Author: LordCanisLupus

2015 Test Century Watch #22 – Asad Shafiq

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Asad-Shafiq

Asad Shafiq – 107 v Bangladesh at Mirpur

The third century of the innings was made by Asad Shafiq, which was his 6th in tests in 35 matches, his second in Bangladesh (the other was made in Chittagong in 2011) and his 4th highest in tests (his career best is 137 v New Zealand in Sharjah last year). He has two tons against South Africa as well, and one other against Sri Lanka.

We’ve done Mirpur now in the Younis Khan hundred yesterday, so sort of running out of things to say at the stadium or Pakistani level now! So was thinking, had we had a 107 this year, so far? The answer is no, so we can go to town on that then!

Have you seen a test 107, Dmitri? The answer is “not really”. I was there on Day 2 of the England v Sri Lanka test in 1998, when Graeme Hick was dismissed on 107 early on that day, but he’d scored all the runs the day before. So it doesn’t really count.

Asad’s 107 was the 68th score of 107 in test cricket. The last one before him was by Jimmy Neesham against the West Indies last year at Sabina Park, Kingston. The last by a Pakistani was by Younis Khan (not out) against India at Eden Gardens, Kolkata in November 2007. David Boon, Allan Lamb, Denesh Ramdin, Alec Stewart, Doug Walters and Younis Khan have all made two scores of 107 in test matches.

The first 107 was made back in July 1893 at Lord’s. Arthur Shrewsbury, who we featured in an earlier piece, had made 106 in the first innings of the game, and when Harry Graham came in for the Australians at 75/5 on the dismissal of Trott(y) things looked bleak. But Graham kept the visitors honest with his 107 which he made on his test debut. I love the old Almanack entries on Cricinfo…. here cometh a mention of a “5”:

Half the wickets were down for 75, but then came the partnership between Gregory and Graham, which completely altered the aspect of the match. These two young cricketers began by making a series of short runs, and obviously upset the fieldsmen by the fearless and rapid manner in which they travelled between the wickets. Very soon, too, the bowlers became anxious, and almost before the spectators could realise it runs were coming at a great pace. So admirably did the two Australians bat that at lunch time 120 runs had been added without further loss, and in all the total had reached 217, or 142 for the wicket, before Gregory was dismissed. With Bruce in, Graham completed his hundred, and soon afterwards the follow-on was saved with four wickets in hand, but at 264 Graham’s splendid, though by no means faultless innings, was closed by a catch at the wicket. Out of 189 added during his stay, the young Victorian had made 107, batting for two hours and twenty minutes, and hitting a 5, twelve 4’s, two 3’s, and nine 2’s.

The obituary makes you want to find out more:

Harry Graham did many brilliant things as a batsman but scarcely gave himself a fair chance. Had he ordered his life more carefully he might have had a much longer and more successful career in first-class cricket. His natural powers were great. He did not play with quite a straight bat but he was a splendid hitter with any amount of dash and vigour. When he came to England for the first time in 1893 he was at his best, playing the innings of his life against England at Lord’s. No one who saw the match will forget the way in which he and Gregory knocked off the England bowling after Australia had lost five wickets for 75.

Count me in as intrigued. On a bit of subsequent research I found this – http://www.cemeteries.org.nz/stories/grahamharrysthn90608.pdf

Other 107s to note, maybe, even if it isn’t a wonderful big ton, are Alec Stewart’s only hundred against the old enemy, made in Melbourne in 1998, when he gave up the gloves to Warren Hegg, in a game England won. In 2004, Marcus Trescothick completed two centuries in a match when he made 107 in the 2nd innings against the West Indies at Edgbaston. But all in all, 107 isn’t earth shattering, is it?

Especially when you have a 226 and a 148 coming in before you.

Asad Shafiq’s 100 came up in 149 balls and contained 9×4 and 1×6.

2015 Test Century Watch #21 – Azhar Ali

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Pakistan batsman Azhar Ali runs as rain falls during the third one-day international (ODI) match between Sri Lanka and Pakistan at the R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo on June 13, 2012. AFP PHOTO/Ishara S. KODIKARA (Photo credit should read Ishara S.KODIKARA/AFP/GettyImages)
 AFP PHOTO/Ishara S. KODIKARA (Photo credit should read Ishara S.KODIKARA/AFP/GettyImages)

Azhar Ali – 226 v Bangladesh at Mirpur

Mohammad Hafeez’s Pakistani record against Bangladesh lasted a week. I had a hunch this man might get close when he rested overnight on 120-odd and so it proved. An old fashioned test batsman making a really high score to set his team on the right path. It’s time for some stats.

This is the 15th highest score in tests by a Pakistani batsman and the 39th test double century. It is Azhar’s first test double, as he passed his previous best score of 157 made against England and Sri Lanka in 2012. This is his 8th test ton, half of which have come against Sri Lanka. He took his average from 41 to over 44 in this innings, and also passed 3000 runs in test matches. His previous best against Bangladesh was the 83 he made in Khulna in the previous test.

