G&C 192
GOOGLIES & CHINAMEN
An Occasional Cricketing Journal
Edition 192
December 2018
Caption Competition
1. Jonathan Agnew: To what do you attribute your success?
Joe Root: We have finally found the right balance - four wicket keepers and three spinners.
2. Jack Leach: How many tests do you think I will get in England next summer?
Trevor Bayliss: Well, let’s put it this way, I shouldn’t cancel your digs in Taunton if I were you.
3. Mickey Stewart: Welcome to Surrey, Richard; what do you want to do first?
Richard Johnson: I’ll tell the groundsman to leave more grass on the wicket.
4. Mark Hughes: I suggested that the owners did a straight swop for me with Cardiff so that they could have Neil Warnock and I could go there.
Out & About with the Professor
We have, in this journal, occasionally bemoaned – or at least nostalgically reflected on – the days when counties played county championship matches on “outgrounds”. In effect, playing county cricket around the county. I don’t know which county holds the record for the greatest number of venues that have ever hosted a first class match (although no doubt someone does); I seem to recall that Essex had a large number of venues in the 1950s and 60s, and when I played cricket in Kent , most of the Kent League teams hosted, or had hosted, county games. However, Yorkshire must be up there with a fairly large number. Most people know that they used to play at Hull and Sheffield, and at Harrogate and Middlesbrough, but there have also been games at fairly unlikely venues like Dewsbury and Wakefield.
I was musing on all this when the Yorkshire fixtures were released recently. This June Yorkshire will play a Championship match at York. Apparently the last, and only, time this has happened was in 1890 and so it would be fair to say that the cricket loving public of York have been reasonably patient. The bad news for them is that this is only a one-off. The venue is being used only because the Bradford Park Avenue ground is not yet thought to be ready. So there may follow another period of waiting although, hopefully, of less than 129 years.
York CC has been a very successful club side for some years but theirs is a club ground and so the plans are to erect a temporary stand and other appropriate bits of “infrastructure”. It won’t however be too posh – I read that spectators will be encouraged to “bring your own deckchair”.
Mention of Bradford Park Avenue, of course, brings recollections of another famous outground. Some years’ ago the County decided (together with, I think, the ECB and other worthy institutions) to put considerable resources into constructing/reconstructing a First-Class facility in Bradford. Something similar is happening at the Abbeydale Park ground in Sheffield, and so, if all goes well, the County should have four venues at which top class cricket can be played.
This strikes me as an unalloyed good thing. It’s true that the journey from Sheffield (and especially Bradford) to Leeds is not too great but it is enough to put some people off, and especially people with young children. Taking cricket to the people must be the right way to go.
The usual case against outground cricket is the cost of maintaining one top class stadium. This of course still applies in Yorkshire, even more so now that the new South Stand nears completion. I assume that it is less of a worry in 2019 given that Headingley will host an Ashes match and four World Cup games and “The Hundred” is, of course, just on the horizon. Still county club committees are faced with the fact that their £multi-million assets are only used for perhaps 40 or so days in the year. Various plans to hold pop concerts have run into not entirely unreasonable protests from the locals - seemingly less of a problem for Lancashire…but we don’t talk about them.
Perhaps we are just not worried about increasing our level of indebtedness…it doesn’t seem to worry anybody at present. Then again, our Chairman, an accountant with PWC, was obliged to stand down in the middle of the summer over (alleged) financial irregularities in relation to the British Home Stores insolvency. The resulting “crisis” was resolved by a Club stalwart, the redoubtable Robin Smith, stepping into the role mid-term. As a past Chairman of Yorkshire, it would be fair to say that he has seen it all before.
So: a new stand, a new venue, two more on the way, a new Chairman, only one thing left…a decent team. Or at least one that can score runs. And good news there as well – Yorkshire are advertising for a batting coach (details on the website should any Googlies readers be interested).
So, lots to look forward to in the summer, as the rain falls in dreary November, and county cricket in York for the first time in generations
…just don’t forget to bring your deckchair.
This &That
I didn’t see any of the first two tests as I was in Chicago and then I was working during the third last weekend. The overall impression was that Sri Lanka weren’t up to much although there were some interesting developments from the England side. At long last they have given up the idea that they will use the same bowling combinations that are so successful in England. In particular they don’t use two seamers and at least one change one for the first thirty overs of the innings and don’t see reverting to seamers as the go to option at any stage during the innings. At most they used Stokes from time to time to rough them up a bit.
Indeed, Anderson can have rarely bowled fewer overs in a test match than in each of the two he played in. However, his contribution with the bat in the second test was significant in that his last wicket partnerships of 101 were significantly greater than the winning margin of 57 runs.
Whilst I was away, I received the following email from the Professor:
“Isn't it great to see an England team with a proper wicketkeeper at last?
Bairstow should bat at 3 and Foakes keep the gloves for the next decade.”
Since I have been back I watched highlights of all three tests on Sky and there certainly seemed to be a significant improvement in the up to the stumps wicket keeping. Foakes’ batting has also played an important role. If Bairstow can bat successfully at three it starts to solve some of the problems. The openers were overall a failure but it was probably mainly down to the Sri Lankans adopting the same bowling approach as the English and so they mainly faced slow bowlers. Jennings made a hundred but he was out in the sixties if the Sri Lankans had bothered to appeal. Burns plays in a black T-shirt. Is this a lucky charm or just sartorial inadequacy? Terry Cordaroy used to find it hilarious when George Bottrill wore one.
I think that I have previously aired my discomfort with the Review system although it is surprising what the technology shows. In the past I have praised the umpires for in the main getting it right. But there were lots of errors in the third test. I am increasingly aware that the umpire has a very different view at ground level than we do at about fifty feet up and from eighty yards away regardless of the effect of zoom lenses. I have enormous sympathy with umpires who have their on-field decisions reversed by the technology. However, I have no sympathy with them for failing to call no balls. I suspect that in the main they have decided not to call no balls at all unless they are enormous breaches and just rely on the technology to right any decisions which result in a dismissal. In the third test second innings Stokes was twice out caught and back in the pavilion only to be recalled for front foot no balls. On this basis the technology should be used every delivery to adjudge no balls.
