Twenty20 Championship in England
I wanted to talk about this when the news broke - I wasn’t able to, but better late than never! If you don’t know about the what where and when, go read the bbc report, then come back here for my view.
Allan Stanford, the American Billionaire looks keen to invest in a tournament that would give England a good IPL rival twenty20 competition. It looks like this is a great idea for a number of reasons, and I think that Stanford has given all the right noises that he seems like the right kind of guy to be a driving force in its conception.
Stanford has had a lot to do with Twenty20 in the West Indies, building his own ground for the competition over there, and bringing a sense of excitement and even innovation in the fact that they use cricket bats painted black in the competition. It is said that he has absolutely no interest in the longer forms of the game, especially Test Cricket, but with the sums of money he can bring in that is not that much of a problem - it will all be money for the game and raise the profile of cricket as an entertaining sport.
I also like the fact that we don’t seem to be rushing too much into this, looking at doing it in 2 years time. This should hopefully mean that when it comes about it isn’t as a knee jerk reaction and is planned out properly with all the relevant interested parties consulted and listened to. Twenty20 in this country currently has a spot in the middle of the summer to itself, so it shouldn’t be that difficult to schedule something in - the only difference really is the marketing and and the rules in terms of players etc. Will it still be counties and will they bring in players even more specifically for the tournament - and will you be allowed more overseas players than currently? Lots of questions, but there is a decent length of time to come up with the answers and as long as the right people are making the decisions I feel positive.
Another good reason for having our own competition like this is to help keep a bit of power in international cricket over here. There is no doubt that India are a very powerful country when it comes to cricket politics, and with the IPL/ICL we have started to see the repercussions of that power - Test Cricket has already lost some of its stars and county cricket is also feeling the pain. Maybe this is a bit selfish, but I don’t think one superpower is healthy as they end up dictating to the rest of the world who can play where and when. Spread the money that players can earn and hopefully it will all be a bit more balanced.
It might be that we end up with too many players that start to try and specialise in the shorter form of the game, and these players might not make the transition to the four and five day games, but that kind of happens now anyway so in my mind this isn’t an issue… yet.
So it all seems positive, and I’m struggling to see a negative side at the moment - anyone out there know anything wrong with this proposal?
Pink Cricket Balls
I posted last November about an MCC trial during 2008 to use pink cricket balls instead of white balls with a view to implementing this into international one day cricket. Their trial started on Monday, and Tuesday morning on the BBC news the sports reporter talked about it as he was part of the first trial. Looking at the ball which was in the studio (not sure how many overs it was used for), and what the reporter says, it sounds like it was a decent trial. The pink lacquer doesn’t get dark like the white ball, and if it rubs off at all, the white underneath can be seen and it still remains quite visible.
From first impressions, it seems like pink cricket balls could well be the way forward, but we will have to see how the ball responds under lights and most importantly for its success, if the TV cameras can pick it up ok. It was the TV cameras not being able to pick up a yellow ball which condemned that idea, but with pink being not that far in the colour family from red this should be better.
If the manufacturers and shops could get a few of these manufactured I’m sure there would be plenty of people looking to buy them and give them a go themselves!
Wisden Cricketers Of The Year
Sorry for the lack of action here this week, but I’ve been playing and watching sports other than cricket this week - namely golf and football. There is an eerie quiet in England regarding cricket at the moment, its still a bit cold to get excited about playing or watching, so the pre-season games that are on are getting very little coverage. We do have the ever present merry-go-round of the Indian leagues and who will/won’t be playing over here but its all getting very dull.
Wisden did announce the other day though their five cricketers of the last year, an annual thing which precedes the publication of the new Wisden. I found it rather odd that players can only be given this honour once in their career - if they’ve had a good season surely it shouldn’t matter how many times they’ve been given the honour? The overall cricketer of the year was Jaques Kallis, and although he isn’t the most exciting cricketer to watch, he has an immense amount of talent with the bat and the ball (and a pretty hot wife as well!) and has scored x runs to deserve the accolade.
Sidebottom and Bell are two England players named as one of the best five of the year, and they have both had decent years. Sidebottom went from being a “who?” when brought back into the England side, and is now arguably the lynchpin of the bowling attack (I’ll start eating my hat once i’ve finished writing this). Bell has had a decent time and if only England would stop shifting him around the order he could be the key to England’s batting over the next 18 months (Ashes series included). Otis Gibson also got a mention for his stunning county season, and Durham have already admitted he’ll be a big loss for them in the upcoming season. Chanderpaul was the final player given the honour, which isn’t surprising as he has racked up the runs over the past year (also winning a damn close game for the WIndies yesterday against Sri Lanka). The final player was Zaheer Khan, which to be honest doesn’t really register with me. He was decent over here last year, but I’d have thought there were better players than him over the whole year.
Anyway, its nearly time for the proper season to start, so hopefully there’ll be some interesting things to talk about soon!
Pre-order the new England Adidas Kit!
As you may notice when visiting the blog, I’ve started the countdown to the new England Adidas kit being revealed and released with a few images and the like! Remember that this is the best place to come for all the info in the lead up to the big day!
In fact, “the big day” is two days - the reveal date that we first see the kit, and then a week later it will be available to buy. If you want to get in there early though, you can pre-order your kit straight from kitbag right now to ensure you are one of the first to receive the latest kit when it is available for sale.
When is it revealed? 18th April
When is it released? 23rd April
There you go, the two most important days in April right there! Keep checking back for more info as I get it!
Update - I have revealed what the kit looks like here, take a look!
How To Ruin International Cricket
I’ve not said much about the IPL and ICL so far on this blog but I think I’ve finally got to the point where I understand how much these new Indian tournaments are going to harm world cricket.
