Author: LordCanisLupus

Aplomb

LordCanisLupus154 Comments

So. Where were you when you heard the news? Me? I was outside the Shakespeare’s Head pub in Holborn and my good friend had shown up. He was on the phone when I saw the first blog message. Incredulity struck, but it was true. I reacted, then felt a little guilt. Should I be cheering a man’s sacking, when it meant bad news for someone else? I then had what little joy I might have had ebb away to anger. Anger that we’d had to put up with someone so out of his depth for so long. Anger that he’d had that attitude throughout of unchallenged intellectual superiority and his boderline patronising nature. Anger that he’d been seen through after five minutes by many on here. Anger that we’d been sold a pup by the ECB hierarchy and more importantly to me, by the print media. The print media which lambasts this site, and people like me for indulging in “guesswork”, of not being close to the team, of not following them around professionally. They took the you-know-what out of us. Damn them. Damn all those who looked down their noses at us. We were right. He was not up to it. We are right about Moores. We are right about Whitaker. Most importantly of all, we are right about Andy Flower. Yet there he resides.

Now what? The news appears to be that Downton is being moved on and his post has been removed from the ECB hierarchy to be replaced with something called the Director of Cricket. Lord alone knows what that means, but people seem to be indicating that Whitaker is for the chop tomorrow and a whole new structure will replace him. Shed no tears either for the speak your Gary Ballance machine if he goes, as he’s been a laff-a-lympics when he’s had to front up to anything resembling a sentient questioner. I’m not that impressed with this from Harrison if truth be told because the structure is being used as a fig leaf for two utter failures.

So what now? Downton gone leaves a huge hole for me to fill, but there’s plenty more where he came from. The replacement list is full of holes, but I think we need to know what the role is before people are put forward. I’ve not had time to read this exercise in shifting sands.

Here’s what I do know. We handed the keys to the kingdom to Paul Downton. His first major move was to speak to Andy Flower. Before we knew it, Flower had gone as coach and been shunted into a role he appeared to be lobbying for. Then he sacked Pietersen and entered into a ridiculous confidentiality clause, which he broke a few months later. He held a press conference where he came across to me as a buffoon, but to some of the agape media as a latter day seer. If the warning signs weren’t flashing then, they had to be after his Agnew interview. But no. After a period in hiding, he re-surfaced in a Sky hack-piece, and was then hidden under the stairs. We then had to endure his backing of a lame duck captain, especially in the ODI game, and his disastrous intervention in the ODI series in Sri Lanka was the crowning glory. Or so we thought. Because then came his post-World Cup media blitz, which was staggering. By then, most of the media had seen the light. I say most.

Because some still don’t. We know their names, we know why they don’t. Their enemy’s enemy has always been their friend. Pietersen was banished by this man. For many this seems enough. They get to keep stirring the pot, getting the clicks on their website, yet still get to be the offended patron at KP’s misdemeanours. If any of them actually think a man who didn’t have a clue what social media was when he took on the job (his words) is still a fit and proper man to be in charge of our team, well….

I hope Harrison undertakes a review of ALL his key decisions. The appointment of Moores actually being more of a priority than Pietersen. The maintenance of a role for Flower arguably being more than that. To sack a man after a year indicates you have no confidence in him at all. So look at his key decisions and act on them.

In tabloid style let me go through some of Downton’s best moments:

  • Sacking KP. Oh yes. For reasons unclear, but something to do with being disconnected. You make a big decision like that, you need to explain yourself. Constantly avoiding the question makes you look a fool.
  • Outside cricket. Given he used that phrase in a 1985 Q&A for Cricketer’s Who’s Who, it seemed to be something he would have said. Way to get a meme started.
  • Difficult Winter – Oh yes. Losing 12 out of 13 to your main foe is just “difficult”
  • The press conference – Alastair Cook being told that he wasn’t strong enough to captain KP seemed rather amusing. Of course that was our spin. Other saw aplomb.
  • The interview – SO good I got multiple posts out of it. Where do you start? Read this. The read this. Then read this. And then there is this. Once you’ve done that, read my conclusion.
  • Who can forget his interview round in Sri Lanka. Backing the captain, then presiding over his sacking a few days later, all the while refusing to answer any questions on KP. Good lord.
  • Then there was the side to be reckoned with going into the World Cup. That went well.
  • Then the media blitz post elimination which struck all the wrong notes, had him wondering how T20 cricket had impacted, and played “it weren’t my fault” cards all over the place.

There’s enough for this evening. No background research, no looking at other things, just an instant reaction. Have your say, read Maxie over at TFT, read the papers/online news columns, and we’ll reconvene.

Speak tomorrow.

Wisdom

LordCanisLupus126 Comments

It’s that day again. The release of the latest version of cricket’s bible. I have copies dating back to 1970 and will do my usual – try to pick it up cheaply from a source in September – but it has been hard to miss the reports coming out on Lawrence Booth’s Editor’s Notes today. The ECB get a good kicking and so does KP. You take what you want from it – some will hone in on the criticism of Pietersen to reinforce what looks more and more like an editorial line (or personal vendetta – both of which are reprehensible), while others will focus on the kicking of the ECB and care less about the book and things. The newspapers have long since been the source of record in this sorry affair.