The over stepping rule was changed from back to front foot to make it easier for the umpires to do their job and to stop the long-legged bowlers from delivering twenty-yard deliveries. In this test it was the spinners who were guilty! The umpires should at least take back this responsibility under their purview.
In 2019 there will only be one side relegated from the First Division of the Championship but three promoted from the Second Division! This means that almost half the sides will gain promotion! Surely Middlesex will be one of them? In fact, it will be a disgrace if they manage to avoid promotion.
Who knew that there was a T10 tournament? I certainly didn’t. But there has been one taking place in Sharjah and Jonny Bairstow hit the highest individual score with an unbeaten 84 from 24 balls for Kerala Knights. He hit eight sixes as the defending champions beat Bengal Tigers with eight balls remaining. He batted at number four in a team led by Eoin Morgan. The eight-team competition is in its second year, with round-robin matches before semi-finals and a final. Tom Curran, Alex Hales, Jason Roy, Chris Jordan and Liam Plunkett are among the other England players competing in the event. Other captains include Shahid Afridi, Brendon McCullum, Darren Sammy, Shane Watson and Shoaib Malik, with West Indian Chris Gayle opening the batting for Bairstow's team. The following day Alex Hales struck an unbeaten 87 from 32 balls to beat Bairstow’s record. He struck spinner Mohammad Nabi for 32 in one over and hit eight sixes in total to help Maratha Arabians, captained by Dwayne Bravo, to a seven-wicket win in their eliminator final with Bengal Tigers.
When a deliberate foul is committed it has become commonplace for the football commentators to say, “He has taken one for the team”, by which they mean a yellow card booking. Normally this stops a very promising move for the opposition. Players who tackle late accidentally are often sent off. It is time that the same sanction is applied to the professional foul. A red card and a three-match ban should be enough to deter this lamentable practice and eliminate the appalling phrase.
The teams to watch over the last couple of seasons have been Manchester City, Liverpool and to a lesser extent Spurs, but after seeing Arsenal destroy Spurs over the weekend with a scintillating display its hard not to see them as the best value at present. I remain unconvinced about their defence but they have put together a long unbeaten run and so must be improving. Emry seems to have found the motivational factor and they will take some stopping. Mourinho must be envious.
I was watching the televised game in 2011 when Richard Keys and Andy Gray accused one of the linesmen, as they were properly called then, of not knowing the offside rule because she was a woman. They were of course wrong and replays of the action showed that she had got the decision right. Keys and Gray were dumped by Sky but Sian Massey-Ellis continues to officiate in Premier League matches and was on duty at Anfield over the weekend. It still seems incongruous to see her in action, but I have never seen her get a decision wrong.
Morgan Matters
Another peep into the Great Man’s diary
Next season, 3 teams will be promoted from Division 2 of the Championship and only 1 relegated from Division 1 creating a situation where there are 10 teams in Division 1 and 8 in Division 2... why? From 2020, it will be 2 up and 2 down again.
It worries me that other clubs are constantly looking to strengthen their squads, but Middlesex seem to do nothing except let blokes move on to other counties eg Higgins, Podmore and Fuller: someone also said that Patel was leaving.
Vic thinks there are only six certainties for the Test team: Root, Stokes, Anderson, Buttler, Moeen and Burns and only 2 who have no chance: Pope and Stone, all the others are somewhere in between. Meanwhile, Barney Ronay argues quite strongly that Anderson must play in England's WC team next summer.
Richard Johnson has joined Surrey as bowling coach: is this S Law's decision? Middlesex will run out of coaches soon.
Middlesex's Player of the Year was J Harris.
Moeen is now level with F Titmus on 153 wickets and the only England offies ahead of him are J Laker (193) and G Swann (255).
There is considerable doubt about who will get to bat at 3 for England in the next Test and Vic has 4 possibles: Buttler looks to be favourite, Moeen is not completely out of the picture, Bairstow gets a mention, but first he has to get into the team and I was surprised to see that Stokes is also a possibility.
O Pope has been relegated from the senior tour to the Lions tour in UAE so that he can "play competitively" rather than "spending the next 3 weeks on the sidelines".
Here's an interesting point: yesterday England were a/o for 285, but now their total has gone up to 290! It looks as if 5 penalty runs have been added to the extras. In England’s second innings Leach batted no 1, with Burns at the other end. So will we have Jennings as (yet) another no 3?
Kandy: we now know that SL were penalised 5 runs for deliberately running one short in order to avoid a run out.
Kandy-Why do we select so many pace bowlers? Anderson bowled 5 overs (0-12), the other 4 bowlers used were all spinners. Curran was off the field with a side strain, but it could not have been through too much bowling!
Kandy: SL 243 a/o, Leach 5-83, Moeen 4-72, Eng won by 57. It is England's first series win in SL since 2001, when I was in attendance. England's spinners took 19 of the 20 wkts, the other was a run out. England have won 7 of their last 8 Tests. The 38 wkts that fell to spinners in Kandy is a record for Tests.
Colombo: Anderson is rested from the 3rd Test and replaced by Broad, while Curran is not fit and replaced by Bairstow (hardly a like for like replacement, but we did not need all those pace bowlers anyway), who will bat at 3... how many no 3s does that make this series? Bairstow is England's 5th no 3 in 5 matches.
Colombo: it was closer than it looked like being, England won by 42. England's spinners took 49 wkts in the series, an England record for a 3 Test series. Leach also pulled off the crucial run out of Mendis. The last time Eng won a 3 Test away series by 3-0 was in 1963 in NZ when Cliff and the Shads were no 1 with Summer Holiday!
