G&C 191
GOOGLIES & CHINAMEN
An Occasional Cricketing Journal
Edition 191
November 2018
Caption Competition
1. Joe Root: I’ll play on the left wing.
Stuart Broad: I’ll be Peter Crouch
Ben Stokes: I’ll be Joey Barton.
Jonny Bairstow: I’ll limp around in goal.
2. Jonathan Agnew: What is appropriate preparation for a test match?
ECB spokesman: A fifteen a side two-day match against a scratch side in which players retire when they reach fifty.
3. Trevor Bayliss: Make a note for the next tour of Sri Lanka to pack golf umbrellas.
4. Nick Compton: I hear Wayne Rooney has been picked for England, maybe I retired too soon.
Out & About with the Professor
At first I thought I must have misheard. I switched on the TV and caught Nasser Hussain (quoting Rob Key) saying that Sri Lanka were giving a first cap to an amphibious player.
“Oh splendid!” I thought. The latest inspired idea from the ECB. From the far-sighted and imaginative team that gave us 60 over cricket instead of the tedious old three day stuff which then morphed into 50 over cricket, then (briefly) 40 overs, back to 50 overs, down to 20 for the inspiringly named “ Blast” (how long did their committee/focus group linger over that?), thence to 100 ball cricket with (or possibly without) 10 ball overs, we now have, for the truly attention-span challenged: underwater cricket. What a wonderful idea – New Road would truly come into its own about every other year. We all know that there is an obvious need to pep-up the game but there is, self-evidently, a limit to the reduction in the number of balls per team that the ECB could make - although I suppose we could go down to a single swipe per side and then all go home.
Sadly, the Malaprop (if it truly was one), referred to Kamindu Mendis’ stunning ability to bowl left and right arm spin. Everyone seems to be an all-rounder these days but to be able to bowl right arm off breaks and left arm orthodox in the same over looks pretty special to me. And new as well. I have played with people who could throw with either hand (a tremendous asset for a cover point, for example) but never one who could bowl with either hand. Perhaps some Googlies readers have? Moreover this chap was doing it in an international...not just in the nets for fun.
I don’t know what Googlies readers thought of it. He didn’t exactly run through the England side (0-27 from 3) and it was said that he was really a batsman who bowls a bit of spin – with either hand. Still it was interesting viewing and an interesting set of challenges for the captain. What surprised me was that he bowled left or right according to which batsman was facing. This allows him, obviously, to turn the ball away from both right and left handlers and set a field accordingly. (One of the few disadvantages of TV coverage, by the way, is the failure to show field placings). Personally, I would have thought it would have presented more of a challenge to the batsman if he had alternated when bowling to the same player. We all know that switching from over to around can make things a touch more difficult - but think of watching the bowler change hand?
He dropped a couple short but the fact that he could do it all (as Samuel Johnson said of female novelists) was impressive indeed.
One little thought for Googlies umpires came to me: what if Mendis was bowling to (say) KP. An amphibious bowler confronting an amphibious batsman. Mendis switches from right to left (since he wants to spin the ball away), the batsman is informed, and promptly also switches from right to left. Mendis then changes back, as does the batsman. This could potentially go on for some considerable time and would not really generate the type of instant excitement that the chaps at the ECB so crave. I suspect that the batsman is likely to be given the last word...but I certainly don’t know.
But wait! There are surely some exciting possibilities here. What about a new competition of, say, 20 or 30 balls per side (no point in it dragging on for ages) where everyone bats/bowls with the wrong hand. What fun! Bound to go down well with the Headingley North East Terrace. I suppose the only problem would be indeed with young master Mendis. Is he right or left handed? He would have to self-identify, as is now required in matters of gender.
…perhaps underwater cricket would be a better idea.
Morgan Matters
It’s the off season and we have to make do with extracts from the Great Man’s diary
The Oval: Jim Revier tells me that Surrey would have been the first team ever to have conceded a lead of over 400 on first innings and go on to win a first class match had they managed to beat Essex.
My days at cricket this year totaled 29, which is the lowest since records began, but only by one, I was expecting a worse figure.
Here are the 2018 first class figures for Middlesex players, but for all ffirst class matches, not just Middlesex matches:
Batting: Runs Average
Eskinazi 853 38.77
Harris 454 32.43
Gubbins 768 32.0
Robson 768 32.0
Holden 643 29.23
Malan 815 29.11
Lace 181 25.86
Helm 102 25.5
Simpson 356 23.73
Roland-Jones 79 19.75
Fuller 242 18.62
Stirling 227 16.21
Cartwright 204 15.69
Andersson 83 13.83
Murtagh 210 13.13
Rayner 172 11.47
Morgan 121 11.0
Bamber 76 10.86
White 101 10.1
Finn 50 8.33
Patel 33 8.25
Scott 16 8.0
Barber 3 1.5
Bowling: Wickets Average
Murtagh 64 15.44
Andersson 12 19.92
Bamber 28 20.25
Harris 61 20.54
Cartwright 19 21.58
Patel 6 29.5
Fuller 28 30.18
Helm 7 33.71
Finn 9 43.89
Rayner 12 44.17
Stirling 2 46.5
Malan 3 48.33
Roland-Jones 2 49
Holden 1 145
Fielding: Catches/ Stumpings
Simpson 27/4
Malan 18
Eskinazi 16
Rayner 16
White 14
Robson 7
Stirling 7
Harris 6
Holden 4
Murtagh 3
Gubbins 2
Helm 2
The batting figures are ordinary. Probably the result of the ridiculously green wickets regularly encountered at Lord's. Harris did well to be second in the batting averages and to be the second highest wicket taker. Murtagh had a great season: it’s those green wickets again! Bamber shows promise.
I forgot to mention that Surrey awarded four first XI and three second XI caps at lunch on day 1 of the Essex match when the score stood at 57 for 7!
J Fuller has left Middlesex to join Hants and N Compton has announced his retirement, he said "the pinnacle of my career was following in my grandfather's footsteps, having achieved my dream of playing and winning Test series for England".
S Warne thinks J Buttler should be England's Test captain.
We have been having some glorious weather recently, but this is worrying me... I have a nasty feeling that the ECB will soon start scheduling Championship matches for mid-October!
SL's R Herath will retire after the first Test in Galle; his 430 Test wkts are a record for a SLA.
