GOOGLIES & CHINAMEN
An Occasional Cricketing Journal
Edition 73
January 2009
Old Wanker’s Almanac
I found myself stuck next to the Old Wanker on a trans Atlantic flight over Christmas and that gave him plenty of time to run through his predictions for next year:
January: QPR go though the entire month without scoring a goal but are still on the fringes of the play-off places. They sign Thierry Henri just as the transfer window is about to close.
Manchester City spend more in the transfer window than Gordon Brown has borrowed. They sign Ronaldhino, Ronaldo and several other internationals with Ron in their name. By the end of the month they are still in the relegation zone. Manchester United announce that they are now solvent following the transfer receipt for Ronaldo.
Yet another Ron, Atkinson, is a surprise inclusion in the New Year Honours List for services to race relations.
February: Manchester City fire Mark Hughes, Blackburn sack Sam Allardyce and West Brom continue without a manager.
Fabio Cappello turns down the vacancy at Stamford Bridge. Phil Scolari says he wouldn’t go to Newcastle if they paid him……..His English is still deficient.
QPR go through February without finding the back of the net and after a record twelve games without scoring, they fire Paulo Sousa.
England announce that Ian Bell and Paul Collingwood will play in all the test matches in the Caribbean regardless of the number of runs they score. They say that it will give them much needed confidence and will also piss Owais Shah off.
March: Graham Sounness takes the vacant manager’s position at Manchester City, Mark Hughes takes over at West Bromwich Albion, Paul Ince goes to Portsmouth, Joe Kinnear takes over at Blackburn.
Peter Moores expresses surprise at his firing after the defeat in the Caribbean. He says that things were starting to come right and that he was taking plenty of positives from the experience. KP announces that he will be taking over as player/manager.
Shane Hamburger Warne announces that he is available for the Ashes series. Australia’s odds shorten dramatically. Ian Bell develops a mystery injury.
April: Durham offer to lend Middlesex the choice of their unpicked seamers. Middlesex play Surrey with Onions and Plunkett opening the attack and Killeen coming on first change
In the first ever manager swap Paul Ince moves to Manchester City whilst Graham Sounness goes to Portsmouth. Meanwhile Mark Hughes fills the vacancy at Newcastle and Joe Kinnear is appointed caretaker manager at West Bromwich Albion.
After failing to reach 100 in each of their first three innings Middlesex ask Ed Smith if he would consider coming out of retirement. They also approach Stuart Law, Graham Hick and Chris Adams.
May: The Tiflex balls being used in Division Two of the County Championship swing all over the place. Miraculously Chris Silverwood and Alan Richardson report fit along with all of the other Middlesex seamers.
Middlesex attribute their position at the bottom of Division Two to it taking longer than anticipated for its new look, lean and mean committee to bed in. In an upbeat statement Vinny Codrington says that it is just a matter of time before things turn round. He reminds everyone that the county won last year’s Twenty20 competition with the old committee. The only member of the press in attendance, the Ham and High’s cookery correspondent, leaves puzzled.
June When the ECB discover that the MCC will not allow the Barmy Army to attend the Lords Ashes test and that plastic snakes and Mexican Waves will be banned they move the test to Old Trafford who undertake unreservedly to permit any appalling behaviour that will assist England’s cause.
Middlesex sign Sir David Beckham as their new middle order batsman. Vinny Codrington says that it is bringing the celebrity cult to cricket. Nobody comes to watch but he does score more than the top order put together.
July Phil Edmunds is asked for advice on how to overcome Monty Panesar’s problems. He suggests that he try the yips. It works.
The new Manchester City manager, Fabio Cappello, says that life in the Championship will be tough but he expects an early return to the Premiership.
On the Sofa with the Professor
I was in Chicago for the first India test and so the professor gave me daily updates
I trust you are well and watching the noble efforts of our lads in the heat and the stress of Madras. The Press are praising Flower for Strauss's ability to play spin plus, of course, that he had no preparation and thus went into the Test "undercooked", as is the now fashionably puerile phrase. Pietersen's innings would appear to provide more ammunition, were that needed, for Lord Ray's opinion of his abilities - it could rate as one of the worst efforts from an England Captain in recent years, a decidedly competitive category of awards. I'm not sure he is fully fit - in the last couple of games he seems to be nursing a rib injury. I didn't think either of our spinners looked that great, notwithstanding Swann's opening over, but Flintoff with the ball looked magnificent. Prior, after Strauss, looked England's best bat. I'm on the sofa for 4am tomorrow - it must be an awful nuisance to have to go to work.
Another good day today- 250 ahead, three wickets down and two days to play. How can we lose? (answer...we will find a way). I'm not sure India were that poor. Strauss and Cook played very well but had it not been for Prior we could easily have gone for 250. While they got off to a dreadful start (Sehwag played on and Gambhir was given out LBW when many would not have been), the odd thing was that Laxman and Tendulkar looked to be turning the whole thing round and then both got out to limp caught-and-bowled shots. As I said before, Flintoff with the ball looked terrific.
When we came to bat again it could easily have been the usual shambles had not Strauss continued his first innings form and Collingwood not have battled it out. Out of form, Collingwood is not, as they say, pretty on the eye. Bumble said at one point that if Collingwood was batting outside your house you would want to close the curtains. Frankly it's difficult to see how we can cock it up from here, but no doubt we will try. Pietersen, by the way, was even worse in this innings than in the first and that, frankly, is very hard to imagine. I'm sure he is injured. If India were not poor, or worried about Mumbai, or coming down from beating Australia, or getting a bit long in the tooth, or any other excuse you can think of, could it be that England are not too bad? No...silly me.
Some Test to miss this James - it's been a cracker from the start. Notwithstanding the last couple of hours, I still think England must be favourites, not least because if they look like they might lose, Panesar can always bowl 20 overs of the Shane Warne line into the rough outside the leg stump...and there is a lot of rough! The wicket is now an oval shape in the middle which is mostly flat and true and the outside of the oval shape is dust and holes. Stepping into the dangerous world of prediction, I fancy Swann to win this for England, much the same as Udal did in Mumbai.