The G says that there will be seven rounds of Championship cricket in June and July next year, which sounds like good news, but I have found that Middlesex only have 3 home games in that period and only 2 of those are at Lord's, the third being at Radlett, which I will definitely not attend. It looks as if I will see only 8 Mx home matches next season, 4 in the RLODC and 4 in the Championship, the other home games being at Radlett and OMTs (Northwood), Uxbridge does not get a mention. As I have no interest in T20, I have not looked at those fixtures.
Hart / Browning Matters
Bill hart sent me the following
I have been stimulated to action by your request for memories of Dave Browning. I remember him well because he was a friend of an old boyfriend of Gill’s called Ron Peggs (also an Old Dane). Having looked David up in my archives, I find that he played regularly in the half-day XI in 1961 (about 18 times), but less than a dozen times in 1962, which was my first season at Milverton Rd and when I would have met him. As far has his being ambidextrous is concerned, I don’t recall him bowling, but he was a very fine field at cover point. I recall him throwing in very sharply and accurately with either hand. Quite a shock to any batsman who was unaware of this facility.
Ged Matters
Ian Harris squeezes everything in
The plan was to have a quiet morning finishing off work bits before setting off towards Birmingham for three nights and three days of Heavy Roller cricketing joy - but we all know what tends to happen to that sort of plan. So I ran around like crazy that morning, fitting in two client meetings, getting my packing done and shovelling down some lunch. Still I managed to leave home at a reasonable hour to avoid the traffic and get to Brum in time to shower, change and join up with the lads.
As I drove past the Warwick junction of the M40, I had a horrible brain flash. The utter conviction I had, earlier in the day, that Chas has the tickets this year, morphed into a distinct memory of Chas handing me an Essex CCC ticket wallet.
"But that must have been my Chelmsford ticket," I thought, until my memory distinctly remembered the sight of Edgbaston tickets in an Essex ticket wallet. The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that I had been an idiot not looking in my ticket draw when packing...even though, in truth, I could not recall seeing those tickets in that draw in my recent ticket trawls for Lord's matches and the like.
I decided that I simply needed to fess up to Charles "Charley The Gent Malloy" Bartlett on arrival and we'd work out how I might get replacement tickets issued. I cannot be the first "gentleman with waning powers of memory" to travel to an Edgbaston test without his tickets, so there must be some sort of reissuing procedure and I knew Chas would have his ticket records with him.
I called Chas on arrival - he and The Boy Malloy had just gone down to the bar to meet Nigel "Father Barry White" Hinks. Chas's immediate reaction was that he had all the tickets in his care, including mine, as is usually the case...then he went on the same memory journey as I had travelled...he did remember handing me an Essex wallet and he did remember separating out tickets for me, for some reason...anyway, by the time I had showered and got to the Plough And Harrow Bar to join the lads, Chas had checked the ticket situation and discovered that he had them all.
We then both realised that the memory flash of Chas giving me my tickets in advance was from last year, when Daisy and I travelled up the night before and had pre-arranged to join the others at the ground for the start of the West Indies day/nightery. Did the lads give me a ribbing for sort of forgetting my tickets...or rather for forgetting that I hadn't forgotten my tickets? Yes.
I tried to counter-rib by suggesting that they had forgotten to book Colbeh, stymieing our dinner plans, but that didn't work. In fact, it is just as well that I saw Azlan from Colbeh as I walked past, as he said he was pretty full that night so I did genuinely make a booking that might just have saved our evening plans. Chapeau to Azlan for remembering my name from last year and the year before.
Anyway, this year's pre-match dinner at Colbeh comprised me, Chas and Nigel. The Boy Malloy had arranged to meet up with a friend at the Birmingham Cosy Club, the name of which drew a "oo er missus" type reaction from Chas and Nigel. The Colbeh Three (as Chas, Nigel and I should now be known) had a superb meal again this season. It is a joy to see how well that place is doing, Nigel and I having been early customers there a couple of years ago when it first opened. I think the food might still be getting better and better.
Day 1
After a hearty breakfast based on kippers, I chose to walk directly from my digs at the Eaton Hotel to the ground. It is a lovely 45 minute walk across Edgbaston.
Ticket scanning and security is so well organised at Edgbaston these days; I was in the ground around 10:30 and heard the toss as I was entering the stand.
I was the first of our group to arrive, but there were quite a few people already seated in our block. Then a young man came along and sat in one of our seats. I said, "excuse me, that cannot be your seat".
"Yes it is", exclaimed the young man, "look!" He showed me his ticket. Block 06, Row A, Seat 5.
"You should be in Block 6", I said, "this is Block 7".
"No it isn't", said a few people seated around me, "this is Block 6". I really was starting to worry about waning powers now, but turned around and saw, clearly on the wall behind me, the big "7" sign that indicates Block 7.
"It really is Block 7", I said. "See the sign..."
...then one or two other people chimed in, "of course this is Block 7".
But for some reason, perhaps an errant steward, perhaps group-think amongst several unconnected parties of people, 15 to 20 people got up and relocated to the real Block 6.
I had a good chortle with a few of the real Block 7 residents about that one.
Then I started to wonder whether the others were ever going to show up; they are usually so keen to get to the ground in good time. Eventually show up they did; slightly frazzled/later than intended. Something about a wrong turn.
Heavy laden, they were, with a picnic fit for Heavy Rollers. Mrs Malloy had gone wild with the sandwiches this year: corned beef with mustard and smoked ham ones for the meat eaters, quorn chicken for the veggies, cheese for everyone and egg mayonnaise for everyone other than me. Mrs Malloy had also gone wild with her gold-ink sandwich-pack labelling pen, to symbolise the impending golden anniversary of the Malloys. We ascertained that Those Were The Days by Mary Hopkin was number one in the charts when the Malloys hitched; likewise when Harsha Ghoble was born. Very apt.
While we tucked in to the picnic for several hours, England seemed to be tucking in to the Indian bowling quite nicely too. In a strange echo of the Charley The Gent run out from 2004, Joe Root was run out, while attempting a second run, by Virat Kohli, soon after tea.