I have done the Pakistan and Bangladesh stats to death already, so let’s look at the number 226. Have you seen one, Dmitri? Given there have been just 8 scores of 226 in test history, the answer is likely to be no, and so it is. There have been recent 226s in this country – Kevin Pietersen made one against the West Indies at Headingley back in 2007, while Jonathan Trott also made this score against Bangladesh at Lord’s in 2010. Azhar’s is the second in Bangladesh – Neil McKenzie made 226 at Chittagong in his record stand with Graeme Smith back in 2008. Bridgetown has seen two scores of 226, and both by Barbadians – Sir Garfield Sobers made one in 1960 v England, while Gordon Greenidge made his score against Australia in 1991 (when, if memory serves, they were thinking of dropping him for poor form). Brian Lara is the third West Indian to make 226, completing his effort in Adelaide against Australia (of course), while our history slot looks at the first 226, made in 1931 by someone who specialised in large innings.

The first score of 226 was made by Don Bradman, and it wasn’t his usual foe (England) he made it against. This was made at Brisbane against South Africa, and his individual score was higher than both South African innings in this game (170 and 117). Bradman made 200 on the first day, and Australia made 450 in the first innings, but this test still managed to go SIX days (yeah, yeah, two of them were rained off) in a timeless match. Interesting that South Africa had a Morkel in their team….

226 is the 136th= highest score in test cricket. Still the holy grail of 229 has not been scored in the history of tests (it must go soon, surely….). 228 still has been scored just the once (Herschelle Gibbs), while 227 has three instances, 225 has three, 224 has six, 223 has nine, 222 has five, 221 has five and 220 has three. Must be something about 223 and 226!

Azhar Ali’s 100 came up in 212 balls with 10×4, and his 200 came up in 406 balls with 19×4 and 1×6. His total innings lasted 428 balls with 20×4 and 2×6.

Lament

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Well, good morning/afternoon all. It has been an interesting one to wake up to, I have to tell you. I’ll leave “proper” politics because there’s a ton more places to look for it than on here, and it divides rather than unites which is never good in my book. So let’s talk about the sort of politics we all love to indulge in and that’s from the good old ECB.

I think you all remember the aftermath of the Ashes debacle when in the infamous February press release, the most heinous crime anyone could perpetrate in the English cricket firmament was to breach the sanctity of the dressing room. There were certain journalists who were said to be “anal about leaks” but that didn’t stop them talking out of that orifice on a daily basis. The people on this board, out there in the world aren’t stupid, and they know these stories don’t just appear out of thin air. These journalists have contacts, have their way to read the runes, because if they didn’t, they wouldn’t be doing their jobs. I’m not sure it is, as John Etheridge I believe once said “more good journalism than leaks”, but it’s something that annoys us all.

So we can’t be all up in arms because the news leaked regularly about Kevin Pietersen and not be when it affected Cook (in December when his sacking from the ODI captaincy got out) and now seems to be for Moores. I know the journalistic corps will accuse me of naivety and all that, and that this is how the world works, but it doesn’t make it right. I’m going out on a limb here and say that although I didn’t support the appointment of Peter Moores (reeked of a pre-ordained Flower-inspired stitch up) and don’t particularly rate him as an international coach (this progress we are making seems rather ephemeral to me – as Grenada / Barbados seems to indicate) he comes across as a very decent man trying his best, and the one thing that those people deserve above all else is to be treated with the same decency. If this is proved, and I note Lawrence Booth for one is saying this didn’t necessarily come from the ECB, to be from high-placed official sources then more shame on them. This is not the way a new and improved organisation does business, and if it is one of the exiting old guard doing it, well….. you know what you should do about that.

The responsibility for a leak goes to the source of the information. So if the ECB told someone in confidence that the decision had been made, and then this gets out, it’s the ECB’s fault for trusting that confidence. The fact is that if this is the case here, and that’s the message coming out here, there’s always the convenient “plausible deniability” on behalf of this organisation which seems to make key decisions ahead of appointees taking up their roles. Indeed, Strauss hasn’t even been officially announced yet, and he’s supposed to be the one either doing the sacking or rubber-stamping it.

I see one of the commenters BTL on the Guardian is going on about us conspiracy theorists again. I’m glad these people are so trusting of those in authority to think that way and just let those running the game to do as they please, no questions asked. Trust those inside the game. But from the outside there seems to be a bit of a power struggle within the ECB and I have no idea how it is going to pan out. The deserved sacking of Downton, a man who should never have been appointed, seems more and more like a piece of meat thrown to us “slobbering hordes”.  We then replace his role with something not yet defined, and when they found out that not many people were interested in a Downton-lite role, the new revolution stumbled across an old pillar to effect whatever it is Harrison and Graves think is needed, which at this stage, we don’t have a clue about. Memo to all here, I’m not buying what Harrison is selling, not at all. Now to appease the hordes again, we are going to fire a coach AFTER a series where we could have looked at new players, but the coach and captain were too keen to bolster positions and didn’t try much. This isn’t a new bold strategy, but something else too familiar. Clueless, aimless and now heartless. The absence of a decent media strategy, treating people in their employment with dignity and class, and allowing things to just get out there, however they get there, isn’t great. It really isn’t.