Today, Prior again looked the best bat behind Strauss, even though Collingwood got his hundred. Why they were so turgid in the afternoon session no one can say except India continued to bowl with the old ball, which became very soft. I read the other day that the new ball law didn't come in until the early 1900's which means that those early batting records must have been scored against a ball that hardly bounced at all. It wasn't quite like that, but it would be difficult to imagine a greater change of pace when India batted.
Sehwag obviously doesn't know how to bat in Test cricket and has probably never even heard of Geoff Pullar. England's openers decided that the best way to get him out was by bowling short and wide, presumably in the hope that he might snick it. He didn't. Sehwag doesn't do snicking, he does belting it over to top for four or six. You might have thought that after three or four of these, some change of tactic was called for...but no, shorter and wider was the policy; harder and higher the response. The only "chance" would have been the six that Sehwag hit over Third Man which, had he been on the fence, would have been a head high catch. Yet again (and how many times have we seen this) he was 15 yards in, and the ball sailed over his head. Once more, Flintoff was the pick of the bowlers and the only one to keep Sehwag quiet.
There was a nice moment after Harmison and Anderson had gone for eight plus an over, and Monty came on to, as the commentator said, "Give some control". His first ball was a shin-high full toss which Sehwag hit about two-thirds of the way up the square-leg stand. It might be interesting to get a response from the anti 20/20 brigade to Sehwag's innings. "Crash bang" cricket is obviously inferior to proper Test cricket, the only problem is that when Virender is at the crease the only perceptible difference is the colour of his kit.
I was back in the UK on the final day and sent this to the Professor
I saw the Sky highlights last night having listened to TMS at work in the morning. I was amazed that on such a long chase how soon England gave up. When I got to see the wicket I appreciated your earlier comments. It was a less than 200 fourth innings wicket and with a decent spinner less than 150.
I suggested to someone a few months back that Monty isn't a cricketer, but rather someone who plays cricket. I don't think he understands the game. He can bowl well on occasion but that is because he has a good loop not because he particularly knows what to do. You or I would have picked up a wicket on that. Swann never takes many wickets and has played too much one-day stuff. England did all they needed to do to win but were badly let down by their bowlers.
The Professor replied
I thought there were 4 reasons why we lost:
1. The bowlers, especially the spinners were poor. They bowled too straight and thus hit the only part of the pitch that was still in one piece. Wide of off or leg stump it was a lottery.
2. Pietersen's field placings were hopeless - he seemed to be concerned about protecting the boundary - the result was dozens of easy singles with little pressure on the batsman. Can you imagine Warne on that wicket giving the bat the license to drop on the ball and take a single? He also had the wrong fielders in the wrong places - with Panesar bowling over into the rough it was essential to have someone at short fine who could stop the single - Pietersen had Harmison there...and he never did.
3. They didn't seem to bowl to a plan. When I wrote to you the other day I said that England shouldn't lose because they could always bowl into the leg-side rough. They did now and again but not consistently. The whole point is to do it over after over so that the batsman never gets a sniff (or takes a huge risk).
4. Tendulkar. To the untutored eye he was just blocking and pushing singles but his defence was brilliant. He mostly played the spinners off the back foot with a grip so loose that the ball fell at his feet - had he been dismissed, I'm sure we would have won.
I agree with you about Panesar - I don't think he has the faintest idea about how to play cricket - he can just bowl. That is why he looks so gauche in the field and so surprised when the ball comes to him. He goes through a sort of tutored routine of stopping it and throwing it back. He rarely takes a catch (he didn't even realise he had caught-and-bowled Laxman) and he can't bat. Perhaps the next Test will include a Yorkshireman?
Middlesex Matters
I sent the following to the Great Jack Morgan
What did you say to Ed Smith in your chat in the summer? He hasn’t played since and has now retired. He must have been impressed by your lifestyle and fancied some of it for himself. Are you still sure that we have enough batting for next year? It is hard to see how Owais will not become a regular in the test side and Strauss will also if he gets runs this winter. That leaves Godleman, Compton, Malan, Dexter and the lads. Scotty will be opening by May.
He replied
Well, we finally found out that Smithy is retiring "through injury". Do we believe this or not? It is certainly surprising that an injury that was originally thought to be trivial turned out to be so serious that it ended his career. If it is true, then the physio or whoever made the initial diagnosis needs shooting. It could be, however, that "through injury" really means "I'm pissed off because I've no chance of getting back into the England team, they've taken the captaincy away from me and nobody likes me, so I'm taking my bat home and I'm going to try to earn a living by scribbling". Perhaps Gus will help him to get the vacant post at the Indy?
It does affect the question you raised about whether the batting will be strong enough next season. If we assume that Straussy plays in Test matches and Owais in ODIs, that gives us five batsmen who ought to be good enough: Strauss/ Shah, Godleman, Dexter, Morgan and Malan, but it is an inexperienced line-up and there is not much cover if there are anymore call-ups or injuries. I'm not being unkind to Dan Housego, who I think has a good chance of making it, but he is totally unproven and very green; it would be good if he got some first team matches under his belt, but it is nice to bring young lads in when the team is flourishing rather than in the middle of a bad run because of (say) an injury crisis. Another experienced batsman would be handy, but they have one... Nashy has always done a good job around no 6, has a career average of more than 35 and I would have no hesitation in using him as a batsman if it became necessary.
Coleman Matters
I heard from Mary Hancock via Carole Perham that Clive Coleman has been very ill in Northwick Park Hospital. We all send him our best wishes for a speedy recovery.
KP Matters
Charlie Puckett sent me the following
A Christmas present for the Penguin from the Wisden Cricketer Newsletter:
“Kevin Pietersen seems to have taken the Mumbai attacks personally: “In cricket-mad India who could be more high profile than the England team? And who could be more high profile than their captain? It makes my blood run cold.””