Meanwhile, as England's fortunes rapidly declined, Charley The Gent was insisting that we finish all the sandwiches today, withholding snacks and sweetmeats for the remaining days. "I have to be able to report to her that all the sandwiches went", said Charley.
They all went. We were stuffed. We did not eat that evening. We simply met in the Plough and Harrow bar for a couple of glasses. We concluded that, although Charley hadn't thrown away any sandwiches, England might well have thrown away the match in that last session.
Day 2
After breakfast (I went full English today after last night's dietary abstinence), again I walked to the ground directly from my hotel. The lads arrived in good time today - no wrong turn. Charley was a little sheepish; he'd been ticked off by Mrs Malloy for force-feeding us with infeasible quantities of sandwiches. She hadn't honestly expected us to get through them all, she just wanted each of us to have plenty of choice.
"Can't win", said Charley, presumably in the matter of pleasing Mrs Malloy but perhaps he was thinking about the cricket match too.
We snacked while India seemed to establish their innings, until Sam Curran had other ideas and the match swung back to England until Kohli and the tail had yet other ideas...you get the idea.
I stopped and chatted with the Tufties a while and alerted the other Rollers (especially Charley) on my return, enabling him to join the Tufties for a while later in the day.
Meanwhile our informal Heavy Rollers plan for dinner that evening to dine
...bit the dust when The Boy Malloy announced that he doesn't like Indian food and a search to discover whether Mr Idly has other options revealed very poor recent reviews. I did some extensive research and due diligence (didn't these guys used to pay me to do this sort of thing, albeit on slightly bigger and more important procurement matters?) to uncover El Borracho De Oro within spitting distance of the Plough & Harrow. With some difficulty, I managed to book it on-line, so we were sorted.
While I was concentrating on all that, England's fortunes slid again and by the end of Day two we were, once again, convinced that India had the edge.
El Borracho De Oro proved to be a good choice for dinner; the only shortcoming being the music noise. Also for future reference, the portion sizes were a little smaller than we expected so we possibly should have ordered more tapas - we'll know for next time. It was very reasonably priced for its quality. Apart from Charley disappearing back to the hotel to sort out an errant duplicate payment that wasn't and Harsha disappearing to pick up on some work malarkey, it was a very cohesive, convivial and enjoyable evening.
Day 3
Back to the kippers for breakfast today, then I left my electricals and Benjy The Baritone Ukulele in the safe hands of Roberto at the Eaton before walking, for the last time this trip, to the ground.
Again, the lads were in good time; indeed they got to the ground ahead of me this time. All except for Harsha, who had to deal with his business crisis before coming to the ground. I thought that might be the last we'd see of him, but in fact he turned up about 10 minutes into the day's play. After a short committee meeting, we decided that he could participate in that day's prediction game anyway, despite the additional inside knowledge that 10 minutes of play provides. It didn't help Harsha. In fact, I was the biggest winner of the day; actually I showed positive on each of the three days - that might be a first.
Again, the match tilted one way and then the other. Despair before lunch as England collapsed. Some respite after lunch as Curran tried to get England to a defensible score. Then joy as India collapsed. Then an impending sense of doom as India recovered somewhat late in the day, leaving the match perilously poised at the end of the day - probably just tilting in India's favour.
Chas kindly dropped me at my hotel to help speed me on my way - Daisy had invited some people over for dinner, although they all knew I would be back late. So we said our fond Heavy Roller farewells in the Eaton Hotel car park.
Day 4
It took me just under two hours to get back to Noddyland, where the dinner with Deni and Tony was only just underway, so I could shower and catch up with starters before joining the group for the main meal. London was sweltering - far hotter/muggier than Brum.
The next morning, Daisy and I did battle on the tennis court first thing. I gave it 120% and needed to do so in order to overcome a very keen Daisy. She felt that she ought to be able to beat me after I had sat around for three days watching cricket, eating and drinking. But I'm made of stern stuff.
As soon as we got home, just before the cricket started, Daisy kindly offered to do my washing from the trip, including the tennis kit in which I had just played. "Just pile it in front of the washing machine, " she said.
When she came to the pile, she exclaimed, "urgh, what the hell is this? This is disgusting. What have you done?" I wondered what on earth was the matter. I stepped in to find her holding my recently-worn briefs at arms length. "Have you wet yourself or something?", she asked. "No, I've just played an hour of rigorous tennis against you in sweltering heat, that's all. You don't normally do my washing and you certainly don't normally see my sweaty undies before they have dried off a bit." "I don't sweat like that", said Daisy. I wondered whether to offer a short biology lesson but decided against.
Then we watched the cricket match pan out. If I gave the tennis 120%, then Ben Stokes must have given England 150%. "I wonder whether Ben Stokes gets GBH of the earhole from his missus in the matter of his sweaty briefs", I thought to myself, before deciding that "GBH of the earhole" was an unfortunate phrase in Ben Stokes's context.
Very Upset Matters
I lifted the following from the BBC website
West Indies batsman Chris Gayle has been awarded 300,000 Australian dollars (£173,000) in damages more than a year after winning a defamation case against Australian publisher Fairfax Media. Articles published in the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and the Canberra Times reported allegations the 39-year-old had exposed himself to a female massage therapist. A jury in Sydney in October 2017 ruled the claims were not true and that their publication by Fairfax Media was motivated by malice.
Gayle's legal team argued that Fairfax journalists wanted to "destroy" the cricketer. New South Wales Supreme Court Justice Lucy McCallum made the award. She said in her decision that the defamation "went to the heart of Mr Gayle's professional life as a respected batsman" and "had particular resonance in cricketing circles".
During the case's six-day trial, massage therapist Leanne Russell said that Gayle had partially exposed himself to her in a dressing room in 2015, leaving her "very upset". She contacted Fairfax Media after being angered when Gayle told a journalist "don't blush, baby" in a television interview, the jury heard.