Lawrence Booth, Jonathan Agnew and Ali Martin can all put their side of the story any time they like – they are more than welcome to here, but I would not expect that. How this news got out there matters to people. It speaks of an organisation seeking to regain our trust, to re-engage with us, to make us proud of the England cricket team again and to bridge the divide. This is not what is happening. The divisions aren’t now a simple chasm down the middle framed by a decision to sack Pietersen. They are becoming fractures, along familiar fault lines, but fractures nonetheless. Those that were original members of the outside cricket club see more of the same. Those who were more attuned to the ECB way of thinking see appeasement of the great unwashed. Those of a more sceptical bent than the ECB line to takers see increasing incompetence and doubt creeps in, like rot in a wooden building. The Cook fans see devilment in every utterance on the doubts in his form. The KP fans see an ECB talking out of both sides of its mouth. The ECB are further away than ever from gaining public trust. Their ultimate test was to keep their traps shut and do this the right way. They haven’t. It’s a bloody PR disaster.

Just one thought, that could negate much of this, but not all. The only explanation that gets the ECB partially off the hook is that the leak came from Peter Moores himself, or someone close to him. In which case we can make our own judgements on him. That said, it would seem a little out of character, wouldn’t it?

Ireland v England – ONLY One Day International

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A forlorn, over-tired Dmitri will not be up in time for the start of this game, as at 6:30 UK time, I’ve not gone to bed yet. It’s 1:30 in New Jersey, and I’m not a happy camper, but this isn’t a politics blog and I am friends with people of many political persuasions, not many of my own!

So to this game between an insulting scratch England squad and a keen and enthused Irish team. If anyone feels inclined to comment on this game, please do so. I’ll probably be asleep for half of it.

Thanks for the comments on the press people. You know, if they read it, people like Ed Smith, they may see why some get a barrage of comments on their posts. It might be of benefit to think about how they come across. I tried to call a truce a while back, a bit silly of me, open to discuss with some people, but now they don’t even seem to try, and I guess they feel the need to interact with the great unwashed is less.

That’s fine by me. I’m at least happy in this pursuit. Good night.

Election

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Well, I’m over here, and most of you are over there, so let me just set down a quick message. In the next few days, please try to avoid political talk on here. We all have our own views, and once the votes are cast tomorrow, that’s that for us as the electorate. I like you all on here without us getting into tedious political debates that divide more than unite. Yes, it’s the “can’t we all get along” speech. I’m out for most of tomorrow, to visit the home of the Lakewood Blue Claws for their crunch Single A clash against the Augusta Greenjackets. Before that, I might be going to a location of an (in)famous TV show. So on your best behaviour and all that….

Right, with that over with, I’ve got some work to do. I’ve begun the (in)famous Journalist rankings piece, and thought I’d seek your input. You get to nominate one of the following for the top prize – Selfey, Newman, Pringle, Brenkley for the top prize – but also I’d like two or three others that you think merit consideration for the top 10. The focus should be on this calendar year, and on something or other that really got to you. We are talking quality over quantity. You can nominate anyone, as long as they write regularly and the main reason for putting them forward is their written work (spoken words can be taken into consideration). Less weight should be given for those employed as recently retired internationals.

At the end of the day I have my own views, but your’s will be taken into account, and the votes actually count when we repeat the exercise for the awards at the end of the season. Particular articles that really riled should be put forward. You also know that if last year is anything to go by, some of the nominees read the piece. I know, because Jarrod Kimber told me. So fill up those comments and help me write the piece.

2015 Test Century Watch #20 – Younis Khan

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Younus-Khan_1500837cYounis Khan – 148 v Bangladesh at Mirpur

Ah, the old warrior, fresh from missing out in the runfest at Khulna, has cashed in today with a 148 in the second test. This was his 29th test hundred, made in his 98th test match, and he continues an exemplary conversion rate which means when he reaches 50, he makes it to 100 every other time. This is his 12th highest test century, not even half way to his career best of 313 against Sri Lanka in 2009 in Karachi.

This is Younis’s third test ton against Bangladesh, with the other two both coming in Chittagong, where he made 200* in 2011, and 119 as long ago as 2002. His previous best at Mirpur was 49. This was the 18th test century made by Pakistan against Bangladesh (number 19 followed three overs later) and Younus joins Mohammad Hafeez as the only Pakistanis to make three test hundreds against them.

