The Golden Strawberry

I am at a friend’s house in Peckham, and am browsing the internet for the first time in a while. Doing so I came across the Times’s archive reports from the “timeless Test” between England and South Africa at Durban in March 1939. England, at the end of the twelfth (!) day, were 654 for five chasing 696 to win. Getting there would have been a remarkable achievement, but the English team had to leave in order to catch the boat back to Blighty.

What is interesting is the reasons for introducing “timeless Tests”:

“The “timeless Test” had emerged from Australia some ten years earlier, where spectators and players liked a result. Promoters quickly spotted the opportunity for increased gate takings and the concept spread, much to the consternation of cricket traditionalists. The Times letters page resounded with accusations of commercialism and hand-wringing about damage to the game.”

Seventy years ago it was thought that by having Test matches last for weeks, and sides crawling along at around two an over, was profitable. Nowadays the theory has gone completely the other way, that cricket is more profitable with a twenty-over thrash that can be over in two and a half hours. Let’s put that in perspective: in the first hour of England’s innings they scored only thirteen runs. In Twenty/Twenty you are looking to score that many in an over; six balls and five minutes of frenzied hitting.

In both cases we are getting dismayed letters to the Times (and today dismayed comments on Times blogs) about the commercialism of cricket. Cricket has been involved with money ever since it’s creation, in 1697 a match was played between two teams in Sussex for 50 Guineas a side. That is three centuries ago, and you could write a decent-sized book on the links between cricket and money. The significant difference between 20/20 and timeless Tests, seems to be that timeless Tests assume you can make money out of Test cricket, whereas 20/20 assumes that isn’t possible.

The main problem with both of these forms of cricket is that they may well end up killing Test cricket. Timeless Tests would have become so tedious that spectators would rather have paid not to watch them. In contrast, 20/20 is like Test cricket’s more handsome brother who ends up getting all the girls. Players like MS Dhoni from India are now taking the decision to rest from a Test series, and the Indian Premier League was a success in its first year.

The Ashes of 2005 seems a long time ago now. That Test series was the only one I can remember in my time that galvanised Britain, in the same way that, say, a Football or Rugby World Cup does. Not even a Cricket World Cup could do that for English cricket. 2005 was a unique series that we will never see again, but there are reasons to be cheerful. Test cricket is not dead!

There have been exciting matches. Most Test series this year have had at least one humdinger. England against India at Chennai springs to mind immediately, probably because it’s one of the most recent. Still with England, their match between South Africa at Edgbaston saw something special from Graeme Smith. Australia’s series against India (twice) and South Africa this year have an aura of Shakespearean tragedy about them; a once great team reduced to a bickering, uncertain mulch. They are no longer the best team in the world, but I still believe they will retain the Ashes this year. Both matches between New Zealand and West Indies were entertaining too, if only to see when Shivneraine Chanderpaul would get out. Even Bangladesh who, with all the will in the world, are a team of no-hopers, got to 403-6 chasing 521 against Sri Lanka this week. True, they were bowled out for 413, but in this age of 20/20 and short attention spans and Lalit Modi controlling the world and Allan Stamford arriving at Lords in his helicopter with $20 million in it isn’t it just wonderful that Test cricket can still create something beautiful, tense, captivating, stunning, unthinkable, frustrating? The late Harold Pinter was right, it is truly the greatest creation of man (give or take the odd technological innovation).

Unlike 20/20, it’s all over in an afternoon and you have all but forgotten about the match by the next morning, because Tests go on for five days they occupy a sizable chunk of your consciousness and a decent part of your life. A tense finish to a Test, like the Old Trafford match of 1998 and most of the Ashes series of 2005, is much more tense than a close one-day finish because of the build up. It’s been five days of twists and turns, of wondering “what the hell is the score?”, of a whole mix of emotions. How can you feel that emotional about a match that began only a few hours before?