The KP issue still gets the blood pumping. Hearing that the book is reviewed by Patrick Collins saddened me. He was given free rein to give KP everything in previous editions, and lo and behold, he gets another opportunity. I’ve not read the review but Newman’s given us the flavour in another spectacularly typical article.

Now sadly, because I’m writing this on the tablet and in my lunch break I cannot do a proper fisking of that Newman article. It deserves it. However, I’ll hold that one back a few days as I have a real life outside of here to handle, which includes a meeting with my legal mate tonight. However a phrase or two requires comment. I can’t cut and paste so you will have to rely on my memory.

“a decision on which they had right on their side”

Newman is amazed that after 15 months sacking a player who had a lot of fans in this country, and a lot of enemies, having top scored in a disastrous tour (an inconvenient fact that you can’t brush away) was the one to be sacked and yet the ECB lost the media war. That this was done without a proper explanation to the fans, was accompanied by unattributable, off the record briefing in the aftermath of Sydney, and with further leakage and gossip along the way, really doesn’t resonate. When the supporters of KP, and others keeping in mind this treatment might be dished out to others (see, to a degree, Cook in Sri Lanka), had the gall not to take our beloved press corps word for it, and raised legitimate, unanswered questions, most notably about their willingness to receive leaks yet not get the ECB to state the case properly, he is mystified how the cause was lost. The message is in there, Paul. Don’t spend too long thinking about it.

“a decision supported by those who follow the team around professionally”

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. It’s not all there is it? Because you are so damned close, and yet so damned reluctant to press these duplicitious swine, is the reason we take your view so sceptically. You don’t have a bloody scooby, do you? Your constant vitriolic, yes, the same word that is used against me, campaign against a man with over 100 caps, allying yourself with the idiots given a shoeing in Wisden today by one of your colleagues, a piece you should have written months ago (and not just after Cook got fired, but before it), is the reason this blogger and, given comments I see elsewhere, many others can’t take you seriously. The Daily Mail is our first stop for a laugh, frankly.

I need to follow the team professionally to have an informed view. There’s the bobby right there. If that doesn’t contrast with the “England team belongs to us all” line in Lawrence’s piece, I don’t know what does.

No complaints over the Five Cricketers of the Year, although I’d have been tempted to consider Brendon McCullum because they can go outside the domestic season if they please, albeit rarely and for special cases (sure they have done). Let’s hope he does enough this summer to get in. I’ve seen some complaints about Moeen Ali, and I do feel there’s a bit of symbolism there, but it’s fair enough. He’s a ray of hope. Ballance, Angelo Mathews and Adam Lyth wrote themselves, and Jeetan Patel is also very deserving.

An absolute ton of work goes into this book, and I would thank Lawrence Booth for the efforts. One of the benefits of speaking to him offline is appreciating the co-ordination required to bring this together. It’s not me going soft. It’s me not being a total curmudgeon.

I’m not commenting on anything else at the moment, until I’ve seen what’s written. Couldn’t Lawrence have sent me a review copy too?

Duplicity

LordCanisLupus112 Comments

I’ve followed the debate on here as best I can and once again the same points are being raised. I’m not moaning because they’ve never been answered, but Cook’s travails are always going to be an issue. To me it doesn’t matter if he scores buckets of runs, because it has not proved the selectors right to persist with him. He’s been given the luxury of time that has not been given to a Compton, Carberry or Robson. He’s been treated as the prodigal son, the one to be kept at all costs. Never forget what Downton said in his infamous interview with Aggers when asked about whether the genius MD had considered changing captains. “Not seriously, no” was the reply. I think it was then I lost it….

Cook has also had the front, it seems, to get arsey over his treatment in losing the ODI captaincy when we were losing and he was a liability at the top of the order. There were the interviews where despite his “nice” persona he made it clear what he thought of the decision and then there has been several bits of reporting indicating his thoughts on all matters including whether KP should come back.

I contrast this decision making, those actions and interpretation, not just with the treatment of KP, but with those of Compton and Robson in particular. Cook’s past, as he confesses in his latest interview, does not matter, because he needs to score runs. This is hilarious as it is this “past” that is keeping him in the team. The hope he recaptures that elusive form. The hope he makes regular hundreds at the top of the order. The hope his technical flaws are ameliorated. All these are in the past. But it gives him the rope while the other failures hang themselves. These technical flaws are not espoused in the print media the way Compton’s stodginess and intensity, and Robson’s feet movement and quietness in the field were.

I can go on, and probably will, but if the likes of Derek and Selfey think this is “wearisome” as they stick doggedly to Tyers Twitter Tendency, then I have news. I’m not weary of pointing this matter out. It’s your haughty arrogance combined with this lack of rigour that cheeses us off. I’m not here calling them dishonest, but good grief, they are hard to love, ain’t they?

