Breaking news: Pietersen and Moores quit as England's captain & coach

According to Sky News, Kevin Pietersen has quit as England's captain. Cricinfo reports that Peter Moores, England's coach, has also resigned.

This follows the publicized clash of views between the two that required hurried intervention by senior folks at the ECB.

Pietersen had been named England captain 5 months ago.

I guess we'll have to await confirmation from the ECB, but this is about the worst thing that England cricket needs now with a tour of West Indies starting in a couple of weeks and a team that hasn't beaten significant opposition for 3 years now, the last one being the home win over Pakistan in 2006.

Now who'll be made captain? Strauss? But he isn't in the ODI team. Vaughan? Isn't that a retrograde move? Flintoff? He was cast aside after the 2006/07 Ashes thrashing. Collingwood? He gave up the job 5 months ago and I'm not sure how much of a certainty he is in tests because he seems to be in the team on a per-test basis. Cook? Far too early! My guess is that the ECB, if it does accept Pietersen's resignation, will opt for Strauss as test captain & persuade Flintoff or Collingwood to be the ODI captain.

As for the coach, that's a toughie because the main candidates that people have talked about are associated with either Pietersen or Moores. Andy Flower is a Moores pick while Graham Ford was being backed by Pietersen. I guess that also rules out Warne!

Do I love it when England cricket is in trouble? Of course!

Update: I just had a rather evil thought. Does it seem like Pietersen doesn't quite enjoy it when things don't work out the way he wants? He quit South Africa claiming that the system was unfair. Now he's quit as captain because he can't have his way with the coach.

Labels: breaking news, captaincy, coach, england, pietersen

Thus spake Jagadish @ 7:19 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Morons running and ruining the game

The fourth day of the Mohali test between India & England got underway at 11 am IST today, after fog caused a delay of two hours.

India wrapped up England's lower order in quick time and at the time of writing, have a lead of 160 runs. There's no doubt that the aim would be to score at least 150-180 more runs by end of day today, and preferably bowl at least 3-4 overs at England.

That said, India may (unnecessarily) decide to play it a little safer. Remember that until a week ago, even 387, let alone 414 was considered nearly impossible to chase.

By the way, did anyone notice that West Indies' chase of 418 against Australia in 2003 had a debutant (Omari Banks) batting when the game was won, and yesterday, South Africa had Jean-Paul Duminy hitting the winning runs? It seems to me that South Africa's lower order batting is at its weakest since they came back to international cricket in 1992. They've always had chaps who could bat down the order. But they got blown away by Mitchell Johnson in the first innings. Since 1992, their #9, #10 & #11 have typically averaged 15-20 runs per wicket, but in the last 2 years its down to 12 & 9!

What was Ricky Ponting doing as captain? His main spinner was leaking 4.5 runs an over. Yet he didn't even bring on Symonds or Katich to try and do something different? I'm having evil thoughts now about why Ponting did nothing!

With Kevin Pietersen in such form in the test, there's a very high chance that India will end up batting all day and declaring only tomorrow morning after a couple of overs. Speaking of him, he has 15 test hundreds in just 3.5 years of test cricket. He has 4000 runs in that period, from just 45 tests. He's 28, and could really play for at least another 8 years. If England continue to play more tests than most other teams and he keeps going with his batting, he could end up with at least 12000 runs and 30+ centuries. In fact, I think he may go past Tendulkar and Ponting (if & when he gets there) in the centuries and runs tallies.

How amazing is that? I think he's a prick, but I have a lot more respect for him than someone like Hayden (I just love the scrutiny Hayden is facing having made 282 runs in his last 13 innings). Pietersen hits some amazing shots, and showed us the reverse hit yesterday. Until his innings yesterday, he only had 221 runs from 8 innings in India. I hope he doesn't get any more!

Coming back to the Mohali game and why I started this post, isn't it so f#@king stupid that when the light is good enough for play, the umpires decide to take lunch? This, when they've spent the last 2 hours trying to establish when play can start! Spectators and audiences (TV, radio, mobile phones, internet, etc.) get shortchanged due to such stupidity. Yet, the ICC ostrich continues to tell us that cricket is in good shape and its Chief Executives announce, after pointless meetings, that "There was also a general discussion on the issue of Test cricket with Members acknowledging the need to find ways in which this format of the game can be protected and promoted.". There's nonsense happening pretty much on a series-by-series basis, and yet the members keep acknowledging the need to find ways to protect & promote test cricket.

Speaking of the ICC, has it relaxed the rules on 'public criticism of, or inappropriate comment on a match related incident or match official' which is normally categorized as a level 1 offense? In the past week, there have been two players who've spoken out in the press conferences about the umpiring decision that ruled them out - Sehwag at Chennai and Pietersen at Mohali have both said that they reckoned the decisions should have gone their way.

Since there has been no action from the ICC against both players (especially considering Sehwag's statement was a week ago), can we assume that the ICC has decided to allow players a little more leeway in expressing their dissatisfaction with the umpiring? If so, why can't they just announce it officially so everyone can do the same without fear of being pulled up?

Labels: bad light, eng v ind 2008, england, icc, india, lunch, match referee, mohali, pietersen, playing conditions, rules

Thus spake Jagadish @ 3:08 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Quite a weekend, that!

The weekend was quite eventful.