Let’s do 148, and ask the question. Have you ever seen a test 148, Dmitri? Ah, funny you should say that but…no. I thought that might have been the score of one of Ponting’s tons in Adelaide, but it isn’t. This was the 31st test 148, and some that my readers may remember include:

  • Rahul Dravid at Headingley in his 2002 “we don’t seem to be able to get this chap out” tour.
  • Alastair Cook’s 148 at Adelaide in his tour for the ages in 2010/11, where he followed up his 235* with this knock. Those were the days.
  • One for Arron, Robin Smith’s 148* at Lord’s in 1991 when he marshalled the tail superbly and made a magnificent hundred.
  • Tim Robinson’s 148 in 1985, allied with David Gower’s 215, was a joy to watch one glorious Saturday afternoon. Have that on video somewhere…

However, as I always try to do, I want to pick out the old or the obscure, and the first 148 was made back in 1884. It’s almost astonishing that another man was not dismissed on this score for 87 years after that (MAK Pataudi), but back in the day Allan Steel made 148 at Lord’s in 1884 to help England to an innings victory over the Australians. I liked this description of him from Cricinfo:

Though not a regular captain of county or country, he had an improbable run of success as skipper: Marlborough over Rugby, Cambridge over Oxford, Gentlemen over Players, Lancashire over Yorkshire and England over Australia.

Bet he’s on Metatone’s Mafia hitlist (well, he’d been dead over a century, so that’s probably pointless). Anyway, the almanack entry gives you the facts of the first test 148.

Les Ames made an unbeaten 148 against South Africa at The Oval in 1930, and Kenny Barrington an unbeaten 148 against the same opposition at Kingsmead, Durban in the period intervening Steel and Pataudi. Tony Greig made two scores of 148 in 13 months – once in India at the Brabourne, Mumbai, and once in Bridgetown. Greig and Dravid have been dismissed twice for 148, while Barrington and Tendulkar have a dismissal and a not out to their name of that score.

This is the second 148 of the year. The first being made by AB DeVilliers against the West Indies in Cape Town. That century watch can be found here

This was the 26th test hundred made at Mirpur. At time of writing, given Azhar Ali is not out overnight, Younis ranks in 6th place, has the highest score for Pakistan (beating Taufeeq Umar’s 130) and was the second Pakistani to make a hundred at this venue (again, obviously, Taufeeq being the first). The ground record is held by Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Mahela Jayawardena who both made unbeaten 203s.

Younis Khan’s century came up in 142 balls and contained 9 x 4 and a six.

Assembly

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The aftermath of the tour continues and eyes turn towards the futures of the top table. Those eyes are cast more in the direction of the coach, Peter Moores, and when you read some of the stuff coming out, it’s no surprise.

Moores has to carry a number of burdens, partly of his own making, and partly a little unfair. I have not been inside a dressing room at professional level, but even at club level, you know when people don’t think you are credible, don’t listen to what you do, don’t care about your future. It’s not fair that Moores never played international cricket, and that will always count against him when it comes to motivating and coaching great international players. However, he has been on the county treadmill and knows it inside out, and will be a great county coach again when this ends. He commands respect of the county pros, but maybe lacks a little at the top level with the senior pros. Maybe. It’s guess work, but I’ve seen enough football managers lose that respect, and I can recognise some of the problems. At this stage, with a young core of players, Moores can bring them along, as long as he retains the support of the key senior pros. These being Cook, Bell, Broad and Anderson, and to a lesser degree, the next in line, Joe Root. All have played every game under Moores, and there is no hint of this changing any time soon.

The second cross he has to bear is that he lacks credibility among much of the watching public. James Morgan on TFT makes the analogy perfectly – would the England national team go back to Steve McClaren, or would the rugby team go back to Andy Robinson. Both were assistants under more successful coaches who never bridged the credibility gap with the public, probably unfairly. Moores, like it or not, comes across as a nice guy out of his depth at this level. I’m not, like some, going to assign some malevolent motive to his tenure on his behalf. He’s been thrown a hell of a challenge after the Ashes 2013-14, made even harder by the idiotic jettisoning of Kevin Pietersen (not for his absence from the team, but because of the messages it sent) and he has developed some of the younger players (although not greatly, not really). The sense remains though, as the World Cup campaign showed, that Moores is not up to key elements of the job. He will present a case, but the evidence is not backing it up. Combine an abject disaster in the World Cup with a home loss to Sri Lanka in all formats, and coughing up a 1-0 lead in the Caribbean, and there is not a lot to say “keep me on” other than some sort of hope for a change of fortune. My football team did that this season, and by the time we sacked our manager it was too late to save them, despite the best efforts of a new manager who did really well.