Which brings me to the duplicity. This KP thing is a charade. A total charade. It doesn’t matter what runs he scores or how England do. They won’t pick him. No chance. The thing is, if the ECB (and Graves) thinks they are being clever by getting him to play, and close the door on him for reasons of revenge or whatever, then they are fools if they think the public will fall for it. They will only buy it if this team beats Australia, and all the batsmen fire. KP, on form and fit (a big if that last one), walks into THIS England team. The line this lot are taking is that if this were Lara or Tendulkar sitting on the outside now, they wouldn’t make the team because there is no vacancy. Hogwash. He’s not in the team because the establishment excluded him, and every day that lack of form canard is put forward, and every day I want to bash those proponents of it with a Punch and Judy stick.

The ECB are pulling our plonkers, and the picking of the team on merit that we all want to see is being made a joke of. It’s not being tackled at all. We keep being told “nothing has changed”, and that equates to “moving on from Kevin Pietersen, who we wish well for the future.” There was nothing about county form last year when he was sacked. In the aftermath of Sydney, when the ECB were leaking like the Titanic on a bad iceberg night, and Newman was receiving more gifts than a one-year old at an extended family christmas, it wasn’t about KP giving it loads to Glamorgan or Leicestershire. So stop bullshitting and let’s have a clear, unambiguous statement. KP is eligible for selection, and will be considered if he makes runs. Anything else is duplicity.

Midnight City

LordCanisLupus55 Comments

Nothing much from me this weekend. Been busy getting stuff ready for my holiday in a few weeks, had lots of little jobs to do, and getting my sport dvd database in as good a way as I can. Have a fair bit of cricket…

I’m thankful you all found things to talk about over the weekend, and must admit I’m writing this with little in mind. It’s a short ramble before I go to bed.

One has to question an opposition that gets skittled for 59 and then allows England to make 180 odd for 1. I mean, really? It takes me back to the last 40 over game I ever played. We played it on a wicket used a couple of days before for a county game at Southgate, and we were playing a team we knew were massively stronger than us. Said to the skipper “win the toss, bat first, and we can have this over with in short order”. I’m a realist. He lost the toss. They batted. Their opener made 189 not out, they got 360 in their 40 overs, and to be fair to the bully, he never made a lot of it, but still. What pleasure can you derive from smashing muppets?

Lots more important stuff will be on the way for next week, so I’ll see what I can do. Cheers for all the words….

Furtherance

LordCanisLupus112 Comments

Not a full post at this stage, but some interesting links out there. Here’s Stuart Broad on Alastair Cook…

http://www.trentbridge.co.uk/news/2015/april/broad-west-indies-a-tough-opposition.html

There’s a lot in there to chew over, especially the contention that Alastair Cook is England’s greatest ever batsman.

Of course, you’ve probably all seen Boycott’s piece:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/cricket/international/england/11516038/Englands-Alastair-Cook-and-Co-in-need-of-reality-check.html

It’s the usual sort of stuff from Geoffrey but ramped up a little. I can’t help get the feeling that he’s really, especially, pissed off with this team and their attitude. I might do a reverse fisking of that a bit later on, but I have the spare room to deal with today.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/west-indies-v-england-2015/content/story/858327.html

According to this the arch data miner and captain plonker haven’t discussed one of the fundamental positions. I’m with James for TFT:

I’ll add more as the day goes on, so keep checking back if you feel like it, or follow my rants on Twitter.

The Colo(u)r Of Money

LordCanisLupus107 Comments

Many of you have already picked up on the wonderful exchange between Hughes and Newman, after the Bogfather had kindly showed them the way to the Dirty Dozen.

If you haven’t, here it is….

I hope that shows Hughes’s comment above (just checked and it does).

Many of you have taken this as a complete dismissal of the words of the people on this blog, which we shouldn’t be surprised about. It’s not as if the great unwashed have been given a say so far, so why change now. But it is something that we still see coming through their writing and other appearances, and is what is now going to be known as the TTT. This stands for Tyers Twitter Tendency.

Readers for a while know exactly what I am on about, as it derives from a tweet by Alan Tyers in February 2014:

https://twitter.com/alantyers/status/430783842535108609

This can be summed up best by the fantastic tweets from Simon Hughes, aka the analyst, in his responses to The Bogfather:

We’ve done this tweet already, on the post “Quietly”. He just jumped on a list containing JAMES BRAYSHAW and thought I was only going on about culprits. Want strange? Read one of his “editorials” in The Cricketer.

Classic TTT. “Ooooooh, I know who the real cuplrits are, and you don’t…. because I’m an insider and you aren’t……”

So when challenged to put up…

“Can’t tell you”. Why not, big man? You subject to a confidentiality clause as well? Worried anything that disturbs Downton will mean less of your puff piece interviews in The Cricketer? No. I call bullshit. If there were culprits, as he puts it, then shame them, with evidence, not hearsay and innuendo like he does with Pietersen. Don’t hide behind this change from within stuff.