First, Marcus Stresscothick Trescothick revealed in his newly published autobiography that during the 2005 Ashes, England tampered with the ball by using mints to polish the ball. Rahul Dravid must be wondering about how stupid he was, not for using a lozenge, but for getting caught while doing so!

Update: I came across Ricky Ponting's response when asked about Dravid being pulled up. He said

I don't think you'll see us doing anything like that.

Ricky's response confirms that Dravid's mistake was in getting caught. Notice that Ponting didn't say "We never do such things". What he said was "You won't see us doing anything like that". i.e. his team would never be caught by umpires, match referees, opponents (live or on television) doing something like that.

However, remember that the ICC, in July, altered the result of a test match two years after the game was completed! So it may not be a bad ploy for Australia to lobby the ICC to reverse the result of the 2005 Ashes series.

Then, the ICC decided that the ICC Champions Trophy would be postponed to Oct 2009, with the proviso that the environment is deemed fit for an international tournament to be staged and there are no security concerns. In case people didn't notice, the boards that wanted the tournament to be moved or rescheduled weren't all 'white'. South Africa and West Indies had concerns as well. In my opinion, this is certainly not an instance of a racial split in cricket, as is often made out to be!

The move is highly likely to cause a lot of ripples in international series scheduling. The ICC's Future Tours Programme doesn't seem to have too much flexibility to accommodate the tournament in 2009. Looking at the schedule, mid-Apr 2009 to early-May 2009 seems the only time period when there's very little international cricket scheduled. West Indies host Bangladesh in that duration, but come on, who cares about that series!

Amidst all the chaos, India have gone 2-1 up against Sri Lanka in the one-day series with a fairly comprehensive 33 run win in the 3rd ODI. But I still don't understand why Sri Lanka were allowed to recover from 59/6 & 94/7. For some bizarre reason, Yuvraj was persisted with despite having done his job in providing the breakthrough (Kulasekara). He's a part-time bowler, yet Dhoni got him to bowl 8 overs on the trot. Naturally, Yuvraj became less effective as his spell dragged on, conceding 16 runs in his last 2 overs. Dhoni should have brought back Munaf or Zaheer or Praveen (in that order of priority) to try and get the remaining 3 wickets (or at least get Jayawardene out).

Sangakkara needs to do something about Zaheer Khan's stranglehold on him. In 6 matches this year, he has been dismissed 5 times by Zaheer and has barely got a run. In the tests, he was driving away from the body and getting caught in the slips. In the one-dayers, he's been troubled by Zaheer getting the ball to cut in. I think this is because Sangakkara is moving a lot outside offstump when the ball is being delivered, possibly to cope with the swing or just as an attacking measure. As a result, he's forced to play at outswingers and when the ball does nip back, he's caught on the move. In any case, I hope he doesn't sort it out for the next couple of games at least!

Charles Davis, an Aussie statistician, seems to have misread his calendar. After a lot of meticulous & painstaking research, he claims to have discovered that 4 runs had to be added to Bradman's test run aggregate, which would give the Don an average of 100. But he seems to have sent in his report around 8 months too early - 1 Apr 2009 would have been the appropriate date for the story!

Darrell Hair, who had been reinstated to the ICC's Elite panel of umpires in March this year, has resigned and will be coaching umpires in New South Wales. There is some ambiguity about when his ICC contract actually expires - Oct 2008 or Mar 2009. In any case, the ICC is really messing up the quality of umpiring in international cricket.

PS: Forget Beefy, I want to know who the heck writes Pietersen's scripts! He got a 100 and England won his first test in charge. Last week, in his first ODI as the official captain, he scored 90, helped England get 270, got two crucial wickets and England won!

Labels: 2009 champions trophy, ashes, autobiography, ball tampering, champions trophy, england, icc, india, pietersen, sangakkara, security, sri lanka, zaheer khan

Thus spake Jagadish @ 5:07 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Strauss' jarring note

I get a feeling that Andrew Strauss is totally pissed off with Kevin Pietersen beating him to the captaincy. Either that, or he's just being brutally honest. Sample some of his quotes when he spoke to AFP and The Guardian.

• I would have liked to have done the Test job and, to that degree, I am disappointed I have not been given the opportunity.
  
• It is a brave decision because KP hasn't done much captaincy before.
  
• I think he does play for the team. I think that selfish aspect is overplayed. He would probably admit in his youth he was a bit like that but I don't think he is like that so much now.
  
• Captains have to be respected and that is something you cannot buy.
  
• There are so many different aspects you have to worry about. It's not just about preparing yourself and the team for the match but also dealing with the selectors and the media. You find there is not much time to concentrate on cricket and it can become dispiriting at times, as Michael found. It's a brilliant job but a really difficult one and, apart from in one one-day match, Kevin has never experienced that. This is a potentially tough time for the team.
  
• We are going from having the best captain England has ever had to someone who has never done it before. It is hard to say if Kevin will ultimately be successful.

Personally, I think England are rather hung up on this whole business of unifying the captaincy. There's no reason why sides can't have separate captains for tests and one-dayers. In fact, the only time England actually won a tournament with 4 or more sides playing was the Akai-Singer Champions Trophy under Adam Hollioake in 1997/98.

My vote was for Strauss to be made test captain and Pietersen to do the job in one-dayers. That way, he could gradually get a hang of things and if Strauss wasn't doing a good job, he could be handed over the test captaincy as well.

