tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-67531369851691878912024-03-16T08:27:29.159+00:00Ashes insomniacAshesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.comBlogger91125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-74085672885020097932014-12-31T14:35:00.001+00:002014-12-31T14:38:44.529+00:00A statement of defiance: Mathews' Headingley masterpiece<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Angelo Mathews has never spoken publicly about the Big Three takeover of our sport. At least not with words. But his series-winning Headingley masterpiece in June felt like a statement of defiance.<BR><BR>
It was a century that stuck a finger in the eye of the English cricket establishment and proved that off-field clout, and all it pays for, is still no match for on-field nous.<BR><BR>
The bare facts of the innings tell a story. Mathews was on 54 when the seventh wicket fell, he ended with 160. He marshalled a 149-run eighth-wicket stand with Rangana Herath, and struck 12 boundaries from the fifth or sixth ball of the over, as he savaged Alastair Cook's tactics.<BR><BR>
But it's the context of what came before that made the innings the so memorable.<BR><BR>
The year began with Cricket Australia and the ECB helping the BCCI formalise its grip on cricket’s governance. In return for more money, the ECB helped choke development of the global game. Lesser nations, like Sri Lanka, were to be given a smaller chunk of our game’s collective wealth. The Big Three were to keep more money and more decision-making power. Cabal rule, we were told, was simple meritocracy.<BR><BR>
In the new regime, however, only some merits counted. Sri Lanka may have had an astounding record: World Cup winners 1996, finalists in 2007 and again 2011. But that was irrelevant. Their board is incompetent (they are hardly along in that regard) and their TV market isn't lucrative enough to compensate.<BR><BR>
As if to demonstrate the inequity, England pinched their coach before the tour began. Paul Farbrace had just helped Sri Lanka to World T20 triumph, and still had 18 months remaining on his contract with SLC. Uninhibited, the ECB paid him and the SLC off, and took what they wanted.<BR><BR>
The ECB spent over £4m on coaches and development staff in 2014 and its reserves easily outgun the indebted SLC that can barely afford to pay its own players. So adding Farbrace to the gaggle of cheerleaders in England’s dressings room was a easy.<BR><BR>
If cricket was decided by balance sheets, an England win was a formality. They could afford more qualified coaches, more backroom experts, youth development pathways, better facilities and a bigger pool of professional, well-remunerated players. Thankfully Mathews’ century showed how the game is infinitely richer. He transformed a first-innings deficit into a match-winning lead and consigned England to their first ever early-summer series defeat.<BR><BR>
It was the innings of the year and one of the finest in history. A gripping match needed a followup, but Sri Lanka were only granted two Tests. Meritocracy decreed India deserved five instead.<BR><BR><BR>
<small><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Second-XI-Cricket-its-Outposts/dp/1785310135/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1419763429&sr=8-1&keywords=second+xi+cricket" target=New">Second XI: Cricket in its outposts</a> is a new book telling the story of cricket's struggle for existence beyond the Test world. I wrote a chapter about Chinese cricket.</small><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-81603049555348951272014-11-28T00:18:00.002+00:002014-11-28T00:20:41.209+00:00Phillip Hughes 63*<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Three months ago Michael Brown, an 18-year old black man, was shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri. I was angry, but only in theory.<BR><BR>
On Sunday a 12-year-old black child, Tamir Rice, was shot and killed by police in a playground in Cleveland. I was angry, but only in theory.<BR><BR>
This morning Phillip Hughes died. I am gutted.<BR><BR>
Sport is weird like that. All I knew of Hughes was a promise soon to be fulfilled, and a leg-side skip/off-side slash that once neutered Dale Steyn.<BR><BR>
Hughes is just one of too many, dead too young. Compared to the tragedies founded on centuries of racism, and the world’s daily injustices and ill-fortunes, we shouldn’t need Hughes’s freak death to give us perspective. But it does.<BR><BR>
Because tragedies are meant for real life, and the sports field is a sacred space where real life is unwelcome.<BR><BR>
Sport should be the great distraction. We may know it’s plagued by the frustrations of real life, but in the thick of action, it <i>feels</i> immune from it.<BR><BR>
So for reality to intrude in the most devastating way, while Hughes played with friends and in front of family, is heartbreaking.<BR><BR>
His death is no sadder than the many that will take place today, tomorrow and forever, but it sure feels like it. <BR><BR>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJJnVHlfC_gWk0H9iCNHEIK914V7AKTbHauKOY2K-nQlJXDfkxLohoSW0iPDeyCGf-RI952OxXwQeaHvV60QXFS-Iglf5RTl7RFOx5o_2iAJB5DcR9dMyyhxEXyyCUU3OnxqC7AWnUyQj8/s1600/put+out+your+bat.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJJnVHlfC_gWk0H9iCNHEIK914V7AKTbHauKOY2K-nQlJXDfkxLohoSW0iPDeyCGf-RI952OxXwQeaHvV60QXFS-Iglf5RTl7RFOx5o_2iAJB5DcR9dMyyhxEXyyCUU3OnxqC7AWnUyQj8/s200/put+out+your+bat.JPG" /></a></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-31627117088978890422014-02-05T16:24:00.001+00:002014-11-28T00:27:56.299+00:00KP and the English cricket establishment <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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They got him in the end. Not before he became England's highest-ever runscorer. Not before he was part of a No.1 team, three Ashes wins, a World Twenty20 title and victory in India. And not before he entertained millions in a way no other Englishman could.
But finally, after a decade of mistrust and suspicion, English cricket has dumped Kevin Pietersen.<br><br>
I say “they” because as collateral from the Ashes mauling mounts, it feels as though an old rift in English cricket is rupturing once more. The establishment, with its management systems, conservatism and ruthless profiteering seems suddenly so distant from the many outsiders whose love and money fuels the sport.<br><br>
Pietersen is a talisman. An Englishman who epitomises “outsider”. After nearly a decade in the England set-up he is left with no friend in the dressing room and no supporters at the ECB. His restless innovation and calculated daring made him one of the most magnetic batsmen to have ever taken guard, but also an individual utterly convinced of his own way. A self-obsessed genius. Most are.<br><br>
Though the runs he scored and series he won were gleefully accepted by captains, coaches and administrators whose lofty reputations he helped establish, they never seemed to accept the man himself.<br><br>
It might well be that his dressing-room presence was untenable. His rumoured put-down of James Taylor offers a glimpse of what off-field life was like with Pietersen. Though it reveals something about the nature and utility of managerial thinking if the best player is sacked for being unmanageable.<br><br>
But if there is a reason compelling enough to deprive England fans of Pietersen, the ECB has to spell it out. Allowing lawyers to gag them speaks of how far the ECB have distanced themselves from the public. So far, a struggling captain, a new managing director and an unappointed coach have made the decision without explanation.<br><br>
All the while, the outsider fans that pay the salaries of the suits, coaches and players have been told nothing beyond obfuscation and innuendo. Parts of the paper press, meanwhile, are quick to sanctimoniously remind us of our ignorance, but far less willing to provide the clarity we pay them for.<br><br>
For the second time in a month the ECB have taken a monumental decision without explanation. When they helped sever cricket's global development and establish the Big Three cabal, much of the print media (Atherton & Berry apart) were silent, before eventually spinning a story about the pragmatic “realities” of the grown-up world. The entire issue passed without the ECB fielding significant public scrutiny.<br><br>
It speaks of a deeper and more longstanding narrowness in English cricket. The ECB executive board is dominated by well-to-do white men, the England team is dominated by private-school boys, and even in 2014, there is no non-white coach of any county team or in the National Cricket Performance Centre. <br><br>
The broadcast media may provide the best of any sport coverage in the country, but it is still dominated almost entirely by ex-pros. Test Match Sofa, an amateur upstart, is being quietly suffocated by an establishment needlessly wary of outsider voices.<br><br>
The danger is that such suspicion creates myopia. From WG Grace to Pietersen - via Tony Grieg and David Gower – English cricket has long had an institutional suspicion of free-wheeling mavericks. Though, at least Grace et al got a chance. It is the less celebrated, like Maurice Holmes, who really suffer from the reflex for orthodoxy that festers in the English game.<br><br>
If England want talk of a “team ethic”, “rebuilding” and new “philosophy” to be more than MBA buzzwords, they should look a little deeper and think a little broader about the way they approach the game. A “fresh start” would be to embrace the irritants, freaks and non-conformists.
<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-3136600649043984392014-01-21T16:11:00.001+00:002014-01-21T16:11:48.228+00:00But the market can't count<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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On Monday, Misbah-ul-Haq angled a single to point to seal Pakistan's remarkable day-five heist <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/pakistan-v-sri-lanka-2013-14/engine/match/657651.html" target="New">against Sri Lanka</a> and one of history's great Test runchases. <br />
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A match that had meandered for four days exploded into a classic finish. Great cricket, but was it financially viable?
