 1997 and that series looked the same after two tests with a 1-0 lead to the hosts (England). Australia came back to win that series 3-2 and the main thing that may prevent the same thing happening again is the absence of Steve Waugh (who made twin centuries in the crucial third match of 1997), Glenn McGrath and Shane Warne - the greatest match winners of all. I know the absence of these two is ALWAYS trumped up as the excuse for any Australian loss these days but in this case it is a singular example of the cost their retirements have on the team. Australia needed to draw this game as much as England needed to avoid defeat in Brisbane, now I fear England have the momentum but Australia may have one last hope
Australia require a bold and risky strategy of attacking England in the next test at Perth. This will likely come from the batting which still has some stability in the middle (of all places given form up until this series) and thus Philip Hughes is essential to replace the injured Katich and attack the bowling before Swann can come on. North may be dropped as well - if only because he seems weak to spin in the same way Martyn and Katich were to reverse-swing in 2005 (and weren't dropped to Australia's detriment) - a new face in the middle is needed.

Stuart Broad is out for the series for England and his place will be taken by one of Bresnan, Tremlett and Shahzad. These three will play this weekend in a tour game in Melbourne - I would recommend that Tremlett play as the most natural replacement (Bresnan is more in the mold of the all-rounder but England don't really need more batsmen and Shahzad may be more useful at the MCG come December 26th). Whichever bowler is selected, Australia will fancy their chance against a different attack and on a different wicket
Speaking of the pitch, for about the fifth season in a row the word is that the WACCA will be hard and fast like the days of Lillee and Thomson. This shouldn't be believed for a second given that for the last four seasons the 'word' has been wrong. However the pitch should still have more bounce than Adelaide and Brisbane but I doubt anyone will lose their head.
Australia have to throw everything at England in the first few hours and either score 300 on day one or knock them over for less than 300. You may have noticed that Australia must avoid defeat in the final three games and win at least two of them. This seems a difficult task for any side and when you consider that England just destroyed them by an innings... suddenly 4-0 isn't a crazy bet. Perth is where the scoreline may be decided
Now there have been some suggestions of strange selections for Australia like Brett Lee and Brad Hodge - both of which are supposed to be playing in the HRV Cup 2020 in New Zealand. Another is the strange notion that Shane Warne should play and 'save' Australia. I think we can laugh that idea into submission in round one can't we? How is a retired, 40+ spin bowler meant to help win a test in Perth of all places? The most cricket he has played since has been 4 over spells in the IPL - and anyone who has actually watched those matches (as I have) will notice that he bowls with the shoulder and not his whole body. There is no way he would be fit to bowl even 15 overs of quality per day (let alone the 30 that would be required). Besides, grant you that he is fit enough to make a contribution - why didn't they do that in 2009?
Having said that, the spin bowling is a big problem for Australia and poses the biggest selection dilemma over the next week. Do you persist with Doherty? I don't think so, I mentioned above that his selection was purely to try and take down Pietersen - the main problem with this is that they don't seem to have plans for Cook, Trott and Bell. This is stupid because the same plan will work for all three and that is to slant the ball across them to the slips - using right-arm quicks against Cook and Bell while employing Johnson (if in form) against Trott - this is their best hope to negate them

I suppose I can hardly lambast Rattue of the NZ Herald and not front up myself so I hope this has helped improve the discourse a little better than his effort; I let you, my readers be the judge

Well that's it from here and I hope you join me again
It's good bye for now