Labels: captaincy, england, pietersen, strauss

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:33 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Kevin Pietersen is England's new captain

Yesterday, Michael Vaughan and Paul Collingwood resigned from their captaincy roles. Vaughan had taken back his test captaincy from Andrew Flintoff while Collingwood had replaced Vaughan, who resigned before he was pushed.

Kevin Pietersen was announced a few minutes ago as England's new captain. The bit in the media release that made me cough was this:

I have learned a great deal about leadership from playing under both Michael and Paul and fully appreciate the level of responsibility that comes with the job of captaining your country.

The operative word being 'your country'. Was he telling the reporters, the people of England and England cricket fans that he didn't think England was his country? I hope the usage of 'your country' was as a possessive pronoun because he does have some history. He recently did say something totally stupid in a chat with 'The Times' correspondent Paul Kimmage. This is how that conversation went:

Paul: Do you get weird fan mail?
Kevin: Yeah (he says with a grin), pictures of girls with their tits out.
Paul: That's outrageous.
Kevin: I know — but look, it’s your nation, not mine.

Labels: captaincy, collingwood, england, pietersen, vaughan

Thus spake Jagadish @ 5:33 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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South Africa suffer from Lord's curse

Since 2000, there have been 7 instances where the touring team sent England in to bat at Lord's. The data is fairly emphatically indicative of the fact that touring teams almost always get it wrong when they opt to field first at Lord's. This is something I mentioned in a post on AOL's cricket blogs section last year before the India v England test at Lord's.

I probably don't have the stats to back me up, but I've seen many visiting teams (not named Australia) flounder at Lord's and opting to bowl first. Then they repent for a couple of days. After that, they realise that the pitch has changed character and the game is out of their grasp before either of the two captains can say 'inexperienced bowling attack'.

England's first innings scores have been 391, 187, 472, 173, 568, 553 & 593. Only Australia (2001) & South Africa (2003) shot out England for a low score.

There're far too many people who're credited with having given advice to the effect of "If you win the toss, you should bat first 9 times out of 10. On that one other instance, you think again, and bat first." I read a similar line in Ashley Mallett's book featuring Ian Chappell - "Chappelli Speaks Out" a couple of weeks ago and Mike Brearley's "The Art of Captaincy". I've also seen this sort of quote attributed to the likes of Richie Benaud & Don Bradman.

That last total of 593 came in the on-going England v South Africa test, the first of an eagerly awaited series. Graeme Smith sent England in and watched with horror as his bowlers failed to pick up a wicket before lunch on day one and England piled up 309/3 at stumps on the first day. First, Kevin Pietersen got a century in his first test against South Africa. He now has 13 centuries from 74 innings, the most for any current English batsman not named Michael Vaughan (assuming that Trescothick is unlikely to make a comeback).

Ian Bell is actually the interesting part of this post. He now has 8 centuries from 71 innings, but all his centuries have had the cushion of someone else also scoring a hundred. You could look at it in two ways.

• He cashes in when someone else does, implying that the conditions are good for batting most of the time.
  
• He strings together big partnerships when his team is in a spot of bother.

But when I looked at his centuries, there've really been only 2 instances (aside from the on-going test where he came in after England had dramatically collapsed from 114/0 to 117/3) when he has come in and done a good job when England was in trouble. These were at Faisalabad (which was quite a dramatic game since Shahid Afridi first smashed 92 in 85 balls and was then caught on TV damaging the pitch while Pakistan was fielding. After Afridi's innings, Inzamam was wrongly ruled run out when he took evasive action after Harmison hurled the ball on the striker's stumps) and at Napier earlier this year when England & New Zealand were in the early stages of their love affair lasting 19 consecutive internationals.

I'm not saying he's not a good batsman. He obviously is. But he'd rate far more highly if he made centuries when others made 30s and 40s. Patrick Kidd from the Times Online is also thinking on similar lines.

Labels: england, ian bell, lord's, pietersen, south africa, statistic, toss

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:00 pm | Sledge/Read 1 sledge(s)
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Kevin Pietersen could end up changing the rules

The MCC has announced that it will be considering today whether switch-hitting was within the laws.

Unless you are in outer space, you'd know by now that Kevin Pietersen, in the first ODI against New Zealand, reverse-hit (not reverse-swept!) Scott Styris twice (Video & Photos) over the infield. I'm using a generic 'infield' description since he actually hit it over mid-wicket and long-on, but since Pietersen is a right-handed batsmen, it was actually cover and long-off.

There's obviously a lot of chatter going around about whether it is fair for a batsman to do so when the bowler can't change his bowling arm midway, etc. There're counter-examples as well: bowlers don't tell batsmen they're going to bowl a slower ball while at the same time batsmen don't tell bowlers they're going to smack them over extra cover (Actually, I take that back. Some do!).

Is such innovation good for the game? Should it be allowed? Will the game progress or regress? Despite my hating Kevin Pietersen (there's something about him that I hate, I just can't say exactly what), I think he's going to end up changing the rules, for the better.

My belief is that batsmen should be allowed to switch-hands and play shots. But to counter that, the lbw and wide rules need to be changed such that if a batsman while playing a reverse hit misses and gets hit on the pad, he can be given out lbw even though in his normal batting stance it may not have been lbw. Similarly, if the batsman misses since the ball was far away, unless it was ridiculously wide, umpires should not be calling it a wide.

Let's take two hypothetical scenarios and a real one.