According to the ICC commercial rights working group, probably not. <br />
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Their leaked position paper revealed much about the dysfunctional governance of world cricket but it also showed just how impoverished an arbiter of sporting worth “the market” really is. <br />
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The paper speaks hopefully of things like “self sufficiency” and “independence” for national cricket boards, but proposes a system where the richest boards take an even bigger slice of world cricket's revenue.<br />
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It reasons that the countries with the biggest broadcasting markets – India, Australia and England – are cricket's biggest wealth-creators and deserve the greatest rewards. That's supposedly the law of the market.<br />
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A law that decrees Azhar Ali's matchwinning century almost worthless because, in commercial terms, Pakistan playing Sri Lanka in UAE is trivial. <br />
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But has the market miscounted? What if Azhar takes this experience to help Pakistan thrive in Australia? What if Junaid Khan uses skills honed against, say, New Zealand to deliver an eyecatching series in India? The kind of series that draws viewers and sponsors in even greater numbers. Where, then, was the value created?<br />
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The sporting drama, romance and historical significance of matches like Shajah are easily overlooked by the market. But even in the hard-nosed terms the working group thinks it deals in, the market is a faulty calculator. <br />
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Cricket's value is captured when broadcast rights are sold, but it is created well before then. The Big Three feel themselves worthy rulers of the sport because they have a cricket-watching population which advertisers are prepared to pay broadcasters vast sums to reach.<br />
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Yet people choose to watch cricket (or follow it online) for its history, its culture, its personalities, its skills and the closeness of its competition. This is where “revenue generation” actually happens and why talk of “independence” is so dishonest.<br />
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For all lipservice paid to meritocracy, the proposals also reveal how markets work by limiting, rather than embracing, competition. In the two-division future it suggests, The Big Three can't be relegated. And, despite cricket's desperate needs for global growth, it suggests money be taken from development and funnelled back to the centre.<br />
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Given the opportunity, there could be millions of new fans in China for example. But the country has one turf pitch and barely any international fixtures. The ICC reported $1,564 million revenue in its last cycle three-quarters of which is handed back to 10 Test-playing countries. Some of this is money that could be used to foster the sport in countries like China. <br><br>
Though in the short run a cost, in the future it would provide a bigger cricket-loving population and a sport with a global outlook. The kind of thing advertisers might one day like. <br />
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Yet, as <a href="http://idlesummers.com/post.php?postid=1812" target="new">Russell Dengan</a> points out, the proposals suggest the opposite. In the 'cost-savings' proposed, if ICC revenue reached $2 billion, the Big Three would pocket 108% of the increase. As usual an appeal for 'market rule' is in fact a call for cartels and cabals. <br />
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Apologists for the paper tell the world to take commerce seriously. But it's less about money than it is about power. </div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-18732358082172696542014-01-19T18:50:00.000+00:002014-01-19T23:40:26.054+00:00Cricket's governance coup: A disgrace but not a shock<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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We've failed. News that cricket's financial Big Three are <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci-icc/content/current/story/710723.html" target="new">planning a coup</a> is a disgrace. It's hopefully a call to arms too. But it's certainly not a surprise. <br><BR>
The signs were clear when the BCCI severed India's tour to South Africa. They were clear when the ECB and CA watched on silently as it happened. They were clear when the only five-Test series being scheduled involved India, Australia and England; when cricket's potential Olympic participation was quietly aborted; when the Woolf Report was ignored. <br><BR>
The Big Three had veto power in all-but name already. Now they are formalising their grip on the game and forcing an even greater concentration of wealth upon themselves. In effect the seven other Test-playing nations – including the best team in the world – are being flung onto the scrapheap with the ICC's other 96 members. <br><BR>
All the while, bar some very determined and important exceptions, much of cricket's fan base and press have stood by idly. Maybe governance just isn't interesting enough, maybe the news cycle is too immediate, maybe it's just easier not to bother. But as a cricketing public we've failed to hold the powers that run our sport to account.<br><BR>
The Guardian's cricket coverage often sets the bar to which others to aspire. According to Mike Selvey, they had this story for a while, but didn't feel it newsworthy. Really!? <br><BR>
There would outrage if the Premiere League proposed a rule preventing the biggest three clubs from ever being relegated. Yet even now there is very little comment on this ICC story. <br><BR>
Broadcasters, meanwhile, are more the partners of administrative power than they are its investigators. Skysports are entirely silent on this news and the BBC have barely raised a whisper. <br><BR>
Maybe it's as much our failure as it is theirs. If we care about our sport we should be screaming from the rooftops. Or at least Tweeting about it. <br><BR>
Jarrod says all that needs to be <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/710789.html" target=New">here</a>. And there is a petition to sign <a href="http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/petition-to-oppose-international-cricket-council" target=New">here</a>. <div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-458664295383372072014-01-06T10:48:00.001+00:002014-01-06T21:44:35.597+00:00Unthinkable? An England team without managers<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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If the Ashes mega-series taught us anything, it was that management was absolutely right until it was wrong. That Andy Flower's professional, marginal-gains micromanagement was superior to Darren Lehman's more old-fashioned, tell-a-joke; be-a-bloke style. Until the opposite was true.<br><br>
As England now decide on what to rescue and restore from their wreckage of a winter, there will be much focus on Flower and his squadron of backroom assistants. But where does responsibility lie? Are the players accountable for their own performance or does the environment they're in matter too?<br><br>
Andrew Strauss articulated the puzzle perfectly when trying to defend England's management team. Flower, he said, deserves support because he has overseen so many successes. Equally he shouldn't be blamed for this series, because it's the players who take the field.<br><br>
Management science relies on the myth that results can be achieved if the correct processes are developed. The moral of the Moneyball story was that there are no barriers to success. Given enough information and enough analysis, strategies can always be found.<br><br>
Team England seem staunch believers in the management ideal. It means they place enormous importance in their pre-cooked plans and enormous faith in their ability to control. So better young players develop under their tutelage at Loughborough than out of view with the counties. Better menus are determined by the experts than let individuals decide what's good for them. <br><br>
Players are required to be automators, delivering the agenda developed by the centre.<br><br>
It made England incredibly proficient against middling teams. As long as there was no outlier x-factor that could elude management planning, England were ruthless. But whenever mystery struck – a doosra, a counter-attack, Mitch - England got derailed. <div><br>
It's not that players took the field and unthinkingly performed Gooch or Saker's instructions. But they imbued a culture of management control that drained them of autonomy, accountability and the ability to think on their feet.<br><br>
Though England are more extreme in their fondness for managerialism, they aren't unique. It's the direction all teams are moving. But it wasn't always this way. <br><br>
The plethora of coaches is a fairly recent development in the sport. As Michael Atherton wrote recently: “On my first Australian tour, in 1990-91, we travelled with a manager, whose job it was to sort out travel arrangements and hand out disciplinary fines, a coach, a scorer and a physiotherapist.<br><br>
“A player... could ask the coach or captain for advice; he could ask a senior player to have a watch in the nets; he could ring home and speak to a trusted adviser; or he could sort things out for himself. It meant that there was no less advice available than now, but it was less structured, less formal.”<br><br>
The great West Indies and Australian teams got by without the dense layers of management England use. As recently as 2007, an Indian side led by Rahul Dravid and packed with senior pros secured a historic series win in England without a coach.<br><br>
It won't happen now but as England ponder their new era it's worth wondering what would happen if they did away with a management team altogether.</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-6485365513438816502013-11-26T19:43:00.001+00:002013-11-26T20:59:25.831+00:00Finn: England's missing paceman <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Cricket doesn't often offer much for adrenaline junkies, but when fast bowlers find fast pitches, it's intoxicating. Pace is the most visceral and unforgiving part of the game. Weakness against spin can be tolerated as a technical failing; falling to pace is invariably a moral problem.<br><br>
It was Mitchell Johnson's pace that made the first Test the most pulsating Ashes match since 2005. Until Jonathan Trott's departure from the tour, the post-match talk was all about the unique challenges real quick bowling presents. Curious then, that England's fastest bowler – Steven Finn – was entirely absent at the Gabba.<br><br>
Finn is not quite as explosive as Johnson - his orthodox action means he'll never feel quite as raw - but he's equally volatile and just as potent. Like Johnson he was spotted early, promised much but never seemed settled. And like Johnson his reputation belies his record.<br><br>
From 23 Tests Finn's strike rate is 48.3, better than James Anderson and Stuart Broad by 10. His average (29.40) also shades England's senior bowlers. He was England's highest wicket taker in the tour matches leading into the first Test but also their most profligate. And therein lies the problem for the selectors. England deem Finn too pricey for their parsimonious preferences.<br><br>
Yet it is interesting to contrast Finn's development with England's Gabba standout, Broad. Finn made his debut an equally willowly quick in Bangladesh three-and-a-half years ago. Since then he has added bulk to his body and speed to his bowling but has been dropped six times. Some of these were horse-for-course changes where England preferred a second spinner. But many were not and they speak of enormous instability.<br><br>
It took Broad less than two years to play the same number of Tests and by his own acknowledgement he had to learn on the job. Unlike Finn, he was allowed to. Broad has been dropped for poor form only twice in his Test career. At the equivalent stage to Finn he had 23 less wickets at an average – 36.14 – that was much worse.<br><br>
Part of the reason Broad was allowed to develop in the team was the presence of a fourth seamer. Andrew Flintoff played in 10 of Broad's early Tests which meant if Broad had a shaky day his overs could be found elsewhere. After repeated batting malfunctions it is unfair to focus on the bowlers, but England miss a fourth seamer. Not just to free Broad and Anderson up, but maybe most significantly to allow Finn to develop.<br><br>
England's obsessively detailed management has been well documented and their devotion to professionalism has undoubtedly lifted standards. But while they focus on the marginals, Finn is quickly becoming their biggest failure.<br><br>
He has all the attributes of an outstanding fast bowler. His second-innings spell at Lord's against South Africa last year was every bit as devastating as Johnson at the Gabba and before his difficult Ashes outing at Trent Bridge in July he troubled New Zealand's batsmen.<br><br>