The short answer is that you can’t. And although pessmists may call 2008 the death of Test cricket, I am more optimistic. It will survive, regardless of how many franchises exist in the IPL. Have a good new year.

Cory

In sport these days, people seem to have problems keeping a sense of perspective. This is all too apparent in the Premiership close-season, when there are no actual football games but plenty of nonsense stories. Misquoted or not, it’s quite hard to know what to think to Ronaldo’s remark describing himself as a slave. Is it more stupid or naive or insulting to the millions of slaves down the Millennia? I am not sure myself.

Another recent remark that raised eyebrows was Ed Moses saying that Dwaine Chambers’s Olympic ban “would be almost like a death sentence”. Except that it…isn’t, surely? Anyone who has listened to the commentary on any Sky football match will know that hyperbole is only an Andy Gray exhalation away, but really? Sigh…

So it’s quite nice to see a sportsman keeping things in perspective for once. Michael Vaughan resigned the England captaincy last Sunday (was it really only last Sunday? Time flies etc) and one of the reasons he gave was, that for the last six to eight months he has not been himself at home. And he “wants to be me again”.

That is a true statement from a man who is not only one of England’s best-ever captains, but one who realises that there is something more important than sport. And that is family. Hence Vaughan crying when talking about his mum and dad as well. Having not really seen him very emotional at all in the eight years of international cricket, that was something.

I’m not quite sure if appointing Kevin Pieterson as captain is the right move or not. Though it was probably the sensible one. A split captaincy of Strauss for the tests and Pieterson for the one-dayers would probably have caused the same tensions as it did before with Nasser Hussain and Michael Vaughan. It does seem like putting the bull in charge of the china shop, though thus far (at least) it’s going smoothly. England to win the Ashes! Now that’s keeping a true sense of perspective!

Norman Geras has 74; Tim Rice (the lucky beggar) has all 145 of them. I have 64, but then the other two have a few years’ head start on me.

I am talking about Wisden Cricketer’s Almanacs. The 2008 edition has recently been published, and the new editor Scyld Berry appears to want to focus on the threat, as he sees it, posed by the Indian Cricket League. I will probably post something of that in due course, but for this instance I want to focus on Wisdens.

It seems to non-cricketing fanatics that Wisden is typical of the game’s curiosities. In a recent chat with my girlfriend, she asked why there was a need for them to come out every year. After all, not much could have changed in a year, could it? Well, yes and no.

But Wisden is more than just a chronicle of statistics. The best bit about last Christmas was just being immersed in Wisden with a glass of wine. Reading Mike Atherton on Shane Warne, and the notes by the editor, the blow-by-blow account of the county season, finding out that Victor Trumper was out for a duck in his first Test in 1899. I’m a freak, it can’t be denied. But then, in this crazy world, cricket is the nearest thing I have to a religion. Which means reading a Wisden is an almost spiritual occasion. This is all pretentious bollocks, of course, but finding solace in a cricket book is cheaper, and better for you, than finding solace in whisky. Or Catholicism.

Cory

“Cricket civilizes people and creates good gentlemen. I want everyone to play cricket in Zimbabwe; I want ours to be a nation of gentlemen”. Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe said this in 1984. These words now sound hollow – Zimbabwe both as a nation and a cricket team is in dire straits. Since 1999 Mugabe’s “land reforms” involved seizing land owned by white farmers without paying any compensation. This caused food production to plummet, thought to be the chief cause of hyperinflation. Inflation in Zimbabwe is estimated at 5000%. Men’s life expectancy has declined from 60 in 1990 to just 37 years in 2006. Women’s life expectancy is even lower, at 34 years. What was Mugabe’s reaction to this? To build a £2 million museum, the size of a football pitch, dedicated to his life and achievements.

 

Zimbabwe’s best cricketers have left the country, and many now play in the English domestic league. Their replacements are youngsters, only about the standard of average club cricketers. They are due to tour England next in 2009, and the British government may ban the team from touring because of hostility to Mugabe’s regime. This is not the first time this has happened. In the 2003 World Cup England refused to play in Zimbabwe because of “safety fears”, after much dithering from the Labour government and the England and Wales Cricket Board.