• The other day, if Styris had bowled the ball in line with Kevin Pietersen's leg stump and if Pietersen had been hit below the knee roll, chances are the umpire would have negated the lbw appeal since the ball was heading down the legside. However, Pietersen's shot was that of a left hander and hence the ball would have hit off-stump. So he should be given out in that scenario. In fact, if the ball had hit Pietersen's right leg, was it hitting his front-leg or back-leg?
  
• The bowler runs in to bowl with, say, 4 slips in the cordon. The batsman attempts a reverse switch hit. Was it a no-ball since there were 4 fielders behind the stumps on the leg side?
  
• In the 2002 NatWest Series final, Nasser Hussain attempted several times to reverse sweep Harbhajan, who fired it down Nasser's legside and ended up conceding wides. However, since Nasser was attempting a reverse shot, the ball actually went under his bat and it was his mistake that he didn't connect.

If the rules are changed to ensure that bowlers aren't worse off, then I am of the belief that such change is good. Batsmen keep inventing new strokes (Ranji's leg glance, Hanif's reverse sweep, Compton sweeping faster bowlers, Kanhai's falling sweep, Marillier's lap shot, etc.) and bowlers keep inventing new deliveries (Bosanquet's googly, Larwood & Jardine implementing leg-theory, Jack Iverson's flicks, Ramadhin trying out a doosra, Waugh using slower balls, Harvey bowling back-of-the hand slower balls, etc.)

Certainly, cricket has benefitted from these changes. These pioneers enabled others to experiment even more and perfect the changes. Andy Flower nearly perfected the reverse sweep while Saqlain did the same to the doosra. We may be seeing the emergence of ambidextrous players, like John Buchanan predicted in 2003.

Let's say the MCC decided that it was not a legal shot if the batsman did not inform the umpires/bowler prior to playing the shot. What'd happen if a batsman played this shot without informing? Would the ball be declared a dead ball? If so, what if the bowler had actually bowled him? Would he be declared out? If it wasn't a dead ball, would the batsman be ruled out (maybe the MCC decides to add this under some 'Confusing the opposition' genre of dismissals)?

The main problem so far has been that bat technology has progressed more rapidly compared to ball technology, thus increasing the mismatch between bat and ball. It is something that definitely needs to be addressed soon.

In summary, I support changes to the laws to allow batsmen to switch their stance and hit the ball, as long as umpires don't penalize bowlers (by ruling wide or not giving lbw decisions) if the batsmen missed the ball.

This seems like a fascinating topic to have a discussion on.

Update: The MCC has, thankfully, ruled that the stroke conforms to the laws. In addition, the release also mentions that since this has implications on the laws governing wides (25) and lbws (36), further research will be done. I wonder why there is no mention of law 41 which deals with calling a no-ball if there are more than 2 leg side fielders aside from the wicket keeper behind the popping crease.

Labels: england, innovation, laws, mcc, pietersen, reverse hit, reverse sweep, rules, switch hitting

Thus spake Jagadish @ 12:15 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Pieter$en to play in the IPL next year?

Kevin Pietersen's interview to the Daily Mail last week is sure to shake up the ECB. He has apparently been approached with a £ 2 million offer for a three year contract with one of the franchisees.

Since the ECB does not yet allow its centrally contracted players to play in the Indian Premier League, he does have the option of turning down an ECB contract offer so that he can play when and where he wants. Unlike other cricketers, he can be pretty safe in the knowledge that the absence of a central contract won't result in him not being considered for selection.

Yet, it's funny how his views have changed over the last year, like Will Luke too points out. Sample this chronology of quotes:

• June 2007 (during West Indies' tour of England):
  'Burnout could cut short my career.'
  
• October 2008 (during England's tour of Sri Lanka):
  'When I said I was tired in the summer nobody said anything to me, nobody backed me at all.'
  
• Feb 2008:
  'I know there is interest and, yes, there have been offers, etc etc, but it's not something I'm particularly interested in.'
  
• April 2008:
  'You want your best players playing both for their country and for the IPL. You don't want them choosing between the two. It's silly to think that you're losing up to a million over six weeks.'
  
• May 2008:
  'I am disappointed and irritated that England players have been stopped going so far, and I definitely want to go next year.'

It can be no-one's case that playing in the IPL is like a walk in the park. From what I've seen, these Twenty20 games need as much, if not more, focus as one-day internationals primarily because the situation changes so rapidly, on a ball-by-ball basis. In a fifty over game, you can recover from 60/4 and put up (or defend) a 250-260 score. In Twenty20, under most circumstances, you might as well concede the game at that stage.

So clearly players will experience burnout of some nature or the other. Obviously the money is good. But in today's cricketing setup, appearances for country and sponsorship deals are the only avenues for players to make money from their skills (and looks!). So, it can be no-one's case that players are mercenaries by playing for money.

Yet, like the chronology indicates, Pietersen has been far from consistent in his take on the IPL. He can't complain of burnout and sign on the IPL dotted line!

My take on there being too much cricket is that players always have the option of opting out of series. Typically the only players you'll see complaining about too much cricket are those that play the most often, and hence are the 'star' players. Surely they've performed well enough to risk skipping a game or a series and not face a piquant situation where they won't be included next time around. Also, if a sufficiently large number of players keep opting out of tournaments, cricket administrators will realize that they may be doing a lot of damage to the golden geese.