It's unlikely Finn will be recalled at Adelaide. England are desperate for the steadier Tim Bresnan to return. But genuine pace is a rare commodity. Finn might soon prove more expensive out of the team than he would in it. <br><br><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-20708616479838590032013-11-17T15:06:00.000+00:002013-11-17T15:08:48.528+00:00Piercing the hot air - Sachin's 38<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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It was tough trying to wade through the torrent of saccharine sentiment. Of course it had to be like this, the entertainment industry loves instructing people how to feel. <br><br>
Cricket, ever more so, is no exception. Though the Test format is less malleable to the banal storytelling of marketeers, Sachin Tendulkar's final Test was an easy sell.<br><br>
And boy they sold it. Cricinfo was bursting with Sachin, while Twitter was melting from tedious twos-and-fros between those lauding Sachin and those taking the piss. <br><br>
Tendulkar's final Test innings (and with that shambolic West Indies outfit it was always going to be his last) was a massive occasion. It was just that being told over and again how important the man and the moment were made me numb. <br><br>
I understood why so many said so much. I've long been struck by the gloriously earnest instinct in India for both sentiment and categorisation. Tendulkar's career and retirement tapped both. His many feats meant he was No. 1 runscorer, No. 1 century-maker, No. 1 match-player. And having watched him live his entire adult life as a champion on the pitch, people had every right to feel emotional.<br><br>
So I did not belong with the curmudgeons grumbling about the quantity of the coverage. It is just that I could not engage with it. The noise - visual, aural and mental - that cluttered Tendulkar's final moment made me immune to it. <br><br>
But it just so happened that I was home when the moment came. Cricinfo told me Murali Vijay was out and that the crowd had erupted. The only video coverage I could get was through my mobile. A small screen pathetically at odds with the occasion.<br><br>
The <i>sound</i> of the crowd as he sped out the middle, the chaotic slog-sweep to get off the mark, the half-volley stroked through cover. <i>That</i> punch drive down the ground. Of his 15921 Test runs, the 38 he made that evening must count among his least significant. <br><br>
But those 20 overs were among the most dramatic I'd seen. As was always the way with Tendulkar, the guff was cleared aside to make way for the sport. <br><br>
It was 20 overs that snatched the moment from the promoters and returned it to the fans. For that I #thankyousachin.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-90377656455773751232013-09-14T21:20:00.000+00:002013-09-17T21:21:48.485+00:00Let the umpire call itWhat makes a good umpiring decision? Thirteen years ago England were chasing an unlikely late-evening victory, against Pakistan in <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/63901.html" target="new">Karachi</a>, in light that was manifestly poor. Conditions were unfair to the fielding team, who couldn't see the ball, and dangerous for the batsmen. Yet the umpires - Steve Bucknor and Mohammad Nazir - got approval from the batsmen and stayed on. Their reasoning was that Moin Khan, the Pakistan captain, had deliberately wasted time and so had no right now to complain.<br><br>
Last <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/566936.html" target=New">month</a> Michael Clarke's self-indulgence combined with Kevin Pietersen to gift a capacity crowd a stirring Sunday-evening finish. A middling Ashes series was set for a spectacular denouement. Yet with the climax in sight, the umpires pulled the plug on the party and sent everyone home four overs from the finish. Why? Because the light had dipped below a benchmark level.<br><br>
In Karachi the umpires used their common sense. Strong-willed and sensible, they spat on the rule book but ensured a fair and memorable result. At The Oval the umpires were consistent. The precedent was set earlier in the series and no matter the context, rules were rules and needed respecting.<br><br>
It seems that when it comes to umpiring, you can have consistency or common sense but you can't always have both. Our inability to decide which we prefer means umpires get berated for making the wrong decision and similarly pilloried for making the right ones too.<br><br>
Whether Saturday league cricket or a Test match, players at all levels often seem to value umpiring consistency more than correctness - the odd decision may go wrong, so the thinking goes, but it is forgivable if the reasoning is consistent. At the highest level that demand for ever more consistency, though, has meant stripping umpires of the ability to exercise their judgement in the way Bucknor did.<br><br>
By necessity rules are written in the abstract and when put into practice may not be appropriate in every situation. Because cricket sprawls over five days and encompasses so many variations and contingencies, its laws are incredibly intricate and open to interpretation.<br><br>
It is this ability to tailor the laws to the situation that makes umpires so important. Bowlers, for example, normally have enormous leeway for wides in Tests, but on the exceptional occasions when a chase enters the final afternoon, it makes sense for umpires to intervene and tighten up the margins. Though not necessarily consistent, few would deny its appropriateness.<br><br>
Yet the more professional cricket has become, the more players' demands for consistency have been met, and the more umpires have been robbed of authority and discretion. Andy Flower, for instance, suggested after the Oval Test that there could be a universal benchmark for bad light. This would clarify any grey area but reduce the umpires' role in the matter to meter readers. And could a one-size-fits-all approach really cope with the nuances of every situation? Absolutely not.<br><br>
The DRS is another area where umpiring judgement has been curtailed. The system was introduced to account for the outliers (howlers) that human umpires will occasionally make. Given that players and spectators will use all technology available to judge the quality of umpires, the officials deserve similar resources. By demonstrating just how many deliveries can go on to hit the stumps, the DRS has also helped even the balance between bat and ball and bring fingerspin back into the game. For that it should be celebrated.<br><br>
The trouble is that by forcing players to decide when to use technology, it necessarily becomes tactical. It is that marginal use of the DRS that too often makes a mockery of umpires. Reasonable decisions get overturned, and umpires are reduced to go-betweens in a process dictated by players and the technology. Not only does that needlessly undermine umpires, it means reviews can get used up on marginal calls while being unavailable to correct the really poor decisions.<br><br>
Better would be to give the third umpire three opportunities an innings to review what he considers to be howlers. The <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/blogs/content/story/654847.html" target="new">existing protocol</a> for suspected edges makes a sound place to start. Through consultation with the third umpire, the on-field official gleans all information and then decides whether to change the original decision. Like in rugby, the officials' reasoning could be explained live to the public and players, and their authority upheld.<br><br>
The Ashes summer was marred by some extraordinarily poor umpiring, especially by the third umpires. There is, though, no legislating for such incompetence and neither should there be. Professionally trained, well-paid and well-rested umpires must be trusted to make good decisions. Their independence also allows them to safeguard the wider interests of the sport in a way players cannot.<br><br>
When empowered, umpires would then be in a better position to act in other areas of the game. The scandalously poor over rates could be tackled with much stronger umpiring. Similarly, the issue of low catches being obscured by camera-lens shortening, which often leads to the wrong not-out decision being made for the sake of consistency, could be resolved by on- and off-field umpires collaborating to try to make more positive judgements more often with clear explanation.<br><br>
No matter how hard they strive, cricket's administrators can never deliver faultless decision-making. Broadcasting technology has helped, Elite umpires too, but the game is just too peculiar to guarantee perfection. Yet in a choice between more rules telling umpires how to act, or more trust in them to do what's best for the game, it's the umpires who should be supported.<br><br>
<small>This blog was first published on <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/blogs/content/story/671495.html">Cricinfo's Cordon</a></small><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-16488608410325109832013-08-19T15:23:00.000+00:002013-08-19T18:14:12.406+00:00Panesar deserves support<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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A couple of years ago a friend of mine from Brighton saw Monty Panesar taking his bins out. As he walked back to his door, Panesar wheeled his bowling arm over. It's a lovely image and much in keeping with popular perceptions of Panesar at the time: unaffected, exuberant and innocent.<br><br>
News of Panesar's ugly night out in Brighton blew that apart. Harassing women and pissing on bouncers jarred with our idea of the once teetotal man. The stereotypes about Panesar, though, were always lazy. Though partly an affectionate reaction to his hapless fielding and wide eyes, the repeated caricatures of Panesar as an essentially meek and laughable man risked slipping into murky territory.<br><br>
Panesar has struck a disaffected figure this season. His marriage broke down and he has, apparently, been repeatedly in Sussex's bad books. His bowling has also suffered with 23 Championship wickets and 40.39 this year, though he still the leading English spinner in Division One.<br><br>
From a distance it seems as though Panesar has been trying for some time to be taken more seriously. Gone last winter were the wild wicket celebrations as he was delivering one of England's greatest overseas triumphs. In their place were more aggressive and poised reactions. He also added an MBA over the winter to his earlier BSc, taking his exams while on tour with England. <br><br>
Despite his resounding success in India (something people forgot far too quickly), Panesar's ability was again questioned after three poor games on unhelpful tracks in New Zealand. The grumbles over his batting and fielding resurfaced, complaints over monotonous bowling returned, and the names of young spinners across the country were talked up.<br><br>
On Sunday England dumped Panesar and picked Lancashire's Simon Kerrigan for The Oval squad. Though understandable for now England should be doing all they can to support one of their prime assets.<br><br>
Panesar is unlucky to have played in the same era as one of England's greatest spinners. Having basked in limelight at the start of his international career he has been stuck on the margins since Graeme Swann's emergence. His mentor Neil Burns told the <i>Daily Mail</i> Panesar “sees himself as “an outsider”, who only becomes “an insider” when he is bowling well.<br><br>
“Some have developed an inflexible view of him and only seem to value him as a bowling machine, and tend to ridicule other parts of his game and personality,” said Burns. “Dealing with rejection, and feeling on the outside again, proved a difficult emotional challenge.”<br><br>
Panesar is off to Essex until the end of the season and it is possible he will return to Northants next year. When he left his boyhood county in 2009 Panesar was reportedly suffering in a hostile dressing-room atmosphere. Still he donated £10,000 to Northants, thanking them for their role in his development. It's difficult to think of many others who would do the same.<br><br>
Swann's sore elbow might curtail his England career soon and though 31 years old Panesar is very fit and a proven matchwinner. Of course Panesar himself is responsible for resolving his problems but as he looks to get his life back on course, he deserves respect and support.<br><br><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-78741536034878653352013-08-13T18:25:00.001+00:002013-08-14T10:12:38.925+00:00Bairstow's nervous wait<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Jonny Bairstow had to wait. Cricket is cruel like that. Not the seven weeks he went without a first-class game in the build up to this series. Rather the 47 hours between the end of his tortured first innings and the start his second. <br><br>
Other sports distract their players by forcing them to play. Cricket refuses that get-out clause. Instead the mind is allowed to fester in the long pauses that outstretch action in any Test match.<br><br>