Which brings us to the third problem, and this one was partly of his own making, but more of that champion of champions Paul Downton. Peter Moores applied for a job and got it and accepted terms no manager/coach should ever do. That is, be told who he could not have in his team under any circumstances. You anti-KP fans keep making it about him if you want, but the message this sends to any player is profound. Be independently minded, have a strong opinion about your game, and how you want your career to pan out, and that could happen to you. It wasn’t a good start. Then, to have your appointment accompanied by the “greatest coach of his generation” comment by Downton was just amazing. Moores would have been completely at liberty to tell the MD to shut his hole, because that was going to stick. If he could not put before the public a set of results to live up to that billing, he was going to be ridiculed. So it has proved.

The final problem for Moores is his inability to speak, or appear to speak, in anything other than management tones. He sounds like a first year MBA student more than a cricket coach. Sport is about maximising the analytical tools to hand (I’m reading a fascinating book on baseball analysis at the moment) but it is also about unquantifiable exploits. You don’t find Jimmy Anderson’s fifth day morning session in any text book. You have that seize the day approach, the raising of the game to higher planes which can’t be factored in. If they were, sport would be bloody dull and we’d all not bother to watch it. But it’s too much process this, learning lessons that.

I’ll tell you another thing that doesn’t help, and it’s a warm welcome to a Paul Newman quote on here after at least a couple of weeks absence, is nonsense like this:

To watch England here has been to see a highly promising group who respect their coach and want to succeed for him and I believe Moores should be given that crack at the Ashes denied him in 2009 by another Kevin Pietersen-inspired controversy.

Just read that and weep. No player is going to come out in the open and say Moores shouldn’t be coach. KP did that and got fired as captain. KP said that about Flower and was booted out for it. There’s not a lot of longevity in showing you aren’t playing for the coach. I’d say we need to win more games to show how well we are playing for Moores, instead of going overboard over one win in Grenada. But Newman doesn’t let it go with his bete noire, who he is now getting all tin foil hat over. KP has the square root of eff all to do with Moores staying on as coach. Pietersen has not scored the runs required of him by Graves et al for starters. Second, KP is not responsible for Moores performance in the job thus far, so is a total utter irrelevance about whether Moores should stay in the job. Third, we’ve been down this long service award drivel before (he deserves a crack at the Ashes – if he deserved it in 2009, he’d have made an unanswerable case instead of losing home series in 2007 and 2008) and that worked in the World Cup. Also, Newman’s changed his tune. He was really down on Moores after the World Cup. Maybe Cook’s told him to lay off or something.

I feel a bit for Moores, to be honest. I actually think he’s a really decent man giving it his all, but he doesn’t really stand a chance. It may be, like before, he’s laying down the foundations for someone else, but also there’s the suspicion that this is as far as he can go. While it is hard to ignore the fact he took the job on compromised terms, he has not been the hate figure some portray him to be. He’s more a figure of sympathy, and in international sport, that is often much, much worse. If this best case you can make to keep him on is he deserves his go at the Ashes because he got sacked before, then you are not making a convincing case.

I thought I’d concentrate more on Moores in this piece, but do a brief bit on Cook and Strauss before longer thought pieces.

Cook has been the subject of a vicious attack by Boycott in the Telegraph. I wonder how Cook will approach Jonathan Agnew about that. Cook doesn’t take kindly to being spoken about like that and the consequences could be interesting. Boycott is a loudmouth, paid to express loud opinions, and you take them as they come. But I’ve never seen him this aggravated by a captain / player ever. This was going for the throat. I would say that it’s not as easy to dismiss Boycott’s views that align with a lot of us outside cricket, than it is for them to slate me, but they try (he’s a wife beater, he quit on England, blah blah – he also faced top quicks at 90 mph without a helmet on). A lot of us believe Cook isn’t the nice guy that his image is portrayed as, but I want to get away from that part. I want to look at the evidence – it’s all I try to do, and try to interpret. He’s protected, for now, and could jettison Moores to keep his career in check. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

As for Strauss…. appointing him the new Director of Cricket would be Downtonian in its brilliance. He talks the language of all charlatans – promising to build for a non-specific future, while using this to move on from something else that he doesn’t like (in this case a player who might return to form and demand selection). He also has the cult of Cook in his playbook, and would be an establishment, company candidate when root and branch change to a more exciting, attractive style of play is going to be needed. This current England team still has dedicated fans and lovers of the game actively wanting them, or key members of them, to fail to get the changes needed in structure, attitude and approach. Bringing back Mr Bowling Dry, with his foster son as captain and his foster dad wheeling away behind the scenes, is spitting in the face of those who actively want to love this side again. Strauss is typical ECB. Unexciting, not credible and the wrong man. More of this later.

2015 Test Century Watch #19 – Alastair Cook

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Alastair Cook – 105 v West Indies at Bridgetown, Barbados

And so it came to pass on the first day of the fifth month of the year two thousand and three fives since the birth of our lord, that Saint Alastair of Cook made his 26th test century. And there was great rejoicing among the corps de press, and amongst former disciples and pharisees, who announced from the highest heights that the lord and saviour was “back to his best” and doth bellowed from their pulpits that the Saint had “rammed the critics’ words back down your throats” and “be quiet muppets”.