V Marks is now out in Colombo, but he does not have much idea what the Test team will look like. I suppose it all depends on the two 2-day practice matches that are about to take place. I have just realised that with Foakes, Pope and Burns all now joining the squad, England have five wicket keepers in the party... that should be enough!
This and That
It’s good to see Rohit Sharma back in the runs although the West Indians will have seen quite enough of him. He averaged 130 and scored two big hundreds along the way in the five-match series.
The Bairstow injury is moronic. He is the latest in a long line who have picked up injuries in a contact sport which is always an accident waiting to happen. It has become increasingly apparent that these guys prefer playing football to cricket. However, they are not paid to do that. The football should be banned as a warm up and appropriate exercises substituted under supervision to avoid injury. Bairstow could lose his place in all the England line ups if those who replace him perform.
What is going on with Australian cricket? There doesn’t seem to be any new batting blood. A recent line up had the Marsh brothers at three and four. Lynn, Short and Head are all stars from the Big Bash and probably aren’t destined for the test side. Even allowing for the absence of Warner and Smith it seems odd that there isn’t new young blood pushing for inclusion from the Sheffield Shield. And they have reintroduced Siddle to the bowling line up.
What happened to the wickets in the second half of the season? There were hardly any big scores in September, particularly in the first innings of matches. If it becomes the norm that the counties are allowed to prepare poor wickets on which the medium pacers such as Murtagh and Stevens go through teams there is no chance for the Championship to generate test quality batsmen. I lunched with the Professor last week and he was unable to throw any light on the phenomenon although he was able to confirm that the weather wasn’t a factor since the club tracks remained belters through till the end of the season. Perhaps Mick Hunt’s successor should be delivered a lorry load of Surrey Loam for Christmas.
The final ODI shows the danger of taking the foot off the gas in international cricket with the England side being soundly beaten. Such a lapse could be very costly if repeated in the World Cup. But that brings us to Moronic Matters 2 with the scheduling of the Sri Lanka tour during their monsoon season. All five ODIs were rain affected which cannot be good for anyone. It must be possible to set up the international programme of matches without scheduling them at such times.
The warm up matches for the tests are again two-day park games of fifteen aside. No doubt the umpires will be instructed to not give anyone out who hasn’t scored a few runs. This cannot be appropriate preparation for serious cricket. When will they learn?
The Middlesex stats in Jack’s notes make dismal reading. Cartwright was a disaster particularly as he batted in pole positions for most of the time. It would be interesting to find what strategy Fraser/Law will be adopting to get back into the first division. They need to get big runs fast. They can probably reckon on having Gubbins full time since his overseas injury in the spring seems to have scuppered his England chances at least for the time being.
Best England XI Matters
World-renowned cricket statistician Philip Bailey, the editor of Cricket Archive, was tasked with assembling the best England XI of the past 50 years based on the numbers alone. Here is the side he came up with, and how he got there...
I have only looked at complete series starting with Australia in 1968, and ignored the recent India series due to research deadlines. Players who also played before 1968 only have their stats from 1968 counted. I started by just looking at batting and bowling averages. There was the possibility of having some weighting factor for batsmen and bowlers who appeared in the early part of the process, and a similar consideration to the opposition.
The problem with the latter is that all sides have poor periods, admittedly some more than others but still (for example) runs made in Bangladesh on England's last tour there would definitely have full value as against early Bangladesh tours to England.
Having looked at the numbers it is easier to go by the averages and not focus too hard on adjustments for batting and bowling, as what looks to me to be a sensible result is achieved.
I used minimum aggregates of 1,000 runs and 100 wickets respectively but as it happens all the batsmen had many more runs.
Thus I get for opening batsmen Geoffrey Boycott and Dennis Amiss (although some early Amiss innings were not as opener), and for the other three batsmen Joe Root, Kevin Pietersen and Graham Thorpe. Alastair Cook has a slightly higher average than Thorpe, but I am sticking to two openers only.
The four bowlers - Bob Willis, John Snow, Jimmy Anderson and Derek Underwood - fit with the three seamers and one spinner combination.
The allrounder spot (also using the 1,000 and 100 qualification) saw me go for Tony Greig on the basis of the difference between batting and bowling average, ahead of Ian Botham.
For the wicketkeeper it makes sense to also keep to the minimum 1,000 runs as the keeper would be expected to be a batsman. Of the qualifying keepers, Alec Stewart and Jonny Bairstow have not always been in possession of the gloves, and since Matt Prior has the highest average ad also most dismissals he should be picked.
Thus my stats XI is as follows, and does interestingly differ in some cases from many of the teams selected upon opinion alone...
G Boycott (batting average 48.69); DL Amiss (47.76); JE Root (52.28); KP Pietersen (47.28); GP Thorpe (44.66); AW Greig (40.43/bowling average 32.20); MJ Prior (40.18/c 243, st 13); JA Snow (26.87); DL Underwood (25.60); RGD Willis (25.20); JM Anderson (27.23)
Championship Team of the Season
More than 16,000 entries were received and BBC Sport has assimilated all the information and selected a final XI.
Unsurprisingly, Division One champions Surrey dominated the voting with five players making the cut. But competition for places was once again tough with James Hildreth, Dane Vilas, Tom Bailey, Ed Barnard, James Harris, Ollie Robinson and Jeetan Patel all narrowly missing out.
Here is the team of the season, as chosen by BBC Sport users:
1. Rory Burns has scored four centuries in Division One this season
1,359 runs, average 64.71, four centuries, 11 catches
What were the other 2% of voters thinking? Burns has the daunting task of filling the void left by Alastair Cook's retirement at the top of England's batting line-up for the tour to Sri Lanka. But yet another incredible domestic season suggests he is ready, The 28-year-old captained Surrey to the Division One title, scoring four centuries and seven fifties and averaging just shy of 70.
2.Daryl Mitchell (Worcestershire) - 47%
957 runs, average 36.81, four centuries, 21 catches
Mitchell remained a dependable presence in a disappointing County Championship season for Worcestershire, in which they were relegated from Division One. The former skipper and Professional Cricketers' Association chairman completed his fourth century during their final game of the season against Yorkshire to take his first-class tally to 35 and continue an impressive conversion rate, having managed 83 scores of 50 or more during his career.