At 23 Bairstow is having his technique publicly severed. The tag-lines are building. Ravi Bopara's Test match career can't be discussed without reference to being "found out by Australia" and Bairstow is watching the same thing envelope him.<br><br>
In 2009 Bopara, batting No. 3, shambled 105 runs at 15 before being cut loose for The Oval finale. Bairstow has 203 at 29 in this series. The backroom army would have routines to try and help him "stay in the present" and "focus on processes" but he would not be human if his mind didn't wander.<br><br>
Right now his team-mates are being celebrated for their stirring late-evening victory dash. Nestled in the eulogies, though, are questions over Bairstow's position.<br><br>
Waking up on day three – with Australia 222 for 5 overnight - he would have known his second innings was coming. But it didn't until well into the final session of the day. Until then his contribution had been nothing beyond the 77-ball first-innings ordeal. <br><br>
Of course Bairstow is used to batting down the order and waiting his turn. He's done that for Yorkshire throughout his career. But usually as a wicketkeeper. The dual role may help liberate his free-wheeling natural game. Shawn of wicketkeeping duties his batting comes under even closer scrutiny.<br><br>
Since Paul Collingwood's retirement at the end of the 2010/11 Ashes England have trialled six middle-order pretenders in 31 matches. Collectively they average 27.5. Joe Root was the one outright success but that only propelled him to the top of the order.<br><br>
The instability – especially the manner of Nick Compton and James Taylor's dropping - was another thing Bairstow had to mull over as he waited for that second chance. When it did finally come England were only 123 ahead and tottering. It was an match-defining opportunity to grab.<br><br>
He didn't quite do so, making 28 before an underwhelming edge behind off Nathan Lyon. Yet Bairstow should take solace from the fact he found some freedom in the last-chance saloon. Just like Collingwood used to. His innings was brief but studded with six boundaries and was decisive while it lasted. It suggests he has the fortitude to overcome cricket's peculiar rhythms, even if his technique remains doubtful.<br><br>
He has another nervous wait now before the squad for the final Test is announced. His positive second-innings batting might just have earned him a reprieve. If England are certain they don't want a No. 6 who can bowl, Bairstow deserves another chance.<br><br> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-26016878411387857842013-07-04T21:26:00.000+00:002013-09-17T21:33:34.669+00:00Are teams affected by their past?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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History matters to those who love cricket. Fans and commentators obsess over statistics and old stories, while TV analysts and tweeters thrill themselves with footage from the past.<br />
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But what about the players? With old failures and successes just a laptop away, it is harder than ever for them to escape their history. If one particular team or cricketer struggles, we're quick to pounce on weaknesses. Think choking South Africans or Kevin Pietersen and left-arm spin.<br />
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Are tropes like these just commentary clichés or is there something more? Do past defeats haunt future performances? Can teams even remember together, or does each individual carry their burdens alone? These are the questions all teams confront, and ones Michael Clarke's Australians will need to answer before the Ashes double header begins in July.<br />
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Clarke has played in <a href="http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/player/4578.html?class=1;opposition=1;template=results;type=allround;view=series" target="New">four Ashes series</a>, and lost three of them. Five of his colleagues have played England in the past but only in losing series. It is one of the many ways the teams have flipped positions from a decade ago.<br />
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Through the '90s, England's players would prepare for their biannual mauling with nothing but defeat to guide them. When, by 2005, they had a youthful team capable of overcoming Australia, Michael Vaughan didn't want a dressing room crowded with past disappointments. It meant Graham Thorpe - a veteran of <a href="http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/player/21537.html?class=1;filter=advanced;opposition=2;orderby=start;template=results;type=allround;view=results" target="New">five defeated Ashes campaigns</a> out of five - was dropped for a callow Ian Bell. England's series win justified the decision, but it's doubtful whether Thorpe's presence would have really harmed Vaughan's chances.<br />
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After South Africa's recent Champions Trophy semi-final flop against England, their coach Gary Kirsten was quick to cite <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/icc-champions-trophy-2013/content/story/643565.html" target="New">the c-word</a>. South Africa's history of semi-final defeats was enough for Kirsten to blame that common curse. Similarly, in 2012 when England <a href="http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/team/1.html?class=1;result=2;spanmax1=31+Dec+2012;spanmin1=01+Jan+2012;spanval1=span;template=results;type=team;view=results" target="new">lost Tests</a> to Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India, the conclusion was that they had a collective - and historical - weakness against spin bowling.<br />
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Yet for Bill Filby, a sports psychologist at Brighton University who works with the Sussex county team, too much is made of the past. "As a group your confidence is related to, and influenced by, past performances in similar situations," he says. "So if you had exactly the same players, playing in exactly the same conditions against exactly the same opposition, then of course [past results] would be expected to have a significant impact. But defeats from four years ago in different situations shouldn't really make much of a difference."<br />
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On the surface it sounds reasonable. Yet why should sports teams be immune to history and culture when other groups are not? Countries draw on founding myths and symbols of collective meaning to maintain certain ideas about themselves. Similarly past traumas scar nations and affect the decisions societies make. The memory of 1920s Germany contributes in some part to creating a country terrified of hyper-inflation and mass unemployment.<br />
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According to Filby such group dynamics are not that significant in cricket: "[It] is a team sport in name but really each moment is an individual battle." Forget no "I" in team, there is no team in "I". That's certainly an appealing idea to sportsmen intent on scripting their own destiny, and useful to the management teams that insist they can help.<br />
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But reputations matter. Australia are no longer the best side in the world and their once revered system is failing to produce the high-quality players of old. Yet to a generation of players, coaches and fans around the world, memories of Australian dominance still burn bright. You only need to look at the over 30 Australians in the last IPL, and the dozen-odd who will feature in county cricket this summer.<br />
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Similarly the history of Pakistani cricket suggests the presence of an ineffable collective force. When they enter one of their <a href="http://www.alloutcricket.com/blogs/sundries/the-haal-of-pakistan" target="New">haal moments</a>, clicking into their unique zone where they summon opposition collapses out of the ether, are they not drawing on a cultural memory deeper than any one individual's experiences? It is something as difficult to quantify and control as it is to ignore.<br />
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The effects of winning or losing linger well after the stumps are drawn. Australia's reputation - especially after their off-field shenanigans - is creaking. If over the next two series they make it five Ashes defeats out of six, it will take a long time to repair.<br />
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<small>This blog was first published on <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/blogs/content/story/647299.html">Cricinfo's Cordon</a></small>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-47545631086984755372013-06-25T09:55:00.002+00:002014-01-22T21:43:22.665+00:00Misunderstanding cricket's valueWe're living in the golden age. Never have cricket's financial foundations been more secure. Yet still, worry abounds. Oddly, it is these very riches causing the uncertainty, because by obsessing on the revenue-generating parts of cricket, administrators are putting the value of the wider game at risk.<br><br>
It is worth reflecting on how much has changed. 17 years ago the sport's most lucrative product – the 1996 World Cup – earned full member nations $500,000 each. At the time it was big money. In 2011, the IPL alone – a notionally domestic tournament - made the BCCI nearly $50m. Such largesse is unprecedented.<br><br>
With this wealth has come much wrangling over the direction the game should take. Players, broadcasters, boards and franchises all see themselves as the key to future fortunes and the ones deserving of greater rewards. Over the last few months this has played out in a number of spats.<br><br>
There was the PCA claim that England players are “substantially underpaid”. Before that Nottinghamshire announced contracted players would be blocked from playing in the IPL. The lead-up to England's Test series in India saw the 'TMS war' where the BBC took umbrage at having to shell out great expenses to cover England internationals while Test Match Sofa didn't pay a penny. And in India, the BCCI denied access to photographers, web-journalists and broadcasters unwilling to meet stringent financial conditions. In short, the sudden wealth brought a poverty of vision and much backbiting. <br><br>
In some sense it is right for the England players to demand flexibility. Central contract retainers pay between £200k - £400k a year, so England's stars are hardly impoverished, but they do earn less than Australia's. Michael Clarke and Shane Watson receive £1m from the ACB while, crucially, remaining free to sell themselves in the BBL and IPL. The early-summer Test matches in England clash with the IPL and are frequently underwhelming affairs against underprepared and understrength oppositions. A rejigging of the summer calendar is welcome but players should accept that their demand for higher salaries drives congestion of the international fixture list.<br><br>
If the PCA case is an attempt to harness player power, Nottinghamshire's stance is the reverse. Cricketers like Alex Hales would undoubtedly learn (as well as earn) plenty from playing alongside the best in a high-pressure atmosphere at the IPL. What that experience and opportunity contributes to the English game might be vast, but difficult to quantify. It is understandable Nottinghamshire should want the services of their player but it is an unsustainable decision in the long term and if all county teams did the same it would not necessarily do much good for English cricket.<br><br>
Both the BCCI and critics of the Sofa share a similar short-sightedness. The inflated cost of broadcast rights has priced all competitors to Sky out of the television market in England, but the BBC's radio coverage was thought sacrosanct. The Sofa changed that by opening out to a new online audience but was criticised for not making a direct financial contribution to the ECB.<br><br>
Greater coverage – whether through online radio, or photography, or web-journalists - broadens the reach and raises the profile of the sport, which can only improve commercial worth down the line. Ensuring people in Australia can listen to radio coverage of the Test series against India, for instance, deepens the presence of the sport globally. That is something to be fostered for tomorrow's good, not blocked in search of a better return today.<br><br>
Underlying all this is a false logic over how wealth in the game is created. On the surface it may seem obvious. Punters watch short-form cricket, especially T20, and this makes broadcasters happy to shell out vast sums for the access to sell adverts to them. Longer forms of the game are less attractive so should be, at best, set aside solely for nostalgic safekeeping. In England specifically, the international team is what is marketable, so the needs of county cricket should be demoted. The implication is straightforward. Limited-over cricket is the must-have product, broadcasters the financiers, and the game should be run to best appease both.<br><br>