Googlies Website
All the back editions of Googlies can be found on the G&C website. There are also many photographs most of which have never appeared in Googlies.
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An Occasional Cricketing Journal
Edition 192
December 2018
Caption Competition
1. Jonathan Agnew: To what do you attribute your success?
Joe Root: We have finally found the right balance - four wicket keepers and three spinners.
2. Jack Leach: How many tests do you think I will get in England next summer?
Trevor Bayliss: Well, let’s put it this way, I shouldn’t cancel your digs in Taunton if I were you.
3. Mickey Stewart: Welcome to Surrey, Richard; what do you want to do first?
Richard Johnson: I’ll tell the groundsman to leave more grass on the wicket.
4. Mark Hughes: I suggested that the owners did a straight swop for me with Cardiff so that they could have Neil Warnock and I could go there.
Out & About with the Professor
We have, in this journal, occasionally bemoaned – or at least nostalgically reflected on – the days when counties played county championship matches on “outgrounds”. In effect, playing county cricket around the county. I don’t know which county holds the record for the greatest number of venues that have ever hosted a first class match (although no doubt someone does); I seem to recall that Essex had a large number of venues in the 1950s and 60s, and when I played cricket in Kent , most of the Kent League teams hosted, or had hosted, county games. However, Yorkshire must be up there with a fairly large number. Most people know that they used to play at Hull and Sheffield, and at Harrogate and Middlesbrough, but there have also been games at fairly unlikely venues like Dewsbury and Wakefield.
I was musing on all this when the Yorkshire fixtures were released recently. This June Yorkshire will play a Championship match at York. Apparently the last, and only, time this has happened was in 1890 and so it would be fair to say that the cricket loving public of York have been reasonably patient. The bad news for them is that this is only a one-off. The venue is being used only because the Bradford Park Avenue ground is not yet thought to be ready. So there may follow another period of waiting although, hopefully, of less than 129 years.
York CC has been a very successful club side for some years but theirs is a club ground and so the plans are to erect a temporary stand and other appropriate bits of “infrastructure”. It won’t however be too posh – I read that spectators will be encouraged to “bring your own deckchair”.
Mention of Bradford Park Avenue, of course, brings recollections of another famous outground. Some years’ ago the County decided (together with, I think, the ECB and other worthy institutions) to put considerable resources into constructing/reconstructing a First-Class facility in Bradford. Something similar is happening at the Abbeydale Park ground in Sheffield, and so, if all goes well, the County should have four venues at which top class cricket can be played.
This strikes me as an unalloyed good thing. It’s true that the journey from Sheffield (and especially Bradford) to Leeds is not too great but it is enough to put some people off, and especially people with young children. Taking cricket to the people must be the right way to go.
The usual case against outground cricket is the cost of maintaining one top class stadium. This of course still applies in Yorkshire, even more so now that the new South Stand nears completion. I assume that it is less of a worry in 2019 given that Headingley will host an Ashes match and four World Cup games and “The Hundred” is, of course, just on the horizon. Still county club committees are faced with the fact that their £multi-million assets are only used for perhaps 40 or so days in the year. Various plans to hold pop concerts have run into not entirely unreasonable protests from the locals - seemingly less of a problem for Lancashire…but we don’t talk about them.
Perhaps we are just not worried about increasing our level of indebtedness…it doesn’t seem to worry anybody at present. Then again, our Chairman, an accountant with PWC, was obliged to stand down in the middle of the summer over (alleged) financial irregularities in relation to the British Home Stores insolvency. The resulting “crisis” was resolved by a Club stalwart, the redoubtable Robin Smith, stepping into the role mid-term. As a past Chairman of Yorkshire, it would be fair to say that he has seen it all before.
So: a new stand, a new venue, two more on the way, a new Chairman, only one thing left…a decent team. Or at least one that can score runs. And good news there as well – Yorkshire are advertising for a batting coach (details on the website should any Googlies readers be interested).
So, lots to look forward to in the summer, as the rain falls in dreary November, and county cricket in York for the first time in generations
…just don’t forget to bring your deckchair.
This &That
I didn’t see any of the first two tests as I was in Chicago and then I was working during the third last weekend. The overall impression was that Sri Lanka weren’t up to much although there were some interesting developments from the England side. At long last they have given up the idea that they will use the same bowling combinations that are so successful in England. In particular they don’t use two seamers and at least one change one for the first thirty overs of the innings and don’t see reverting to seamers as the go to option at any stage during the innings. At most they used Stokes from time to time to rough them up a bit.
Indeed, Anderson can have rarely bowled fewer overs in a test match than in each of the two he played in. However, his contribution with the bat in the second test was significant in that his last wicket partnerships of 101 were significantly greater than the winning margin of 57 runs.
Whilst I was away, I received the following email from the Professor:
“Isn't it great to see an England team with a proper wicketkeeper at last?
Bairstow should bat at 3 and Foakes keep the gloves for the next decade.”
Since I have been back I watched highlights of all three tests on Sky and there certainly seemed to be a significant improvement in the up to the stumps wicket keeping. Foakes’ batting has also played an important role. If Bairstow can bat successfully at three it starts to solve some of the problems. The openers were overall a failure but it was probably mainly down to the Sri Lankans adopting the same bowling approach as the English and so they mainly faced slow bowlers. Jennings made a hundred but he was out in the sixties if the Sri Lankans had bothered to appeal. Burns plays in a black T-shirt. Is this a lucky charm or just sartorial inadequacy? Terry Cordaroy used to find it hilarious when George Bottrill wore one.
I think that I have previously aired my discomfort with the Review system although it is surprising what the technology shows. In the past I have praised the umpires for in the main getting it right. But there were lots of errors in the third test. I am increasingly aware that the umpire has a very different view at ground level than we do at about fifty feet up and from eighty yards away regardless of the effect of zoom lenses. I have enormous sympathy with umpires who have their on-field decisions reversed by the technology. However, I have no sympathy with them for failing to call no balls. I suspect that in the main they have decided not to call no balls at all unless they are enormous breaches and just rely on the technology to right any decisions which result in a dismissal. In the third test second innings Stokes was twice out caught and back in the pavilion only to be recalled for front foot no balls. On this basis the technology should be used every delivery to adjudge no balls.