Ian Bell (Warwickshire) - 78%
3.Ian Bell hit two centuries in a Championship match at Edgbaston for the first time against Glamorgan in June
1,027 runs, average 54.05, five centuries, 13 catches
A season without the responsibility of captaincy has done Bell the power of good. More than 1,000 Championship runs in 2018 meant the five-time Ashes winner was talking up his England ambitions again with his zest for batting well and truly rediscovered. Add in an average of 56.17 and five centuries and it's easy to see why there was a gathering clamour for an experienced, wily batsman to bolster an often fragile Test line-up.
4.James Vince (Hampshire) - 55%
962 runs, average 40.08, three centuries, five catches
The Hampshire captain remains very much in the thoughts of the international selectors after another solid domestic season. The 27-year-old scored 76 on his last England Test appearance, against New Zealand in April, but managed to pass 50 just three times in his 11 Test innings during the winter. Three centuries for his county and close to 1,000 runs - including a top score of 201 not out - will have done his long-term chances no harm, although they were not enough to earn him place in the squad for the forthcoming tour to Sri Lanka.
Ollie Pope (Surrey) - 87%
5. Ollie Pope was called up by England despite only playing 15 first-class matches
986 runs, average 70.43, four centuries; 21 catches
An almost perfect season for the talented middle-order batsman. Pope's impressive statistics, which saw the 20-year-old average more than 70, helped earn Surrey their first County Championship title since 2002 and brought England Test recognition. He was still playing school cricket as recently as 2016 but did enough for his county and in two appearances against India to merit selection for the Sri Lanka tour.
6.Ben Foakes (Surrey) - 52%
624 runs, average 36.71; 37 catches, one stumping
The third of five Surrey men to make the cut, Foakes was the chosen one behind the stumps last season and similar figures saw him feature in more than half of the votes. England's strength in wicketkeeping back-up means he misses out on a second successive winter with the Test squad, but another 592 Championship runs at almost 40 will keep him very much in the thinking.
7. Rikki Clarke (Surrey) - 63%
500 runs, average 31.25, one century, 19 catches; 47 wickets, average 21.53
Rikki Clarke's contribution at the county where he started out as a professional has been quite something. The 36-year all-rounder excelled with bat and ball, hitting one century, two half-centuries and weighing in with 45 wickets for the champions. "He's one of our own", said director of cricket Alec Stewart when re-signing Clarke before the season got under way. Surely even Stewart could not have predicted the impact Clarke would make?
8. Simon Harmer (Essex) - 37%
Harmer's bowling was key to Essex's Championship win in 2017
57 wickets, average 24.46; 460 runs, average 27.06, one century, 13 catches
Spinner Harmer was a star turn for Essex in his first season and the South African backed that up to retain his spot in your best county line-up for 2018. His haul of 56 wickets was 16 below last season's total when Essex won the title, but only Graham Onions (57) took more in Division One.
9. Morne Morkel (Surrey) - 88%
59 wickets, average 14.32; 172 runs, average 15.64, one catch
An absolute certain selection, Morkel's pace, aggression and accuracy was a key factor in Surrey's four-day success. The top division's standout bowler took 54 wickets at an average of just over 13.5 with four five-wicket hauls thrown in for good measure. Sometime stats tell you more than enough to make a decision.
10. Matt Henry (Kent) - 52%
Matt Henry is the leading wicket-taker in Division Two this season with 74 to his name
75 wickets, average 15.48; 303 runs, average 21.64, two catches
The New Zealand pace bowler was out in front as the leading wicket-taker in Division Two, and unsurprisingly a big reason behind Kent's stunning season. Five times Henry picked up five wickets in an innings with his best figures of 7-42 coming as he took 11 wickets against Northants.
11. Graham Onions (Lancashire) - 26%
57 wickets, average 21.77; 135 runs, average 9.00, one catch
Lancashire's 'gamble' on offering the former England seamer a two-year deal after an injury-plagued spell worked out rather well for both parties, although his efforts could not prevent the Red Rose being relegated from Division One of the County Championship. Onions, Durham's all-time leading wicket-taker, added 57 more in 12 appearances in the four-day format. He also managed two five-wicket hauls, proving both his quality and durability.
London Cricket Trust
Ian Harris (Ged) explains all
I have been looking forward to the formal launch of our cricket charity, the London Cricket Trust, for many months. We chose Seven Kings Park in the Borough of Redbridge as the venue, because we have put a full suite of new facilities into that park. So we needed to wait for all that work to be completed ahead of a full media launch. The day had finally arrived. I needed to go into the city afterwards and also needed to get Dumbo (my car) in for service. But I digress. Point is, I went to the gym, drove out west to the house, then to drop Dumbo at the garage and then commuted to Newbury Park...which I imagined might take a heck of a lot longer than it did take. So I got to Newbury Park ludicrously early.
On emerging from the station, I started fiddling with my map-app to work out what to do next; a non-trivial matter in getting from Newbury Park to Seven Kings Park. A pair of suited and booted people, one male, one female, had also emerged and were carefully studying a large (A3) colour map. I guessed that they might be visiting dignitaries on the way to the same event, so I asked them where they were going. "Regal House" said the man, turning the map one way up and then the other in bemusement. "Can't make out one end of this road from another."
I glanced at his upside down map and noticed "Regal House" clearly marked on the map, about 300 yards to our right just along the main road. "You need to go that way", I said, pointing, "I think it's just past that building, there". Some 45 years after earning my cub scout map reading badge, the skills are still coming in handy. Buoyed by my success and the fact that I had already done my good deed for the day, I got my head around the map-app and strode towards Seven Kings Park, arriving a mere, Dicky Bird-like, 45 minutes early. I wasn't the first Trustee to arrive; Chris Swadkin had made an even more cautious time allowance for his journey from Kent.
There had been a distinctly autumnal (indeed, even misty/mizzly/drizzly) feel to the early part of the day, but the sun started to show its face and then came out full glow just in time for our joyous launch. Soon there was a melange of cricketers, dignitaries, media folk and a small army of schoolchildren for the launch. Ed Griffiths doesn't organise things by halves. The speeches were brief, to the point and note perfect. In particular, Jas Athwal, the head of Redbridge Council, spoke with great passion about growing up in that neighbourhood and playing in the Park. His hope is that these facilities help inspire youngsters to play and love cricket as he does.
In particular, Jas mentioned Bishen Bedi. I remember trying to emulate Bedi too, in the summer of 1974. I could manage the loop but not the spin and certainly not the inch-perfect accuracy. But I digress. Leshia Hawkins, who heads up the ECB's participation and growth team for London, spoke from the heart about the initiative and how helpful it has been for the four London-based counties (Essex, Kent, Middlesex and Surrey) to come together to progress community cricket in this way.