Yet if the last five years have taught us anything, it is that balance sheets can occlude more than they reveal. The value of a product can't be understood by how much it is sold for. This is because of the difference between what business textbooks would call “value-creation” and “value-capture”. The first is a complex, messy and often unintended process involving many parties over a long period, while the second is a more simplified snapshot of all that went before.<br><br>
International players can point out it is their labour on display that people enjoy watching, so should be entitled to a handsome share of the revenue created. But where would they be without an administrative set up that provides them the place to showcase their skills? Counties and other domestic teams don't attract the kind of crowds, sponsorship or rights deals that allow them to generate much revenue, but it is they who identify and nurture the talent that goes on to become broadcast-valuable international cricketers. So while they may not capture value, they certainly help create it. Similarly, women's cricket may not yet draw the same audience numbers or rights deals as the men's game but by opening out cricket's audience and changing perception of the sport, it helps cricket as a whole become more lucrative. As such women cricketers could demand a greater share.<br><br>
Looking further down the ladder to grass roots, clubs play a pivotal role fanning the first flames of interest in youngsters. Without Burnley CC, James Anderson might have become an estate agent. Moreover the communitarian spirit recreational cricket instills forms an important part of the affection for the sport more broadly, which matters when boards sell sponsorship and rights.<br><br>
At the most basic level, cricket is valuable because people like it and it takes all these groups to ensure that's the case. How this love gets monetised is a different matter and changes as society and technology evolves.<br><br>
Cricket's first flourishing was thanks to aristocratic patronage. High society benefactors showcased their wealth and status by paying amateurs and shamateurs to compete. The popularity of both the cricket and especially gambling on it, then allowed the game to expand with punters happy to pay to watch matches. Fast-forward two generations and the post-Packer era of bumper media rights provided the engine for the multimillion-pound growth in the game. Just lately the circle is intriguingly returning in some way to its origins, with IPL teams being bought partly as very public displays of status. In the long term, as technology further undermines the ability for monopoly broadcasting, it may be that the sums available for the game diminish.<br><br>
It is important to remember all this in the dash for cash. Those arguing that Test cricket's pre-industrial sprawl is out of kilter with contemporary commerce, miss where some of the short-form's value comes from. In part it is the context and contrast provided by the longer game that makes T20 attractive. Also it is the star personalities, forged over international series, that brings value to the IPL and BBL brands.<br><br>
These two dominant Twenty20 tournaments rely on the stardom of international cricketers to market themselves. How else to explain Shane Warne's continued presence? Unlike football, cricket is a sport that blossomed primarily through international competition. Even in the private, city-based tournaments, the success of the national team matters. The 2012 BBL is forecast to make a £7.2m loss at just the time the Australian national team are floundering. Likewise the IPL's brand value, while still sizeable, dipped along with the form of the Indian side.<br><br>
The skills and new audience developed in the shortest form have already crossed over to the longer game. Test cricket is going through an especially fast-paced period. While recognising how gains from one form can cross-subsidise another in this way, administrators seem less able to see the reverse. The South African cricket board's decision to stage a T20 international on Boxing Day last year instead of a Test was a galling example. Pulling support out of Test and long-form cricket and hoping to get by predominantly on limited-over games might look commercially sensible now, but may undermine the value of the game further down the line.<br><br>
One way or another, the new wealth will dramatically restructure how cricket is played. It provides administrators with a wonderful opportunity to expand the game. Yet if they continue to chase short-term gains over broader support they will only squander the chance.<br><br>
<small>This article appeared first in the May 2013 issue of Spin Cricket. <a href="http://www.spinoffcricket.com/" target="new"">Subscribe here</a></small>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-50904884962122022052013-05-28T21:29:00.000+00:002013-09-17T21:29:53.368+00:00Broadcast biggies wary of pirate streams<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Pirate internet streams were once described as “<a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/story/551041.html" style="color: #3faadb; text-decoration: none !important;">the biggest danger to the future of the sport</a>”. Greater than dwindling Test crowds; as vilified as match fixing. Why? Because they put no money into the game. For a sport awash with cash, it is a strange worry. Two decades ago, the ICC’s revenue was a meagre £100,000 (Haigh 2012). They now command <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/story/271994.html" style="color: #3faadb; text-decoration: none !important;">deals worth 10,000 times that</a> amount.</div>
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Given this, it seems churlish for administrators to fret over murky corners of the internet. Surely they should be glad fans are finding new ways to follow the game they love? Not so. Even small web outlets like Test Match Sofa* leave some feeling vulnerable. Take Jonathan Agnew’s <a href="http://www.theweek.co.uk/cricket/49875/bbc%D5s-angry-agnew-lashes-out-cricket-rival-test-match-sofa" style="color: #3faadb; text-decoration: none !important;">outburst</a> over how the internet radio station was undermining the game. At the heart of it is a deep-seated fear over how technology is threatening to break-up the broadcasting cartel that bankrolls the game.</div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-81156151858104019612013-05-02T08:45:00.002+00:002013-05-08T09:01:49.133+00:00Mike Gatting, rebel tourist and MCC president <blockquote>Forgiving is not forgetting; it's actually remembering - remembering and not using your right to hit back. It's a second chance for a new beginning. And the remembering part is particularly important. Especially if you dont want to repeat what happened. - Desmond Tutu</blockquote><br>
Forgiveness is more forthcoming for some than others. On Wednesday Mike Gatting was named the next MCC president. It completes a rapid journey back to the heart of the establishment for the once rebel tour captain.<br><br>
In 1990, while Nelson Mandela was being released from his jail in Robben Island, Gatting was leading the final, and most reprehensible, tour to apartheid South Africa. The tour was a disaster from the off with Gatting waving away questions over its appropriateness by declaring: "I don't know much about how apartheid works but one way to find out is by going there." He soon discovered plenty.<br><br>
The English tourists were met with demonstrations at the airport and a larger, angrier protest in Pietermaritzburg where the crowd chanted "Gatting go home!". Never blessed with an especially silver tongue, Gatting felt it all “just a bit of singing and dancing”.<br><br>
Unlike the previous tours, which had been funded by private sponsors, Gatting and his team were paid directly by the apartheid regime.<br><br>
The tourists have since been far happier to discuss their reasons than their regrets. Gatting had been harshly stripped of the England captaincy a little over a year after winning the Ashes in Australia. Clearly he felt no overwhelming loyalty to the TCCB. It was a time when cricketers weren't paid the substantial sums of today so perhaps were more easily swayed.<br><br>
Yet their swift welcome back into the bosom of the authorities feels grubby. David Gravney, tour manager in 1990, became a well-respected ECB chairman of selectors in 1997. Gatting was back in the England team to tour India the moment his ban ended in 1992. Now, having never apologised, he has become the ceremonial figurehead of cricket's self-appointed moral anchor.<br><br>
Gatting's treatment seems to jar with the authorities' more forceful condemnation of spot-fixers. Mervyn Westfield was sentenced to four-months in jail after admitting that he accepted £6,000 in return for conceding a set number of runs off an over in a Pro40 match against Durham in September 2009. He came forward and assisted the ECB's investigation of Danish Kaneria, hoping they would treat him with more understanding.<br><br>
Instead he was banned from professional cricket for five years and club cricket for three. The ECB vehemently pursued his case, obtaining a summons from the High Court to compel him to appear at Danish Kaneria's ECB disciplinary panel.<br><br>
Westfield felt abandoned by English cricket's governing institutions – the ECB and PCA – and few defended him after he spoke of his dismay at his treatment. “What a sad young man Mervyn Westfield must be to think that it was anyone's fault but his own that he sold the game down the river,” tweeted Mike Selvey.<br><br>
Westfield was 21 years old and on the margins of the Essex team when he disgraced the game. Gatting was 33 and an Ashes-winning captain.<br><br> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-62237675347717340692013-03-31T00:21:00.003+00:002013-03-31T19:42:38.663+00:00Pujara's waitIt was the pause. The ball had passed; it was already behind his head. He still waited. Eventually he just dabbed, deflecting its flight path well over Matthew Wade and away to the boundary. He was Cheteshwar Pujara orchestrating India's final run-chase of a triumphant series.<br><br>
He must have played many more significant and less eye-catching strokes through the series but that upper-glance off Mitchell Johnson betrayed a batsman in complete, devastating control.<br><br>
Pujara is emerging out of the haze surrounding Sachin Tendulkar's future as one of names that will loom over the next decade. Growing up through the 1990s, Lara, Tendulkar and Steve Waugh were the triumvirate that towered over the cricketing landscape. A benchmark that others (Dravid, Kallis, Ponting later) were checked off against. The batsmen whose dismissal opposition fans would celebrate desperately, but whose runs they would later cherish the most.<br><br>
Over the next 10 years Pujara looks likely to join that rank. Already his numbers are frightening. After 13 Tests, Tendulkar had 666 runs and Lara 1108. Pujara has 1180. But it is the things the statistics don't reveal that is so magnetic. <br><br>
The elevated calm, classical execution and understated charisma. The fact that ever since his debut, when his 89-ball 72 top-scored in a successful runchase against Ricky Ponting's Australia, he has flourished under Test-match pressure. <br><br>
Set alongside his nationality and batting position, the Dravid comparison is obvious. But Pujara is very much a man of his time. His mentality and technique forming in an era where Twenty20 dominates means he has greater resources than Dravid to draw from.<br><br>
Pujara's two (already!?) Test double-hundreds both began cautiously before shifting stealthily through the gears as opposition bowlers fatigued. When he feels the moment appropriate, he has all the shots of a short-form specialist. In fourth innings chases, with matches to be seized, he averages 93.00.<br><br>
As a product of post-Ganguly India there is no trace of deference in the way Pujara carries himself. After his methodical dismembering of England in Ahmedabad he crowed: “The way they were batting it looked like they were a fragile batting line-up for sure. It's going to be a challenging task for them”. He has Kohli's aggression with (almost) Sangakkara's elan.<br><br>
An enormous tasks awaits him in South Africa. They possess the world's most incisive pace attack and have the pitches to match. In three innings there – his only Tests outside of India - he did not pass 19. But there is nothing in Pujara's makeup to suggest he'll struggle. <br><br>
He is neither front nor backfoot dominant and doesn't rely on a freakish eye in the way Virender Sehwag did. At no point has he appeared overawed with the duty of carrying India's top-order into the next generation. It suggests a temperament cool enough to ride out the dotball storms Philander and co will create.<br><br>