How interesting though that Newman reacted to the list. Now, as you know, Paul Newman doesn’t like my stuff. He’s never said so in print, but he has said so by blocking me on Twitter. Wonder how I can still link your stuff, sir? It’s not hard. I can understand being cheesed off being told you are a shill for the ECB decision makers (until one came along) and the most anti-KP presence on the new circuit, but blocking me for questioning why this is so? Do leave off.

He got one thing right on those tweets. I’m not important as one person. But as a blog with quite a decent hit rate, along with the Full Toss, we have a small voice that is growing, and has caught some attention. One press guy described the blog to me as the best one holding the press and decision makers to account. That was nice. But I’m not here for the ego, I’m here because I enjoy it (most of the time). And what I enjoy most is fisking articles like this.

Frustration was clear in the voices of Peter Moores and Alastair Cook as they fended off repeated enquiries about Kevin Pietersen’s future more than a year after he had seemingly been banished from international cricket for good.

Getting worried, Paul? Getting worried that a person with a test hundred since your beloved captain made one might get back into the team? And hang about, weren’t you banging on about how rubbish Moores had been at the World Cup? Do you want to stay consistent on that? Oh, you’ll claim this a factual representation of what happened, but Moore especially, needs to feel the heat. Cook, well, I’ve given up with you lot ever challenging his lamentable record over the past two years in all formats. Seems he’s a protected species.

Well, there is only one person to blame — and that is Colin Graves. The incoming ECB chairman has been responsible for the mixed messages that leave the England team in as big a state of turmoil and internal rebellion as ever.

Well, I’d humbly suggest that Colin Graves wasn’t the architect of England’s brilliant World Cup campaign, and if we’d done well in that, the clamour, for what it is worth, would have been a great deal less. After all, your constant line is that the only way to shut people up is for England to keep winning. So there isn’t only one person to blame for doing, as Tickers says:

Graves has forged an excellent reputation in English cricket as chairman of Yorkshire for the way he bankrolled and transformed the club, but his initial forays into the international game have been little short of an embarrassment.

I’m not embarrased? Anyone else think he is embarrassing? Are you embarrassed not because of this, but because he may be attacking your casus belli, Mr Newman (the persecution and exclusion of Pietersen)? Really? OK, some of his and Tom whatisnames ideas are a bit off beam, but as you will say later on, you agree with one of the most controversial. All of his forays into the international game are an embarrassment, but one that could potentially bankrupt the counties isn’t? Way to pick and choose, sir.

He has become the loose cannon of English cricket — and he has yet to take up office.

He’s yet to take up office. Of course, he’s the deputy to Clarke at the moment, so he is in office, which is why us refuseniks are greeting all this with scepticism and a great deal of care. You’re worried because if KP makes a comeback, your fox (and all those that made the decision) has been shot. So while you call this man the loose cannon of English cricket, you save your powder on Paul “outside cricket” Downton and Giles “right kind of family” Clarke. We know you can’t include James “Gary Ballance” Whitaker because he’s tight as a drum when it comes to talking. He’s about as much a loose cannon as a speak your weight machine.

It all started on March 1 when he gave an interview to Garry Richardson of the BBC, who is known for his persistence and admirable success in coaxing ear-catching sound bites from interviewees.

Dacre won’t like you praising someone at the BBC. Also, note. Garry Richardson got someone to say something interesting. A lesson for you lot, maybe? See also, BBC employee Pat Murphy.

So when Graves said that Pietersen — exiled for valid reasons after the last Ashes debacle before producing a nasty autobiography that only supported the ECB’s decision — had to be playing county cricket to earn an England recall, it was put down to Yorkshire straight-talking.

A nasty autobiography. Your paper has the rights to the definition of nasty. I don’t think the book did Pietersen any favours, but on the first part, we are all still waiting on these “valid reasons” that you cling to like a piece of driftwood. It’s a clash of personalities with Andy Flower mainly, and we can’t be having someone who might make test hundreds playing because he cheesed off one of the officer class. What a load of cack. Keep rolling on with this nonsense.

Yet subsequently, most importantly in a phone conversation with Pietersen, Graves has done little to play down the 34-year-old’s chances — even if privately the chairman is said to be perplexed at the media’s ‘spin’ on his apparent opening of the England door.

The “picking the team on merit” ethos, which we want, which any country seems to want, goes out the window if it means picking someone who won’t keep his gob shut and might make 8181 runs at an average in the high 40s, who may have a couple of years left and may, just may, be BETTER than those currently playing, including a captain who can’t buy a century at the moment. But hey, you keep on keeping on. Graves may, or may not, be playing a game. We don’t know, and evidently, nor do you.

If Graves, who has apparently assured senior figures that he does not want Pietersen back, really had no intention of encouraging the maverick, then he has made a right old mess of it.

These the same senior figures who told you Surrey hated his guts and never wanted him to darken their door again. Called that one right, sunshine. Remind me, who is piling on the guesswork here, John? Me or you lot?

For he has created a soap opera that will run and run now Pietersen has rejoined Surrey and put huge pressure on a fledgling England middle order who made significant Test progress last summer.

