World Cup: one week left

Overall the cricket at the current World Cup has been very good. We have not had too many poor matches. Of the four quarter finals:

West Indies were thrashed by Pakistan and rightly so. Pakistan, like West Indies are a team that can beat anybody one day and lose to anyone the next. Pakistan at least have more ‘good’ days and could easily will the competition.

India beat Australia in a close game that in the end India deserved to win. India have, to quote the Heath government, been walking around the battlefield looking for someone to surrender to. In this match they got their act together. I was really impressed with Australia even though they lost. Not for one minute did they stop trying to win. There is no shame in being beaten by a better side, especially if in doing so you give everything. Australia, and Brett Lee in particular, embodied that. It was good to see such dominant champions going out on their shield.

South Africa has a side that should have won the 2011 world cup. They can beat anyone. Unfortunately that extends to themselves and the serial underachievers did just that. Credit must go to New Zealand who was clever enough to see it coming and exploit it. A World Cup just wouldn’t be a World Cup without a South African choke.

Sri Lanka looks like a side that might be peaking at the right time. Their bowling was superb to restrict England to 229. The Harath, Murali, Mendis, Malinga quartet are superb with the ball; Dilshan and Tharanga similarly so with bat. England looked a tired side at the end of a long set of tours. However, the reality is that they were beaten by a better side.

Roll on the semi-finals. Who will win? Toss a coin.

England beat South Africa... again

Rain: we get a lot of it in England. They also seem to get a lot in South Africa too with two out of five ODIs being washed out. That gives England a 2-1 victory over South Africa in South Africa something that has not been done by any side for 15 home series! More remarkable than England beating South Africa is how poor South Africa looked. Their bowling looked ineffective and the batting flaky. I thought England would get out muscled in the test series but now I am not so sure. If the wickets are flat we could be in for some big scores and sore bowlers.

Topsy turvy is the new normal for England

What a strange series England are having with South Africa. One side dominates completely then the other only for it to switch again. I would say it was extraordinary except it isn’t: it matches the pattern of the Ashes series almost to a tee. We have had three thrashings with England currently leading 2:1.

England has shown some promise with the batting have an uncharacteristic solidity. Strauss continues to lead well, Trott and Morgan are cementing the places and Collingwood is back in form. Bowling was always going to be difficult on flat South African pitches but at least England managed to seize the opportunity today when it appeared.

South Africa has been pretty poor. They have had one good performance and although England did bowl poorly at Cape Town the statistics were against them batting second under lights. Smith was delighted when he won the toss and batted. Their batting looks fragile and their bowling almost non-existent. I expected South Africa to beat England easily, especially in the test matches. However South Africa are struggling to find a second opening bowler and if Stein isn’t fully fit they are in real trouble.

South Africa Squads

England announced their squads to tour South Africa in November. The ‘headlines’ have been generated by the omission of Steve Harmison. His lack of form and maybe commitment on tour means that this is not really a surprise. Geoff Miller this lunch time made it fairly clear (to me anyway) that Harmison would never be picked again. His words said the opposite of course but he also mentioned that Harmison’s comments that he would not tour Australia in 2010 had a bearing on it. Translation: not going to pick you. Fair enough I think.

A few choices have raised a my eyebrows. In the Test squad they have picked Luke Wright. There is no way Wright is a test player, he is just good enough to play ODI cricket. In South Africa against Steyn etc he has no chance. They have picked the hopeless Ian Bell and dropped Bopara and Shah. Why do they persist with some mediocre players and insist that others are dropped at the first chance? Same story time after time. They have also picked a reserve wicketkeeper (Steven Davies) but no reserve opener. So we are stuck with the steadily declining Cook whatever happens...

In the one day squad they have picked, I kid you not, Alastair Cook and (wait for it) dropped Owais (destroyer of South Africa a week ago) Shah. What on earth is going on there? No Bopara either so the thinking must be that Cook is better than both of them. Bizarre.