Forhad Hussain (the Essex Trustee) spoke briefly on behalf of us Trustees, emphasising the collaborative nature of the initiative, while Dawid Malan said a few kind words on behalf of the county players who had turned out to help make the day special. When the players, most of the coaches and kids gathered at one end of the new non-turf pitch for the press shoot, we were left with a fairly large gaggle of schoolkids and one coach at the other end, so I took on the wicket-keeping duties.
I tried to crouch, like Alan Knott, although I probably looked more like a clumsy git trying to do the policemen's dance in When The Foeman Bares His Steel. Still, I was taking the ball surprisingly well and was only denied several stumpings by an over-zealous ECB official (who shall remain nameless) consistently shaking her head rather than raising the finger at square leg. Does she not realise that those schoolkids were not there to gain encouragement and fun; they were there to have their characters built in the school of hard knocks.
I got completely lost in the fun of actually playing cricket; when I eventually looked around I realised that the dignitaries, cricketers, media folk and my fellow trustees had all gone, leaving just me, the coaches, the kids and the teachers. I was five minutes late for the Trustees meeting we had scheduled to take place in the pavilion after the launch. Not my style, but I think I might have been forgiven in these special circumstances.
It's hard to express what a special day this was. I can hardly wait until we can do some more of these launches. We'll be putting in dozens of facilities across London over the next couple of years so I'll be putting my hand up and no doubt going to quite a few.
Ambidextrous Matters
Harold Compton pointed out that Kamindu Mendis bowled both right-arm off-spin and slow left-arm during the tourists' chase at the P Sara Oval. He went on to ask whether any reader can recall Dave Browning who was also ambidextrous in the early 1960's.
My only experience of such versatility was with the Great Jack Morgan who when captain would treat us to his medium pacers for a while before changing to off-spinners. Then in the dressing room he would regale us with tales of his leg spinning exploits earlier in his career. Later on he would mark out his run up for Left Arm Medium Pace (LAMP), although I cannot recall him actually delivering a ball in this mode in a first class match.
DRS Matters
Michael Atherton gives a view
Changes have unintended consequences. The use of video assistant referees in football is in its infancy, but how far it will affect strategy in years to come was one of the fascinations (for me at least) of the World Cup. More penalties? More goals from set pieces? Will players like Harry Maguire, superb in the air, find their value soaring? Strategy, tactics and player value will all be ripe for re-evaluation.
The introduction of the decision review system (DRS) in cricket, trialled in 2008, introduced formally into Tests a year later, has had the most profound effect on the way the game is played. Its rationale was to prevent umpiring howlers but its consequences have been far more wide-ranging, affecting how bowlers, batsmen, captains, selectors and umpires think about the game.
The most significant effect was projected clearly at Edgbaston last week, when Ravichandran Ashwin bowled Alastair Cook in very similar fashion in both innings, when Cook was lured forward but beaten on the outside edge by two balls that drifted in, dipped and spun to hit off stump. Former opening batsmen would say that you should rarely get bowled by a spinner, but DRS makes it a more complex (and better) game.
Before the advent of DRS, it is likely that Cook would have played both balls very differently, pushing his pad to the line of the ball, so that his bat would cover any spin. Umpires rarely gave batsmen out leg-before on the front foot, judging that there was too much guesswork to make a decision accurately. Batsmen, in other words, had a bigger line of defence.
Benedict Bermange, the Sky Sports statistician, tells me that Bishan Bedi took only 6 per cent of his Test wickets leg-before; John Emburey, the former England off spinner, took 11 per cent of his Test wickets this way. These were in pre-Hawk-Eye and DRS days.
The advent of both suggested a hitherto inherent bias against spinners — that more balls would hit the stumps than was previously imagined — and umpires now give more batsmen out on the front foot. Captains and bowlers, therefore, use DRS for leg-before appeals that, previously, would have been unthinkable.
The number of leg-before decisions to spinners has risen: Rangana Herath, the Sri Lanka left-armer, has taken a quarter of his Test wickets leg-before; Ashwin’s percentage is marginally less (22 per cent).
Consequently, batsmen have had to change the way they play. The pad is no longer your friend but your enemy. Instead of thrusting it on the line of the ball in hope, Cook now must play with his bat. As a result, the off spinner need only spin the ball half the width of the bat, instead of the width of pad and bat together, in order to beat the outside edge. The stumps, therefore, are very much in play, whereas previously they would have been obscured.
So far, so straightforward. This has been a rare case of the game benefiting (albeit in an unintended way) the bowler. Finger spinners, in danger of disappearing, have become valuable again. Batsmen who cannot read which way the ball is spinning can no longer bluff their way through. A better game all round.
This has also changed how spinners look to bowl. The method of flighting the ball outside off stump to bring slip and a catching cover into play has gone the way of the dodo. Now spinners bowl more quickly and straighter, attacking the pads and the stumps as a default method. Before, the general pace was slow with a few quicker balls; now it is the other way around.
Now think through those changes from a captain’s perspective. If the batsman can no longer play bat and pad together and has to play with his bat in front of his pad, there is no need for a silly point (the fielding position close to the batsman on the off side). Silly point was among the most important positions for a spinner because he would snap up catches off bat and pad. At a stroke, this position has been made redundant. The bat thrust in front of the pad brings more edges behind square, to slip, gully or leg slip, instead.
These changes are not insignificant for selectors. Last winter, England went to the Ashes with six lefthanders against a team with a solitary spinner, an off spinner. Nathan Lyon had a fine time. He took 21 wickets in the series, 18 of which were left-handers, the highest percentage in Test history for a bowler with more than 20 wickets in a series. At the start of this series, England picked seven left-handers against Ashwin. He enjoyed himself at Edgbaston, too: five of his seven wickets were lefties.
Now, one of those left-handers, Dawid Malan, has been dropped. Poor form (and his catching) were the main reasons but his left-handedness would not have helped. Ollie Pope, as a right-hander, will be challenged in different ways, but Ashwin’s record against right-handers is worse than against left-handers. One more right-hander in the order should help England.
That is all well and good, but England travel to Sri Lanka in the winter, when the main spinning threat will come from Herath. Then, of course, the opposite will apply. Of Herath’s 430 Test wickets, 335 have come against right-handers, 26 per cent of which have been leg-before. It is a complex and endlessly fascinating game.