 

Zimbabwe have not played Test cricket since 2005, but still play in international one-day tournaments. Some feel that their involvement in international cricket legitimises Mugabe’s rule. It is to be hoped that Brown takes a more forceful role on the Zimbabwe question than his predecessor. For all Tony Blair’s talk of “liberal interventionism”, his government’s spineless attitude to Zimbabwe was another foreign policy disaster. Firm action is needed to help a nation in crisis, and that requires far more than merely banning its cricket team.

Cory

Hot Ginger and Dynamite has some pictures from a recent Middle East rally which are amusing in a disturbing way.

Norm has details of an Engage meeting: Rally Against the Boycott, which is in London on July 11th. The speakers include Jonathan Freedland.

Andrew Miller from Cricinfo on Beefy’s much-deserved knighthood.

I might not post on the Middle East for a while, but why not read this marvellous Amer Tahiri article in the Times.

That’s enough to keep you lot busy for now, I think!

Cory

Oh dear. I’m wrecking my degree and my body clock by keeping up to date with the Ashes score, at 2.30am. No doubt I’ll be up for another hour or two. Though God knows why…

The only positive I can think of, is that it’s like being back at primary school again! The good old days…Australia 602-9 declared, England 118-5 at lunch. Sigh.

Cory

Marcus Trescothick is now out of the Ashes series, with a recurrence of a stress-related illness. Well, good luck to him I say. Losing Banger is a big miss. Yes, he doesn’t have a great record against the Aussies, and yes, there is adequate cover (Cook, Bell and whoever the selectors call up in his absence - Robert Key maybe?) but the simple fact is that England are a poorer side without him. Here’s hoping that Marcus Trescothick can take off the time he needs (however long that may be) and come back refreshed and ready. I don’t care if he misses the World Cup; the important thing is that he is able to get over his problem.

Cory

PS - in the meantime, nice to see Freddie and KP in among the runs.

The disturbing news that Geraint Jones, not Chris Read, will be England’s wicket-keeper for the Ashes.

I’m getting pretty sick at the way the English selectors - and Duncan Fletcher in particular - keep shafting Chris Read in favour of Mr Jones. He’s quite clearly the better wicket-keeper of the two, and the treatment he gets is shocking. He batted well when he finally got another chance against Pakistan in the summer. OK, he only got six runs in the Champion’s Trophy, in three innings, but so what?! One-day cricket has virtually no influence on your performance in the Test arena. England themselves prove that - a great record in Test cricket over the last two and a half years, whereas in one-dayers drawing a series is considered an achievement.

The simple fact is, Jones earned his right to be dropped, after hardly scoring a run all summer. Reid had earned a call up, performed well, and still gets dropped. God, it makes me angry.

Cory

I’m not sure I’ll ever get bored looking at this photo. Ah, the hilarity.

For those not in the know, England won their first Test series at home against Pakistan since 1982. Very impressively. Although Pakistan folded a little in their second innings.

The chap falling over in the photo is Inzamam Ul-Haq, the Pakistan skipper. Although you cannot see his head, since it’s obscured by his not inconsiderable backside. He is falling onto Chris Read, the English-wicketkeeper-cum-Frodo-lookalike.

Good to see Chris Read and Monty Panesar playing well too. Anyone with a passing interest in cricket has to be pleased at the inclusion of a keeper for his keeping (!) ability. Whilst Monty is already a legend after nine Tests. Bring on Australia. Do you want some?

-posted by Roy

One of the greatest fast bowlers EVER. His tally of 307 Test wickets is remarkable, considering that far fewer Tests were played then than today. Not a bad average either. Although he could irritate in the commentary box - firmly in the “In My Day” school of cricket commentary - as a fast bowler he was peerless. Rest In Peace “Fiery Fred“.

-posted by Roy