Pakistan give South Africa a chance to choke

South Africa choking in a semi final is almost as good as Australia getting knocked out of the tournament early on. Not as good, obviously. I didn’t think they would blow it this time, I thought they had a good enough team and enough form to carry them through. Happily I was wrong and we saw the choke-meister generals do it one more time. Pakistan, it must be said, played superbly. Afridi played a classic innings and followed it up with a spell of leg-spin bowling that had the South Africans turning their ovens to gas mark nine. Umar Gul delivered the killer blow with some awesome death bowling. Magic stuff. Pakistan of course narrowly lost the first ICC T20 final and ten years and one day after they last played a final at Lords, they will play another. Hopefully this one will be closer.

Every ICC Final has a special ‘ICC shoots foot’ moment. This year they organised it early: the Final clashes with the British Formula 1 Grand Prix...

Hayden's SCG Swan-song?

The upcoming fourth day of Australia v South Africa could be a defining one for Matthew Hayden. After a long string of low scored (he averaged less than 35 in 2008) there must be a chance that failure at the SCG could be his last Test innings. He has already had an enormous bit of fortune -- near the end of day three Dale Steyn trapped him directly in-front in what was easily the clearest LBW of the series (helped by the fact it shot along the ground, Hayden didn’t have a chance). Hayden was amazingly given not out. Even the terribly biased Channel 9 commentators admitted it should have been given. Big man, big day.

Biased? The Channel 9 commentators. During one spell Doug Bollinger had a couple of close-ish LBW appeals. On one of them Michael Slater called out ‘come on umpire give one’. How very professional. Next thing we know they will be claiming Nathan Hauritz is a spinner.

As I said Hayden had a huge slice of luck in day three...but he wasn’t the only one. The ball hit the stumps twice in the South African innings and did not knock the bails off. It all helped South Africa make 327 on a badly deteriorating pitch. With 150 run lead it is Australia who are in control.

New world order

In ten years many events of the last decade will be lost in a sea of vagueness. However, that is not true of 2008; the financial events of the past year will be analysed for years to come and their repercussions have still to be fully felt. For cricket, 2008 has also been a significant year, with two momentous happenings.

The first of these events was the IPL and the massive cash injection it has brought. 20:20 cricket was largely ignored by India until they won the Twenty20 World Championship in September 2007. From that point on it has been full-steam ahead with the IPL spending million dollar sums on international players. India went from a ‘difficult place to tour’ to a land filled with milk and honey. Talk of ‘cricketer burn-out’ magically disappeared in favour of making a gap in the schedules for the IPL and other 20:20 tournaments. 20:20 has changed the face of cricket and will continue to exert a large influence in 2009 and above.

The second major cricket event of 2008 has been the demise of the Australian Test winning machine. Australia has been virtually unbeaten for the last decade and beyond. Australia losing a Test match was an event of note and losing a series was a very rare event indeed. However, in the past few months Australia has lost two Test series: they were soundly thrashed in India after a good start and have been similarly beaten by South Africa at home. Australia has lost four of its last eight Test matches. The reasons for the slump in form are clear to see – a number of world class players have retired and the holes they create cannot be filled easily. In particular the gaps left by Warne and McGrath swiftly followed by MacGill and Hogg have left Australia with a barren bowling attack and without a spinner of note. This is excellent news for everyone except Australian fans. It means that Test matches will be closer and everyone has a realistic chance of beating them. There are now three top sides in Test cricket: India, Australia and South Africa. The rest are playing catch-up.

Of course not everything has changed with England playing the same first six players in their last test of 2008 as they played in the first Test match of the 2006/07 Ashes series, with similar results...

Test matches over before the summer arrives

Being an England fan I tend to obsess about the England side and its failings – not that I am short of things to talk about there. South Africa has just won the Test series 2-1 and deservedly so. England rallied in the last Test match and South Africa, having already won the series, lost a bit of their discipline. England has played the same batsmen all year (10 Tests) and they have rarely looked like a Test match winning line-up. This will continue because the same players will continue to make the same mistakes. Will England fall lower that their current Test Ranking of 5th? Possibly. There I go again… obsessing about England.