How dare Pietersen still want to play at the highest level. How dare he be cheesed off he’s escluded. How dare the poor little darlings in the test team now have an excuse to fail. How dare there be pressure on them to perform.

Not to mention completely undermining managing director Paul Downton and national selector James Whitaker, who have repeatedly clarified England’s stance on the batsman over the last 14 months.

If I’m nailing my credibility to these two, I’m bang in trouble. Downton is a joke. Everyone on here, most on Twitter and all those who see him in action, including the vast majority, I reckon, of your press corps colleagues think he’s totally and utterly out of his depth. Also Whitaker doesn’t do press conferences, and has spoken around three times that I can recall in public (that is three occasions he has spoken to multiple outlets). You let out one of your off the record sources there, sir?

And if Graves disagreed with the original decision to axe Pietersen, then he had a duty as deputy chairman of the ECB to say so then, not wait until he had taken over from Giles Clarke.

He might have. I don’t know. But note, earlier he doesn’t take office so he shouldn’t be saying anything. But now because he has an office, he should. This is belting stuff.

That is not all. Since his Pietersen outburst, Graves has said that there will be an inquiry if England do not beat a ‘mediocre’ West Indies in the upcoming three-Test series.

Well. most of us were calling for this after the Ashes last year. And also, although I love West Indies cricket, even their own people think this is a mediocre team. Come on. So do you. So stop pretending like he’s offended the lorded classes with this comment. If they lose this series, heads should roll.

This prompted the respected Barbadian commentator Tony Cozier to liken the comments to Tony Greig’s infamous intention in 1976 to make the West Indies ‘grovel’.

Because “mediocre” has all the racial connotations of a white South African telling a black team that he intended to make them grovel. I mean, seriously. This is nonsense from Cozier and it is nonsense from Newman to repeat it. Put it more alongside the “worst Australian team ever to tour here” comments of 1989, or “can’t bat, can’t bowl, can’t field” from one of our own at Ashes 1986-7.

Then Graves came out with the ridiculous notion of reducing Test matches to four days. This would be achieved by introducing the unrealistic target of playing 105 overs a day — a move that would destroy the primacy of the ultimate game.

I don’t agree with it, but it’s not ridiculous, and it’s not speaking the unspeakable. The guff that came with it about corporates and families was nonsense, and the thought that we might get 105 overs in a day is unrealistic in a world where TV demands a five minute break every hour, and there’s no real disincentive not to slow the game down. But there’s something to work around.

If Graves wants to make himself useful, then he should concentrate on his supposed main aim of introducing a 10-team English Premier League franchise Twenty20 competition. Everybody bar a few myopic counties wants that.

This isn’t ridiculous because Paul agrees with it. Tremendous. Nice to see “a few myopic counties” there as well to reinforce his view that he’s in step and everyone who disagrees is myopic or ridiculous.

He could also do something about a crippling fixture list that will see England play 17 Tests in the next 10 months — a key factor in why they have fallen so far behind in the 50-over game and just endured the worst World Cup in their history.

Some of us mentioned this around two years ago. Nice to see you join us here. However, hard to see how a future fixture list meant we cocked up the World Cup. We had a very light winter of cricket, playing just 12 days of cricket between October and January. And we were crap. Care to explain how fixture congestion caused this? Should we not play in our summer? Also, not sure it is in Graves’ gift to cancel our tours, given he’s not in office yet, Paul.

There is much for the ECB’s new regime — which includes new chief executive Tom Harrison and communications director Chris Haynes — to do, but all the new chairman has done so far is make things worse.

We share your scepticism on this front. I don’t trust Graves as he has been part of the furniture, and if England falter and KP is scoring runs, the cry will be for him to come in, and if we are told there is no place for him, the alienation will be complete. Betrayal of the worst kind is raising hopes to dash them. You seem to want to finish KP’s career and take glee in it. If Cook can’t lump it, then he’s the one with the issue and needs to get over himself, but you are never going to write that. Unless there’s blatant insubordination which we’ve not been told about. But also, I have a healthy mistrust of all authority and I don’t like people telling me someone is great before they’ve proved it. Indeed if they have to rely on that testimony, then they probably aren’t.

I am worried Tom Harrison hasn’t shown his face. He’s becoming a bit Downton-esque on this front as again, we are being told how great he was before he spoke and disproved that notion. The new press officer can hardly do worse than Colin Gibson and his entourage.

Colin Graves should think very carefully in future before he speaks.

Or Paul will block you on Twitter.

Quietly

LordCanisLupus97 Comments

I don’t know. I don’t know. I just don’t know why I bother some times. Last night’s post. Twitter can really peeve me.

