The problem with Zimbabwe

Has cricket ever been in such a state of precariousness? Wherever you look within this great game of ours there are issues, issues and more issues. On a domestic level there is disenchantment with Kolpaks in England, debate about quotas in South Africa and ensuing grief surrounding the Champions League Twenty20 as India won’t allow teams in with players who played in the ICL.

Internationally there’s how to deal with Twenty20, how to deal with Stanford and how to look after the pinnacle of the game – Test cricket. All of the above merely scratches the surface and is why the meeting of the ICC today in Dubai is likely to be critical on several levels.

But there’s one other thing on the agenda that is of wider importance to the world than the sometimes insular world of cricket. Zimbabwe. Home of equality and bastion of free speech – the very model of a 21st century democracy. In the wake of the recent elections there it seems the whole world is scathing of what happened… and yet no-one is doing very much about it. Where is the UN? Where the so-called defenders of democracy the US and UK (wot no interests or oil – oh well in that case we’ll just leave em to their own ‘kill you if you don’t vote for us’ devices)?

And yet out of this world of apathy the ECB, of all people, has decided to make a stand (although to be fair to the government they did help them along). Rather than go into all the details here check out this article in today’s Independent.

So cricket has the chance to act where the rest of the world hasn’t… except the Indians don’t. To get a full understanding of the situation read this article. As I write the ICC keeps putting this to the back of the agenda to deal with oh so important measures like whether Pakistan should be awarded a draw for the Test match they decided not to finish against England a couple of years ago. Talk about getting your priorities right.

For me the answer is obvious. No-one wants to recognise a country or a government led by someone like Mugabe, so why would you recognise a team that has links to that government. Just because they’re still allowed to compete in the Olympics and World Cup doesn’t make it right… someone needs to take a stand and why not cricket. Kick them out until the international community has done something to override the travesty of so-called democracy carried out in front of the world’s eyes.

Snake eyes

Amidst all the fretting, frothing and pontificating about Twenty20, the IPL, the ICL, the Stanford make a man a millionaire for fielding a few balls invitational baboons v gibbons events and the occasional Test match, no-one has spotted the real gap in the market for enticing supporters to grounds.

The teams do have names and yet the personnel are very rarely the same which adds even more spice and that game is, of course, how big can we get the beer snake before the stewards (that being team name number one) get near the crowd (the opposition) and we chuck everything in the air so it rains on everyone around us, including the stewards and anyone who happens to be near them? If you think Twenty20 is quick then this is even quicker for no sooner has one snake been dismantled than all the cups are hastily reassembled in another area of the ground for another game.

The great thing about this game is you can put a game of Twenty20 on in the background and for those who get bored of the snake game they can watch some cricket instead. But surely it is only a matter of time before the authorities dispense with the cricket – after all the cricketers cost money – and just have Twenty20 snake matches instead. The ICC would have to ascertain some rules – if, for example, a steward gets a touch to the snake does this mean you are out or is it an unsuccessful appeal?

There is a serious point here – if you want to watch this game rather than watch the cricket that you paid your ticket for then that’s your prerogative, but do me a favour and GET OUT OF MY WAY WHILE YOU ARE DOING IT SO I BLOODY WELL CAN.

Twenty20 apocolyptic vision

The sheer ridiculousness of the Stanford Twenty20 deal with the ECB came home to roost at Old Trafford last night as a dull game of cricket was played out in front of a bunch of people who barely knew the rules or what was actually going on, resulting in England cantering to a win.

The ridiculousness comes in when you consider that if it was West Indies v England and Mr Stanford was behind the game then England’s players would have raked in 500k each for the privilege. Someone like Owais Shah would have been laughing all the way to the bank. I have nothing against him – he’s a good cricketer – but I could have done his job last night. He was not needed to bat, was hardly irreplaceable in the field and so if you reckon Colly got his MBE for doing very little after the 2005 Ashes then what to make of him walking away with half a million?

Fair play to him – we’d all take it, but considering England’s best paid player last year earned shy of half a million you’re not telling me Mr Vaughan might be casting the odd envious glance as some journeyman one-day player takes more from three hours work than he does a year for being England’s most successful cricket captain? And what of Mr Stanford – wouldn’t he rather have Vaughan playing than a good county cricketer barely recognisable to anyone outside the county circuit?

There could be trouble ahead.

Shouldn’t we be somewhere else?

As England and New Zealand were enjoying a day off (well England were enjoying it anyway) an interesting sub-plot was going on at Chester-le –street. In what looks like a belter of a match that Durham lost to Hampshire by just four runs. But it wasn’t the closeness of the contest, but the battle between two men who have been the talismen for the respective international sides in very recent times.