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An Occasional Cricketing Journal
Edition 191
November 2018
Caption Competition
1. Joe Root: I’ll play on the left wing.
Stuart Broad: I’ll be Peter Crouch
Ben Stokes: I’ll be Joey Barton.
Jonny Bairstow: I’ll limp around in goal.
2. Jonathan Agnew: What is appropriate preparation for a test match?
ECB spokesman: A fifteen a side two-day match against a scratch side in which players retire when they reach fifty.
3. Trevor Bayliss: Make a note for the next tour of Sri Lanka to pack golf umbrellas.
4. Nick Compton: I hear Wayne Rooney has been picked for England, maybe I retired too soon.
Out & About with the Professor
At first I thought I must have misheard. I switched on the TV and caught Nasser Hussain (quoting Rob Key) saying that Sri Lanka were giving a first cap to an amphibious player.
“Oh splendid!” I thought. The latest inspired idea from the ECB. From the far-sighted and imaginative team that gave us 60 over cricket instead of the tedious old three day stuff which then morphed into 50 over cricket, then (briefly) 40 overs, back to 50 overs, down to 20 for the inspiringly named “ Blast” (how long did their committee/focus group linger over that?), thence to 100 ball cricket with (or possibly without) 10 ball overs, we now have, for the truly attention-span challenged: underwater cricket. What a wonderful idea – New Road would truly come into its own about every other year. We all know that there is an obvious need to pep-up the game but there is, self-evidently, a limit to the reduction in the number of balls per team that the ECB could make - although I suppose we could go down to a single swipe per side and then all go home.
Sadly, the Malaprop (if it truly was one), referred to Kamindu Mendis’ stunning ability to bowl left and right arm spin. Everyone seems to be an all-rounder these days but to be able to bowl right arm off breaks and left arm orthodox in the same over looks pretty special to me. And new as well. I have played with people who could throw with either hand (a tremendous asset for a cover point, for example) but never one who could bowl with either hand. Perhaps some Googlies readers have? Moreover this chap was doing it in an international...not just in the nets for fun.
I don’t know what Googlies readers thought of it. He didn’t exactly run through the England side (0-27 from 3) and it was said that he was really a batsman who bowls a bit of spin – with either hand. Still it was interesting viewing and an interesting set of challenges for the captain. What surprised me was that he bowled left or right according to which batsman was facing. This allows him, obviously, to turn the ball away from both right and left handlers and set a field accordingly. (One of the few disadvantages of TV coverage, by the way, is the failure to show field placings). Personally, I would have thought it would have presented more of a challenge to the batsman if he had alternated when bowling to the same player. We all know that switching from over to around can make things a touch more difficult - but think of watching the bowler change hand?
He dropped a couple short but the fact that he could do it all (as Samuel Johnson said of female novelists) was impressive indeed.
One little thought for Googlies umpires came to me: what if Mendis was bowling to (say) KP. An amphibious bowler confronting an amphibious batsman. Mendis switches from right to left (since he wants to spin the ball away), the batsman is informed, and promptly also switches from right to left. Mendis then changes back, as does the batsman. This could potentially go on for some considerable time and would not really generate the type of instant excitement that the chaps at the ECB so crave. I suspect that the batsman is likely to be given the last word...but I certainly don’t know.
But wait! There are surely some exciting possibilities here. What about a new competition of, say, 20 or 30 balls per side (no point in it dragging on for ages) where everyone bats/bowls with the wrong hand. What fun! Bound to go down well with the Headingley North East Terrace. I suppose the only problem would be indeed with young master Mendis. Is he right or left handed? He would have to self-identify, as is now required in matters of gender.
…perhaps underwater cricket would be a better idea.
Morgan Matters
It’s the off season and we have to make do with extracts from the Great Man’s diary
The Oval: Jim Revier tells me that Surrey would have been the first team ever to have conceded a lead of over 400 on first innings and go on to win a first class match had they managed to beat Essex.
My days at cricket this year totaled 29, which is the lowest since records began, but only by one, I was expecting a worse figure.
Here are the 2018 first class figures for Middlesex players, but for all ffirst class matches, not just Middlesex matches:
Batting: Runs Average
Eskinazi 853 38.77
Harris 454 32.43
Gubbins 768 32.0
Robson 768 32.0
Holden 643 29.23
Malan 815 29.11
Lace 181 25.86
Helm 102 25.5
Simpson 356 23.73
Roland-Jones 79 19.75
Fuller 242 18.62
Stirling 227 16.21
Cartwright 204 15.69
Andersson 83 13.83
Murtagh 210 13.13
Rayner 172 11.47
Morgan 121 11.0
Bamber 76 10.86
White 101 10.1
Finn 50 8.33
Patel 33 8.25
Scott 16 8.0
Barber 3 1.5
Bowling: Wickets Average
Murtagh 64 15.44
Andersson 12 19.92
Bamber 28 20.25
Harris 61 20.54
Cartwright 19 21.58
Patel 6 29.5
Fuller 28 30.18
Helm 7 33.71
Finn 9 43.89
Rayner 12 44.17
Stirling 2 46.5
Malan 3 48.33
Roland-Jones 2 49
Holden 1 145
Fielding: Catches/ Stumpings
Simpson 27/4
Malan 18
Eskinazi 16
Rayner 16
White 14
Robson 7
Stirling 7
Harris 6
Holden 4
Murtagh 3
Gubbins 2
Helm 2
The batting figures are ordinary. Probably the result of the ridiculously green wickets regularly encountered at Lord's. Harris did well to be second in the batting averages and to be the second highest wicket taker. Murtagh had a great season: it’s those green wickets again! Bamber shows promise.
I forgot to mention that Surrey awarded four first XI and three second XI caps at lunch on day 1 of the Essex match when the score stood at 57 for 7!
J Fuller has left Middlesex to join Hants and N Compton has announced his retirement, he said "the pinnacle of my career was following in my grandfather's footsteps, having achieved my dream of playing and winning Test series for England".
S Warne thinks J Buttler should be England's Test captain.
We have been having some glorious weather recently, but this is worrying me... I have a nasty feeling that the ECB will soon start scheduling Championship matches for mid-October!
SL's R Herath will retire after the first Test in Galle; his 430 Test wkts are a record for a SLA.