Look. Let’s be clear about this. I thought I needed to do something a bit different to get us out of the malaise of constantly going on about the World Cup and also the KP / Graves stuff. I was also hoping that post might catch some attention because although I’m not, really not, driven by hits, reaching 50000 in one month would have been nice. As it was, I failed by around 250, but I gave it a go, and thought the Dirty Dozen was a different thing from my always popular Journalist countdown, which I’ll do soon enough, and other criticial pieces or awards, like the Dmitris. I thought it might get me over the hump, is slightly different to those usual pieces and would get people commenting. I have sort of drawn the conclusion that this blog gets hits when someone says or does something stupid, rather than being based on what I write.

The Bogfather has gone to some of our old friends and tweeted it to them, and in reply the analyst called it a “strange list”, saying the real culprits lie underneath. Good grief.

This was not a culprits list of English cricket, you absolute muppet. It was a list of people who cheesed me off. JAMES BRAYSHAW is on it for crying out loud, and he has the square root of fuck all to do with the England malaise. So my list is no more odd than calling Jim Holden’s piece “terrific”. It would be an odd list if it was solely to do with England.

If truth be told I have ongoing twitter convos with a number of journalists. I am mellowing, somewhat, towards some of them, but can’t help but think that they still believe we are a bunch of swivel-eyed nutters who rant for pleasure. I want to be able to watch a cricket team play really good, winning cricket, preferably without acting like school bullies, and do it with a bit of joy and a bit of verve. I’m sure you are nearly all the same as me. I despise the petty politics, the schoolmaster class warfare bollox masquerading as the ECB in the last year, aided and abetted by the print media. They sided with these muppets, and they have to decide why. Some still hide behind their personal animosity towards Pietersen to prevent them actually saying “you know what, they’ve got a point about Downton, you know.”

Newman did not annoy me in the last quarter, for instance, as much as those in the list. I have to say that in some regards coming across some of the old Wisden Cricket Monthly magazines, when he took over from Doug Ibbotson on the SE county cricket watch made me sad for what he’s become. They are really pretty good. The anti-KP thing is getting really tiresome now, and it has to stop. If he’s good enough, he should play. End of. Let’s not mess about with semantics.

I have said a billion and one times that I’m not after anything from writing other than expressing an opinion on a sport I love, one of the few left. On Sunday the MLB season starts, another sport I love, and if the Boston Red Sox show signs of life this season, my attention could quickly be drawn from cricket. That their 2014 season was a train wreck only fuelled my cricket ire. I have no test tickets this year, for the third summer in a row. I have no plans to go to any specific games this season, although I’m sure to go to one or two. Money’s tight, priorities change. I love blogging, but as you can tell, work is tougher for me now, the responsibility, if not the pay, has increased, I’m knackered when I get home, and churning out the stuff is still enjoyable, but god, when people like Hughes can’t even analyse this, then I’m in trouble.

Some of you who read this may feel that my ever changing moods, and my unpredictability when it comes to my actions is a bit me, me, me. That’s who I am. I think Zepherine may have summed it up best about my “anxieties”. It fits me well. Things make me anxious. I still get a little nervous when those I criticise read this stuff. If it didn’t, I should give up. But in my view they deserve it. I want England to do well, not fail. I hope that’s clear.

Anyway, I don’t want four day tests, I thing Graves is coming across as a bit of a tit at the moment, has anyone seen Tom Harrison yet, and has Downton been locked under the stairs again? Think I’ll stick with Soap and Shower Gel.

And no, I’ve not been drinking so that’s no excuse.

Have a good night while I chunter to myself and start pacing up and down.

(An odd list)

Dmitri’s Dirty Dozen

LordCanisLupus110 Comments

I listened. I read the rage. I felt your pain. I feel the anger stirring in my bones. Or somewhere else. Here we go. Reminder, this is for events in the last three months only. I intend repeating this at the end of June.

Before I start, these are not in a strict order, but the nearer the top, the more likely you are to have annoyed me.

The press people in here have annoyed me overly in the last three months. This is not a reflection of their overall perception when it comes to my always popular journalist list, which will appear soon.

Thinking also of doing one for the TV personalities too, just so Mark Nicholas can be the Paul Newman of that poll.

OK. Here we go.

1. Paul Downton. Absolutely no shock there. He had a shocker in 2014, and now 2015 has come up and bit him on the arse. The main problem I have is that if anyone in a high position in most all organisations in this country had been this bad, he’d be gone. The World Cup was his Christmas sales, and he’s the cricketing equivalent of shutting at weekends. He bigged us up as a team to be reckoned with, and when we weren’t, he hit the media cycle at full blast before the Bangladesh’s could exit the stadium! His message “not my fault”. Many claim him to be a nice man, a man who builds teams, a consensus builder. I suggest they look at the evidence so far. If he’s still around at the end of Quarter 2, Graves and Harrison are nothing but a false dawn.

2. Giles Clarke. We’ve heard barely a peep out of him. This is the one thing he has done right. If, as we suspect, he’s stopped the dismissals of Moores and Downton on his watch (this has been intimated – that the new duo didn’t even try because Clarke wouldn’t have it), he’s made his personal pride more important than the future of the game. He’s seen as the impediment. An unpopular leader over a revolting set of counties. Who were so pissed off they couldn’t even fire him, so shunted him to a sinecure in the ICC where he can rule world cricket with Srini’s hand up his [fill in the blank]. He won’t be gone in three months, he’ll be around for an age. His dead hand has still got control. We couldn’t finish him off. Because the establishment, of which Graves is a part, can’t do that. His first task was to rid us of this pariah, this embarrassment. Instead, we’ll have him lording over world cricket. God help us.