Labels: burnout, fatigue, indian premier league, ipl 2008, pietersen, twenty20

Thus spake Jagadish @ 1:30 pm | Sledge/Read 1 sledge(s)
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What goes around, comes around

During England's innings in the thrilling game yesterday, Paul Collingwood was ruled run-out by the third umpire after the on-field umpire asked for a replay based on what he saw on the big screen at the ground.

7.3 Ganguly to Pietersen, OUT, punched out to cover, and they go for a single - this could be a disaster. In comes the throw, Dhoni whips off the bails but the umpires haven't called for a replay. But hold on - drama here - Collingwood, according to the big screen replay, is short of his ground! And after a bit of a delay, and a referral to the TV umpire, Collingwood's given his marching orders by the umpire.

Paul Collingwood was rather livid (Photo) and the Cricinfo commentary said

Collingwood was absolutely spitting nails when he was finally dismissed. And he's pictured in the dressing room debating it with Moores and co.

Fair enough, Paul. You're justified in feeling mad that the on-field umpire used the the screen replay to refer the decision to the third umpire. Let's rewind to the first innings of the Lord's test. Pietersen got a thick outside edge and the ball fell short of Dhoni. Simon Taufel ruled that Pietersen was out, while Pietersen started to walk. The England players meanwhile saw the replay on TV and started waving asking him to go back. The third umpire was then called upon to adjudicate, and he ruled 'Not out'.

83.5 Khan to Pietersen, no run, madness! Pietersen was beaten twice in the over, then gets one fuller outside off stump, drives hard, gets a thick edge, which replays clearly indicated hit the turf before Dhoni snapped it up! They all appealed, Simon Taufel raised the finger, Pietersen had already started to walk...then with the tv showing what happened - the ball did hit the grass just before going into Dhoni's gloves - Pietersen is called back from near the ropes. The third umpire is referred to and NOT OUT is the verdict. Pietersen was almost home when he looked up at the balcony and saw his mates waving him back. People will have their views on this, I'm all too sure...

Labels: collingwood, england, india, pietersen, umpires

Thus spake Jagadish @ 9:19 pm | Sledge/Read 21 sledge(s)
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A view of the future?

Yes, long time no post. But hey, there were one-dayers on! Those are never interesting to write about.

Except when you watch these little skirmishes within the structure of the game.

Like Kevin Pietersen (27, batting avg. > 50 in tests and one-dayers) facing Piyush Chawla (18, 15 wickets from 9 games, including Pietersen twice in successive games). You immediately know this is a 'rivalry' we should be seeing for the next 8-10 years at least.

Ditto when he bowls to Ian Bell or Alastair Cook. The case is the same when Stuart Broad or Monty Panesar bowl to Yuvraj Singh or Dhoni or Dinesh Karthik.

It is in fact sad that Yuvraj is being referred to in the future tense. It has been seven years since he made his international debut. By now, he should have got a permanent slot in the test middle order, by capitalizing on the absence of Tendulkar and Ganguly during last year. Instead, he toured West Indies and made 104 runs in 7 innings.

Akash Chopra must probably be cursing himself and the selectors for spotting him only when there're tough series against Pakistan and Australia coming up. He's in the India 'A' squad which plays South Africa's 'A' team at home. One-day discards Mohammad Kaif and Suresh Raina are in that squad as well.

What would the Indian team in England give for Yuvraj, Kaif, Dinesh Karthik, Raina, Rohit Sharma and Uthappa manning the in-field? I've never seen such poor catching by an Indian team. I'd never expect a team consisting of Ganguly, Dravid, Munaf and Powar to be athletic. The least I thought they'd do is to at least hold the catches that come their way! That isn't the case.

So the best option is have Ganguly, Munaf, etc. 'injure' themselves every now and then so that Uthappa and Rohit Sharma can at least improve the standard of fielding. Alternately, have Powar and Munaf bowl in tandem so that the fielding damage only happens during one section of the innings!

Labels: catching, fielding, future, pietersen, piyush chawla, sloth

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:33 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Well done Sreesanth!

On Day 3 at Trent Bridge, towards the end of India's innings, Zaheer Khan and Kevin Pietersen got into a slanging match. This is what Cricinfo had to say:

Zaheer and Pietersen exchanging insults and the umpire has to step in as Zaheer brandishes his bat. It's all kicking off and so unlike the shy and retiring KP to speak out of turn. "Sure you've got the right man," he chirps as the umpire tells him to calm down

When I saw that on TV, the first thing I told my brother was that Zaheer needed to give Pietersen a 'perfume ball', not of the bouncer variety, but a beamer. Coincidentally, the first ball Pietersen faced yesterday was from Zaheer, but Zaheer bowled a terribly disappointing first ball. A few overs later, Sreesanth had the ball and he did what Zaheer didn't, albeit perhaps unintentionally.

Sreesanth to Pietersen, 1 no ball, oh dear, that was unintentionally nasty - a beamer from Sreesanth heads straight for Pietersen's head. Pietersen crashes to the ground, taking evasive action, and Sreesanth apologises immediately

Next over, Pietersen was out twice - the first time it wasn't given (caught behind) and a ball later, he was out lbw to a beautiful banana inswinger from RP Singh. I must confess that my earlier skepticism about RP Singh seems misplaced. He has a lot of ability and potential. He's shown that he can handle the job of the #3 seamer quite well. He bowled brilliantly in England's second innings at Lord's and did a great job yesterday with the crucial wickets of Pietersen and Prior.