V Marks is now out in Colombo, but he does not have much idea what the Test team will look like. I suppose it all depends on the two 2-day practice matches that are about to take place. I have just realised that with Foakes, Pope and Burns all now joining the squad, England have five wicket keepers in the party... that should be enough!
This and That
It’s good to see Rohit Sharma back in the runs although the West Indians will have seen quite enough of him. He averaged 130 and scored two big hundreds along the way in the five-match series.
The Bairstow injury is moronic. He is the latest in a long line who have picked up injuries in a contact sport which is always an accident waiting to happen. It has become increasingly apparent that these guys prefer playing football to cricket. However, they are not paid to do that. The football should be banned as a warm up and appropriate exercises substituted under supervision to avoid injury. Bairstow could lose his place in all the England line ups if those who replace him perform.
What is going on with Australian cricket? There doesn’t seem to be any new batting blood. A recent line up had the Marsh brothers at three and four. Lynn, Short and Head are all stars from the Big Bash and probably aren’t destined for the test side. Even allowing for the absence of Warner and Smith it seems odd that there isn’t new young blood pushing for inclusion from the Sheffield Shield. And they have reintroduced Siddle to the bowling line up.
What happened to the wickets in the second half of the season? There were hardly any big scores in September, particularly in the first innings of matches. If it becomes the norm that the counties are allowed to prepare poor wickets on which the medium pacers such as Murtagh and Stevens go through teams there is no chance for the Championship to generate test quality batsmen. I lunched with the Professor last week and he was unable to throw any light on the phenomenon although he was able to confirm that the weather wasn’t a factor since the club tracks remained belters through till the end of the season. Perhaps Mick Hunt’s successor should be delivered a lorry load of Surrey Loam for Christmas.
The final ODI shows the danger of taking the foot off the gas in international cricket with the England side being soundly beaten. Such a lapse could be very costly if repeated in the World Cup. But that brings us to Moronic Matters 2 with the scheduling of the Sri Lanka tour during their monsoon season. All five ODIs were rain affected which cannot be good for anyone. It must be possible to set up the international programme of matches without scheduling them at such times.
The warm up matches for the tests are again two-day park games of fifteen aside. No doubt the umpires will be instructed to not give anyone out who hasn’t scored a few runs. This cannot be appropriate preparation for serious cricket. When will they learn?
The Middlesex stats in Jack’s notes make dismal reading. Cartwright was a disaster particularly as he batted in pole positions for most of the time. It would be interesting to find what strategy Fraser/Law will be adopting to get back into the first division. They need to get big runs fast. They can probably reckon on having Gubbins full time since his overseas injury in the spring seems to have scuppered his England chances at least for the time being.
Best England XI Matters
World-renowned cricket statistician Philip Bailey, the editor of Cricket Archive, was tasked with assembling the best England XI of the past 50 years based on the numbers alone. Here is the side he came up with, and how he got there...
I have only looked at complete series starting with Australia in 1968, and ignored the recent India series due to research deadlines. Players who also played before 1968 only have their stats from 1968 counted. I started by just looking at batting and bowling averages. There was the possibility of having some weighting factor for batsmen and bowlers who appeared in the early part of the process, and a similar consideration to the opposition.
The problem with the latter is that all sides have poor periods, admittedly some more than others but still (for example) runs made in Bangladesh on England's last tour there would definitely have full value as against early Bangladesh tours to England.
Having looked at the numbers it is easier to go by the averages and not focus too hard on adjustments for batting and bowling, as what looks to me to be a sensible result is achieved.
I used minimum aggregates of 1,000 runs and 100 wickets respectively but as it happens all the batsmen had many more runs.
Thus I get for opening batsmen Geoffrey Boycott and Dennis Amiss (although some early Amiss innings were not as opener), and for the other three batsmen Joe Root, Kevin Pietersen and Graham Thorpe. Alastair Cook has a slightly higher average than Thorpe, but I am sticking to two openers only.
The four bowlers - Bob Willis, John Snow, Jimmy Anderson and Derek Underwood - fit with the three seamers and one spinner combination.
The allrounder spot (also using the 1,000 and 100 qualification) saw me go for Tony Greig on the basis of the difference between batting and bowling average, ahead of Ian Botham.
For the wicketkeeper it makes sense to also keep to the minimum 1,000 runs as the keeper would be expected to be a batsman. Of the qualifying keepers, Alec Stewart and Jonny Bairstow have not always been in possession of the gloves, and since Matt Prior has the highest average ad also most dismissals he should be picked.
Thus my stats XI is as follows, and does interestingly differ in some cases from many of the teams selected upon opinion alone...
G Boycott (batting average 48.69); DL Amiss (47.76); JE Root (52.28); KP Pietersen (47.28); GP Thorpe (44.66); AW Greig (40.43/bowling average 32.20); MJ Prior (40.18/c 243, st 13); JA Snow (26.87); DL Underwood (25.60); RGD Willis (25.20); JM Anderson (27.23)
Championship Team of the Season
More than 16,000 entries were received and BBC Sport has assimilated all the information and selected a final XI.
Unsurprisingly, Division One champions Surrey dominated the voting with five players making the cut. But competition for places was once again tough with James Hildreth, Dane Vilas, Tom Bailey, Ed Barnard, James Harris, Ollie Robinson and Jeetan Patel all narrowly missing out.
Here is the team of the season, as chosen by BBC Sport users:
1. Rory Burns has scored four centuries in Division One this season
1,359 runs, average 64.71, four centuries, 11 catches
What were the other 2% of voters thinking? Burns has the daunting task of filling the void left by Alastair Cook's retirement at the top of England's batting line-up for the tour to Sri Lanka. But yet another incredible domestic season suggests he is ready, The 28-year-old captained Surrey to the Division One title, scoring four centuries and seven fifties and averaging just shy of 70.
2.Daryl Mitchell (Worcestershire) - 47%
957 runs, average 36.81, four centuries, 21 catches
Mitchell remained a dependable presence in a disappointing County Championship season for Worcestershire, in which they were relegated from Division One. The former skipper and Professional Cricketers' Association chairman completed his fourth century during their final game of the season against Yorkshire to take his first-class tally to 35 and continue an impressive conversion rate, having managed 83 scores of 50 or more during his career.
