Top Order Runs? We Swear By ‘Em

At last! Some red ball cricket. At last! England’s top order actually made some runs. Both have been a long time coming.

Yes it was only against a ‘New Zealand XI’, which could mean absolutely anything when you think about it, but how refreshing it was to see the overnight scorecard from England’s first warm-up ahead of their two-test series against the Kiwis.

England finished a shortened first day on 285-1 with both Dom Sibley and Zak Crawley scoring unbeaten centuries. I can’t remember the last time we scored nearly three hundred runs for the loss of just a single wicket. It sure makes a nice change from being 58 all out – which is precisely what happened in Aukland the last time we toured this part of the world.

It’s important not to get carried away though. After all, we can’t be exactly sure where the ‘New Zealand XI’ got their players from. I didn’t recognise the names of any of their bowlers, and some of them don’t even have Cricinfo profiles. It could well have been a compilation of New Zealand farmers, part-time rugby players, or Lord Of The Rings extras.

Nevertheless it was great to see two young batsmen perform so well on their England debuts. This game doesn’t have first class status – perhaps another indication that this wasn’t the most intense of warm-ups – but it does bode well for the future, not least because it seems clear our fledgling top 3 will be given licence to bat time. Apparently it took Sibley 60 balls to score a boundary. Talk about channeling one’s inner Boycott.

England’s batsmen have had somewhat mixed messages about the correct approach to Test innings in the past. Joe Root has always insisted that he wants his teams to play very positively – perhaps because his ultimate boss, Harebrained Harrison at the ECB, once declared that England should play aggressively and risk losing to win.

What’s more, accumulators have often been somewhat mistreated by the selectors in the past. Nick Compton, for example, has frequently spoken about how he never felt at home in the England side. He sometimes felt under pressure to score quickly and couldn’t always play his natural game.

As someone who always used to admire Jonathan Trott, and loved the way Alastair Cook compiled innings in the subcontinent, personally I don’t care how England’s top 3 makes runs – as long as they start making them again. Therefore it’s great news that the Jason Roy experiment is over and Ed Smith has now put his faith in more traditional red ball openers.

Although there’s a slight danger that innings can go nowhere if the batsmen get too bogged down – when England played New Zealand at Aukland in 2013 the aforementioned Compton made 13 of 77 balls, Bell made 17 off 60 and a young Root made 45 off 176 balls (a strike rate of just 25.6) – I can’t see that happening to this particular batting side. If the top order start steadily then the stroke-players down the order are almost certain to catch up.

In other news it emerged yesterday that Jonny Bairstow has been reprimanded by the ICC for swearing loudly when he was dismissed in the 3rd T20 at the weekend. What do you all make of this?

Although it’s obviously not great to hear sportsmen yelling obscenities at the top of their voice, it’s important to point out that Jonny was simply expressing frustration with himself. He wasn’t abusing a Kiwi player or the umpires. What’s more, anyone with even a very basic lipreading ability will know that players in other sports (notably football and rugby) swear their heads off all the time. But luckily for them there’s no microphone located a metre away to pick it up.

This is the crucial point in my view. Had the ICC not installed stump mics for general entertainment purposes (yes it’s also for snicko but noises other than edges can be filtered out) then Jonny wouldn’t find himself on the naughty step. So is it then a bit unfair to make an example of him?

It’s worth mentioning that a similar incident happened to Ben Stokes a couple of years ago. Here’s a link so you can read what happened. Reprimanding Stokes seemed harsh at the time and I was under the impression that the ICC were going to change the ruling to avoid a repeat.

It seems they didn’t act after all. The f****** b******s.

James Morgan

Subscribe to receive new article notifications via email

We keep your data private and never share it with third parties.