For that beamer act of his, despite his theatrics & otherwise shoddy show with the ball, three cheers to Sreesanth! Hip hip hurrah! Hip hip hurrah! Hip hip hurrah!s

Labels: beamer, england, india, pietersen, sreesanth, trent bridge

Thus spake Jagadish @ 1:36 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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KP Spoils Lara's Day

Or better put, Marlon Samuels spoiled Lara's day.

In front of the largest crowd of the World Cup so far, Chris Gayle and Devon Smith, gave the West Indies a solid platform. They put on 131 for the first wicket, with Gayle, who seemed out of sorts at the start of his innings, finding his form to make a brisk 79 off 58 balls. Smith played fairly well for his 61, but too often failed to give the strike back to the dashing Gayle and consumed all of 106 deliveries.

At the fall of Gayle's wicket, caught at third man, the crowd called out for Lara, and he came out to thunderous applause. The England players saluted Lara by forming a guard of honour as he walked out to the middle for the final time in his international career. Lara played well for his 18 runs, tantalising his spellbound audience with three fours. After Smith fell to a brilliant Paul Collingwood catch, Samuels joined Lara at the crease. And then the unthinkable. Samuels hit a delivery down to mid on and called Lara for a run that was never on. When Samuels stopped and finally realised that the run was not on, it was too late for Lara as Kevin Pietersen swooped in and hit the wicket as Lara desperately tried in vain to make it back. Samuels went on to make a superb 51 off 39 deliveries, but gave it away when he hit a Michael Vaughan delivery straight to mid on's lap.

The West Indies eventually made 300 all out in 49.5 overs, but they should have had at least about 20 - 30 more. Especially when the Windies were well placed at 250/4 after 40 overs. The Windies' futility in the last 10 overs is highlighted by the fact that of the 50 runs they scored in this period, 10 came by Jerome Taylor off one Flintoff over. In fact, they lost 6 wickets for 42 runs within the last 8 overs.

On the true Kensington pitch, 300 was very gettable and England made the Windies pay for their ineptitude at the end of their innings. England started positively as Vaughan (79) and Ravi Bopara (26) batting at number 3, took England to 101 in the 16th over. Dwayne Bravo then took over in the field as after several missed attempts, he finally hit the stumps to run out Bopara. He repeated the trick and ran out Vaughan at 154/3. When Jamie Dalrymple suicidally ran himself out at 189/6 in the 36th over it looked like the Windies would send Lara off with a win.

But that was not to be as a splendid 90 ball 100 by Pietersen and a dogged 38 by keeper Paul Nixon carried England to 269 in the 47th over. Pietersen brought up his ton with a massive six off Taylor's first delivery in the 47th over. But Taylor soon had his revenge as he uprooted KP's leg stump with his very next delivery. Pietersen tried to repeat the shot but missed the ball completely. It again seemed for Windies fans that the game had been won when three balls later, Liam Plunkett picked out a fielder in the deep.

England's task of getting 30 from the final three overs with only 2 wickets left, seemed steep. However Collymore failed to bowl full and straight in the 48th over and paid the price as Nixon plundered 3 fours. England were gifted a fourth boundary in the over when keeper Randin could only parry a Collymore bouncer over his head and down to the boundary rope. England only needed 4 from the final over, but a Bravo slower ball gave the Windies some hope as he comprehensively bowled Nixon, leaving bowlers Stuart Broad and James Anderson to get 3 off 4 balls. Broad was up to the challenge and hit the winning runs over Lara's head. It was ironic that on Lara's day, he had to run after the ball as the batsmen scored the winning runs. England had won by 1 wicket with only 1 ball left. Full credit to England as both sides fought valiantly for whatever pride was at stake. Lara probably missed a trick though, as with Samuels off the field for much of the England innings, he only bowled Gayle and Sarwan (1/21 off 5 overs) for a combined 10 overs. Pacers on both sides struggled throughout the match and Vaughan's offspin (3/39 from 10) earlier in the day demonstrated that taking the pace off the ball was the way to go on this Kensington pitch.

Did I entertain?

In the on-field interview, when asked what would be his final words to his fans, Lara asked the crowd "Did I entertain?" and was greeted with rapturous approval. Lara then jogged around the outfield and hopped the advertising boards to get closer to his fans. We will miss you, Brian Charles Lara. We will miss those thunderous cover drives and those deft late cuts. We will miss the high back lift and the one-legged pulls that you made famous. We will miss your genius and yes, you did entertain.

(Cross-posted from Rain, No Play)

Labels: 2007 world cup, england, lara, pietersen, west indies, world cup

Thus spake Sean @ 8:22 am | Sledge/Read 1 sledge(s)
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Wrong award choice - part 3

It is the time for yet another post on a wrong choice of awards by administrators. In 2005, Jacques Kallis was overlooked for the man of the match award for his brilliantly relevant batting display in game five of the one-day series in India. In 2006, Kevin Pietersen's inability to play his role as his side's best one-day batsman was not rewarded either with a man of the series award.