In broad terms, the ICL was the first, and known as the “rebel” league as it didn’t have the Indian Cricket Board’s sanctioning. Because the board saw someone other than them was going to make some money out of it, they quickly put together the IPL, or “official” tournament.
Both of these offer the players huge financial rewards for playing relatively very little cricket. You can’t blame the players for having their heads turned by these rewards, they are human after all. Earning a few hundred grand for about 14 games of 20 over cricket, yes please!
And I don’t blame these tournaments for their season overlapping the English county season either. Yes, some overseas players will have a choice to make and for some it is the moral decision of keeping loyal to someone who has backed you for a number of years or following the money to India. Loyalty, like in football though is in very short supply and we will be deprived of a number of overseas stars this summer. But that isn’t the fault of the Indian tournaments – their offering is more attractive than playing county cricket, and it is something that the counties will need to review. If anything it might give more youngsters a chance in county cricket which would be good – although it will probably just mean more mediocre overseas players who aren’t wanted by the IPL/ICL playing instead.
So although I’m not too bothered about the effect of losing overseas players from a bit of county cricket, I’m not happy that English players like Dimi Mascarenhas are now signing up to the IPL, and will miss a few weeks this season and the whole period of the ‘09 and ‘10 competitions. County cricket is going to die a very very quick death if the best players run off to India for half of the English summer. And this isn’t even my main problem with these tournaments.
My main problem is what these tournaments will do to International Cricket – which is there I think their harm is going to be biggest felt. Already we have the situation where players such as Shane Bond have signed up with the “rebel” ICL are now no longer available to play for their countries. International Cricket is already weaker, and the tournament hasn’t even started. You could point the finger of blame for this state of affairs at the ICL, the IPL or the New Zealand management, but the fact is its happening and it sucks.
Even the ICC sanctioned IPL is getting in on the ruining International Cricket action though, which is disgraceful. A few NZ players, including skipper Vettori are playing in the “official” ICL, and because of that, they will be missing the start of the tour to England this summer. A tour which fits in with the ICC’s ten year tour plan, and has been on the calendar for years is being ignored for a game of wham bam twenty20. Disgusting. If this is the case, how long will it be until test cricket is ignored altogether? Maybe I’m a traditionalist (if you knew me, I’m really not!), but I still think test cricket is the numero uno – all the other cricket is way way down the scale, and I see the IPL and ICL as stamping all over it at the moment. Do the people behind these tournaments really think they are better than anyone else in world cricket, as that is the impression I’m getting. They’ll make their money, be idolised in their country, but to hell with world cricket..
Test Dilemma’s and will Australia and India please grow up
With the first test against New Zealand approaching it is time to start thinking about the possibilities selection wise. There are challenges for positions in most sections of the team, and the players will be putting forward their case in the warm up games on at the moment. I’ll talk about them and let you know who I’d pick – let me know if you disagree!
Starting at the top there is the batting selection. Cook, KP, Bell, Colly and Vaughan are already on the team sheet, with seemingly Shah and Strauss vying for one spot. If Strauss gets it, it seems he might bat at no 3 with Bell moving to no 6 probably. The second warm up game starting this evening goes with this line up I think. If Shah gets it then Bell will stay at 3 and Shah gets the no 6 spot in a nice and simple move. In the first warm up game Shah did himself no harm nearly getting a century, while Strauss (who has been playing club cricket in NZ) played onto his stumps for a poor 4. I was watching Sky Sports the other day and Dominic Cork was quite adamant that Strauss shouldn’t even be in the squad, although he never quite backed up this claim with why he thought that. I’d go the way of Shah – he seems to have done enough in my mind to be given a bit of a run in the side and has looked at times a class player. However this seems to be against what the selectors will do according to the press, and I’m unsure what more Shah could do to get a test place!
Seddon Cricket Ground, Hamilton
Onto the keeper situation – and time for me to toss a coin. Mustard kept well in the ODI’s, and showed that he had potential with the bat, although I’m not sure how his batting would fare in test match cricket. It was either Craig McMillan or Cork the other day who said however, that we should be looking to bring Tim Ambrose as he was the real deal. I’m not going to say one way or the other as I don’t know enough so heads its Mustard, tails its Ambrose… and its come down tails!
Onto the bowling attack and our way without Flintoff is to go with 3 seamers and a spinner and I see no change to that formula here. The spinner will be Monty, and you couldn’t drop Hoggard or Sidebottom (if he gets over a hamstring niggle) with the new ball. Which leaves one spot open for a seamer. I would give Jimmy Anderson a break, he took some hammering in the ODI’s and would do well to maybe take a step back. Broad is one for the future and I’d be really looking to get him into the side permanently very soon, but I don’t know if now is the time. Much to the despair of a few people I expect, I would go with our friend Harmy. The very same Harmy who has managed to strain his back without even playing a proper game of cricket out there! Hold on, what am I saying – I want to bring in a permanently injured, homesick bowler who isn’t a shadow of his former self over an up and coming youngster who seems to not let setbacks affect him at all (see 36 off the over in the world twenty20 for what I mean here). I must be mad and I remain the right to change my mind at any point! What I really can’t understand is how Tremlett is still staying in the selectors thoughts. Please, anyone tell me why he is there. Broad is many times better and it annoys me to watch the mediocre performer that is Tremlett in the England side.
The final thing I wanted to say (on this rather long blog post!), is how boring it is getting reading about another incident between the players of Australia and India. Recently we had Sharma fined for over ellaborate celebration (ridiculous, I think you should be allowed to do anything!), and what really annoyed me here was a quote from the Indian team which went something like “Australia started it”. I mean come on, are we back in the playground? Australia don’t seem to know how to play humbly though, as shown by the continued comments coming out of their camp regarding some of the Indians. Guys, give it a rest now eh, its getting very boring.