Shane Bond beat Harmison by nine wickets to eight in the match, including the last gasp winner, although ironically it was Harmy stranded at the other end after scoring 36 not out as Durham edged closer to a win. Presumably as I write this they may be in the bar together wondering what might have been. What might have been if Bond wasn’t made of glass? What if Harmy could get his headspace to match his talent? And what if the powers that be had not decided Bond was no longer eligible to represent New Zealand thanks to his involvement with the ICL.

Sadly it seems they will remain unfulfilled talents, which might make even Bond’s celebratory beer a touch bittersweet as he sees his old team-mates struggle whilst Harmy could be forgiven for feeling even more annoyed having just watched Anderson do what he used to do so well in an England shirt.

And they say football is a funny old game.

Ladies in red v women in white

Sometimes you have to wander whether the cricket writers of this world have got their priorities in order. Today’s debate in the wake of series victory against NZ is all about the enigma that is Jimmy Anderson and what to do about our middle order travails. Yet anyone who has been at the Tests knows that the real burning issue of the day is whether the Marston’s Maidens have taken over from the npower girls as the fittest ladies at the Test grounds.

It’s a question causing controversy amongst the male fraternity. The Maidens have the great freshness about them, something new. They wear white, not red. Maybe not as much fire about them, but something virginal. And they wear little schoolgirl type outfits which again puts them in the nice and innocent v flirty npower girls.

But let’s face it, if you really put your mind to it then there’s one simple reason why the Maidens have truly bowled us over. They are associated with beer and that makes them altogether more sexy than the ladies in red, who might well be electric but aren’t going to inebriate us.

Snakes alive

So the burning question of the day at Trent Bridge was… what exactly is offensive about beer snakes? I just don’t understand really. Think about it… if you were in a pub and went round, picked all the empty glasses up and stacked them all neatly the landlord would thank you very much and offer to buy you a cheeky half after saving him the hassle of glass collecting. In a cricket ground you get kicked out, yep kicked out. The poor bloke who suffered such a fate yesterday looked very bemused and so did we.

It’s not that anyone really thinks they are particularly big or clever, but surely they are harmless? And not only that, but you have to feel sorry for the poor old stewards who have to enforce the rules and in so doing look like a bunch of killjoys. When half the stand is on its feet singing ‘stand up if you hate stewards’ you have to wonder whether looking for alternative employment in McDonalds might be a good idea. Free burgers and no abuse, mmmm where’s my Big Mac?

Having said that, they show a hell of a lot more intelligence than the people who, having seen someone kicked out for building one, then go and build another one. Lessons. Learnt? No.

Trent warfare

It’s not often I’m going to paraphrase the Beautiful South, but it occurred to me that when it comes to the next Test ‘this could be Hamilton or anywhere, Wellington or home, The Black Caps are everywhere, We played away then at home. Played away and then at home.’ (If you don’t get that see this).

Suffice to say that no-one’s going to bemoan seeing the back of the Kiwis – indeed they’ll almost be glad to see the back of themselves. There’s the one-dayers to come, but let’s face it the only thing anyone’s going to remember about one-day games between these two in a few years time is that it saw Jesse Ryder stick his hand through a window and put himself out the game for a while. If indeed that ever loudening din is the death knell of one-day cricket then that would seem an amusing, if not particularly fitting, tribute to a form of the game which, let it be remembered, once revolutionised the game in the same way as Twenty20.

So anyway, despite my lack of enthusiasm, some thanks as we draw to an end. To Jesse – for inspiring some amazing songs; to Vettori for hating his particular song (it’s there on the same page) so much it inspired us to sing it even more and even buy some comedy glasses for added effect and lest we forget Stephen Fleming who said “It would have been nice to have had one final tour in England but it seemed like we were in England with their support and I’m just happy they didn’t come up with a song for me.”

Let’s hope Trent Bridge springs a few good stories to end it in style.

Raining on mexican parades

Oh for crying out loud not again. Not another weekend watching the same thing. The sheer relentlessness of it. The sheer repetitiveness of it. The sheer dampness of the occasion. I’m not complaining about the fact that for the sixth bloody Test match in a row we’re playing New Zealand but the fact that for the third in a row we’re going to be watching it in shit weather. See, there are three things about watching cricket that make it so great. First up is the sport itself which is the main reason you are there. Secondly is the opportunity to have a beer or two with cricket-loving friends and thirdly is the chance to bask in a bit of sunshine. Take point three away and the beers don’t taste quite so nice and some of the fare served up this summer hasn’t really been enough to warm anyone up. I’m still counting down the hours though.