Ian Bell (Warwickshire) - 78%
3.Ian Bell hit two centuries in a Championship match at Edgbaston for the first time against Glamorgan in June
1,027 runs, average 54.05, five centuries, 13 catches
A season without the responsibility of captaincy has done Bell the power of good. More than 1,000 Championship runs in 2018 meant the five-time Ashes winner was talking up his England ambitions again with his zest for batting well and truly rediscovered. Add in an average of 56.17 and five centuries and it's easy to see why there was a gathering clamour for an experienced, wily batsman to bolster an often fragile Test line-up.
4.James Vince (Hampshire) - 55%
962 runs, average 40.08, three centuries, five catches
The Hampshire captain remains very much in the thoughts of the international selectors after another solid domestic season. The 27-year-old scored 76 on his last England Test appearance, against New Zealand in April, but managed to pass 50 just three times in his 11 Test innings during the winter. Three centuries for his county and close to 1,000 runs - including a top score of 201 not out - will have done his long-term chances no harm, although they were not enough to earn him place in the squad for the forthcoming tour to Sri Lanka.
Ollie Pope (Surrey) - 87%
5. Ollie Pope was called up by England despite only playing 15 first-class matches
986 runs, average 70.43, four centuries; 21 catches
An almost perfect season for the talented middle-order batsman. Pope's impressive statistics, which saw the 20-year-old average more than 70, helped earn Surrey their first County Championship title since 2002 and brought England Test recognition. He was still playing school cricket as recently as 2016 but did enough for his county and in two appearances against India to merit selection for the Sri Lanka tour.
6.Ben Foakes (Surrey) - 52%
624 runs, average 36.71; 37 catches, one stumping
The third of five Surrey men to make the cut, Foakes was the chosen one behind the stumps last season and similar figures saw him feature in more than half of the votes. England's strength in wicketkeeping back-up means he misses out on a second successive winter with the Test squad, but another 592 Championship runs at almost 40 will keep him very much in the thinking.
7. Rikki Clarke (Surrey) - 63%
500 runs, average 31.25, one century, 19 catches; 47 wickets, average 21.53
Rikki Clarke's contribution at the county where he started out as a professional has been quite something. The 36-year all-rounder excelled with bat and ball, hitting one century, two half-centuries and weighing in with 45 wickets for the champions. "He's one of our own", said director of cricket Alec Stewart when re-signing Clarke before the season got under way. Surely even Stewart could not have predicted the impact Clarke would make?
8. Simon Harmer (Essex) - 37%
Harmer's bowling was key to Essex's Championship win in 2017
57 wickets, average 24.46; 460 runs, average 27.06, one century, 13 catches
Spinner Harmer was a star turn for Essex in his first season and the South African backed that up to retain his spot in your best county line-up for 2018. His haul of 56 wickets was 16 below last season's total when Essex won the title, but only Graham Onions (57) took more in Division One.
9. Morne Morkel (Surrey) - 88%
59 wickets, average 14.32; 172 runs, average 15.64, one catch
An absolute certain selection, Morkel's pace, aggression and accuracy was a key factor in Surrey's four-day success. The top division's standout bowler took 54 wickets at an average of just over 13.5 with four five-wicket hauls thrown in for good measure. Sometime stats tell you more than enough to make a decision.
10. Matt Henry (Kent) - 52%
Matt Henry is the leading wicket-taker in Division Two this season with 74 to his name
75 wickets, average 15.48; 303 runs, average 21.64, two catches
The New Zealand pace bowler was out in front as the leading wicket-taker in Division Two, and unsurprisingly a big reason behind Kent's stunning season. Five times Henry picked up five wickets in an innings with his best figures of 7-42 coming as he took 11 wickets against Northants.
11. Graham Onions (Lancashire) - 26%
57 wickets, average 21.77; 135 runs, average 9.00, one catch
Lancashire's 'gamble' on offering the former England seamer a two-year deal after an injury-plagued spell worked out rather well for both parties, although his efforts could not prevent the Red Rose being relegated from Division One of the County Championship. Onions, Durham's all-time leading wicket-taker, added 57 more in 12 appearances in the four-day format. He also managed two five-wicket hauls, proving both his quality and durability.
London Cricket Trust
Ian Harris (Ged) explains all
I have been looking forward to the formal launch of our cricket charity, the London Cricket Trust, for many months. We chose Seven Kings Park in the Borough of Redbridge as the venue, because we have put a full suite of new facilities into that park. So we needed to wait for all that work to be completed ahead of a full media launch. The day had finally arrived. I needed to go into the city afterwards and also needed to get Dumbo (my car) in for service. But I digress. Point is, I went to the gym, drove out west to the house, then to drop Dumbo at the garage and then commuted to Newbury Park...which I imagined might take a heck of a lot longer than it did take. So I got to Newbury Park ludicrously early.
On emerging from the station, I started fiddling with my map-app to work out what to do next; a non-trivial matter in getting from Newbury Park to Seven Kings Park. A pair of suited and booted people, one male, one female, had also emerged and were carefully studying a large (A3) colour map. I guessed that they might be visiting dignitaries on the way to the same event, so I asked them where they were going. "Regal House" said the man, turning the map one way up and then the other in bemusement. "Can't make out one end of this road from another."
I glanced at his upside down map and noticed "Regal House" clearly marked on the map, about 300 yards to our right just along the main road. "You need to go that way", I said, pointing, "I think it's just past that building, there". Some 45 years after earning my cub scout map reading badge, the skills are still coming in handy. Buoyed by my success and the fact that I had already done my good deed for the day, I got my head around the map-app and strode towards Seven Kings Park, arriving a mere, Dicky Bird-like, 45 minutes early. I wasn't the first Trustee to arrive; Chris Swadkin had made an even more cautious time allowance for his journey from Kent.
There had been a distinctly autumnal (indeed, even misty/mizzly/drizzly) feel to the early part of the day, but the sun started to show its face and then came out full glow just in time for our joyous launch. Soon there was a melange of cricketers, dignitaries, media folk and a small army of schoolchildren for the launch. Ed Griffiths doesn't organise things by halves. The speeches were brief, to the point and note perfect. In particular, Jas Athwal, the head of Redbridge Council, spoke with great passion about growing up in that neighbourhood and playing in the Park. His hope is that these facilities help inspire youngsters to play and love cricket as he does.
In particular, Jas mentioned Bishen Bedi. I remember trying to emulate Bedi too, in the summer of 1974. I could manage the loop but not the spin and certainly not the inch-perfect accuracy. But I digress. Leshia Hawkins, who heads up the ECB's participation and growth team for London, spoke from the heart about the initiative and how helpful it has been for the four London-based counties (Essex, Kent, Middlesex and Surrey) to come together to progress community cricket in this way.