He's certainly got his sense of priorities right - 1,000,000,000 Indians to pick on but Al Quaeda & Co want only one person! Even more so, given that he was about 800 miles away at the time - perhaps the terrorists were using Harmison's radar system.
And then he sent this Another quote for the KP Supporters Club (Chairman: PF Ray) to enjoy. Tom Fordyce on BBC text commentary:
"Kevin Pietersen trots around at point, looking wistfully for a patch of limelight to stand in."
I haven’t heard from Lord Ray recently and so asked Charlie for any news. He replied
Peter is currently suffering from a cold which, for us, is a mild inconvenience but, for him, means an urgent course of anti-biotics and a banning order from She Who Must Be Obeyed on going out. He is in excellent form otherwise and preparing his Winter Offensive against Companies House, the Ombudsperson, Barrie Stuart-King and the International Institute of Cricket Umpires & Scorers (they have upgraded themselves since last we spoke as they now train cricket umpires in Ulan Bator and similar, soon-to-defeat-England, centres of cricketing excellence. He also sent me the following recent extract from an article by Brian Viner in the Independent:
“Down the years I must have been to a hundred sporting dinners, and listened to dozens of great sportsmen, past and present, telling their anecdotes. The best speakers I have ever heard at sporting dinners, the men who really brought the house down, were, in reverse order, a gynaecologist from Edinburgh, a baker from the Welsh Marches, and a retired insurance broker called Peter Ray, who on Thursday evening in the Long Room at Lord's showed quite the same mastery of his arena as WG Grace – looking down with beady brown eyes from his handsome incarnation in oils on canvas – once did out on the sacred turf. It was a masterclass in after-dinner speaking.
The occasion was the Lord's Taverners' annual balloon debate in which each speaker must present a case for a deserving figure not to be jettisoned from a punctured, rapidly descending hot-air balloon. Ray eschewed more conventional heroes to push the case for Werner Heisenberg a German physicist who in 1927 coined the uncertainty principle. You needed to be there to appreciate the po-faced, idiosyncratic way in which Ray mined his subject for the belly laughs that left one well-known captain of industry gasping for air, but it was genius at work.
The conventions of this balloon debate require a sporting theme, so Ray had to invent a cricket team in which Heisenberg's contemporaries Max Planck and Albert Einstein also featured. But he didn't have to strain so ingeniously to apply the uncertainty principle to modern sport, indeed it was never more plainly embodied, he said, than when Steve Harmison's opening delivery in the last Ashes series ended up in the bucket-like hands of Andrew Flintoff at second slip. All the best comedy contains profound truths, and Ray chose an appropriate day, the day of Roy Keane's dramatic resignation as Sunderland manager, to explain to 200 men in varying degrees of laughter-induced helplessness that Werner Heisenberg's uncertainty principle is nothing less than sport's guiding force.”
Bush matters
The Shepherds Bush Centenary Booklet has many gems and vignettes. The following photo is from 1978:
The picture is of David Jukes and Gary Black who added 228 for the first wicket before lunch in all day game against Sunbury CC. The eventual lunchtime score was 254-2. Does anyone recall this match? It is a source of surprise to me that none of my correspondents over the years of producing this journal has so much as mentioned the inimitable Jukes.
England Matters For several years we have had Team England bleating on about playing too much cricket. Moores, before going back to India, complained that they hadn’t played test cricket for three months and so would be completely unprepared for the India tests. I think that they would be happiest not playing at all. Bad light is the perfect setting for these sad prima donnas. They can pretend that they were trying to play but the fates had conspired against them rendering their calling impossible to perform.
It seems that a number of the test squad were scared to return to India on security grounds. When development squad players were called up they soon feared that their places on the Comfy Bus might be taken on a more permanent basis. KP tried to make himself appear a caring and reasonable fellow by saying that no one would be forced to go. What quite did he mean? Do they usually have to employ press gang tactics to get Team England onto the field of play? Perhaps they do, particularly after a rest for bad light.
Whilst I was getting hot under the collar the Great Jack Morgan was getting confused
England clearly had advance warning of the slaughter in Mumbai because they were on the plane almost as soon as the first bullet was fired. Not for them was there any hanging around taking advice and calmly consulting with local experts; oh no, it was "we're outtahere man!" And it was all to avoid more slaughter on the pitch. They didn't need a valid reason, they just wanted any excuse to cut short their agony. Did England shoot off home in 1984 when Indira Ghandi and Percy Norris were assassinated almost under their noses? Did the Aussies bunk off back to Oz when Londoners were massacred in 2005? Of course they did not: they took time to assess the situation, accepted the advice of experts and took the mature decision to continue the tour in both cases... but then they both still thought they had a chance of winning.
It was the right decision for England to return to India, but it has been terribly confusing trying to find out who is going and why. The first news I heard was that Dominic Cork was saying that five England players would not return to India; next it was that three Middlesex bowlers (Richo, Murts and Finny) had been put on stand-by because they have current Indian visas in case Flintoff, Harmison and Anderson pulled out. Very sensible of course, but hang on a minute... the A Team would all have visas wouldn't they? And they would all be ahead of the Middlesex chaps surely? Then I read that Sidey is unfit and will not be going and that Broady is currently unfit and will not be going , leaving thirteen. The Guardian told us that the thirteen would be complemented by nine of the A Team, but couldn't be bothered to tell us who the nine were. I checked with Ceefax, who were insisting that the full England squad were going (including Sidey and Broady) and gave us the names of the A Team Nine (Bopara, M Davies, Plunkett, Joseph, Khan, Mahmood, Patel, Rayner and Richardson, though Richo, of course, was not actually a member of the A Team), which made 24 on the trip including eleven seamers! That should be enough for two matches shouldn't it?