Yesterday, as West Indies chased 339 against India at Nagpur, Marlon Samuels played the kind of innings Jacques Kallis would have been proud of. He came in with the score reading 102/1 in the 17th over, after Gayle and Chanderpaul had waded into some extremely ridiculous bowling on a superb batting track. West Indies had to get 7 an over over nearly 34 overs, certainly a tough ask. Samuels made it even tougher for his side. He did have his moments, especially with a couple of blows against Harbhajan, but West Indies were really handicapped by the fact that Samuels monopolized the strike during his partnership with Chanderpaul. When Samuels came in (102 in 16.2 overs), Chanderpaul had scored 40 in 38 balls. When Samuels left (175 in 33 overs), Chanderpaul had scored a further 27 runs in 44 balls while Samuels made 40 in 60 balls. They scored at 4.4 runs an over in those 16-odd overs. Obviously credit must be given to the bowlers (Agarkar and Harbhajan especially) when they bowled some tight overs early on in the partnership.

India maybe made a mistake by dismissing Samuels, because it allowed Lara to come in and express himself and gave West Indies a real chance of a win, which would have been a record in most other circumstances, except for the fact that they'd still have fallen short of the record by nearly 100 runs!

Ok, now lets set the snide remarks aside. But why was Chanderpaul given the man of the match award? Yes, a score of nearly 150 with his side chasing a huge total was a brilliant effort. But this was, all said and done, a great wicket for batting. In contrast, the bowlers might as well not even have turned up. Well, except for Zaheer Khan. He bowled brilliantly, except for a couple of overs early on. He finished with 2/48 in 10 overs, streets ahead of every other bowler in terms of economy rate. When West Indies needed 8.5 an over, he bowled 3 overs for 13 runs (and dismissed Samuels). The moment he finished his spell, the impact of his parsimony was felt as Chanderpaul and Lara cut loose against Sreesanth, Tendulkar and Harbhajan. When Zaheer came back for his final spell, West Indies needed 11.5 an over in 7 overs. He conceded 15 in 2 overs, and dismissed Bravo.

Why should a batsman be named man of the match when both sides scored over 325 runs? Why wasn't a bowler recognized?

Meanwhile, in other news, there's an absorbing finish in store at Port Elizabeth as Pakistan chase 191 for victory against South Africa. I'm tempted to put money on South Africa though.

Update: I really need answers in the form of comments here. What was Sourav Ganguly on when he told BBC Sport that England would fare well at the 2007 World Cup? Was he clearly inebriated by his brilliant 98 in his first one-day international for India since a triangular series final in Zimbabwe, after which Chappell's leaked email took the spotlight and Dravid was named skipper?

Labels: awards, ganguly, kallis, lara, pietersen, samuels, zaheer khan

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:54 am | Sledge/Read 9 sledge(s)
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Batting with the tail

While Andrew Flintoff's captaincy in the series so far has been questionable, his batting in the first innings at Sydney has been his best effort so far.

The interesting part about his innings was the way he batted with the tail (i.e. after the fifth wicket fell!). In total contrast to Kevin Pietersen's approach of taking a single off the first ball and keeping himself happy with a not out, something which Steve Waugh was very adept at doing, Flintoff played out an hour (16 overs) with the tail, scoring 39 out of the 46 runs made until he was out. He took a single off the first or second ball of an over only five times in that duration.

It's perhaps quite obvious who the 'selfish' bloke is!

Labels: ashes, ashes 2006, australia, england, flintoff, pietersen, steve waugh, waugh

Thus spake Jagadish @ 7:12 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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What was he thinking?

I can't believe the recent comments by John Buchanan about Kevin Pietersen - what was he thinking? "Not a team player" - who cares anyway particularly at this point? I heard, I think it was, Shane Warne in an interview last week, talking about sledging - he said "we all know there are guys you talk to and guys you don't...KP for instance you don't give any extra motivation...".

So, in the lead up to a Test Match Australia would love to win to send off three champions and claim the Ashes series 5-nil, the coach comes out and gives the one guy who has shown enough this series to influence the outcome of a game in England's favour, just the ammunition he needs to fire up and play one of his "Oval" style innings - stupid! What was he thinking? If KP turns in a big score here, I think Messrs Warne, McGrath and Langer will be mightily pee'd off at their coach!

Labels: ashes, ashes 2006, australia, england, pietersen, whitewash

Thus spake Stuart Helwig @ 9:13 am | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Pietersen upto something

Thrice in the span of four overs at the MCG so far today, Kevin Pietersen has taken a single off the first ball and let Sajid Mahmood (dismissed 3 balls later) and Steve Harmison (dismissed 1 ball later in this last over) have strike for the remaining five balls.

Monty Panesar has now walked out, at #10, ahead of Matthew Hoggard!

Labels: ashes, ashes 2006, australia, england, melbourne, pietersen

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:44 am | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Kevin Pietersen leaves Natal

In an extract from his soon-to-be-released autobiography "Crossing the Boundary: The Early Years in My Cricketing Life", England's current poster-boy, Kevin Pietersen, talks about the circumstances which led to him leaving Natal a few years ago.

I should not have been discriminated against because of something that happened years before my time. I must emphasise I am not racist. Apartheid was none of my doing and was now — thankfully — a thing of the past. Why should I be punished?

If you do well you should play on merit. That goes for any person of any colour. There should never be a case of someone who is not as good as you taking your place purely for political reasons. I don't see how that can do anyone any good. And that includes the person who is brought in. Surely if he knows he is not in the team on merit it can only be harmful to him and the team. It can create the very divisions you are trying to destroy.

It was heartbreaking. There had to be three non-white players in the team and one of the better ones at that time in Natal was Ghulam Bodi, also a young off-spinning batsman. He was to take my place.