South Africa looked an impressive side against England. The batting, when required, looked very solid. I was particularly impressed with Amla and Prince who looked every inch Test quality players. When England last played South Africa there was a suggestion Amla was in the side because of his ‘colour’. Whatever the truth, or otherwise, of that rumour he is now an impressive number three. Both players seem to have a very good knowledge of where their off-stump is and what not to play at. Smith captained his side as well as any South African I have seen and was quite rightly named man-of-the-series by the England coach. His innings at Edgbaston that won the series was one of real character and ability. The fact that South Africa won the series with barely a contribution from Kallis and had half the series without Steyn showed how far ahead of England they now are.

South Africa’s next Test series is against Australia – can they trouble them? Australia is a team in steady decline. They have lost some exceptional players: Warne, Mcgrath, Glichrist with Hayden to follow shortly. In addition they have lost some good players: MacGill, Hogg, Langer. However, their initial bar of excellence was so high that they are only just getting down to the point where they can be beaten by normal Test sides. I think it will be a close series, made closer by Australia’s inability to find a decent spinner. If they lose Lee to injury, which must happen someday because they bowl him into the ground, then the bowling cupboard will look very bare.

However, long before all that we have a one-day series which South Africa will win with some ease…

A combined 11+11=11

One thing I like to do as a mental exercise in a Test series is choose a combined team – just to see how many England players make it into the eleven. Clearly the result will be the biased by me – so feel free to disagree in the comments. I have tried to match player against player and I have used the Edgbaston line-up… and anyway the Oval line-up without Vaughan or a direct replacement makes it more difficult  Here goes:

Strauss or Cook v Smith or McKenzie
I am not that fond of Graham Smith and his particular brand of arrogance but there is no doubt he has bags more ability than Strauss or Cook. I think the Strauss, Cook, McKenzie choice is not clear cut. What is clear though is that McKenzie is in miles better form that either of the other two so I would choose him.

Vaughan v Amla
On anywhere near current form it’s a no-brainer for Amla

Pietersen v Kallis
Hmm, tough one. Of course it wouldn’t be a tough one because you would choose Pietersen and Kallis and drop someone else. Kallis’s record is miles better than Petersen although their ICC rankings are near identical. If I had to choose on batting alone it would be Pietersen, he is lots younger and can still improve.

Bell v Prince
Another no-brainer: Prince.

Collingwood v de Villiers
de Villiers and Collingwood have very similar Test records so in theory it’s a tough call. de Villiers is much younger and just as good a fielder. Collingwood is a useful bowler though. I would go for de Villiers, although it is very tight – he has three centuries this year (one a double).

Ambrose v Boucher
Quite a large mismatch… Boucher by a mile.

Flintoff v Morkel
Morkel is good, but Flintoff is Flintoff.

Sidebottom v Nel
Although Sidebottom has been excellent for England, I would choose Nel every time He has that ability to get wickets when none look likely. In addition, Nel replaced Steyn and Sidebottom v Steyn is a simple call.

Anderson v Ntini
Ntini is the most experienced current pace bowler in world cricket but he has looked past his best on this tour. I have been impressed with Anderson recently and so would choose him.

Panasar v Harris
Although Panasar is a liability in the field his ability to change a Test match wins here.

That makes the combined side:
Smith
McKenzie
Amla
Pietersen
Prince
de Villiers
Boucher
Flintoff
Nel
Anderson
Panasar

I would swap Kallis for de Villiers and get a better batsman and a very useful bowler. Anybody else fancy a try?

South Africa show up England's failings

I expected South Africa to thrash England at Lords’. As it turned out the beatings were put back a week until they got to Headingley, not that they lost any of their severity. England lost in Leeds because of two things: batting and bowling.

How can a side that made 593-8 at Lords’ be bowled out for 203 and 327 at Headingley? The fact is that the 593-8 is out of the ordinary for England. 203 is a more representative score, a true reflection of where England’s batting is at. Earlier in the summer against much weaker opposition England managed first innings scores of 319 (Lords’), 202 (Old Trafford) and 364 (Trent Bridge). Given these scores, 203 sounds about right. The second innings was classic England:

• a bad start, it is the law that when facing a huge task an England opener has to get less than five.
• a hopelessly out of form number three.
• a middle order whom play like they have just won the lottery
• someone who looks in decent form who then gets out to a soft catch
• a general collapse followed by someone in the lower order making the score look much more respectable than it really is

On a flat wicket, in the sun, England was reduced to 152-6, of which Jimmy Anderson had made 34. Rubbish.