Richo is probably delighted to be in an England squad, but with ten competitors for probably only three places, I wouldn't think he is getting excited about making his Test debut. I couldn't help wondering what had happened to the Yorkshire duo of Tim Bresnan and Adil Rashid. Richo has replaced Bresnan for unknown reasons and Olly Rayner (don't forget he was recently described by a Sussex supporter as a "second team player") has inexplicably been preferred to Rashid. England will surely need two spinners in the Test matches, so if either Monty or Swanny were ill or injured, Olly could be playing in a Test! Later it was confirmed that Sidey was definitely unfit and that Broady is unfit at present, but hopes to travel out soon. It was only when I was consulting the Middlesex website on another matter, however, that I found out that the A Team Nine was, in fact, the A Team Ten and that Rashid had been included after all. Finally sanity breaks out, but low marks are awarded for clarity of communications.
But that wasn't the end of it: there were renewed worries about the safety of Chennai airport and the players started making comments like "we only agreed to go to Abu Dhabi", but KP apparently said "we will have 15 lads who are going to play a Test match next week" 15? This was great news for cynics who felt that England could not even muster 11 (the maximum allowed, I believe) who were good enough and keen enough to play, but KP failed to enlighten us on who the 15 were and who the 8 were who didn't qualify. Next we were hearing that Shaun has said that Freddy and Harmy are still uncertain about returning to India irrespective of how favourable the security report turns out to be, but then we heard that KP's 15 had been confirmed to be the original 13 plus Amjad and, not Sajid, but Rashid (born in Bradford) who was another selected because of his familiarity with Indian conditions! This means that more than a quarter of the England squad are of Asian descent, though only one (Owais, in Karachi) was born in the continent. As you know, I have often suggested the selection of Rashid and I have also been consistently impressed by Amjad, but that is because he has always done well against Middlesex (especially with the bat); I am not totally convinced, however, that Amjad's bowling is Test class and I might have preferred, say, Mark Davies, whose career bowling record is ten runs per wicket better than Amjad's, or even my own hero, Alan Richardson, but then Amjad knows all about Indian wickets, having grown up in Copenhagen.
It is astonishing that Jon Trott has pulled out of the A team (sorry, performance squad) "citing the need for a break". Frankly, I don't believe it. It is over two months since the end of the season and in that time he has played a few six-a-sides and has no more cricket scheduled until April. The tour lasts about three weeks and they are playing only two matches! In addition, fringe players are desperate to get on these tours as they could be their passport into the big time. The truth is surely that he had to be dropped in order to accommodate Vaughan and Panesar (neither was in the original squad), though a squad of 16 is surely still too big for two games! Monty is supposed to be getting some "coaching" out there, but we don't know who will be coaching him now that Mushie's visa request has been denied, while Vaughany is out there for... er... what exactly? I bet Trotty is livid.
Football Matters-1
The articles by Terry Hunt and Denis Jones about primary school football have stimulated considerable interest amongst the readership. First to join in was Malcolm Cromer:
Further to the correspondence regarding Hammersmith Schools Football Finals being played at QPR I can add the following:
From memory the last finals played at QPR were 1960-61, the year before I moved from Victoria to Danes. The above photograph shows yet another winning Victoria team. We played two games there on the same day. I played in the first game and I believe it was against a school team with Bob Proctor in it. Yes we did play the whole pitch, with corners taken from the correct places, and with full size goals. I particularly remember being taken to one side by our teacher/coach Mr. Rogerson before the game, and being told that as the pitch was so much bigger than anything we had experienced before, my job was to run up and down the middle of the pitch and not to get drawn to the wings. He expected that both teams would end up chasing the ball like a swarm of bees. As a result of Mr Rogersons ‘cunning plan’ a crossed ball and a speculative ‘toe poke’ led to me scoring a goal at QPR. The only other memory of that game was of Bob Proctor (or someone looking very much like Bob) accidently kicking me in the ankle. I am visiting Bob in Perth in Feb 09 so will try to get confirmation of his part in proceedings.
As a postscript to Terry Hunt’s picture of his winning Victoria team – I would be interested to know which of the Blanchetts was in the photograph. I lived next door to the Blanchett family in Lefroy Road next to Wendell Park School. From memory there were three brothers, two of which were Ronnie – the middle brother – and Chris – the younger brother. My guess is that it was Ronnie Blanchett.
The above picture is of team members mainly from the year above me, so I have difficulty in remembering their names. I appear at the rear between the guy holding the shield and the guy holding the cup. Another Old Dane to be – Jim Trott - appears to the rear and on the right of the guy holding the shield. I only played at QPR once. The following year 61/62 the finals, I am sure, were played at the Ravenscourt Park pitch.
I then heard from Arthur Gates
Reading Denis Jones’ article about playing a cup final at Loftus Road brought back memories, which unlike Denis’ are still clear in my mind. We played on a bone hard dust bowl of a pitch, on which the only concession was that corners were taken from the edge of the penalty area. The score at full time was 0-0, only for Ellerslie to lose in extra time. I was the captain of the side and losing was a disappointment which was further compounded by the absence of losers’ medals. My only other memory of that day was the state of the dressing rooms. I wonder how the prima donnas of today’s football would have coped with the run down facilities.
Football Matters-2
George sent me this
A lovely piece in the paper this morning about the Fulham striker Bobby Zamora. It’s sung to the tune of ‘That’s Amore’
When you’re sat in row Z
And the ball hits your head
That’s Zamora ….
Try singing it.
Football Matters-3
Andrew Baker is showing signs of nostalgia and has re-installed terracing at the ground where his Ladies Team play in an effort to recapture the excitement of football watching in the seventies. Kelvin West was on hand with his camera to record the event for posterity.
Over the Christmas Holiday Kelvin offered to take the Ladies team for a break to the Caribbean. What Andrew Baker didn’t know when he agreed to release them was that Kelvin had entered them in a beach football competition. Kelvin has promised photos for the next edition of Googlies.
Book Matters
There are now three volumes of Googlies & Chinamen available in hardback format. Each covers twenty editions of this monthly newsletter. They can be obtained direct from the publisher www.lulu.com or I can supply you with copies. They are £15 each.