There is something especially thrilling about watching youthful talent in its first throes. Kids coming to the game now will scrawl Pujara's name on their notebooks for years to come, fantasise about bowling to him, and try, over and again, to copy <i>that</i> pause before unfurling their strokes.<br><br> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-31217387809573186262013-03-11T15:47:00.003+00:002013-03-11T15:48:33.125+00:00Office space AustraliansThere is a great scene in Mike Judge's 1999-film <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IwzZYRejZQ">Office Space</a> where protagonist Peter Gibbons is reprimanded by his boss for failing to include a cover sheet on the report he filed. His six managers mean he gets the same reprimand over and again. Each time his argument that he 'forgot, the report is done, and it won't take long to sort a new cover sheet' is ignored. Eventually, he just stops caring. <br />
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It came to mind when news broke that Australia are dropping their best bowler, vice-captain and two leading reserves for failing to submit to management three points on how they and the team could improve. <br />
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Despite the lavish salaries and lifestyles cricketers enjoy these days, it's <a href="http://ashesinsomniac.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/warnes-manifesto-and-managerial-dream.html">managerial</a> and not player power that defines the era. It is clear in this case like it was with the <a href="http://ashesinsomniac.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/kp-and-moneyball-effect.html">KP fiasco</a> last summer. <br />
<br />
Perhaps these management tasks matter. It's possible Mitchell Johnson had crucial insights on the technical failings of his team's top-order but he's more likely to have made a difference with his left-arm slingers. On the field James Pattinson looks one of the world's brightest fast-bowling prospects; he's certainly Australia's best bowler. Is that not enough?<br />
<br />
Iain O'Brien put it best when he Tweeted: “What if those 4 Aust players were training/netting/gyming – making themselves better personally - & didn't have time to “form fill”?” <br />
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In a managerial era such commitment doesn't count unless it's demonstrable through means acceptable, and accountable to those up top. In Britain this means NHS nurses are told they don't care unless they fill out the appropriate forms “proving” they've paid attention. In the Australian cricket team this means players must 'take responsibility' and be 'more professional' only by completing the tasks set by managers reading the latest in business leadership. It's less a case of empowering people than it is about infantilising them. <br />
<br />
Drop Shane Watson for his failings as a batsman, not as an administrator. Else, treat him as a child and he might just <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/sport/cricket/up-in-the-air-watson-flies-home-after-test-axing-20130311-2fw9i.html">stomp off home</a>.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-68630894546653554912013-01-30T23:14:00.001+00:002013-01-31T08:41:12.212+00:00Warne's manifesto and the managerial dream<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
If you ignore the grammar, 90s nostalgia and traffic-driving promotion in the Shane Warne <a href="http://www.shanewarne.com/blog/330/where-is-australian-cricket-at-part-1" target="_blank">manifesto</a>, there is actually some wisdom in what he writes. Over the last 20 years cricket's drive for “professionalism” has merged consultants of the business world with coaches from the sporting world, and left a game dominated by the ideals of management. <br />
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Australia may have been Warne's target but all countries are caught up in the trend. Dressing rooms now strive to be “businesslike” which seems to entail employing an army of technocrats to help control and prepare players. Alongside the head coach, there are specialists for each cricket skill, statistical analysts, fitness bods and self-help gurus.
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<br />
Undoubtedly some coaches provide essential help. Matt Prior, for example, readily credits his improved wicketkeeping to the work he's done with Bruce French. But the infiltration of corporate ideals into the running of cricket teams has also had more questionable effects.<br />
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South Africa, for example, employ Paddy Upton as a "performance director". In <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/583853.html" target="_blank">his own words</a>, Upton's brief is to help cricketers move “out of the shadows of the ego and into the light of awareness.” It isn't just the appointments that seem spurious. Business lexicon has also infected the way people discuss the game. “Informed player management” is an especially jarring example, but obfuscating corporate speak is a staple of most press conferences. <br />
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It is difficult to question the abundance of managers without sounding like a Boycottian luddite. The professionalism of Kerry Packer and World Series Cricket forced a focus among some players who had previously lacked it. Now, with the financial stakes raised further still, perhaps it is inevitable that teams should seek other avenues of improvement. <br />
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Yet it is debatable whether the management drive has really achieved success. In the corporate world, the only industry that management consultants have really transformed is their own. Similarly in men's cricket at least, it is difficult to claim that anything other than fielding has really revolutionised. <br />
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Injuries, especially among pacemen, seem as frequent as ever, and for all the praise Nathan Leamon gets, statistical wizardry has not dramatically altered team strategy. Instead, professionalism's most telling effect has been to deepen the layers of management into the game.<br />
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Cricketers can expect their food, drink, sleep, hobbies, and public interactions to be carefully surveyed and controlled. In England, cricketers are hauled out of adolescence and brought into "the setup" so that they too can familiarise themselves with what is expected of a "professional".<br />
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In some senses this is a good thing. Joe Root is a perfect ECB specimen having played age-group cricket with England since Under-16s and been part of their Lions and Academy setups. At 22 he has had experience of conditions from all around the world which has left him well prepared to join the international fold. <br />
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These cricketing skills are the first level of management input. The second is the moneyball-style numbers analysis. The final is the kind of personality management Upton deals in. Though covering different areas, these are all part of management science's broad aim: shifting focus from outcome to process with the underlying belief that success is a simple matter of the correct planning.<br />
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Jeremy Snape, once an England limited-over offspinner, is now a consultant business and sport psychologist. He <a href="http://www.alloutcricket.com/player/coaching/getting-your-head-right-finding-a-gold-medal-mindset-for-cricket" target="_blank">writes</a> that “to deliver our goals of wickets or runs we will need to have divisional goals for fitness, concentration and technical skills. These become our daily focus, not the gold medal.” Who could argue with that? It is not without reason you have cliches about playing each ball on its merits and take each day as it comes. <br />
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But the obsession with planning has created an entire industry to support the idea. Statisticians devise metrics that hold cricketers accountable to process, and sports psychologists design formulas to help them “stay in the moment”. <br />
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Management science began in army barracks before expanding to factories and boardrooms. It is, at base, less about performance than it is about control. You needn't have watched <i>The Wire</i> to recognise the feeling that sometimes work seems more about following the right protocol than doing the right job.<br />
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The belief that there exists a process to control every outcome implies that egotists like Kevin Pietersen or worriers like Morne Morkel can be coached into perfect sporting drones; that injury-prone quicks can be conditioned into unbreakable cyborgs. The practice is more tricky. No amount of self-help psychology has solved a riddle like Ravi Bopara, for example.<br />
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Cricketers and cricket teams aren't machines. Some will succeed at the highest level and most will not. This human unpredictability may make cricket fascinating but it is at odds with the managerial dream.</div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-79720534567824253952012-11-01T22:02:00.000+00:002012-11-02T09:00:40.490+00:00Proudly unprofessional It was fitting that the latest TMS/TMS <a href="http://www.theweek.co.uk/cricket/49875/bbc%E2%80%99s-angry-agnew-lashes-out-cricket-rival-test-match-sofa" target=New">row</a> began with an article in the Times before being <a href="https://twitter.com/Aggerscricket/status/263966022309122048" target="new">fuelled</a> by Twitter. At its base, much of the Test Match Special team's hostility to the Sofa upstarts comes from a misunderstanding of new media and the opportunities it provides.<br><br>
As this and the many other <a href="http://www.thealternativecricketalmanack.com/2012/11/test-match-sofa-special-bbc/">blogs</a> and <a href="http://thecricketcouch.com/" target="new">podcasts</a> are testament to, technology has merely provided a wider space than the pub for non-professionals to air their views. Often they're inane, often they're unoriginal and often they're brilliant. Always, though, they're driven by nothing beyond a love for the game and maybe a taste for the weekend-cricketer type spotlight.<br><br>
It is a trite point that can't be made strong enough. Thankfully, Gideon Haigh's recent <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/australia/content/story/587974.html" target="new">Bradman Oration</a> was a timely manifesto for the value of amateur cricket. Amateurs are the 99% who love playing, watching, writing and talking about the game but don't get handsomely paid to do so. <br><br>
Haigh's focus was on club cricketers but he could easily have extended it to media. On Twitter and on the blogs there are people discussing, enraging, engaging and informing; spreading their love of cricket because they simply can't stop themselves. The idea that they have either the desire, or capacity, to be “predators” is odd. Moreover it speaks of a strange logic where promoting the sport is a zero-sum game.<br><br>
Clearly, as cricket's highest level, pushed by walls of cash hungry for returns, gets ever more commercially glamourised, it is dragging establishment media with it. One result is a trend to homogenise the voice of sport. Generally male, generally well-known and generally sanitised. For every Ian Ward or Nasser Hussain there are many more ex-pros like Danny Morrison* and Brad Hogg, hammering out clichés and hyperbole as freely as limited-over sixes.<br><br>
Another is that broadcast media especially can lose its reflective instinct. Mark Taylor is both a Channel Nine commentator and employed by the ACB, while the BCCI employ Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri who uncritically peddle endless outrage and hot air. In England there was a clear rupture in how media insiders and outsiders treated the Kevin Pietersen affair, with the more <a href="http://theoldbatsman.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/kp-and-art-of-war.html" target=new">nuanced</a> and <a href="http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/cricket/test-matches/could-kevin-pietersen-be-set-for-international-1232035" target="new">balanced</a> accounts coming overwhelmingly from outsiders.<br><br>
Yet what matters most about the professional fetish is that it distances the game from its roots among the many. Which brings us to <i>Test Match Sofa</i>. Beyond a core group of participants scraping a living from the Sofa's <i>Cricketer</i> ownership, it runs on devotion. Dark rooms, early starts, and no Tweetpics of the pressbox spread, theirs are the voices of the amateurs.<br><br>
The flourishes, digressions and dependency on listener contribution (via Twitter) often makes the Sofa's commentators seem more human than the in-joking TMS team. And the plurality of ages, genders and ethnicities makes a welcome change from the standardised sound of the pros. <br><br>
Yet equally there are times when the Sofa's one-speed irreverence misses the hum of Test-match tension that TMS captures so well.<br><br>