England’s bowlers continued to struggle. Flintoff’s return is welcome and he added some pace into the attack. Anderson bowled well without much success. Broad looks worryingly like a man who doesn’t know how to take wickets but it is difficult to drop a number eight who regularly makes more runs than half of the top order combined. Pattinson was there for reasons about which I will not go into, mainly because I haven’t figured out what they could possibly be. That leaves Panasar who looked ineffective.

South Africa batted really well and England’s singly failed to follow their lead. South Africa made 522 and to be honest it looked like a 500 wicket so it seems churlish to criticize England’s bowlers for not getting South Africa out sooner. There was some movement early on in the first day but it was by no means a 203 all out wicket, at least not for a quality Test line-up...

Its twenty-twenty finals day on Saturday. The first match is Essex v Middlesex and Cook and Strauss have been told (and no this isn’t me having a laugh by making something ridiculous up):
“It was deemed after two tough Test matches that those players who played in both Tests will not be available,” an England spokesman said.

Unbelievable.

Paris to host 2012 Olympic Games

After I made a perfect prediction for the first Test match, I thought I might have a go at the booming property market… So, I couldn’t have been more wrong about what would happen at Lords’. If you look at previous results I should have been at least in the right ball park, so what changed. I think there were two key differences to previous matches:

1. England batted well. They don’t do it much so there was no way I could expect that to happen! The openers Strauss and Cook laid a solid foundation. Pietersen and Bell then played quite beautifully with ample support from Broad. I do wonder why England managed to bat really well against South Africa and no so well against a clearly inferior attack like New Zealand. It will be interesting to see if they can do it twice.
2. South Africa bowled rubbish. Dale Steyn, world number two, did not live up to billing. Ntini bowled like Jason ‘Put him on at both ends’ Gillespe did in the 2005 Ashes. A class act gone to seed. I hope we are not watching the demise of a quality performer. Morkel was impressive and clearly the best on offer. Harris, well, I wondered if the England tail-enders had been told to gift him a wicket or three so that South Africa would have to pick him in the next Test. Harris or Nel is presumably the choice– I would take Nel on any surface and any day.

South Africa looked underprepared, it may be that IPL cricket has softened them a bit – there is no challenge in bowling 2x2 over spells every few days. Of all the teams that could turn up looking a bit … tubby … I didn’t expect the normally professional South Africa to be one of them.

It looks like it may be a close series, which is excellent news after the “why haven’t we beaten them yet” groundhog days playing New Zealand.

Is it time for South Africa to stop choking?

It is the first England v South Africa Test match at Lords' on Thursday. South Africa usually starts the series strongly and wins the first Test match. Something odd then happens and their domination wanes and then disappears. South Africa has not won a Test series in England since, well, before I was born. They played cricket in black and white then, so it is quite a while ago. So, what do I predict this time around: more of the same? I expect South Africa to trounce England at Lords’ – weather permitting. Why? They have better bowlers, better batsmen and better fielders. Oh, and they probably have more desire too.

South Africa has two bowlers in the top five in the ICC rankings - Steyn (2) and Ntini (5). Steyn is genuinely quick and I am looking forward to see him bowl. His pace and reverse swing could be devastating against England’s mediocre batting line-up. In addition they have Kallis (25) and Morkel (56) who are more than useful first change bowlers. England in comparison lacks fire-power and that could be their undoing. Sidebottom is England’s top ranked bowler (6) with Panasar next (11), Andserson (26) and Broad (63).

South Africa has two quality batsmen – Smith and Kallis, both of whom have made big scores against England. These are the two key men, possibly in the series. If they fall cheaply England may prosper, if they play near their potential, England’s bowlers will toil. England’s batsmen have been poor recently. They have just played six tests against New Zealand and their highest first innings score was 364. England last scored 400 in the first innings… wait for it… in June 2007 against the West Indies. Yes, England has not made 400 in the first innings for over a year (they did make over 400 at Napier in the second innings). South Africa has passed 450 in two out of their last three Tests.