Googlies and Chinamen
is produced by
James Sharp
Broad Lee House
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High Peak
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Tel & fax: 01298 70237
Email: [email protected]
An Occasional Cricketing Journal
Edition 73
January 2009
Old Wanker’s Almanac
I found myself stuck next to the Old Wanker on a trans Atlantic flight over Christmas and that gave him plenty of time to run through his predictions for next year:
January: QPR go though the entire month without scoring a goal but are still on the fringes of the play-off places. They sign Thierry Henri just as the transfer window is about to close.
Manchester City spend more in the transfer window than Gordon Brown has borrowed. They sign Ronaldhino, Ronaldo and several other internationals with Ron in their name. By the end of the month they are still in the relegation zone. Manchester United announce that they are now solvent following the transfer receipt for Ronaldo.
Yet another Ron, Atkinson, is a surprise inclusion in the New Year Honours List for services to race relations.
February: Manchester City fire Mark Hughes, Blackburn sack Sam Allardyce and West Brom continue without a manager.
Fabio Cappello turns down the vacancy at Stamford Bridge. Phil Scolari says he wouldn’t go to Newcastle if they paid him……..His English is still deficient.
QPR go through February without finding the back of the net and after a record twelve games without scoring, they fire Paulo Sousa.
England announce that Ian Bell and Paul Collingwood will play in all the test matches in the Caribbean regardless of the number of runs they score. They say that it will give them much needed confidence and will also piss Owais Shah off.
March: Graham Sounness takes the vacant manager’s position at Manchester City, Mark Hughes takes over at West Bromwich Albion, Paul Ince goes to Portsmouth, Joe Kinnear takes over at Blackburn.
Peter Moores expresses surprise at his firing after the defeat in the Caribbean. He says that things were starting to come right and that he was taking plenty of positives from the experience. KP announces that he will be taking over as player/manager.
Shane Hamburger Warne announces that he is available for the Ashes series. Australia’s odds shorten dramatically. Ian Bell develops a mystery injury.
April: Durham offer to lend Middlesex the choice of their unpicked seamers. Middlesex play Surrey with Onions and Plunkett opening the attack and Killeen coming on first change
In the first ever manager swap Paul Ince moves to Manchester City whilst Graham Sounness goes to Portsmouth. Meanwhile Mark Hughes fills the vacancy at Newcastle and Joe Kinnear is appointed caretaker manager at West Bromwich Albion.
After failing to reach 100 in each of their first three innings Middlesex ask Ed Smith if he would consider coming out of retirement. They also approach Stuart Law, Graham Hick and Chris Adams.
May: The Tiflex balls being used in Division Two of the County Championship swing all over the place. Miraculously Chris Silverwood and Alan Richardson report fit along with all of the other Middlesex seamers.
Middlesex attribute their position at the bottom of Division Two to it taking longer than anticipated for its new look, lean and mean committee to bed in. In an upbeat statement Vinny Codrington says that it is just a matter of time before things turn round. He reminds everyone that the county won last year’s Twenty20 competition with the old committee. The only member of the press in attendance, the Ham and High’s cookery correspondent, leaves puzzled.
June When the ECB discover that the MCC will not allow the Barmy Army to attend the Lords Ashes test and that plastic snakes and Mexican Waves will be banned they move the test to Old Trafford who undertake unreservedly to permit any appalling behaviour that will assist England’s cause.
Middlesex sign Sir David Beckham as their new middle order batsman. Vinny Codrington says that it is bringing the celebrity cult to cricket. Nobody comes to watch but he does score more than the top order put together.
July Phil Edmunds is asked for advice on how to overcome Monty Panesar’s problems. He suggests that he try the yips. It works.
The new Manchester City manager, Fabio Cappello, says that life in the Championship will be tough but he expects an early return to the Premiership.
On the Sofa with the Professor
I was in Chicago for the first India test and so the professor gave me daily updates
I trust you are well and watching the noble efforts of our lads in the heat and the stress of Madras. The Press are praising Flower for Strauss's ability to play spin plus, of course, that he had no preparation and thus went into the Test "undercooked", as is the now fashionably puerile phrase. Pietersen's innings would appear to provide more ammunition, were that needed, for Lord Ray's opinion of his abilities - it could rate as one of the worst efforts from an England Captain in recent years, a decidedly competitive category of awards. I'm not sure he is fully fit - in the last couple of games he seems to be nursing a rib injury. I didn't think either of our spinners looked that great, notwithstanding Swann's opening over, but Flintoff with the ball looked magnificent. Prior, after Strauss, looked England's best bat. I'm on the sofa for 4am tomorrow - it must be an awful nuisance to have to go to work.
Another good day today- 250 ahead, three wickets down and two days to play. How can we lose? (answer...we will find a way). I'm not sure India were that poor. Strauss and Cook played very well but had it not been for Prior we could easily have gone for 250. While they got off to a dreadful start (Sehwag played on and Gambhir was given out LBW when many would not have been), the odd thing was that Laxman and Tendulkar looked to be turning the whole thing round and then both got out to limp caught-and-bowled shots. As I said before, Flintoff with the ball looked terrific.
When we came to bat again it could easily have been the usual shambles had not Strauss continued his first innings form and Collingwood not have battled it out. Out of form, Collingwood is not, as they say, pretty on the eye. Bumble said at one point that if Collingwood was batting outside your house you would want to close the curtains. Frankly it's difficult to see how we can cock it up from here, but no doubt we will try. Pietersen, by the way, was even worse in this innings than in the first and that, frankly, is very hard to imagine. I'm sure he is injured. If India were not poor, or worried about Mumbai, or coming down from beating Australia, or getting a bit long in the tooth, or any other excuse you can think of, could it be that England are not too bad? No...silly me.
Some Test to miss this James - it's been a cracker from the start. Notwithstanding the last couple of hours, I still think England must be favourites, not least because if they look like they might lose, Panesar can always bowl 20 overs of the Shane Warne line into the rough outside the leg stump...and there is a lot of rough! The wicket is now an oval shape in the middle which is mostly flat and true and the outside of the oval shape is dust and holes. Stepping into the dangerous world of prediction, I fancy Swann to win this for England, much the same as Udal did in Mumbai.