3. Peter Moores. The greatest coach of his generation put out that rubbish. Players play, we know that, but the whole set-up was wrong. We could all see it from a mile off. His nice man persona, his affability and cordial relations can’t disguise that this man looks fundamentally out of his depth. I don’t want to have a pop at him, he’s far too decent, but we are going backwards. The World Cup was a key objective and he blew it. He’s not getting the most out of his players in one of the fundamental formats of the game, whether we like it or not. Ignore that data stuff, it’s a smokescreen. You need a technician but you also need a motivator. Moores isn’t the latter. We can all see it. It’s painful. I’d gladly eat my words if we win the Ashes this year. Gladly. But I can’t let that campaign go.

4. Alastair Cook. I’m not quite as down on the comments he raised with the reporters in Abu Dhabi, but clearly he’s suffering from a real image problem right now. He’s associated with the dying embers of the Downton/Clarke axis of incompetence and it is too late to distance himself from it. So while many of you have interpreted his remarks with due rage, I want to temper that a little. He was treated badly by the powers that be last December, but it was their sheer incomptence in struggling to make the correct decision at almost the worst time possible that was bad. Bleating about it now, and then making the story about him not particularly wanting KP back (a number of sources quoted his rage at the prospect) has left a bad taste. It’s because if anyone in the England set up that needs to score runs in county cricket to have a place in that team it is “no test tons for nigh on two years” Cook.

5. John Etheridge. This one, I admit, is personal to me as none of you have mentioned him. However, he chose to pick a fight, albeit a little obliquely, with this blog and blogger, on the back of a harmless use of a picture in an old Wisden Cricket Monthly of Doug Ibbotson. Many of you may remember it as a storm in a teacup, and to a degree it was. But timing is everything. It was a combination of the message and the timing that was so bloody annoying, and the accusation of this blog being the product of guesswork (which I have never pretended it wasn’t – I have no access), when those being paid to write are not exactly covering themselves in glory in the post-Ashes era was the most galling thing. They backed the wrong horse, not us. We’ve seen little to prove us wrong. Our reading of some of the issues hasn’t been bad at all for guesswork. None of us said Downton showed aplomb and was impressive. None of us took copy from leaks from the ECB. After he had a pop, you did back.  Then to say some were perhaps OTT in responding was the cherry on the trifle. While this won’t be reflected in another piece I will do soon (the ever popular top 10 reporters piece), I was disappointed by his approach. As I say, a personal one. Because Etheridge is one I have hope for. I don’t know why…

6. Dave Richardson. The only thing that could complete this guy’s quarter of a year would be to be appointed as a new press officer for the ECB. Paul Downton has competition for the most out of their depth face of a board/commission in cricket, and this is a world Srini and Clarke occupy (at least these two have seemed to learn to limit public utterances). This was a World Cup with precious few competitive games between the test nations, and illuminated by the characters and performances of some of the “lesser nations” as the ICC clearly thinks thet are. Ireland should have shut him up, but still he has to bow to the TV tune and maintain a 10 team World Cup is better. It’s not a simplistic issue, no matter how some paint it to be, but surely we should err on the side of expansion of the game over limiting the scope? He’s been atrocious, come across as out of touch and arrogant, and been the target for lots of rage. Come join the ECB, Dave.

7. Simon Hughes. I’m worried. Still a few left and room for Newman is running out. Why Hughes? Well he’s the editor at large of The Cricketer and he’s using it to full effect. I blame editors for cartoons like the one disparaging Pietersen. I blame editors for letting pieces like Pringle’s through citing propaganda from KP’s side as if it was all one way. I blame editors for setting the tone. Then, on top of that, whether it be personal animosity towards Pietersen or loyalty to former team-mate Downton, or a mixture of both, he throws his “analyst” tag out of the window and abandons any pretence at logic. He endorsed that piece from Holden a few weeks ago and floundered when challenged. He’s made a strong play to get into the journos top 10 – he’s a dead cert, and may well get a very high new entry placing – because he combines his personal animosity with an implied “don’t you know who I am” persona. The very personification of what we know as the “Tyers Tweet Tendency”.

8. Mike Selvey. At the risk of alienating some of my readers, who I believe are developing what I would call “a bit of a thing” about Selvey, he’s not really incurred my wrath to your levels. As I said, I think some of that is due to people having a high opinion of him and feeling let down. I never started there. I know your writers are a matter of taste, but his really really awful stuff was last year. He is, though, protected like there is no tomorrow on The Guardian BTL, and treats critics with an aloofness and contempt that if he just TRIED to engage he’d find there’s a kinder, calmer voice out there. He seems unable to pick his spots, his words anger, his approach seemingly of a different age. But he’s not Simon Hughes this quarter, although, I’ll grant you, he’s worthy of a place here. Is Ali a threat – he’s started very well at the Guardian – because Selvey seems to annoy more than enjoy these days.