15 comments

  • It’s a real bugbear of mine this business of bad language on the field of play. International sportsmen are under the kind of pressure we can only imagine, so venting frustration with the kind of offhand swearing we all use regularly, including in front of our kids at home, should be deemed perfectly acceptable. It’s not aimed at anyone, just a reflex.
    It’s the puritanical media who seem to think that if they allow it on their channels millions will switch off in disgust. It’s always interesting when a sportsman lets an expletive slip when a microphone is stuck under his or her nose, usually in defeat and the puerile, ‘how do you feel’ is asked. The interviewers feels the onus is on them to apologise for the sportsman’s ungentlemanly conduct, and the presenter further embarrasses himself and his bosses by making an issue of it, compounding the apology. It’s a dashed poor show.

    • Umm, anymore pressure than a solider under fire? Or a fireman when inside a burning building ?

      I’m not sure a sportsman is under anything like that pressure.. it’s not life and death .. it’s just a game

      • Like they don’t swear like troopers in the heat of the action and don’t have to answer for it afterwards.
        Can you imagine what it would be like if you couldn’t let loose with verbals at work without being fined and given verabal and written warnings. It’s not just a game it’s their livelyhood and as a batsman, getting put cheaply is a risk to that. it’s clearly more than just a game to them. You’re representing your country in a very public way, soldiers and fireman dont have that sort of pressure, it’s an entirely different scenario. The vast majority of what they do is not in the public domain.

  • Had the ICC … had the ICC ensured that pay for international cricket was the same across nations, South Africa would actually have a decent playing XI on the field, rather than playing domestic cricket in England. But no, your financial doping has ensured you will have the easiest tour in South Africa since what? 1899? So congratulations on a well bought series victory. Because financial doping is of course the pinnacle of meritocracy in sport. How exciting. What a compelling narrative.

    We know the ICC is useless at best (and for most countries, they are more of a hindrance than a helping force these days). We know the ICC is happily engaged in corruption. We know that the Anti-Corruption Unit does the square root of sweet nothing about corruption by administrators. And even when players cheat on the field, it is left to the HOME broadcaster to actually detect it. The ICC simply does not care. So we are effectively in the situation that cheating is not allowed, unless you do it at home. How noble. That is cricket in the 21st century for you.

    They can’t even get three good umpires on the field / as third umpire for most games, let alone umpires on the field who actually know the rules of the game. And nothing is done about that. Because, apparently swearing is a bigger threat to the game, than incompetent umpires.

    I have nothing against moderate swearing, or a bit of innocent banter. Far from it. Not that most players in 2019 can actually engage in the latter. But since the ICC is extremely adept at hypocrisy, they will have to draw a line somewhere, and of course that will mean that rather innocent remarks will attract a sanction. It is the only way in which they actually make themselves relevant, other than being a money-delivery service to the nations that least need the money. So poor Johnny used an expletive. Shocker.

    The same thing happened to Michael Clarke, when the stump mics were supposed to be switched off (back in 2013). But no, then apparently everyone in England had to complain about his nasty remarks (they were certainly not classy). So deal with it. If you are paid north of one million pounds a year for being a rather average Test player (and that is generous to Bairstow) and a good ODI player (figures most international cricketers won’t make out of international cricket over the course of their international careers), then it really should not be beyond someone to know when to keep their trap shut. He can even hire 20 coaches to teach him that skill, out of his own pocket, and then still comfortably make more than 80% of the other international cricket players from Full Member nations.

    International cricket is dead. I could swear about it, but then the ICC will see fit to fine me, rather than apply a modicum of reflection on the grand larcency they have committed, and continue to commit.

    • Professionals .. there is literally never a need to swear or engage in “light hearted banter”.. just play cricket

      • Swearing is not about need, it’s a reflex to let off steam that the vast majority of the human race do on a regular basis. You have to have an almost religious conviction to restrain on principle.

  • I think we are in danger of being rather prudish if we are complaining about grown men letting of a swear word or two. Most of us do it in life from time to time and it always happens in sport and always will. Fred Trueman swore like a trooper but they didn’t have stump mike’s then. Ok you don’t want it 24/7 but we really are becoming a namby pampy nanny state society of we continue down this road. It’s keying of a bit of steam.