There is no way that the Sofa could replace the older TMS, which makes Agnew and CMJ's outrage all the more puzzling. For a game that jostles at the margins for attention of Britain's sports-mad public, the greater coverage and variety that the Sofa provides can only enhance the ECB's product, not dilute it. <br><br>
Professionals, with their insider experience and at-the-ground insight will always be a necessary part of the media landscape. It's just that now, helping and prodding them along, the rest of us can join in.<br><br>
<small>This was changed from Simon Doull after <a href="https://twitter.com/MannerOfSpeakin" target=New">Avi Singh</a> reminded me I'd mixed up my retired NZ quicks</small> <div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-87784217206111834792012-08-15T19:18:00.000+00:002012-08-15T19:24:10.068+00:00KP and the moneyball effect<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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It is difficult to see who gains from Kevin Pietersen's ongoing expulsion from England colours, but it is clear who has won: management. By slapping down the maverick, the ECB have shown exactly where power lies in English cricket.<br><br>
Call it the Moneyball effect but never – in what's actually a rather brief history – have cricket's managers been held in higher regard. This is much less an era of player power than it is one of managerial power. <br><br>
The Moneyball story – of a coach who used expert skills to reconceptualise his sport and build an (almost) champion team from scant resources - is now familiar. The broad idea was that by focusing more on processes and less on outcomes – and finding the stats to help that end – coaches could devise new strategies that make all the difference. The old-wives intuition of gnarled ex-pros was outdated and for real insight into the workings of a sport a new breed of rational, coaching-course-trained technocrat was necessary.<br><br>
Interestingly, the visible effects of the Moneyball generation have so far been felt much more keenly off the field than on it. There have been no especially revelatory tactics or unexpected selections. Bowling dry in a free-scoring era helped England climb the rankings but it is was hardly revolutionary. Similarly the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_management" target="new">Taylorist</a> attention to detail saw England's fitness and fielding improve, but did not transform the game.<br><br>
Instead, as the Pietersen episode shows, it's the power granted to managers that has been the real consequence. Resources are made available for all manner of different specialists, and coaches can make demands on their national boards that were never possible even 15 years ago. Flower, as coach, is given far greater scope to shape the team than any senior player has. That may well be fair, and Flower's on and off-field history shows he is a deeply impressive man, but perhaps management in general should be treated with more caution. <br><br>
Is it too simplistic to ask which of Pietersen or Flower has contributed to more England victories? Perhaps, but looking beyond cricket we see how thoroughly ingrained the cult of management is. The extraordinary reaction to Steve Jobs's death last year was emblematic of it. Rather than it being the team of researchers, designers, App developers, or indeed the fingers of suicidal Foxx-con workers that were credited for creating Apple's products it was the 'genius' of Jobs that had to be celebrated. <br><br>
The belief that in the heads of coaches lies insights that nobody else can muster makes their influence enormous. Players have been emasculated to the point where they are reliant on experts for everything. <br><br>
The wider effect of the subordination of players to management is making them more equal with each other. To 'buy into the approach', as managers love putting it, is to agree to relegate your own desire to that of the manager's. Why? So that everyone 'pulls in the same direction'. By extension when somebody, as Pietersen did, undermines the management structures he undermines the principle of unity-from-above. <br><br>
The balance of power between different fractions of a collective – be it a cricket team or a company - is always unstable. Different environments at different moments will favour different groups but, judging by Pietersen's situation, the current consensus leaves management untouchable.
<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-56103882544401788152012-07-24T09:45:00.000+00:002012-07-29T09:11:33.498+00:00After The Oval - All that is solid melts into air<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br /></div>
Suddenly everything feels different. The quiet certainty built up over the last three years in the minds of England supporters, media and surely to some extent the players themselves, has shattered. <BR><BR>
It was, though, a <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/england-v-south-africa-2012/content/current/story/573667.html" target="new">devastating</a> result at The Oval. Maybe a mystic few saw it all coming but the magnitude of South Africa's first-Test win must be a surprise to most.
England may yet produce a monumental turnaround and salvage the series but that seems unlikely. If they don't, the damage done to England's self-perception will have deeper consequences.<BR><BR>
It's all so different to a year ago but the No. 1 ranking is clearly toxic. India arrived last year with that lofty status but unravelled spectacularly, losing all four Tests as England grabbed the crown. At that stage it seemed right to talk about legacy building. Though incomparable to the great teams in history, England seemed to have a formula well suited to their era. They were skilful, disciplined and with their best years still to come. Moreover they had a structure in place that was the envy of set-ups around the world.<BR><BR>
Instead, since the end of that 2011 summer, England have lost five Tests out of nine. After The Oval, the UAE results look less an aberration to be cast aside and more a stark warning of things to come.<BR><BR>
It has left Andrew Strauss with the toughest challenge of his captaincy career. If confidence is a habit born of winning, then every defeat must etch away at the belief that separates the best teams. What's more, the stability that helps individuals flourish in their roles is now under significant strain.<BR><BR>
Andy Flower and Strauss can't wave-away the five-bowler question by pointing to the results. The rotation policy that kept key players sidelined can no longer be defended with the crisp repetition of the rankings. Even the attritional, bowling-dry strategy that underpinned England's climb up the rankings is not so easily justifiable any more. <a href="http://ashesinsomniac.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/winning-dry.html" target="new">Twice</a> in <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/england-v-south-africa-2012/content/current/story/573669.html" target="new">four</a> series England have found opponents attuned to their pace and prepared to out-leave them. <BR><BR>
It is premature for now, but it does not take much for cast-iron certainties to dissolve. Another defeat and the management team that have had the board dish up their every passing whim will come under more scrutiny. Hell, even the national structure may soon no longer be able to call itself the nursery to the best team in the world. It didn't take many losses to start doubting Australia's once totally hallowed system. <BR><BR>
The 'aura' that teams long to create is less a force to lord over the opposition and more a sense of comfort that binds a team together. 637 for 2 changes that. <BR><BR>
It doesn't all crumble overnight. And it's grossly unfair to all those who have strived so hard to turn England into a top team to write-off their chances. After all, over the last two years England have won 14 of their last 25 matches compared with South Africa's six from 14. Yet before India arrived in England they had won nine and lost three as world No. 1s. During their <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/474472.html" target="new">first Test</a> last summer, though, they felt like a team heading the wrong way and have lost every Test since. <BR><BR>
England are a fine side and one home defeat doesn't change that, but it does change how people <i>feel</i> about them. Comeback and confidence will never be surer but subside as grimly in the rest of the series and nothing will be sacrosanct.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-38934797323778908832012-06-18T22:19:00.000+00:002012-06-18T22:46:28.811+00:00Tom MaynardA week ago I wrote how fans develop strangely meaningful relationships with players. Tom Maynard's death, at 23 years old, brought that home horribly.<br><br>
It has forced perspective on a community - sports lovers – who often lack it. For his close friends and family, losing Maynard must be a deep, personal tragedy and incomparable to what those on the outside will feel. Foremost, it is desperately sad that a man has died so young.<br><br>
Yet even when confronted by cricket's ultimate worthlessness, it is still cricket that makes Maynard's death matter for many. The majority of people know Maynard only by his cricketing personality. And his was magnetic. <br><br>
He had <a href="http://theoldbatsman.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/talent-and-tom-maynard.html" target="new">glittering talent</a>, a spark of cockiness and a future wide open. It's sad that someone bursting with potential will never get a chance to realise it fully. It doesn't make his untimely death any more or less of a tragedy than anyone else’s, but it does make the cricketing family mourn a stolen future.<br><br>
I remember watching him against Sussex a few weeks ago, trying to pull Surrey out of a first-innings muddle by nonchalantly advancing down the crease at 90mph James Anyon. It was typical of him.<br><br>
Maynard was the sort of cricketer that made you want to watch the game because you could never play it as easily as he could. I'll miss him because of that.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-22466700946324789622012-06-13T08:25:00.000+00:002012-06-18T13:59:00.839+00:00Excitement without tension<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Maybe the cliché is true and cricket does actually give a compelling window into the minds of those playing; or maybe it’s just because it takes so long, but as England's series against West Indies showed, the relationship between players and those watching them is oddly meaningful.<br><br>
Neither Tino Best nor Graham Onions know who I am but their return to Test cricket was genuinely pleasing. Likewise I don’t know Marlon Samuels, but his charisma and class were bright spots in a dank month. Even Dinesh Ramdin, a fairly anonymous sort, delivered an unforgettable moment. The series proved how, even where teams are mismatched, the fortunes of individual players can create real entertainment.<br><br>
As production technology allows analysis to become ever more technical it’s easy to overlook the emotional story at the heart of every contest. It’s what makes Ed Cowan’s book so refreshing. He describes the stress, embarrassment, anger and dejection that go with playing the sport. How "patches of failure leave you with an empty state of doubt.”<br><br>
It’s worth reflecting on when thinking about Ramdin’s <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/england-v-west-indies-2012/content/image/567971.html?object=52917" target="new">A4 scribbling</a>. It was his first Test series in two years. Having played professional cricket since he was 18, his Test runs are the barometer by which most people, and to an extent even the man himself, will judge his life. That scrawled response to Viv Richards' barbs was testament to how important his hundred was. Not for the team performance, nor for a financial gain it may help secure, but for something more fragile, his self-worth. It cannot be easy for West Indian cricketers playing out their existence in the shadow of a gargantuan past. It makes the ICC’s <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/england-v-west-indies-2012/content/current/story/568096.html" target="new">fine</a> all the more staggering. Of all things bringing the game into disrepute, a player’s desperate pride should be the least of its worries.<br><br>
Samuels is another who has faced criticism. His murky history has included bookmakers, chucking and years of squandered talent. Having remembered his debut series against Australia 12 years ago, and the <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/63910.html" target="new">promise</a> it held, it was fantastic to see him succeed this summer. His runs were enjoyable not just for their style and their match importance but also because they were his redemption. That he also spoke a dialect humans, and not PR executives, could relate to made him all the more magnificent.<br><br>