Today, Prior again looked the best bat behind Strauss, even though Collingwood got his hundred. Why they were so turgid in the afternoon session no one can say except India continued to bowl with the old ball, which became very soft. I read the other day that the new ball law didn't come in until the early 1900's which means that those early batting records must have been scored against a ball that hardly bounced at all. It wasn't quite like that, but it would be difficult to imagine a greater change of pace when India batted.
Sehwag obviously doesn't know how to bat in Test cricket and has probably never even heard of Geoff Pullar. England's openers decided that the best way to get him out was by bowling short and wide, presumably in the hope that he might snick it. He didn't. Sehwag doesn't do snicking, he does belting it over to top for four or six. You might have thought that after three or four of these, some change of tactic was called for...but no, shorter and wider was the policy; harder and higher the response. The only "chance" would have been the six that Sehwag hit over Third Man which, had he been on the fence, would have been a head high catch. Yet again (and how many times have we seen this) he was 15 yards in, and the ball sailed over his head. Once more, Flintoff was the pick of the bowlers and the only one to keep Sehwag quiet.
There was a nice moment after Harmison and Anderson had gone for eight plus an over, and Monty came on to, as the commentator said, "Give some control". His first ball was a shin-high full toss which Sehwag hit about two-thirds of the way up the square-leg stand. It might be interesting to get a response from the anti 20/20 brigade to Sehwag's innings. "Crash bang" cricket is obviously inferior to proper Test cricket, the only problem is that when Virender is at the crease the only perceptible difference is the colour of his kit.
I was back in the UK on the final day and sent this to the Professor
I saw the Sky highlights last night having listened to TMS at work in the morning. I was amazed that on such a long chase how soon England gave up. When I got to see the wicket I appreciated your earlier comments. It was a less than 200 fourth innings wicket and with a decent spinner less than 150.
I suggested to someone a few months back that Monty isn't a cricketer, but rather someone who plays cricket. I don't think he understands the game. He can bowl well on occasion but that is because he has a good loop not because he particularly knows what to do. You or I would have picked up a wicket on that. Swann never takes many wickets and has played too much one-day stuff. England did all they needed to do to win but were badly let down by their bowlers.
The Professor replied
I thought there were 4 reasons why we lost:
1. The bowlers, especially the spinners were poor. They bowled too straight and thus hit the only part of the pitch that was still in one piece. Wide of off or leg stump it was a lottery.
2. Pietersen's field placings were hopeless - he seemed to be concerned about protecting the boundary - the result was dozens of easy singles with little pressure on the batsman. Can you imagine Warne on that wicket giving the bat the license to drop on the ball and take a single? He also had the wrong fielders in the wrong places - with Panesar bowling over into the rough it was essential to have someone at short fine who could stop the single - Pietersen had Harmison there...and he never did.
3. They didn't seem to bowl to a plan. When I wrote to you the other day I said that England shouldn't lose because they could always bowl into the leg-side rough. They did now and again but not consistently. The whole point is to do it over after over so that the batsman never gets a sniff (or takes a huge risk).
4. Tendulkar. To the untutored eye he was just blocking and pushing singles but his defence was brilliant. He mostly played the spinners off the back foot with a grip so loose that the ball fell at his feet - had he been dismissed, I'm sure we would have won.
I agree with you about Panesar - I don't think he has the faintest idea about how to play cricket - he can just bowl. That is why he looks so gauche in the field and so surprised when the ball comes to him. He goes through a sort of tutored routine of stopping it and throwing it back. He rarely takes a catch (he didn't even realise he had caught-and-bowled Laxman) and he can't bat. Perhaps the next Test will include a Yorkshireman?
Middlesex Matters
I sent the following to the Great Jack Morgan
What did you say to Ed Smith in your chat in the summer? He hasn’t played since and has now retired. He must have been impressed by your lifestyle and fancied some of it for himself. Are you still sure that we have enough batting for next year? It is hard to see how Owais will not become a regular in the test side and Strauss will also if he gets runs this winter. That leaves Godleman, Compton, Malan, Dexter and the lads. Scotty will be opening by May.
He replied
Well, we finally found out that Smithy is retiring "through injury". Do we believe this or not? It is certainly surprising that an injury that was originally thought to be trivial turned out to be so serious that it ended his career. If it is true, then the physio or whoever made the initial diagnosis needs shooting. It could be, however, that "through injury" really means "I'm pissed off because I've no chance of getting back into the England team, they've taken the captaincy away from me and nobody likes me, so I'm taking my bat home and I'm going to try to earn a living by scribbling". Perhaps Gus will help him to get the vacant post at the Indy?
It does affect the question you raised about whether the batting will be strong enough next season. If we assume that Straussy plays in Test matches and Owais in ODIs, that gives us five batsmen who ought to be good enough: Strauss/ Shah, Godleman, Dexter, Morgan and Malan, but it is an inexperienced line-up and there is not much cover if there are anymore call-ups or injuries. I'm not being unkind to Dan Housego, who I think has a good chance of making it, but he is totally unproven and very green; it would be good if he got some first team matches under his belt, but it is nice to bring young lads in when the team is flourishing rather than in the middle of a bad run because of (say) an injury crisis. Another experienced batsman would be handy, but they have one... Nashy has always done a good job around no 6, has a career average of more than 35 and I would have no hesitation in using him as a batsman if it became necessary.
Coleman Matters
I heard from Mary Hancock via Carole Perham that Clive Coleman has been very ill in Northwick Park Hospital. We all send him our best wishes for a speedy recovery.
KP Matters
Charlie Puckett sent me the following
A Christmas present for the Penguin from the Wisden Cricketer Newsletter:
“Kevin Pietersen seems to have taken the Mumbai attacks personally: “In cricket-mad India who could be more high profile than the England team? And who could be more high profile than their captain? It makes my blood run cold.””