The over stepping rule was changed from back to front foot to make it easier for the umpires to do their job and to stop the long-legged bowlers from delivering twenty-yard deliveries. In this test it was the spinners who were guilty! The umpires should at least take back this responsibility under their purview.
In 2019 there will only be one side relegated from the First Division of the Championship but three promoted from the Second Division! This means that almost half the sides will gain promotion! Surely Middlesex will be one of them? In fact, it will be a disgrace if they manage to avoid promotion.
Who knew that there was a T10 tournament? I certainly didn’t. But there has been one taking place in Sharjah and Jonny Bairstow hit the highest individual score with an unbeaten 84 from 24 balls for Kerala Knights. He hit eight sixes as the defending champions beat Bengal Tigers with eight balls remaining. He batted at number four in a team led by Eoin Morgan. The eight-team competition is in its second year, with round-robin matches before semi-finals and a final. Tom Curran, Alex Hales, Jason Roy, Chris Jordan and Liam Plunkett are among the other England players competing in the event. Other captains include Shahid Afridi, Brendon McCullum, Darren Sammy, Shane Watson and Shoaib Malik, with West Indian Chris Gayle opening the batting for Bairstow's team. The following day Alex Hales struck an unbeaten 87 from 32 balls to beat Bairstow’s record. He struck spinner Mohammad Nabi for 32 in one over and hit eight sixes in total to help Maratha Arabians, captained by Dwayne Bravo, to a seven-wicket win in their eliminator final with Bengal Tigers.
When a deliberate foul is committed it has become commonplace for the football commentators to say, “He has taken one for the team”, by which they mean a yellow card booking. Normally this stops a very promising move for the opposition. Players who tackle late accidentally are often sent off. It is time that the same sanction is applied to the professional foul. A red card and a three-match ban should be enough to deter this lamentable practice and eliminate the appalling phrase.
The teams to watch over the last couple of seasons have been Manchester City, Liverpool and to a lesser extent Spurs, but after seeing Arsenal destroy Spurs over the weekend with a scintillating display its hard not to see them as the best value at present. I remain unconvinced about their defence but they have put together a long unbeaten run and so must be improving. Emry seems to have found the motivational factor and they will take some stopping. Mourinho must be envious.
I was watching the televised game in 2011 when Richard Keys and Andy Gray accused one of the linesmen, as they were properly called then, of not knowing the offside rule because she was a woman. They were of course wrong and replays of the action showed that she had got the decision right. Keys and Gray were dumped by Sky but Sian Massey-Ellis continues to officiate in Premier League matches and was on duty at Anfield over the weekend. It still seems incongruous to see her in action, but I have never seen her get a decision wrong.
Morgan Matters
Another peep into the Great Man’s diary
Next season, 3 teams will be promoted from Division 2 of the Championship and only 1 relegated from Division 1 creating a situation where there are 10 teams in Division 1 and 8 in Division 2... why? From 2020, it will be 2 up and 2 down again.
It worries me that other clubs are constantly looking to strengthen their squads, but Middlesex seem to do nothing except let blokes move on to other counties eg Higgins, Podmore and Fuller: someone also said that Patel was leaving.
Vic thinks there are only six certainties for the Test team: Root, Stokes, Anderson, Buttler, Moeen and Burns and only 2 who have no chance: Pope and Stone, all the others are somewhere in between. Meanwhile, Barney Ronay argues quite strongly that Anderson must play in England's WC team next summer.
Richard Johnson has joined Surrey as bowling coach: is this S Law's decision? Middlesex will run out of coaches soon.
Middlesex's Player of the Year was J Harris.
Moeen is now level with F Titmus on 153 wickets and the only England offies ahead of him are J Laker (193) and G Swann (255).
There is considerable doubt about who will get to bat at 3 for England in the next Test and Vic has 4 possibles: Buttler looks to be favourite, Moeen is not completely out of the picture, Bairstow gets a mention, but first he has to get into the team and I was surprised to see that Stokes is also a possibility.
O Pope has been relegated from the senior tour to the Lions tour in UAE so that he can "play competitively" rather than "spending the next 3 weeks on the sidelines".
Here's an interesting point: yesterday England were a/o for 285, but now their total has gone up to 290! It looks as if 5 penalty runs have been added to the extras. In England’s second innings Leach batted no 1, with Burns at the other end. So will we have Jennings as (yet) another no 3?
Kandy: we now know that SL were penalised 5 runs for deliberately running one short in order to avoid a run out.
Kandy-Why do we select so many pace bowlers? Anderson bowled 5 overs (0-12), the other 4 bowlers used were all spinners. Curran was off the field with a side strain, but it could not have been through too much bowling!
Kandy: SL 243 a/o, Leach 5-83, Moeen 4-72, Eng won by 57. It is England's first series win in SL since 2001, when I was in attendance. England's spinners took 19 of the 20 wkts, the other was a run out. England have won 7 of their last 8 Tests. The 38 wkts that fell to spinners in Kandy is a record for Tests.
Colombo: Anderson is rested from the 3rd Test and replaced by Broad, while Curran is not fit and replaced by Bairstow (hardly a like for like replacement, but we did not need all those pace bowlers anyway), who will bat at 3... how many no 3s does that make this series? Bairstow is England's 5th no 3 in 5 matches.
Colombo: it was closer than it looked like being, England won by 42. England's spinners took 49 wkts in the series, an England record for a 3 Test series. Leach also pulled off the crucial run out of Mendis. The last time Eng won a 3 Test away series by 3-0 was in 1963 in NZ when Cliff and the Shads were no 1 with Summer Holiday!