    Cricketers under pressure? Well I wouldn’t mind being under “pressure” as a highly paid sportsman. No comparison to pulling people out of burning buildings though is it?

    • We’re not talking about pressure comparison we’re talking about swearing as a perfectly natural reflex to it. As I said to Mr Cricket pulling people out of burning buildings and putting your life on the line is a completely different scenario, as most of what is done here is not put out int the public domain. What sportsmen do is always in the full glare of publicity and that sort of pressure would be as likely to do for your average soldier or fireman as it would for the man in the street. I’ve known a few squadfies in my time and theres as many twats in the forces as in civvy street.

      • Sorry but I don’t see your point. International sportsman are paid in most cases huge amounts of money to do something most of us would give our right arm for. If they can’t handle the “pressure” of the publicity then they’ve a problem. Fireman and soldiers among others often put their lives on the line, a bit of bad PR in the public domain is rather irrelevant I think.

        • The point is money has nothing to do with it. You don’t become a professional sportsman for the money, it’s a labour of love. Like us it’s what they’ve always wanted to do except they have the talent for it. As a kid I had aspirations to be a professional cricketer and made my way through the county youth age groups, it soon realised I hadn’t the talent. Unlike soldiers and firemen the competition for a limited number of spaces is immense and the vast majority fall by the wayside, so those who do make it are fully aware of their good fortune. What you call a bit of bad PR is just a symptom of what extra pressure the media puts on them, the stump mic being a total irrelevance to the game. Can you imagine a Truman pandering to it.
          Put soldiers and fireman in the full glare of publicity to account for trivial matters, largely irrelevant to their ability to do the job and see how they’d cope. Not well is my guess.
          Putting your life on the line is what millions of civillians did in the last war. They didn’t ask for it, they we conscripted to fight for their country and many more than do now went to their deaths doing so, including volunteer fireman. What do they get for that, no special recognition apart from 1 day a year. Just because someone wears a uniform doesn’t make them better person than anyone else. Personally I would say your average nurse displays more courage, seeing people at their worst in their daily job than either a soldier or fireman, despite not putting their lives on the line. They have to cope to a far greater degree with death, pain and distress. There’s no glamour attached to it for them. No one treats them as special because of their uniform. We just take them for granted, a bit like the police, another abused minority.

  • Apologies for going off-topic but shocking news just in that Colin Graves might be right about something!

    The ICC apparently want to play an ICC tournament every year between 2023 and 2031. Graves is against it on grounds of the impact on the status of Tests and the danger of player burn-out.

    BTW, Jonathan Liew’s article for Wisden about The One is a hoot (tedious shoehorning-in of Brexit and climate change references aside).

  • In most cases money has everything to do with it In professional sport which is half the problem. I don’t think I can agree on this, it’s just an unfair comparison when you talk about people who risk their lives for a living. They have no interest in PR, why should they. If I’m being paid a million quid a year to play cricket I’d be very happy to cope with any PR fallout or “pressure” in playing what at the end of the day is just a game.
    You know I’ve swum the Channel 3 times, never got paid for it, but believe me that’s pressure like you wouldn’t believe.
    Anyway, have a good day.

    • It’s not a pressure of accountability for anything. If you make a mistake as fireman or soldier the matter is usually dealt with internally as the organisation close ranks. Sportsmen don’t have that luxury, look at all the ridiculous media fallout from the recent Stirling-Gomez incident, with thousands of spectators making Stirlings life a misery over it. Southgate had to come out and almost acknowledge it was a public matter.
      This is pretty typical of the consistent hostility many sportsmen and women face if they do anything remotely controversial. As I said it maybe just a game to you but it’s their Livelyhood. They seem to have become public property in a way no other profession has to deal with and it goes on 24-7 whatever they’re doing.
      Well done for swimming the channel, a great achievement, but what is the day to day pressure comparison?

FOLLOW US ON TWITTER

copywriter copywriting