Alastair Cook’s 26th test hundred came nearly two years after his previous one. In that time he immortalised the number 95, and went the number of innings not making a century from the opener slot that was inhabited by people like Mike Brearley. I could make this a whole piece on the nonsense between hundreds, but let’s try to keep this true to form.

Only one of Cook’s tons has been less than 105 – his unbeaten first century on debut v India at Nagpur where he made 104 not out. This was his second century at Kensington Oval, where he made 139 not out in the first innings back in 2009, and it remains his only venue in the Caribbean where he has made a test hundred. This is his fourth century against West Indies, and as we’ll see later, he’s not exactly gone on from the three figure score in those innings. This is his first test century in the first innings of a test match (first overall, not England’s first innings) since his 115 in 2012 v South Africa.

Have you seen a 105 Dmitri? Well, funny you should ask, but I saw a large part of a 105 made by Alastair Cook, when he made that score v Pakistan at Lord’s in 2006. I have seen two others at The Oval – the first by Chris Gayle in 2004, in an innings that drove Michael Holding mad I seem to recall, and the other by Justin Langer in 2005, when the Aussies started getting us all worried with that opening partnership. There have been 92 scores of 105 in test cricket. Alastair Cook and Jacques Kallis are the only two players to have been dismissed three times on that score. Ricky Ponting and Kumar Sangakkara have also made the score three times, but both have a not out to their name.

In our vintage slot, we go back to the first 105 made in tests, and that took place a mere 130 years ago (any jokes about it seeming like that between Cook’s last two hundreds is your gag, not mine). His name was Arthur Shrewsbury Sr, and he made his unbeaten 105 at the MCG. The home team had been dismissed for 163, and it reached that due to the Demon Spofforth making 50 from number 11. In England’s reply of 386, made over a very sedate 221 overs, Shrewsbury came in at 97 for 3 and batted for over 5 hours in making his score. Must have got a wiggle on with that over rate. England went on to seal an innings victory, bowling out Australia for 125 in a mere 102 overs. Paul Collingwood….beat that. The match report is worth reading.

The first 105 in the West Indies was by Les Ames in 1930 at Port of Spain. Doug McGlew’s 105 against Australia in 1958 held the record for the slowest ever test hundred until Mudassar Nazar beat him twenty or so years later. Just the nine hours and five minutes in getting to three figures. Fifty of these 105s have been scored since 1992, although it has been over a year since the last one – Virat Kohli made 105 against New Zealand at Wellington last year (after McCullum’s triple). Sherwin Campbell made the last 105 at Bridgetown, in the famous 1999 test against Australia (think Brian Lara).

This was England’s 17th test century in Bridgetown. Alastair Cook nestles in at #15. The record score for an England player is, surprisingly, 154 by Mark Ramprakash in 1998. Only one other player has passed 150 there for England, and it’s that man Andrew Sandham again, who made 152 in 1930. Alastair Cook joins Alec Stewart (two in one match) and Graham Thorpe as the only England players to make two centuries in Barbados.

Going back to Sandham, that 152 was made in the first innings of the first test. After a lean run in tests 2 and 3, Sandham made 325 and 50 in a timeless 4th test and never played for England again.

Imagine that, Alastair.

Alastair Cook’s 100 came up in 259 balls and contained 10 x 4.

Mediocre

LordCanisLupus64 Comments

There ends another series. If we’d just got Jason Holder early on in Antigua, and we’d scored 50 more runs in Bridgetown, it would have been a whitewash. Then it would have been six on the bounce and bring on the Aussies. Sorry. Been chanelling my inner Selfey there. It’s probably all Jos Buttler’s fault.

Instead of a whitewash we’ve got into a decent position here in Bridgetown, had our feet on the home team’s throat, and in another calamity, let them off the hook. To do it in Melbourne could have been understandable on a bad tour; to do it at Headingley could have been considered an understandable, if lamentable, brain fart. This reeked of complacency. This reeked of thinking we had the job done once we’d edged up to around 280 and had the home team a few down early. Blackwood got the West Indies into range and our lamentable, undroppable batting line-up (other than the revolving door non-Cook opener slot) handed another test over to the valiant opposition. Ballance, Root, Bell and Moeen – Headingley, Lord’s and Kensington Oval. Save your Moeen at Headingley stories….this middle order is untouchable we are told.