There is one thing that will piss me off more than the weather in Nottingham and that’s Mexican waves. Not withstanding the weather, the standard of the cricket or the taste of the beer, there is still never, ever a reason to do a Mexican wave. Let’s reiterate that. Never. Ever. Not even if someone said we’d win next year’s Ashes 5-0 if we do Mexican waves all the time. Not even if you got to sleep with Natalie Portman, Keira Knightley and Cameron Diaz at the same time. Not even if it meant you got to play for England. And not even if you got to play for England, score the winning century in that 5-0 win and THEN sleep with Natalie, Keira and Cameron all at the …. hang on a minute I need to have a word with myself here.

…

…

No, I was right there’s still no excuse. Mexican waves were funny once – in 1986 during the Mexican World Cup from which they take their name. They are to crowd participation what Big Brother is to television – namely the end of civilisation as we know it. If you still think that watching people stand up and sit down in order is funny you really need to get out more and if you’re busy watching that working out when it’s your turn to stand up then you’re obviously not watching the cricket which, in case you hadn’t noticed, is what you are bloody there for.

The only excuse for standing up and sitting down in order is when it’s your round and the sooner people learn that the better. Glad I got that off my chest anyway. Speak soon.

Tiny Tim and piss-poor Ponting

Tiny Timmy Ambrose. Ahhh look at him; so tiny, so ickle… indeed so small he hasn’t even got any hair to add that all important “and an eighth” when anyone asks how tall he is. I have an affinity for Mr Ambrose and it ain’t because of our height. I’m 6′ 3″ and the last time we posed for a picture together (that’s us there – I think he’s standing on a box) I nearly missed him.

But I wrote his song you see. Now to be fair I’m not expecting Lloyd Webber on the blower any minute to see if I can do a Tim Rice-esque job for him but all the necessary elements of a Barmy Army song were there…. Juvenile. Tick. Crap? Tick. Very very catchy (the most important thing)? Tick.

Not only that, but he loves it and I know because he told me so. He also told me that he hopes we are going to be mates for a very long time. Let’s be real he wouldn’t recognise me again if he saw me and he was referring more to the fact that he hopes has a long Test career, but as I kiss his picture every night before I go to bed I….. oops gone too far.

Anyway I was thinking of him today not in a long lost friend kind of way but because he has replaced Phil Mustard in the one-day team. Bless Phil Mustard as well. Tried to have a chat with him once but couldn’t understand a word he was saying. Still don’t know whether it was because of his accent or because he was drunk or because I was drunk.

One person I have no blessings for is Ricky Ponting. According to Cricinfo he only scored 0.004 points per 1,000 dollars in their scoring system. Ha. Double ha because he was obviously so pissed off when the poor little sod only earned $400,000 dollars in the bidding. “I could end up being the bargain buy of the tournament, you never know,” he said at the time. Or you could be the worst value for money player in the entire tournament. If only the Ashes were this year we could write a song about that, but you know he’ll score bucketloads next year and ruin our chance. So in the meantime:

Ponting joined the IPL hurrah, hurrah
Ponting joined the IPL hurrah, hurrah
Ponting joined the IPL, 400 grand was not so swell
But he said I’ll score a load of runs, and prove the money men wrong.

Ponting joined the IPL hurrah, hurrah
Ponting joined the IPL hurrah, hurrah
Ponting joined the IPL, 39 runs oh bloody hell
Two golden ducks and not much else, the money men weren’t wrong

Manc memories

So – Madchester for a bit of a cricket. Truly mad fer that. Wicked. Now I dunno bout you but I could never quite understand the whole Madchester look, what with anoraks done up to the neck and those weird little hats they all used to wear. But then I found myself dressing exactly the same at the cricket cos it was cold and windy and I realised precisely why. It was nothing to do with looking cool and everything to do with the miserable weather up here.

It also made me realise why all those Manc bands never move on stage. Think about it – Liam stands with his hands behind his back, Morrissey was hardly a dancing dervish and Ian Brown – he was so cold he couldn’t sing in tune. Like them I only moved enough at Old Trafford to grab my pint and put it down and then wander backstage for a fag. That Billy lad who played the trumpet likes to move though – saw him on Sky Sports News pretending to be Rocky. He can play the tune but fight the fight – I don’t think so Billy lad.

Anyway that lack of movement affliction obviously afflicted the England batsmen who crawled along at a snail’s pace as well. The only English player who broke out of the freezing shackles was Monty and that’s because he’s as hyperactive as a man with a pogo stick instead of legs. And he’s got that nice beard and hat to keep him warm…

You’d be mistaken for thinking this is the capital of sport at the moment. Mad man Ricky Hatton was fighting down the road on the Saturday and the sight of Old Trafford of the football variety peaking above the stands was a reminder the bloody red gits had just won a rather cool double… but it’s the last we’ll see of it for a while as there’s no more Tests for at least three years. On the one hand that’s a right royal pain as we always seem to win or do well here, but let’s face it the ground is rubbish and about as modern as the Hacienda. And let’s face it we’ve grown out of that… haven’t we?