Is it all doom and gloom for England? Vaughan (assuming he is fit) may play well against South Africa. He likes batting against pace and the same could also be true of Strauss and Cook. The problem is that I don’t think Pietersen likes pace and the South Africans know it. He can expect plenty of chin music and lots of pressure. If any of the wickets take spin then Panasar could be a big factor and he can produce when the pressure is on.

Who knows, England could be beaten that badly that the selectors even have to change the side. Now I am being silly.

Kolpak, sounds a bit South African to me

There has been a lot of news and discussion about the number of ‘Kolpak’ players playing in English County Cricket -- but what is a Kolpak player?

The United Kingdom is part of the European Union (EU) which is a political and economic union of twenty-seven member states. One of the principles of the EU is a guarantee of free movement of people, trade, services and capital. This means that any EU resident can work for any European company, including county cricket clubs and that it is illegal to discriminate against people of any member state.

South Africa is not in the EU, so... what has all this EU stuff got to do with South Africans playing in England? In 2003, Maroš Kolpak took the German Handball Federation to the European Court of Justice because he had been discharged from his German handball club because they had a non-EU player quota system. Maroš is from Slovakia which (at the time) was not part of the EU. His argument was that as he was allowed to work in the EU he should be allowed to work for whomever he liked. The Court of Justice found in Kolpak’s favour and ruled that any person who is allowed to work in the EU from a country that has an Associate Trade Agreement with the EU (like Slovakia) must be treated the same as an EU citizen. This has become known as the Kolpak ruling. South Africa have an Associate Trade Agreement with the EU and so if a South African cricketer has a work permit he can legally play for a country cricket team without breaking any ‘non-EU’ player rules.

Is it because I is white?

If your name is Andre Nel, then the answer to this question, sadly, is 'Yes'. Nel was selected for the South African tour of India. Nel always gives his best and his best is frequently good enough to worry most batsman, including Brian Lara who he had a penchant for dismissing. However, South Africa have a policy of picking six players ‘of colour’ in their 14 man squad. As a result Nel was replaced, in a process called ‘transformation’, by Charl Langeveldt. How can this possibly be to the advantage of anyone? It is clearly unfair to Nel and it would not be a huge surprise if he now turned his back on South African cricket (just have they have turned their back on him). Langeveldt has been thrust into the ‘not good enough to be picked’ limelight and promptly, and not unexpectedly, pulled out of the tour and will have to be replaced with the guy who wasn’t as good as the guy who wasn’t as good to be picked (Zondeki in this case). It is also worth sparing a thought for Graeme Smith who has the unenviable task of deciding when the bowlers who are not really good enough to be picked get to bowl...

A game of two halves

They say in cricket that you never know what the next ball will bring and that even when a side is in total control, batting with the gods, a lapse of concentration or an inspired bowling spell can completely change that. This has been vividly demonstrated twice in two days.

Firstly Australia faced Sri Lanka at the MCG. This was Adam Gilchrist’s last appearance at the ‘G’ and what a performance he put on. Chasing 222 for victory Gilchrist struck 83 from 50 balls and demonstrated exactly what we will be missing when he retires – class. At 113-2 from 15.4 overs when he was dismissed it all looked a formality and Sri Lanka were in the process of being crushed (again). This was not to be as the Sri Lankans reduced Australia to 123-6, then 158-8 bowling them out for 208. Ponting, Clarke, Symonds, Hussey and Haddin managed twelve between them! A remarkable turn-around.

Secondly South Africa started their second Test Match against Bangladesh. The first was a surprisingly close affair and so Smith and McKenzie must have gone out to bat on the first morning with a few nerves. If they did, it didn’t show. By stumps on day one, South Africa had amassed 405/0 with Smith on 223 and McKenzie 169 – a record highest first day score without losing a wicket. The highest first wicket stand ever (413) looked a formality and given the way Smith in particular played, all sorts of records looked like being broken. Smith and McKenzie broke the first wicket record and then, relatively at least, collapsed -- slowly. Smith went at 415 having make 232 from 277 balls, a truly commanding innings. From that point only Amla 38 from 87, Boucher 21 from 83 and Kallis 39 from 120 made double figures and South Africa made very heavy weather of getting to 583/7 dec. 583/7 is still clearly a commanding position but I expected to wake up to hear Lara’s 400* had been broken...