When they told me I flew into a rage, flinging a water bottle across the Natal dressing room and shouting: "I'm leaving here." Perhaps not the wisest move, but I was so angry because I knew Ghulam wasn't as good as me.

Labels: autobiography, pietersen

Thus spake Jagadish @ 3:03 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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The wrong award choice - part II

Late last year, I wrote about how Jacques Kallis' amazingly relevant batting display should have earned him the man of the series award against India in the one-day series.

This time, I train my guns on Kevin Pietersen, one of Wisden's cricketers of the year and the ICC's one-day player award winner for 2005.

In the recently concluded one-day series against India, Pietersen scored 291 runs from 5 games at an average of 58 and a strike rate of 93. Superb stats those, perhaps hinting that he was clearly the best batsman on view. The problem is that he didn't do what was expected of him - score centuries (or at least one!) as the side's world's best one-day batsman. His scores were 46(49), 71(87), 77(82), 33(40) and 64(56). Not a single knock which had the potential to impact the way the game/series turned out. Even England's lone win was primarily because of a good bowling performance and a blitz start from Strauss & Bell. In fact, barring the last game, everytime Pietersen got out, England either collapsed or suffered a real scare (at Jamshedpur).

So effectively, he just didn't do what his job was, especially considering England were missing Marcus Trescothick. For that reason alone, I'd have given Kevin Pietersen the Man of the Series award. His inability to make the big score was a huge factor in India whipping England 5-1.

But that isn't all to this post. After the first day of the Mohali test, he proudly proclaimed that mauling spinners was his idea of fun.

Looking at the ball-by-ball commentary and the player-v-player stats for the one-day series, he scored 161 runs in 187 balls when spinners were bowling to him and 130 runs off 127 balls against the fast-medium/medium-fast bowlers. In addition, in the five innings he played (he didn't play at Goa and Guwahati was a non-starter), he got out to Yuvraj Singh thrice and Harbhajan Singh twice.

After his slog-sweep triggered a shocking England collapse at the Kotla, Pietersen continued to proclaim that the slog-sweep was his favourite and most effective shot against spin.

This series, he has got out thrice playing the slog-sweep. It is almost becoming laughably predictable now that he will get out that way. In fact I did a bit of digging up on his past record against spin. From the various ball-by-ball commentary, and some of the instances where I watched the dismissal live), the likes of Clarke, Boje, Warne and (gasp!) Matsikenyeri had already dismissed him to slog-sweeps before he came to India.

During the NatWest triangular last summer in England, I wrote:

I was checking on Kevin Pietersen's stats, given that he is fast approaching an iconic status as far as this blog is concerned. I found that in his brief one-day career so far, on the six occasions that he has been dismissed, four have been to spin. Add in the fact that Michael Clarke picked him up twice early on in the tour and there is obviously something for opposing captains to think about. From what I've seen, he does tend to go hard at the ball, preferably over the infield. So when you have someone bowling slow spinners, he could tend to either overbalance or lose control of his shot.

Kevin, you can keep hitting your favourite slog sweep. But if you hit two sixes in an over and get out in the next, there's no prize for guessing who won the battle and who won the war, although I hate using military metaphors in a cricketing context!

Labels: pietersen

Thus spake Jagadish @ 2:58 pm | Sledge/Read 11 sledge(s)
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Well played PK and that's all about it

I feel a little bit sorry for the little kid who bowled today but that's just how I play spinners.

That was Kevin Pietersen about the 17-year debutant Piyush Chawla at Mohali.



I think 16 runs off 12 balls is by no means a disappointing start and no one needs to feel sorry about this, especially when he has got 7 dot balls to PK. I am sure it was not as if he played like a kaataan and showed him who the boss was. I agree he didn't want to allow him into a rhythm and so he attacked him, but not as far as his statement goes. Also, twenty runs off the first five overs in international cricket (with a maiden over in it) cannot be called mauling by any standards. And by the way, why did you score just 17 runs off the 50 balls from the other 2 spinners and infact just 13 off 43 from Kumble.

I really hope PK keeps getting out to spinners in this tour from now on.

Labels: pietersen

Thus spake Ganesh @ 7:37 pm | Sledge/Read 1 sledge(s)
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Not so great expectations?

For someone who was voted the ICC One-day player of the year after his first season of international cricket, and played an unforgettable knock at The Oval to ensure that Australia would have to chase an unattainable target, Kevin Pietersen seems to be satisfied quite easily with his on-field achievements.

Talking to reporters a day after England landed in India, he said

I had a pretty ok tour of Pakistan. I got a Test hundred and I played two one-dayers and I got a fifty.

If I were Kevin Pietersen, I'd be very dissatisfied with 201 runs from 6 innings at an average of 33.5 with one century and two scores in excess of 30. Especially when you consider that he had a superb tour of India with England-A in 2004. In fact, in one of the last games on the tour, he scored a century in each innings to help his side set South Zone a target of 501, only for Venugopal Rao to score a brilliant double century to reach the target. Rao is skipper of the Board President's XI which plays England in a tour game.

Then again, maybe he is just playing it safe. But somehow he doesn't seem the sort to do so, given that he loudly proclaimed his ability to read Warne's variations two months before the Ashes series began.

Labels: pietersen

Thus spake Jagadish @ 6:50 pm | Sledge/Read 4 sledge(s)
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