As a not a real fan candidate (according to Guardian commenters I’m supposed to be nice to – add “the usual malcontents” to the list of glorious things I’m not to be cheesed off about), I can say that I lost contact with this game at around tea. The feed for Sky Sports, which I bloody well pay for, went down. It never came back. I tried TMS, got 10 minutes of Swann’s summarising, and my internet link shut down to prevent further damage. Instead I watched a team live up to its billing in the NBA Play-offs (Golden State Warriors) on the TV and followed updates on cricinfo and Twitter as another team didn’t live up to its star-studded rep. To me this isn’t surprising – we’ve seen the over-hype machine cranked to bursting point after Grenada and it’s not as if we weren’t warning them. We’re not Jeremiahs…we’ve bloody seen this before. Lots of times. Now those who were quick to spray their bile over us after that miracle at St. George’s, will need to take it back. This was utterly abject. But they won’t when it’s easier to shoot the misery messenger telling you as it is.

It may be funny, in a strange sort of way, that Cook’s century was made at last. Because all the while he wasn’t scoring those big runs (and 105 isn’t massive, although very good in the context of the match) there was almost this paranoid need for him to retain all facets of the test job as if this would inspire him to make those scores. You know, all that leading from the front twaddle. There has been an air of defiance from our wonderful captain this tour, with his prickly demeanour reputed to have included a heated discussion with Agnew over his commentary stints with the mortal enemy. Who know’s if this is true? But what I heard from the bits of this series I caught was a concerted effort from some of the Sky crew to really “get behind” our captain, to the extent that there were copious mentions of our dear leader’s “body language” and “I’m in charge” stance. It’s nonsense. That you feel the need to point this out, or to comment on how much better it supposedly is indicates there’s a problem. I’m trying to work out a captain post-Gower who had these comments made about him.

I said after Grenada that:

1. When you win a test, act like you’ve been there before; and

2. When you win the test on a back of an inspirational solo effort, don’t bank on that as a long-term solution.

Instead, even I got sucked in, with my prediction that the WIndies would fall 40 or 50 short in their chase. This was in direct contrast to my suspicion. The suspicion was that the 123 we made in the second innings wasn’t the product of a minefield as seemed to be intimated on the wires last night. It was the product of total, utter incompetence, and watching this morning I didn’t see much devil in the wicket. No, we were perfecting a craft. Losing from winning positions is becoming a lovely little Cooky habit. Bring on Australia, I say. So I dismissed West Indies, wrongly, and they showed what getting your head down and not fretting about the “one with your name on it” as Botham muttered on could achieve. Well played chaps.

I’ve missed the aftermath. I understand Nasser got a bit pointed with Moores. Oh well, it’s always better to a sinner repent and all that. There’s far more good than bad with Mr Hussain. I’ve missed Bob off the long run, although I’m sure it will be the same old same old. It loses its resonance when you’ve been throwing hyperbole all over the place after Grenada. Then there’s the press – ready to stick it to all the doubters on Friday when Cook made his ton, and now ready to stick a belated knife in to whoever is this month’s sacrificial non-Cook lamb. Some have been just totally dismissive of the opposition, but now lay the blame at a comment by a loudmouthed Yorkie who gave the home team a supposed push with his “mediocre” comment.

The West Indies played with passion, with patience, with skill and with no little application when the going got tough. Darren Bravo’s innings summed it up. He has been accused of being flashy and irresponsible. Now he played with a calm head and rode what luck he had to make the crucial contribution. Jermaine Blackwood, a dasher of huge irresponsibility it is claimed, stuck to his task and was there at the end. He’s had a really promising series and I hope he goes on to bigger and better things. The bowling was honest, was clever and too good in the end. We kept being reminded that Jason Holder was “fourth seamer” material and yet he took wickets, whereas our seamers (Stokes and Jordan) appeared to have no clue for much of the time. I am still not seeing what the world sees in Chris Jordan’s bowling that I didn’t when at Surrey. Sure, he bowled a decent spell that took an early wicket, but he’s not consistent enough.

So where does this leave us? I’m fed up with saying what I say about Cook. The batting is now put to bed, and we have no chance of seeing him leave the team on form now. The captaincy position is more interesting, but there’s nothing I haven’t seen before. We’re told he is developing all the time, but I’m fed up with hearing this drivel, month in, month out. The century in Barbados proved nothing. It was a good innings, but not a match-winning one. It was his first in two years, yet this isn’t something to be lauded, but something to be concerned about. It answered no questions, other than one in the media’s mind. We weren’t wrong to criticise his preferential treatment just because me made a ton. You carry on, because the evidence is stacked in our favour. Boycott has had enough, that’s for sure.

I don’t know about Moores. I am not as down on him as others, but the position is becoming more and more untenable. The story book had been set. After the World Cup embarrassment, it was clear that the media message the ECB wanted to portray was that the tests were what mattered now, and we’d just won three on the bounce in that format. Cook was refreshed, there were young pros developing and this is the future. Now we look like a shambles within a week of a “famous victory”. The reports I’m hearing is that we are trying to say the Windies weren’t really “mediocre”. Well, let’s see how the Australians deal with this team. Moores has to be on thin ice, and we’ll see very soon how the new management react.