He's certainly got his sense of priorities right - 1,000,000,000 Indians to pick on but Al Quaeda & Co want only one person! Even more so, given that he was about 800 miles away at the time - perhaps the terrorists were using Harmison's radar system.
And then he sent this Another quote for the KP Supporters Club (Chairman: PF Ray) to enjoy. Tom Fordyce on BBC text commentary:
"Kevin Pietersen trots around at point, looking wistfully for a patch of limelight to stand in."
I haven’t heard from Lord Ray recently and so asked Charlie for any news. He replied
Peter is currently suffering from a cold which, for us, is a mild inconvenience but, for him, means an urgent course of anti-biotics and a banning order from She Who Must Be Obeyed on going out. He is in excellent form otherwise and preparing his Winter Offensive against Companies House, the Ombudsperson, Barrie Stuart-King and the International Institute of Cricket Umpires & Scorers (they have upgraded themselves since last we spoke as they now train cricket umpires in Ulan Bator and similar, soon-to-defeat-England, centres of cricketing excellence. He also sent me the following recent extract from an article by Brian Viner in the Independent:
“Down the years I must have been to a hundred sporting dinners, and listened to dozens of great sportsmen, past and present, telling their anecdotes. The best speakers I have ever heard at sporting dinners, the men who really brought the house down, were, in reverse order, a gynaecologist from Edinburgh, a baker from the Welsh Marches, and a retired insurance broker called Peter Ray, who on Thursday evening in the Long Room at Lord's showed quite the same mastery of his arena as WG Grace – looking down with beady brown eyes from his handsome incarnation in oils on canvas – once did out on the sacred turf. It was a masterclass in after-dinner speaking.
The occasion was the Lord's Taverners' annual balloon debate in which each speaker must present a case for a deserving figure not to be jettisoned from a punctured, rapidly descending hot-air balloon. Ray eschewed more conventional heroes to push the case for Werner Heisenberg a German physicist who in 1927 coined the uncertainty principle. You needed to be there to appreciate the po-faced, idiosyncratic way in which Ray mined his subject for the belly laughs that left one well-known captain of industry gasping for air, but it was genius at work.
The conventions of this balloon debate require a sporting theme, so Ray had to invent a cricket team in which Heisenberg's contemporaries Max Planck and Albert Einstein also featured. But he didn't have to strain so ingeniously to apply the uncertainty principle to modern sport, indeed it was never more plainly embodied, he said, than when Steve Harmison's opening delivery in the last Ashes series ended up in the bucket-like hands of Andrew Flintoff at second slip. All the best comedy contains profound truths, and Ray chose an appropriate day, the day of Roy Keane's dramatic resignation as Sunderland manager, to explain to 200 men in varying degrees of laughter-induced helplessness that Werner Heisenberg's uncertainty principle is nothing less than sport's guiding force.”
Bush matters
The Shepherds Bush Centenary Booklet has many gems and vignettes. The following photo is from 1978:
The picture is of David Jukes and Gary Black who added 228 for the first wicket before lunch in all day game against Sunbury CC. The eventual lunchtime score was 254-2. Does anyone recall this match? It is a source of surprise to me that none of my correspondents over the years of producing this journal has so much as mentioned the inimitable Jukes.
England Matters For several years we have had Team England bleating on about playing too much cricket. Moores, before going back to India, complained that they hadn’t played test cricket for three months and so would be completely unprepared for the India tests. I think that they would be happiest not playing at all. Bad light is the perfect setting for these sad prima donnas. They can pretend that they were trying to play but the fates had conspired against them rendering their calling impossible to perform.
It seems that a number of the test squad were scared to return to India on security grounds. When development squad players were called up they soon feared that their places on the Comfy Bus might be taken on a more permanent basis. KP tried to make himself appear a caring and reasonable fellow by saying that no one would be forced to go. What quite did he mean? Do they usually have to employ press gang tactics to get Team England onto the field of play? Perhaps they do, particularly after a rest for bad light.
Whilst I was getting hot under the collar the Great Jack Morgan was getting confused
England clearly had advance warning of the slaughter in Mumbai because they were on the plane almost as soon as the first bullet was fired. Not for them was there any hanging around taking advice and calmly consulting with local experts; oh no, it was "we're outtahere man!" And it was all to avoid more slaughter on the pitch. They didn't need a valid reason, they just wanted any excuse to cut short their agony. Did England shoot off home in 1984 when Indira Ghandi and Percy Norris were assassinated almost under their noses? Did the Aussies bunk off back to Oz when Londoners were massacred in 2005? Of course they did not: they took time to assess the situation, accepted the advice of experts and took the mature decision to continue the tour in both cases... but then they both still thought they had a chance of winning.
It was the right decision for England to return to India, but it has been terribly confusing trying to find out who is going and why. The first news I heard was that Dominic Cork was saying that five England players would not return to India; next it was that three Middlesex bowlers (Richo, Murts and Finny) had been put on stand-by because they have current Indian visas in case Flintoff, Harmison and Anderson pulled out. Very sensible of course, but hang on a minute... the A Team would all have visas wouldn't they? And they would all be ahead of the Middlesex chaps surely? Then I read that Sidey is unfit and will not be going and that Broady is currently unfit and will not be going , leaving thirteen. The Guardian told us that the thirteen would be complemented by nine of the A Team, but couldn't be bothered to tell us who the nine were. I checked with Ceefax, who were insisting that the full England squad were going (including Sidey and Broady) and gave us the names of the A Team Nine (Bopara, M Davies, Plunkett, Joseph, Khan, Mahmood, Patel, Rayner and Richardson, though Richo, of course, was not actually a member of the A Team), which made 24 on the trip including eleven seamers! That should be enough for two matches shouldn't it?
