Daryl Harper & Tony Hill

Dear England,

If you didn't want a New Zealander and an Australian to try scuppering your series and hand victory to a set of South Africans, you should have treated your Dominions better, now shouldn't you have?

This is what you get for Bodyline and surrendering Singapore, as far as I'm concerned.

Kindest Regards,
Nathan

Ways not to stay competitive in a Test Match with Australia

28.6  Bollinger to Mohammad Yousuf, 2 runs, OUT, run out! full length delivery, driven along the ground through mid-off, Yousuf wants a third, Butt says no but the captain keeps coming, he's halfway down the pitch before he finally concedes the necessity to retreat, the throw comes in from Johnson at deep mid-off all the way to the keeper's end, Haddin removes the bails with Yousuf well short
Mohammad Yousuf run out 7 (24b 0x4 0x6) SR: 29.16

33.3 Hauritz to Umar Akmal, OUT, run out! pushed to mid-off, the batsmen set off for a single, before Butt stops in his tracks, Akmal is already half-way down before he has to retreat, the throw from Siddle comes into Haddin and Akmal is just short, as the television replay confirms Umar Akmal run out 8 (13b 2x4 0x6) SR: 61.53

You're 500 runs down and you want to start playing a game of risky rushed singles?  The captain as well?  Are you all crazy?

A day without rain for Australia, seeing Ponting get our first double-tonne since Gillespie in '06 (funny he just pops that out, randomly, JUST AS THE PRESSURE IS ON, I smell a conspiracy) and Clarke reach a new high score, to be followed by a top-order collapse from Pakistani.  And Peter Siddle, for nabbing two in an over and prompting the collapse, may have just gone a long way to saving his place in the team, especially in light of last match's batting heroics.

Ps. Hi Sid

Dear Blog

Dear Blog,

Terribly sorry I have not updated you, I am quite remiss.  I blame my holidays, but alas, they are over now, so I will try and churn out some stuff on this very weird series with Pakistan very soon!

Regards,
The Author

PS.  Sid, I'm not doing my best to ignore you, your site just keeps causing my browser to crash!

Thanks for including me in your worst of '09    ):

India vs Sri Lanka

Suffice to say, India has now rather definitively proved that Sri Lanka has no business sitting in the # 2 position on the ICC Test Rankings.

Decent performance in the first match, but two follow-ons in the succeeding matches?  Time for some serious self-reflection for Sri Lanka.

Chris Gayle

It's safe to say that Chris Gayle now knows exactly who Bollinger is.

Too much slogging, Gayle, not enough batting; who do you think you are, Sehwag?

Sreesanth the Bloody

Another belated post-weekend post, about another follow-on-inducing massacre.

Sreesanth came out with accumulated figures of 33 Ov, 8 M, 122 R, 6 W, 2nb.  But more importantly, he tore the Sri Lankan top-order to pieces in the first innings, getting a five-for, four of them against notable danger-men, including Sangakkara.  Not as present in the second innings, but that was largely because the second innings belonged to the spinners (and surprisingly, Sehwag).

I have to admit, I was really surprised to see the Sri Lankans come apart at the seams like this.  They seemed to have everything together at Motera, their only problem was hyper-cautiousness, especially in their captain, and a penchant for preferring batting records to victory.  To go from Motera to this is quite a puzzler.

And remind me not to doubt Kanpur groundsmen.

India 642
Sri Lanka 229 & 269

West Indies: Where to start...

Sorry I'm late to get on the topic but, busy weekend.

Well, that was rather cruel and unusual.  The pitch was lively enough for both sides, and on the third day you could see these terrifying longitudinal cracks in the pitch, like giant San Andreas fault lines.  The lack of Jerome Taylor beyond a nine-over contribution no doubt hurt as well.  But even those factors can't excuse a three-day slaughter. 

From what I could tell, the West Indies were simply in a ODI mindset.  As thrilling as the opening overs of the West Indies innings were, it wasn't test cricket and it wasn't being mindful of the pitch or the opposition.  With fifteen wickets falling on one day, they were certainly dismissed in an ODI fashion, and in doing so deprived me of my sunday afternoon viewing.

Chanderpaul probably stands out as the biggest disappointment.  Effectively the anchorman of the West Indies order, the calypso reply to Dravid, in the last outing with the Australians he batted an average of like five hours per innings.  A score of 2 & 2 makes it nearly impossible for the WI batting order to make the necessary chase.  Add into that the fact that Gayle and Chanderpaul racked up 3 of 4 referrals, all on exceptionally plumb decisions...

All in all, the Windies had two shining points, Adrian Barath's century performance, and Kemar Roach's bowling.  Both of these look like players who will go places if given the chance.

On the downside, the rest of their bowling was ho-hum, their star bowler couldn't bowl, their top order was brittle, their middle order was brittle, their lower order was brittle, their discipline with the referrals was lax and they simply couldn't perform on a lively pitch. 

Australia 480/8d
West Indies 228 & 187 (f/o)