Telegraph Fantasy Cricket Update - I’m In!
I mentioned about telegraph fantasy cricket the other day and how I wasn’t sure if I would enter or not.. well I’ve caved in after a mate of mine set up a super league and I have to show him my superior knowledge! I’m already hammering him in Fantasy Premier League (football), so why not carry that over to cricket!
I’ve downloaded the player list from here, and this evening I will take a look at the lists and get my winning team together! Without giving too much away, I’m going to go for the approach with players that should be here for all the summer (none of these 3 week overseas players), and play in all forms of the game. This will allow me to effectively forget about my team once it has been setup and not worry about who’s playing for their country, in the IPL/ICL etc. So although I won’t be challenging those at the top of the leaderboard I should do ok. And if you’re really lucky I’ll give you some updates here!
Right, I’m off to choose my winning team… any tips gratefully received in the comments!!
Whilst we wait for the new England Cricket Adidas Kit
I was in a bit of a rush when I posted the other day about being able to pre-order the new England Adidas cricket kit. I didn’t get the chance to pick up on the fact that there are three variants of the kit - Test, ODI and Twenty20. The last variant is a new one for England to have at the beginning of an English summer, although we did have one at the World Cup in SA last year - previously in Twenty2- games we’ve just worn our ODI kit. I just hope that despite being by Adidas it won’t be the same as the Australian one without any sleeves! There isn’t much that can be done with the Test kit looks wise, but it will be interesting to see what design they come up with for the ODI kit.
Enough talk about kit for now, for there is a new online cricket game to play! To help with building up the launch of the new England kit, kitbag have released a little online game in the mould of stick cricket to play. My best after a couple of goes is a pretty decent 113 runs! Click Here to play and let me know your best score in the comments!
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!
Telegraph Fantasy Cricket 2008
With the counties starting pre-season games this week (it seems far, far too early though!), thoughts start to look towards the county season and The Telegraph’s popular fantasy league cricket game. There isn’t much to report at the moment, it looks like they’re waiting for the last few decisions on who is actually going to turn up and not play in India, but you can “pre-register” for the game here, and start signing up from the 7th April.
I’m undecided if at the moment if I’ll sign up - a couple of years ago I enjoyed it but there is so much cricket to try and keep an eye on and not enough time nowadays and last year my team was just ignored once I’d set it up! Anyone else thinking of playing?
Shane Warne Quits Hampshire
Quite a bold move, but if I’m honest it doesn’t surprise me in the least. Ever since he came over to play for Hants he’s taken them for a bit of a ride, saying he’ll only be over during particular dates, not playing in certain tournaments etc. Rod Bransgrove (Hants chairman) took it all though as Warne was a great marketing tool for him and the Rose Bowl outfit. And I’ll be honest, it worked to get me there a couple of times as watching the guy play did make you feel like you were watching a world class player.
However, ever since it was announced that he would miss the start of the ‘08 season to play poker (yes really), he went down in my estimation. Either you are a cricketer or a pro poker player, make up your mind and don’t play us all for fools, and sure as hell not this close to the start of the league season. Why has he taken until this point to say he’ll not play for Hants again? He was supposed to be happy where he was living and playing cricket, so something has come up, and its probably money..
Re-reading what I’ve written it seems a bit harsh on Warne as I understand that the Indian leagues and other stuff outside of cricket bring these guys a good retirement fund, but something about this announcement just seemed so inevitable I think I would have preferred to hear it early on, with all the cards on the table (no pun intended!)
When We’re Good..
I don’t know what is going on with the England team at the moment - it seems that when we’re good we’re very very good and when we’re bad we’re just bloody awful! The third test got off to a shocking start, but we recovered thanks mainly to KP, although Colly and Broad also helped out. Then with the ball we take an early wicket before giving them a chance, before Sideshow Ryan leaps into action and ends up with 7-47! The pitch looks a good one so there isn’t really a reason as to why both teams have relatively struggled with the bat in the first innings.
Fast forward to the second innings and watching Andrew Strauss possibly saving his international career with a not particularly fast, but telling big century. Quite why, when he got out, we continued batting baffled the commentators but I don’t see it as that big an issue, we’ve got plenty of time to bowl them out on the last day that if we don’t do so we won’t have deserved to win the series.
With Freddie talking a good game with his recovery though and aiming to be ready for the first test of the English summer, one of the current batsmen may have to miss out, so Strauss may not have completely saved himself just yet. It’s not clear cut though that he’ll walk straight back into the team, he’ll have to prove that he is ready before he waltzes back into the side..
Also, there is now just one day of test cricket left before we start wearing new Adidas England cricket shirts! As soon as there is some info/pictures and somewhere to buy these I’ll let you know so keep an eye out for that!