Samuels’s series-long asversary, James Anderson, was rested for the final Test. It meant Onions returned to the side for the first time since his career was almost ended by a back injury. After the first day he tweeted: “Today has been a special special day, I’ve had the most unbelievable support over the last 2 years to get me to put the 3 lions on again..” It was a testament to the personal that underpins the professional. Having reached the pinnacle of his career in 2009, he suddenly faced the possibility of losing his livelihood altogether. Watching the fruition of months of rehab made a dead Test matter more.<br><br>
And then there was Tino. For two years he has pined on twitter, pleading anyone who would listen (and plenty who would not) for another chance with West Indies. His jubilant, delirious comeback was something we could all celebrate.<br><br>
It’s these individual stories that get contextualised through competition. While closely-fought contests are obviously the most enjoyable, sometimes it’s nourishing just to share in someone else’s personal fulfilment.</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-28512010147338219572012-05-23T10:54:00.000+00:002012-05-23T20:28:45.785+00:00West Indies and memories of Atherton's Young Lions<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Like your favourite childhood meal or that desperately meaningful teenage film, there is something about formative memories that make them the most poignant. West Indies' <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/england-v-west-indies-2012/engine/current/match/534205.html" target="new">1st Test defeat</a> was hardly pulsating cricket but watching a struggling team scrapping to pick itself up off the mat did stir bittersweet recollections of England's 90s woes.<br />
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Myopic and Anglo-centric though that is, it is an interesting thought. Back then England were the team playing under the shadow of its past; where the names of former legends weighed heavily on a group of young, inexperienced players. Cricket in 90s England felt uncared for, unfashionable and in a state of unflinching decline.<br />
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So throughout the Lord's Test, I kept asking myself just which 90s period were West Indies in? Alec Stewart's prim yes-men? Nasser Hussain's early streetfighters? Or how about the first throes of Mike Atherton's leadership? <br />
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It's difficult to place but the approach Ottis Gibson and Darren Sammy are adopting – with senior players dumped in favour of a brick-by-brick rebuilding – reminded me of the time the sides met in 1994. <br />
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“Young Lions are going to go” sung the Skysports intro music to that series (“back to the pavilion,” my brother used to add). Atherton, in his first full series in charge, was without Graham Gooch who had top-scored the previous Ashes summer but opted out of touring. Likewise, Mike Gatting and John Emburey were left out as a Atherton backed a clutch of youngsters - including Nasser Hussain, Graham Thorpe, Mark Ramprakash – to tour the world's best team. <br />
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“My vision," wrote Atherton in his autobiography, "was of a group of young, athletic and talented players with the dedication to work hard and grow together, taking a few knocks along the way but coming through on the other side.”<br />
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The <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/63637.html" target="new">1st Test</a>, on a Sabina Park flyer, was not unlike this one at Lord's. England mixed talent with brain-fades to slide to an under-par, though not disastrous, 234 batting first and conceded a first-innings deficit of 173. An innings defeat looked distinctly possible at 63 for 4 but England fought to 267 on the back of Hick's heartbreaking 96, leaving a small target that West Indies knocked off easily enough. Defeat, sure, but not humiliation and enough for genuine positivity about the youthful project. <br />
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Through the series England were maddeningly inconsistent with an innings defeat the next game and that <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmMn4bhi-KU" target="new">horrorshow finish</a> to lose a match they had dominated in Trinidad. The <a href="http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/63640.html" target="new">stunning victory</a> in Barbados (“historic,” I remember Willis repeating on commentary) followed by a draw in Lara's first world-record at Antigua was enough for Atherton to recall: "I was happy with my efforts on the tour... The team was beginning to take shape in my mind. New Zealand were soon to arrive in England and I felt sure it was the perfect opportunity to achieve some long overdue success." <br />
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Yet by the following winter, England's new 'supremo' manager-selector Ray Illingworth, had lost patience with Atherton's ideal and the young lions were exchanged for old soldiers. Back for the Ashes came Gatting and Gooch, who both retired by the series' conclusion as England slumped to a 3-1 loss. It took another four years - and a plunge below Zimbabwe and New Zealand in the Test rankings - before Hussain and Fletcher finally turned England's tide. <br />
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Gibson and Sammy's stated aim is to restore pride in West Indies cricket. Their rush to do so has left some high-profile casualties. It was sad to hear Ramnaresh Sarwan talk about how managements' public criticism of his attitude had broken him. Clearly in form Sarwan would add much more than Kirk Edwards. But Gibson and Sammy's thinking – a star team over a team of stars - is right and progress is being made in a way that has not happened before. <br />
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The flashes of promise in West Indies barren recent years have been on the back of outstanding individual feats. Lara in the 2-2 draw against Australia in 1999, Jerome Taylor's freak spell to flatten England ten years later. This time, after fight against India, Australia and again at Lord's, the progress feels deeper. <br />
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The limit, though, seems to have been reached. Thanks to the impoverished and incompetent WICB, gifted players are missing, itself a significant block to improvement. Yet it's also Sammy's ability, as batsman, bowler and captain, that his holding his mission back. Atherton in 1994 was the best player in the team and if supported could have led a youthful team forward in his image. Unless Sammy can improve, his lack of class will eventually undermine both his authority and the values he and Gibson are looking to instil.<br />
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When the fall-out happens, though, West Indies would do well to avoid the tried-tested-and-failed approaches of the past. It's up to the younger players being trusted by management now to carry the fighting attitude forward.<div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6753136985169187891.post-45159799752104951022012-04-23T18:31:00.000+00:002012-06-18T23:08:02.574+00:00The radical County Championship<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Sat among pensioners, loners and pigeons at The Oval, Surrey's Championship outing against Worcestershire didn't feel like a typical gathering of anti-establishment agitators. The rumbles of discontent from members sounded familiar perhaps, the polite cheers less so. Yet the spectacle we were witnessing – four-day domestic cricket – was as brazen a two-fingers up at the ruling ideas of the day as any Occupy protest.<br />
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The hackneyed view of the Championship is that it replays a lost era of pastoral England. At 122 years old, people often see it –to mangle Derek Birley – as an institutionalised anachronism. Some hail this as its virtue, dialing down the pace of life at a time when everything else seems to be speeding up. Others vilify it as irrelevant for the very same reason.<br />
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But the Championship is no relic. A glance at the first few scorecards of the season show wickets and boundary boards clattering rapidly. The rate of scoring is as unmistakeably modern as the batsmen's inability to tough it out on lively wickets. Similarly the way the game is covered – online radio, live blogs, Tweets – is more contemporary than dated technologies like television or print media. We know vast numbers follow the games online – one day perhaps they can prove as economically valuable as TV viewers.<br />
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Yet what's radical is the experience of the sport itself. A game sprawling four days is entirely antithetical to the commercial interests that rule our age. A marketeer likes few things more than an easily-digestible, quick sell. It is why Twenty20 is the era's golden goose. That does not make it bad – Twenty20 is extremely watchable – but its slavish compliance with the commercial rulebook makes it deeply conservative.<br />
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Like most big-budget blockbuster entertainment, the way Twenty20 is sold is also rather patronising. The entertainment industry – which Matthew Hayden will tell you is where cricket squarely belongs – thrives on making passive spectators of us all. Rather than trust us to participate in making our experience of the sport we love, the kings of commerce prefer to spoon feed us every step of the way. Cricket's natural cadence – where pauses outstretch action – gets disrupted by a chaotic cocktail of cheap stimulants. Crack go the fireworks, up go the cheerleaders' legs, “phew” go the money men. By preventing supporters from filling cricket's empty spaces ourselves, we become disenfranchised from the game.<br />
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The Championship, though, demands more of us. Unlike other forms, there are no commentators selling products, or dubious governments, mid game. Neither do they script our emotional reaction to every passage of play. In between deliveries, overs, sessions and innings we are instead left to muse. Sometimes about what we've seen, often not. With no visual or aural noise demanding attention when the action pauses, two people can sit a row apart and spend entirely different days at the cricket. That's a fundamental challenge to business ideals that prefer homogeneous, interchangeable experiences that market easily.<br />
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That the Championship is unique in this regard is less conspiracy and more cold calculation. Shorter cricket is ‘what the market wants’. But there is a danger of misunderstanding the market 'forces' the game cowers to. The market has no force of its own. It doesn't even exist. Instead it takes players, TV companies, administrators, sponsors and countless other groups to make it. Currently these groups shovel plenty into promoting limited-overs cricket and very little into even protecting – let alone promoting – the longer game. They have no confidence that the sport itself is strong enough to carry its own weight.<br />
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Nobody, of course, admits this. Instead administrators point to market research that becomes like an unknowable Big Brother we must obey. Yes, cricket's governing bodies need to find ways of listening to fans but surveys are a sham democracy. They are neither empowering nor always effective.<br />
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In a different sphere, Apple's overwhelming success makes them a favourite of business gurus, yet they avoided market research when developing their products. “It’s not about pop culture, and it’s not about fooling people, and it’s not about convincing people that they want something they don’t,” Steve Jobs once said. “You can’t go out and ask people, you know, what’s the next big [thing].” Similarly US TV network HBO – makers of The Sopranos and The Wire - shunned the easy route their competitors followed and instead developed unfashionable, quality programmes that they are now lauded for. There is a lesson in that.<br />
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There is much about the County game that remains entrenched in the past. It is dominated, on and off the field, by privileged white men. Though crowds grew last year they remain small and don't reflect the demographics of the country nearly fully enough. These are challenges administrators, players and minority communities themselves must take seriously. Yet cricket is entertainment and like all forms of entertainment is says something about the society it's in. Far from nostalgia, the Championship should be celebrated for its unique progressiveness.
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<small>This post also appears at <a href="http://www.spincricket.com/2012/04/23/the-radical-county-championship/" target="new">Spin cricket</a></small>
</div><div class="blogger-post-footer">Ashes Insomniac - Thoughts of a cricket die-hard</div>Ashesinsomniachttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00339250954881022722noreply@blogger.com2