Jonathan Trott has been sent to the cricketing gallows, so he’ll pay the price. Ian Bell started the series on fire, and finished it fully soaked. Gary Ballance looks good, but I’m still worried about his technique, and Joe Root did not follow up his great effort at Barbados. The bowling is a long-term issue, and you can moan about Moeen until the cows come home, but 123 all out sums it up. Is that Moores fault? Really?

Meanwhile one of the main architects of this struggle remains in Loughborough like the malevolent priest, the power behind the monarchy. We have rumours of his evangelical student Strauss becoming the Director of Cricket, which fills me with all the joy of a root canal procedure, and there remains the thoroughly uninspiring body language king as captain. Good grief. How can you put up with Stuart Broad’s batting as captain of your team. I don’t care if he got hit, we all have who have played the game, and the next time you bat you are nervous. He’s not pulling his weight. If the issue is that serious, he has to go. Just has to. How can you ask people to play through tough times when one of your senior pros is showing such fragility?

I am now listening to TMS and Boycott’s comments. This should be fun.

Vian will have more tomorrow, hopefully, and thanks for all the comments today. We’ll be back tomorrow with more comments and analysis of what has just happened, and some of the reaction.

Buffering

LordCanisLupus5 Comments
Coming To You Live From The Jersey Shore
Coming To You Live From The Jersey Shore

Watching test cricket in the US is not as impossible as it used to be. I have access to the test match feed, but my internet connection isn’t brilliant and there are also other things to do. It’s a peaceful holiday, a really cool and calm time with a sick mother in law and a wife fussing over her and also getting her home air back in her lungs. Meanwhile it’s sunset and selfies more for me (and I don’t mean the journalist).

I’ll let Vian take over many of the more technical duties relating to this test. I’ve been struck by a couple of things while I’ve been watching. First, listening to one of our Sky Sports finest discussing a pitch pre-game is about as accurate a predictor of the game’s progress as legendary NFL draft seer Mel Kiper Jr has been when confronted with the first round of this year’s horse-trade. We had predictions of a great pitch to bat on and with it breaking up on day 5. Unless there’s a monsoon on the next two days, the public will be on the beach / drinking rum, or if they know what they are doing, going to admire the view at Bathsheba.

There is, of course, the Alastair Cook century to deal with. I have never looked forward to a century watch less. I am probably glad to be by the Delaware Bay than have to read much of the bilge that no doubt accompanied this century. But, let’s get one thing into context. Without it, in this test, we’d be in big, big trouble. It would be churlish in the extreme to be denigrating of this century given the context of the match. These are two really ordinary teams, and the difference is in a couple of extraordinary performances, and not much else. 39 for 5 is really killing this game off, isn’t it? We have just over 100 runs to play with. 150 might be enough, but it might not. Our tail has not exactly been our strong point when it comes to the team’s performance. Bloody hell, we need it now.

Make no mistake, this has not been a rampage, and this does not augur well for the upcoming battles. Much has been made about the Jonathan Trott experiment failing, and I know, I must get round to reading George Dobell’s take on matters. Others have been rather too keen to jump on the bandwagon, and while I note all that has been said on here about his form towards the last couple of years of his first go around, we were hoping for the best. I don’t know if we are seeing a trend here as well – one the press won’t ever go to town on – but that since Strauss, this is another opener who has tried and failed with Cook. They just don’t last long with him. According to some, mentioning this in the same breath is “warped thinking” and that we thought Trott had been put there to fail to make Cook look good. Hey, if there’s an insult from a press-man going, I’ll catch it and run with it. It’s nowhere near as warped a thinking as Cook getting 35 or so test innings to register a century and then to be greeted with a “he’s back” and “you are the ones with problems” nonsense I have seen over the past couple of days. Wind your bloody necks in.

But in between the constant buffering on my feed, I’ve seen two poor batting sides. I’ve seen England lurching between spells where they look like absolute top dollar to others where they’ve been utter, utter dross. The proof of this particular pudding is how we do in the late summer this year with Australia about. That’s what they want us to focus on. I don’t see the up and at them needed to compete. Jimmy Anderson has it in bursts, and again, from what I saw today he was excellent (seriously, spare the bloody “genius” cockwaffle I saw on Twitter from some who should really know better – act like you’ve been there before) but there’s enormous question marks over the rest of the bowling. It might be we get out of here winning 2-0, but portraying it as a brilliant success isn’t going to cut it. There are flaws, massive flaws, and they can’t be covered up that easily.

I have the house to myself tomorrow to watch the denouement. The rest are going out to collect sea glass. I hope our message in a bottle is one of success, and of lower order scoring prowess. Instead, we could be watching a cliff-hanger, with the fragile veneer of English cricket potentially shattered on the mediocre rocks of West Indian cricket. And with that, it’s off to watch the NBA play-offs.

From Town Bank, NJ, it’s Dmitri Old, wishing you well.