9. David Saker. His one and only appearance in a dirty dozen, we hope. All we can say is that if you are judged by current performance, the way the bowling fell off a cliff in the last couple of years, with our best prospect regressing alarmingly before our eyes, then Saker should have been booted out a while back. Instead it was the same old same old. Lightning rod for criticism, protected by number 8 in print, and then leaving with no regrets from many outside cricket. His stock, so high after 2010/11 has now become a laughing one. As we bowled bouncer after bouncer in a World Cup, getting carted about, the coach was not for turning. Both he and Moores went on and on about “plans” and when they failed they “weren’t executed properly”. No. He’s gone. Thankfully.

10. Jim Holden’s one article of note. You know when there’s an internet meme going about when an article on the Diana and the Weather rag, the UKIP love-in Express catches attention. Jim Holden was always someone I liked to read, and although I didn’t agree for a lot of the time, it was good stuff. The article in praise of Cook and slagging off Pietersen was just gobsmackingly rubbish. D’Arthez tore it apart. I tore my hair out, and there’s not a lot of that. It’s bad because it completely ignores Cook’s last two years in the job, with batting form going out the window, and then turning on Pietersen as if his points were new. When he brought Piers Morgan into it, then he’d lost the plot. When the people who backed your article were Hughes and Newman, and when the people who would approve of it were Downton, Whitaker and Clarke, you may be batting on the wrong team, Jim. Terrible stuff.

11. James Brayshaw. Man it was a toss-up between him and Dominic Cork. The latter is turning into the Robbie Savage of cricket, slagging KP off for many crimes that could have been levelled at him (“show pony”). But I’m always an avid viewer of Australian test and ODI cricket in the winter months, and Brayshaw is just off the charts atrocious. I mean so lost in the ether, they’d make seven series about him and tell us it’s all a dream. I expect a little bias to the home team, but this is partisan cheering. Geoff Lemon tore the Channel 9 team apart. In his piece he said “James Brayshaw has the emotional depth of a sock puppet during a button shortage.” I gave that a standing ovation. We were spared him during the World Cup, thank God, but his grating man-love, his fawning attitude scarred me. I know, it’s pointless hating him, but then I can mention Brad McNamara….

12. This is difficult. All of the following are going to be left out. Paul Newman. Derek Pringle. Andy Flower. Stephen Brenkley. Nick Knight. Mark Nicholas. Australia. Shane Watson in particular (gobbing off at a Scotland bowler – big man). Srini. Colin Graves. Tom Middleton or whatever his name is. Kevin Pietersen, Piers Morgan and those BTL stalwarts we all know and love. But number 12 has to be James Whitaker.  For that interview with Pat Murphy. Like any man completely out of his depth he keeps his public utterances to a minimum. His first as chairman was memorable for the phone going off and wilting under the pressure of Tim Abraham. His last was memorable for keep mentioning plans that someone wasn’t part of, and the justification more or less being Gary Ballance. I like Ballance a lot, but after you’ve parachuted him into the ODI team with no return whatsoever, I’d have kept that quiet. David Graveney had no caps and if I recall, was a leader behind an apartheid rebel tour. We didn’t feel the need to get angry at him for lack of experience. Whitaker has something else. That knowledge he isn’t good enough. That he cannot cut the mustard. That he cannot represent a policy so stupid, so immensely dense, so beyond understanding that any attempt comes off as imbecilic and easily picked apart. He’s my last in the dirty dozen.

Thanks for all the help in putting this together. Hope you enjoyed it, and although you won’t agree with my views, the prompting helped no end….

Quarterly

LordCanisLupus75 Comments

Well. It’s a windy old night in London town, and the winds of change are blowing around English cricket. Or are they?

Unless I get distracted by someone or other wanting light refreshment tomorrow evening, I intend wrapping up the first quarter of the year with a special post. It will be called Dmitri’s Dirty Dozen, and I’ll be doing a list of 12 (hey, that education did not go to waste) people in the cricketing world to have really got on my nerves this last three months.

There will be the perennial faces of establishment rot – Downton, Clarke and Whitaker – and the pillars of the press (who will win the little sub-battle to be crowned the journo who cheesed me off the most), but at this point I need your contributions. Who has really annoyed you in the past three months? Who needs telling?

I’m not going down the Full Toss route of bowing down to those Aussies, as we need to keep some pride intact, and not give in! But they are right in saying not so long ago we held the aces, and then decided to revert back in time. Let’s get some fight going!

Test cricket is not far away, the county season will be starting soon, and our summer is not far away. Will it be as tumultuous as the last summer? I have a feeling it might be.

Let me have your suggestions by noon tomorrow for the article. Then the piece gets written. As usual, my decision is final! Also, suggestions for the man of 2015 so far. I’ll take that on board too.

Get suggesting!