Forhad Hussain (the Essex Trustee) spoke briefly on behalf of us Trustees, emphasising the collaborative nature of the initiative, while Dawid Malan said a few kind words on behalf of the county players who had turned out to help make the day special. When the players, most of the coaches and kids gathered at one end of the new non-turf pitch for the press shoot, we were left with a fairly large gaggle of schoolkids and one coach at the other end, so I took on the wicket-keeping duties.
I tried to crouch, like Alan Knott, although I probably looked more like a clumsy git trying to do the policemen's dance in When The Foeman Bares His Steel. Still, I was taking the ball surprisingly well and was only denied several stumpings by an over-zealous ECB official (who shall remain nameless) consistently shaking her head rather than raising the finger at square leg. Does she not realise that those schoolkids were not there to gain encouragement and fun; they were there to have their characters built in the school of hard knocks.
I got completely lost in the fun of actually playing cricket; when I eventually looked around I realised that the dignitaries, cricketers, media folk and my fellow trustees had all gone, leaving just me, the coaches, the kids and the teachers. I was five minutes late for the Trustees meeting we had scheduled to take place in the pavilion after the launch. Not my style, but I think I might have been forgiven in these special circumstances.
It's hard to express what a special day this was. I can hardly wait until we can do some more of these launches. We'll be putting in dozens of facilities across London over the next couple of years so I'll be putting my hand up and no doubt going to quite a few.
Ambidextrous Matters
Harold Compton pointed out that Kamindu Mendis bowled both right-arm off-spin and slow left-arm during the tourists' chase at the P Sara Oval. He went on to ask whether any reader can recall Dave Browning who was also ambidextrous in the early 1960's.
My only experience of such versatility was with the Great Jack Morgan who when captain would treat us to his medium pacers for a while before changing to off-spinners. Then in the dressing room he would regale us with tales of his leg spinning exploits earlier in his career. Later on he would mark out his run up for Left Arm Medium Pace (LAMP), although I cannot recall him actually delivering a ball in this mode in a first class match.
DRS Matters
Michael Atherton gives a view
Changes have unintended consequences. The use of video assistant referees in football is in its infancy, but how far it will affect strategy in years to come was one of the fascinations (for me at least) of the World Cup. More penalties? More goals from set pieces? Will players like Harry Maguire, superb in the air, find their value soaring? Strategy, tactics and player value will all be ripe for re-evaluation.
The introduction of the decision review system (DRS) in cricket, trialled in 2008, introduced formally into Tests a year later, has had the most profound effect on the way the game is played. Its rationale was to prevent umpiring howlers but its consequences have been far more wide-ranging, affecting how bowlers, batsmen, captains, selectors and umpires think about the game.
The most significant effect was projected clearly at Edgbaston last week, when Ravichandran Ashwin bowled Alastair Cook in very similar fashion in both innings, when Cook was lured forward but beaten on the outside edge by two balls that drifted in, dipped and spun to hit off stump. Former opening batsmen would say that you should rarely get bowled by a spinner, but DRS makes it a more complex (and better) game.
Before the advent of DRS, it is likely that Cook would have played both balls very differently, pushing his pad to the line of the ball, so that his bat would cover any spin. Umpires rarely gave batsmen out leg-before on the front foot, judging that there was too much guesswork to make a decision accurately. Batsmen, in other words, had a bigger line of defence.
Benedict Bermange, the Sky Sports statistician, tells me that Bishan Bedi took only 6 per cent of his Test wickets leg-before; John Emburey, the former England off spinner, took 11 per cent of his Test wickets this way. These were in pre-Hawk-Eye and DRS days.
The advent of both suggested a hitherto inherent bias against spinners — that more balls would hit the stumps than was previously imagined — and umpires now give more batsmen out on the front foot. Captains and bowlers, therefore, use DRS for leg-before appeals that, previously, would have been unthinkable.
The number of leg-before decisions to spinners has risen: Rangana Herath, the Sri Lanka left-armer, has taken a quarter of his Test wickets leg-before; Ashwin’s percentage is marginally less (22 per cent).
Consequently, batsmen have had to change the way they play. The pad is no longer your friend but your enemy. Instead of thrusting it on the line of the ball in hope, Cook now must play with his bat. As a result, the off spinner need only spin the ball half the width of the bat, instead of the width of pad and bat together, in order to beat the outside edge. The stumps, therefore, are very much in play, whereas previously they would have been obscured.
So far, so straightforward. This has been a rare case of the game benefiting (albeit in an unintended way) the bowler. Finger spinners, in danger of disappearing, have become valuable again. Batsmen who cannot read which way the ball is spinning can no longer bluff their way through. A better game all round.
This has also changed how spinners look to bowl. The method of flighting the ball outside off stump to bring slip and a catching cover into play has gone the way of the dodo. Now spinners bowl more quickly and straighter, attacking the pads and the stumps as a default method. Before, the general pace was slow with a few quicker balls; now it is the other way around.
Now think through those changes from a captain’s perspective. If the batsman can no longer play bat and pad together and has to play with his bat in front of his pad, there is no need for a silly point (the fielding position close to the batsman on the off side). Silly point was among the most important positions for a spinner because he would snap up catches off bat and pad. At a stroke, this position has been made redundant. The bat thrust in front of the pad brings more edges behind square, to slip, gully or leg slip, instead.
These changes are not insignificant for selectors. Last winter, England went to the Ashes with six lefthanders against a team with a solitary spinner, an off spinner. Nathan Lyon had a fine time. He took 21 wickets in the series, 18 of which were left-handers, the highest percentage in Test history for a bowler with more than 20 wickets in a series. At the start of this series, England picked seven left-handers against Ashwin. He enjoyed himself at Edgbaston, too: five of his seven wickets were lefties.
Now, one of those left-handers, Dawid Malan, has been dropped. Poor form (and his catching) were the main reasons but his left-handedness would not have helped. Ollie Pope, as a right-hander, will be challenged in different ways, but Ashwin’s record against right-handers is worse than against left-handers. One more right-hander in the order should help England.
That is all well and good, but England travel to Sri Lanka in the winter, when the main spinning threat will come from Herath. Then, of course, the opposite will apply. Of Herath’s 430 Test wickets, 335 have come against right-handers, 26 per cent of which have been leg-before. It is a complex and endlessly fascinating game.
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