Well, we are back again for another go round of the Ashes blog. This series promises to be another full of media beat up, genuine intrigue, heroes, villains and damn Ponting getting caught hooking on the deep fine leg boundary. I can't promise to find young ladies kissing in front of me whilst texting Dave about that day's play as happened last year but I guess you just never know. Before we get fully into the excitement of form, key players and possible scorelines, a first entry always needs to serve as a bit of background and context for all that comes after it. With that in mind …
The times, they keep on a changing. No, not the recent Murdoch experiment in charging for online access to The Times, but the times in which we live and watch cricket.
For one, I am now only 8 children away from captaining my own cricket team of offspring rather than the 9 away that I was during the last Ashes series. Both boys have what is known as “a passing interest in cricket” in the Living Vicariously Through Your Children trade. We all watched Cameron White bring up his hundred in the recent Australia A vs. England match before turning our attention back to the high pressure world of animal rescue that is Go Diego Go. Whilst I, like all parents, am still honing my child rearing craft, I remain convinced that
“No Daddy No! Turn off the cricket, I want to watch Diego!!”
and
“Ba Ba BABABA Dadda”
actually means
If I thought that finding time to write the blog was hard last time then in between work, 2 children and getting back into drumming (via my excellent new Roland TD12K kit), I suspect it may be a real challenge this series. But, as I heard a lady say on a work related course I was on last week,
“I have free reign to be whomever I wish and do whatever I want between the hours of midnight and 6am”.
Whilst somewhat open to interpretation but true, and compelling, as this is, I almost always choose to be me and be asleep between those hours (except on the occasions that one of my sons wakes, begging to be taken through the details of the catch off a leg glance I took 5 years ago in the Grand Final against North Ryde RSL of course) but will do my best to make a bit of time none the less. Dave Thompson, I am looking for the same commitment from you!
After re-watching Chris Tavare’s 1980 debut Test against the West Indies (13 off 48 balls and 4 off 27 balls), we all agreed that you probably had to be there to appreciate the majesty of it
What else has changed?
Oh yes, that’s right, Australian cricket is …. In Crisis.
Whether it is falling audiences, more match fixing allegations to Cricket Australia’s ridiculously pompous naming of a squad for the first Test, that was one larger than England’s touring party, or ridiculous 20 20 matches thought to be primarily a “silly self-indulgent, poorly timed and irrelevant costume drama” by the still preeminent Peter Roebuck, Australian cricket is bouncing up and down on the bottom of the barrel like nothing since Wayne Phillips took the keeping gloves from Rod Marsh in 1983. Sure I predicted that the end of the cricketing world was nigh two years ago but I hate to even reveal that I in fact have a trumpet, let alone blow it.
Some elements of the cricketing fraternity seemed surprisingly comfortable at Australia’s fall from cricketing grace
For me though, nothing sums up the turmoil like the dropping of spinner Nathan Hauritz for Xavier Doherty. OK, so Nathan never set the world on fire, and often seemed more likely to trip over with the burning match and set his own trousers on fire, but a bowling average of 35 over 17 Tests is nothing to sneeze at. Understandably the selectors seemed to want to move on from a “holding” type spinner to someone that could bowl sides out and win games for his country; not a bad idea in concept.
However, the man that has replaced him, Tasmania’s Xavier Doherty, averages a stunning 48 with the ball over 35 first class matches in 8 years. This is something like picking a middle order batsman to play Test cricket after he has averaged 17 with the bat in 8 years; madness, total and utter. Add the fact that Xavier is the 9th spinner to be tried since Warne retired in 2007 and I challenge anyone to explain the logic of Chairman of Selectors, Andrew Hilditch's ongoing employment. Isn't this the stuff we used to laugh at England about?
Worse still, the most important thing to consider when picking a spinner, his nickname and how it sounds be chanted out by the keeper into the stump mike for 6 hours a day, seems to be a real problem here.
“Bowling Warnie”
is obviously the yard stick by which all spinner related encouragement should be measured but
“Bowling McGilla”
worked very nicely as did
“Bowled Hoggy”.
Even
“Nice lines Haury”
was starting to gain traction across Australian primary school playgrounds everywhere.
However, I fail to see how
“Acceptable bowling X, considering you have been a long term failure at first class level”
doesn’t seem to have the sort of ring to it that we are looking for.
And no, that wasn’t a typo; Xavier’s nickname appears to be simply X. He is either going for a The Artist Formerly Known As Prince, Now Known As A Fairly Wanky Symbol Thing, or his nickname is simply his signature. Either way, I feel my confidence ebbing away. Bring back little Nathan I say !
Only two sleeps to go before the first Test starts. Who else can get injured? Will it rain? Will I be able to squeeze in another post? Let’s find out !
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