Ok. I’m going to take a deep breath before writing this. First of all, lets deal with the pitch … It’s flat, and it got flatter as the first day progressed. Bumble, the one member of the Sky team with local knowledge, doesn’t think it will break up as the game progresses. Let’s hope he’s right. In theory, it won’t be easy for either team to take 20 wickets on this. When it does occasionally offer a bit of seam movement, it’s so extravagant (and seemingly random) that it misses the bat by a...
Settee: The Search for Extratesttrivia Life
How have you coped without live Ashes cricket for nine long days? Did you return to your normal daily routines, watch the endless re-runs of ‘England’s best days’ on Sky, or hibernate for a week – recharging your batteries for another emotional roller coaster? At TFT we’ve been tracking down fresh writing talent; looking for like-minded cricket fans keen to share their musings. As a result we’ve unearthed this fella, who goes by the name Paul Grin Hopi. We...
Foregone conclusion? I don’t think so – day four at Trent Bridge
Andrew Strauss has been a great addition to the Sky commentary team. But like many of us he made one bad error of judgement at the start of day four: he said England already had enough runs when the lead went past 250. Wrong! We really could’ve done with another one hundred runs in the end. As it happened, we got another sixty. Game on. After Watson and Rogers’ excellent start, it looked almost inevitable that Australia would chase the necessary 311 for victory. Then we took a couple of wickets...
Australia’s ‘WACAs’ not up to test standard
WACAs, ‘whackers’, you get the idea. Australia batted unbelievably poorly on day one at Perth. Only one batsman was out to a ball he could do nothing about – and that was the exasperatingly exemplary Mike Hussey. The rest of them got out to shots that were as ill advised as the selection of Australia’s final XI. What on earth were the Aussies thinking? Test cricket requires discipline and patience – not whackers like Phil Hughes and Steve Smith. Unless they can get a fast start against an under...