The G says that there will be seven rounds of Championship cricket in June and July next year, which sounds like good news, but I have found that Middlesex only have 3 home games in that period and only 2 of those are at Lord's, the third being at Radlett, which I will definitely not attend. It looks as if I will see only 8 Mx home matches next season, 4 in the RLODC and 4 in the Championship, the other home games being at Radlett and OMTs (Northwood), Uxbridge does not get a mention. As I have no interest in T20, I have not looked at those fixtures.
Hart / Browning Matters
Bill hart sent me the following
I have been stimulated to action by your request for memories of Dave Browning. I remember him well because he was a friend of an old boyfriend of Gill’s called Ron Peggs (also an Old Dane). Having looked David up in my archives, I find that he played regularly in the half-day XI in 1961 (about 18 times), but less than a dozen times in 1962, which was my first season at Milverton Rd and when I would have met him. As far has his being ambidextrous is concerned, I don’t recall him bowling, but he was a very fine field at cover point. I recall him throwing in very sharply and accurately with either hand. Quite a shock to any batsman who was unaware of this facility.
Ged Matters
Ian Harris squeezes everything in
The plan was to have a quiet morning finishing off work bits before setting off towards Birmingham for three nights and three days of Heavy Roller cricketing joy - but we all know what tends to happen to that sort of plan. So I ran around like crazy that morning, fitting in two client meetings, getting my packing done and shovelling down some lunch. Still I managed to leave home at a reasonable hour to avoid the traffic and get to Brum in time to shower, change and join up with the lads.
As I drove past the Warwick junction of the M40, I had a horrible brain flash. The utter conviction I had, earlier in the day, that Chas has the tickets this year, morphed into a distinct memory of Chas handing me an Essex CCC ticket wallet.
"But that must have been my Chelmsford ticket," I thought, until my memory distinctly remembered the sight of Edgbaston tickets in an Essex ticket wallet. The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that I had been an idiot not looking in my ticket draw when packing...even though, in truth, I could not recall seeing those tickets in that draw in my recent ticket trawls for Lord's matches and the like.
I decided that I simply needed to fess up to Charles "Charley The Gent Malloy" Bartlett on arrival and we'd work out how I might get replacement tickets issued. I cannot be the first "gentleman with waning powers of memory" to travel to an Edgbaston test without his tickets, so there must be some sort of reissuing procedure and I knew Chas would have his ticket records with him.
I called Chas on arrival - he and The Boy Malloy had just gone down to the bar to meet Nigel "Father Barry White" Hinks. Chas's immediate reaction was that he had all the tickets in his care, including mine, as is usually the case...then he went on the same memory journey as I had travelled...he did remember handing me an Essex wallet and he did remember separating out tickets for me, for some reason...anyway, by the time I had showered and got to the Plough And Harrow Bar to join the lads, Chas had checked the ticket situation and discovered that he had them all.
We then both realised that the memory flash of Chas giving me my tickets in advance was from last year, when Daisy and I travelled up the night before and had pre-arranged to join the others at the ground for the start of the West Indies day/nightery. Did the lads give me a ribbing for sort of forgetting my tickets...or rather for forgetting that I hadn't forgotten my tickets? Yes.
I tried to counter-rib by suggesting that they had forgotten to book Colbeh, stymieing our dinner plans, but that didn't work. In fact, it is just as well that I saw Azlan from Colbeh as I walked past, as he said he was pretty full that night so I did genuinely make a booking that might just have saved our evening plans. Chapeau to Azlan for remembering my name from last year and the year before.
Anyway, this year's pre-match dinner at Colbeh comprised me, Chas and Nigel. The Boy Malloy had arranged to meet up with a friend at the Birmingham Cosy Club, the name of which drew a "oo er missus" type reaction from Chas and Nigel. The Colbeh Three (as Chas, Nigel and I should now be known) had a superb meal again this season. It is a joy to see how well that place is doing, Nigel and I having been early customers there a couple of years ago when it first opened. I think the food might still be getting better and better.
Day 1
After a hearty breakfast based on kippers, I chose to walk directly from my digs at the Eaton Hotel to the ground. It is a lovely 45 minute walk across Edgbaston.
Ticket scanning and security is so well organised at Edgbaston these days; I was in the ground around 10:30 and heard the toss as I was entering the stand.
I was the first of our group to arrive, but there were quite a few people already seated in our block. Then a young man came along and sat in one of our seats. I said, "excuse me, that cannot be your seat".
"Yes it is", exclaimed the young man, "look!" He showed me his ticket. Block 06, Row A, Seat 5.
"You should be in Block 6", I said, "this is Block 7".
"No it isn't", said a few people seated around me, "this is Block 6". I really was starting to worry about waning powers now, but turned around and saw, clearly on the wall behind me, the big "7" sign that indicates Block 7.
"It really is Block 7", I said. "See the sign..."
...then one or two other people chimed in, "of course this is Block 7".
But for some reason, perhaps an errant steward, perhaps group-think amongst several unconnected parties of people, 15 to 20 people got up and relocated to the real Block 6.
I had a good chortle with a few of the real Block 7 residents about that one.
Then I started to wonder whether the others were ever going to show up; they are usually so keen to get to the ground in good time. Eventually show up they did; slightly frazzled/later than intended. Something about a wrong turn.
Heavy laden, they were, with a picnic fit for Heavy Rollers. Mrs Malloy had gone wild with the sandwiches this year: corned beef with mustard and smoked ham ones for the meat eaters, quorn chicken for the veggies, cheese for everyone and egg mayonnaise for everyone other than me. Mrs Malloy had also gone wild with her gold-ink sandwich-pack labelling pen, to symbolise the impending golden anniversary of the Malloys. We ascertained that Those Were The Days by Mary Hopkin was number one in the charts when the Malloys hitched; likewise when Harsha Ghoble was born. Very apt.
While we tucked in to the picnic for several hours, England seemed to be tucking in to the Indian bowling quite nicely too. In a strange echo of the Charley The Gent run out from 2004, Joe Root was run out, while attempting a second run, by Virat Kohli, soon after tea.