Richo is probably delighted to be in an England squad, but with ten competitors for probably only three places, I wouldn't think he is getting excited about making his Test debut. I couldn't help wondering what had happened to the Yorkshire duo of Tim Bresnan and Adil Rashid. Richo has replaced Bresnan for unknown reasons and Olly Rayner (don't forget he was recently described by a Sussex supporter as a "second team player") has inexplicably been preferred to Rashid. England will surely need two spinners in the Test matches, so if either Monty or Swanny were ill or injured, Olly could be playing in a Test! Later it was confirmed that Sidey was definitely unfit and that Broady is unfit at present, but hopes to travel out soon. It was only when I was consulting the Middlesex website on another matter, however, that I found out that the A Team Nine was, in fact, the A Team Ten and that Rashid had been included after all. Finally sanity breaks out, but low marks are awarded for clarity of communications.
But that wasn't the end of it: there were renewed worries about the safety of Chennai airport and the players started making comments like "we only agreed to go to Abu Dhabi", but KP apparently said "we will have 15 lads who are going to play a Test match next week" 15? This was great news for cynics who felt that England could not even muster 11 (the maximum allowed, I believe) who were good enough and keen enough to play, but KP failed to enlighten us on who the 15 were and who the 8 were who didn't qualify. Next we were hearing that Shaun has said that Freddy and Harmy are still uncertain about returning to India irrespective of how favourable the security report turns out to be, but then we heard that KP's 15 had been confirmed to be the original 13 plus Amjad and, not Sajid, but Rashid (born in Bradford) who was another selected because of his familiarity with Indian conditions! This means that more than a quarter of the England squad are of Asian descent, though only one (Owais, in Karachi) was born in the continent. As you know, I have often suggested the selection of Rashid and I have also been consistently impressed by Amjad, but that is because he has always done well against Middlesex (especially with the bat); I am not totally convinced, however, that Amjad's bowling is Test class and I might have preferred, say, Mark Davies, whose career bowling record is ten runs per wicket better than Amjad's, or even my own hero, Alan Richardson, but then Amjad knows all about Indian wickets, having grown up in Copenhagen.
It is astonishing that Jon Trott has pulled out of the A team (sorry, performance squad) "citing the need for a break". Frankly, I don't believe it. It is over two months since the end of the season and in that time he has played a few six-a-sides and has no more cricket scheduled until April. The tour lasts about three weeks and they are playing only two matches! In addition, fringe players are desperate to get on these tours as they could be their passport into the big time. The truth is surely that he had to be dropped in order to accommodate Vaughan and Panesar (neither was in the original squad), though a squad of 16 is surely still too big for two games! Monty is supposed to be getting some "coaching" out there, but we don't know who will be coaching him now that Mushie's visa request has been denied, while Vaughany is out there for... er... what exactly? I bet Trotty is livid.
Football Matters-1
The articles by Terry Hunt and Denis Jones about primary school football have stimulated considerable interest amongst the readership. First to join in was Malcolm Cromer:
Further to the correspondence regarding Hammersmith Schools Football Finals being played at QPR I can add the following:
From memory the last finals played at QPR were 1960-61, the year before I moved from Victoria to Danes. The above photograph shows yet another winning Victoria team. We played two games there on the same day. I played in the first game and I believe it was against a school team with Bob Proctor in it. Yes we did play the whole pitch, with corners taken from the correct places, and with full size goals. I particularly remember being taken to one side by our teacher/coach Mr. Rogerson before the game, and being told that as the pitch was so much bigger than anything we had experienced before, my job was to run up and down the middle of the pitch and not to get drawn to the wings. He expected that both teams would end up chasing the ball like a swarm of bees. As a result of Mr Rogersons ‘cunning plan’ a crossed ball and a speculative ‘toe poke’ led to me scoring a goal at QPR. The only other memory of that game was of Bob Proctor (or someone looking very much like Bob) accidently kicking me in the ankle. I am visiting Bob in Perth in Feb 09 so will try to get confirmation of his part in proceedings.
As a postscript to Terry Hunt’s picture of his winning Victoria team – I would be interested to know which of the Blanchetts was in the photograph. I lived next door to the Blanchett family in Lefroy Road next to Wendell Park School. From memory there were three brothers, two of which were Ronnie – the middle brother – and Chris – the younger brother. My guess is that it was Ronnie Blanchett.
The above picture is of team members mainly from the year above me, so I have difficulty in remembering their names. I appear at the rear between the guy holding the shield and the guy holding the cup. Another Old Dane to be – Jim Trott - appears to the rear and on the right of the guy holding the shield. I only played at QPR once. The following year 61/62 the finals, I am sure, were played at the Ravenscourt Park pitch.
I then heard from Arthur Gates
Reading Denis Jones’ article about playing a cup final at Loftus Road brought back memories, which unlike Denis’ are still clear in my mind. We played on a bone hard dust bowl of a pitch, on which the only concession was that corners were taken from the edge of the penalty area. The score at full time was 0-0, only for Ellerslie to lose in extra time. I was the captain of the side and losing was a disappointment which was further compounded by the absence of losers’ medals. My only other memory of that day was the state of the dressing rooms. I wonder how the prima donnas of today’s football would have coped with the run down facilities.
Football Matters-2
George sent me this
A lovely piece in the paper this morning about the Fulham striker Bobby Zamora. It’s sung to the tune of ‘That’s Amore’
When you’re sat in row Z
And the ball hits your head
That’s Zamora ….
Try singing it.
Football Matters-3
Andrew Baker is showing signs of nostalgia and has re-installed terracing at the ground where his Ladies Team play in an effort to recapture the excitement of football watching in the seventies. Kelvin West was on hand with his camera to record the event for posterity.
Over the Christmas Holiday Kelvin offered to take the Ladies team for a break to the Caribbean. What Andrew Baker didn’t know when he agreed to release them was that Kelvin had entered them in a beach football competition. Kelvin has promised photos for the next edition of Googlies.
Book Matters
There are now three volumes of Googlies & Chinamen available in hardback format. Each covers twenty editions of this monthly newsletter. They can be obtained direct from the publisher www.lulu.com or I can supply you with copies. They are £15 each.
Googlies and Chinamen
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