Meanwhile, as England's fortunes rapidly declined, Charley The Gent was insisting that we finish all the sandwiches today, withholding snacks and sweetmeats for the remaining days. "I have to be able to report to her that all the sandwiches went", said Charley.
They all went. We were stuffed. We did not eat that evening. We simply met in the Plough and Harrow bar for a couple of glasses. We concluded that, although Charley hadn't thrown away any sandwiches, England might well have thrown away the match in that last session.
Day 2
After breakfast (I went full English today after last night's dietary abstinence), again I walked to the ground directly from my hotel. The lads arrived in good time today - no wrong turn. Charley was a little sheepish; he'd been ticked off by Mrs Malloy for force-feeding us with infeasible quantities of sandwiches. She hadn't honestly expected us to get through them all, she just wanted each of us to have plenty of choice.
"Can't win", said Charley, presumably in the matter of pleasing Mrs Malloy but perhaps he was thinking about the cricket match too.
We snacked while India seemed to establish their innings, until Sam Curran had other ideas and the match swung back to England until Kohli and the tail had yet other ideas...you get the idea.
I stopped and chatted with the Tufties a while and alerted the other Rollers (especially Charley) on my return, enabling him to join the Tufties for a while later in the day.
Meanwhile our informal Heavy Rollers plan for dinner that evening to dine
...bit the dust when The Boy Malloy announced that he doesn't like Indian food and a search to discover whether Mr Idly has other options revealed very poor recent reviews. I did some extensive research and due diligence (didn't these guys used to pay me to do this sort of thing, albeit on slightly bigger and more important procurement matters?) to uncover El Borracho De Oro within spitting distance of the Plough & Harrow. With some difficulty, I managed to book it on-line, so we were sorted.
While I was concentrating on all that, England's fortunes slid again and by the end of Day two we were, once again, convinced that India had the edge.
El Borracho De Oro proved to be a good choice for dinner; the only shortcoming being the music noise. Also for future reference, the portion sizes were a little smaller than we expected so we possibly should have ordered more tapas - we'll know for next time. It was very reasonably priced for its quality. Apart from Charley disappearing back to the hotel to sort out an errant duplicate payment that wasn't and Harsha disappearing to pick up on some work malarkey, it was a very cohesive, convivial and enjoyable evening.
Day 3
Back to the kippers for breakfast today, then I left my electricals and Benjy The Baritone Ukulele in the safe hands of Roberto at the Eaton before walking, for the last time this trip, to the ground.
Again, the lads were in good time; indeed they got to the ground ahead of me this time. All except for Harsha, who had to deal with his business crisis before coming to the ground. I thought that might be the last we'd see of him, but in fact he turned up about 10 minutes into the day's play. After a short committee meeting, we decided that he could participate in that day's prediction game anyway, despite the additional inside knowledge that 10 minutes of play provides. It didn't help Harsha. In fact, I was the biggest winner of the day; actually I showed positive on each of the three days - that might be a first.
Again, the match tilted one way and then the other. Despair before lunch as England collapsed. Some respite after lunch as Curran tried to get England to a defensible score. Then joy as India collapsed. Then an impending sense of doom as India recovered somewhat late in the day, leaving the match perilously poised at the end of the day - probably just tilting in India's favour.
Chas kindly dropped me at my hotel to help speed me on my way - Daisy had invited some people over for dinner, although they all knew I would be back late. So we said our fond Heavy Roller farewells in the Eaton Hotel car park.
Day 4
It took me just under two hours to get back to Noddyland, where the dinner with Deni and Tony was only just underway, so I could shower and catch up with starters before joining the group for the main meal. London was sweltering - far hotter/muggier than Brum.
The next morning, Daisy and I did battle on the tennis court first thing. I gave it 120% and needed to do so in order to overcome a very keen Daisy. She felt that she ought to be able to beat me after I had sat around for three days watching cricket, eating and drinking. But I'm made of stern stuff.
As soon as we got home, just before the cricket started, Daisy kindly offered to do my washing from the trip, including the tennis kit in which I had just played. "Just pile it in front of the washing machine, " she said.
When she came to the pile, she exclaimed, "urgh, what the hell is this? This is disgusting. What have you done?" I wondered what on earth was the matter. I stepped in to find her holding my recently-worn briefs at arms length. "Have you wet yourself or something?", she asked. "No, I've just played an hour of rigorous tennis against you in sweltering heat, that's all. You don't normally do my washing and you certainly don't normally see my sweaty undies before they have dried off a bit." "I don't sweat like that", said Daisy. I wondered whether to offer a short biology lesson but decided against.
Then we watched the cricket match pan out. If I gave the tennis 120%, then Ben Stokes must have given England 150%. "I wonder whether Ben Stokes gets GBH of the earhole from his missus in the matter of his sweaty briefs", I thought to myself, before deciding that "GBH of the earhole" was an unfortunate phrase in Ben Stokes's context.
Very Upset Matters
I lifted the following from the BBC website
West Indies batsman Chris Gayle has been awarded 300,000 Australian dollars (£173,000) in damages more than a year after winning a defamation case against Australian publisher Fairfax Media. Articles published in the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and the Canberra Times reported allegations the 39-year-old had exposed himself to a female massage therapist. A jury in Sydney in October 2017 ruled the claims were not true and that their publication by Fairfax Media was motivated by malice.
Gayle's legal team argued that Fairfax journalists wanted to "destroy" the cricketer. New South Wales Supreme Court Justice Lucy McCallum made the award. She said in her decision that the defamation "went to the heart of Mr Gayle's professional life as a respected batsman" and "had particular resonance in cricketing circles".
During the case's six-day trial, massage therapist Leanne Russell said that Gayle had partially exposed himself to her in a dressing room in 2015, leaving her "very upset". She contacted Fairfax Media after being angered when Gayle told a journalist "don't blush, baby" in a television interview, the jury heard.
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