cricket with balls

As Radiohead almost said*, anyone can score a hundred. Anyone. Jrod’s done it. I’ve done it. Hell, even Monty Panesar has done it. All it takes is timing, a bit of good fortune, a lot of patience and, in my case, the rather benign bowling of your own grandfather.

Scoring a hundred is child’s play. Sachin Tendulkar has almost a hundred of them in international cricket alone, and he’s only 3′6″ in his stockinged feet. Scoring 99 is something special, though. Scoring 99 not out even more so. After all, given the number of hundreds that are scored around the world, how many of them are truly memorable? But a 99? Well, just about everyone remembers those. From Mike Atherton falling flat on his arse against Australia at Lord’s in 1993 (he never did make a hundred there), to Shane Warne butchering his chance of a maiden first class ton against New Zealand in 2001, 99s are the kind of innings that fix themselves in your memory.

An unbeaten 99 is even more special, because history shows it is almost never the fault of the guy who made the runs. Sometimes it is pure ineptness at the other end, like Dewald Pretorius failing to survive two balls from James Kirtley so that Andrew Hall could make his maiden international hundred. At others, it is pure selfishness, like Graham Thorpe denying Alex Tudor the first century by a nightwatchman in Test history, against New Zealand in 1999.

To this list, we can now add Michael Clarke. He may have benefited from the most significant drop in the annals of Australian cricket since Lara Bingle’s knickers hit Brendan Fevola’s shower room floor, but Clarke can take solace in the fact that the only thing which stood between him and a truly forgettable one day hundred was the selfishness of a cheese-faced toddler named Steven Smith. Really, he should be grateful.

(*Radiohead wrote a song called ‘Anyone Can Play Guitar’, and have since devoted their entire career to proving themselves wrong)

Had Michael Clarke not been selected captain of Australia’s T20 squad, I would have given Hilditch a sloppy hug.

Australia’s squad was just about as good as it could be, and for Hilditch, it was quite daring.  Going in with three strike bowlers who can all be quite wayward and a 20 year old untried leggie was a pretty bold move for someone once went trawling through the Sydney grade cricket bargain bins for a defensive spin option.

Hilditch must have realised that his previous T20 squads were pretty rubbish, so with this one he tried to get the best line up he could. Other than Harris coming in for Bollinger when Lee was injured there was no real problems in the squad that I had, other than one.

The captain.

Picking Michael Clarke as captain was a political appointment rather than a selection on merit.  Obviously on merit the better T20 cricketer whose team wins T20 tournaments for fun, Cam White, would have been the captain.

Instead Clarke was appointed as captain because one day he will be test captain, and while I understand the logic (even if the thought of all this sickens me), what is the point of making someone captain of a form of cricket they suck at? How can Clarke, newly separated from a glamour python, be expected to take over his first Australian team in the one form of cricket he has never been any good at?

Had he taken over the one day side, given Ponting even more time to prepare for the short balls he will face in test matches, it would make sense.  Clarke is class in One Day cricket. He would have taken over a side that he has been a successful part of for hyears and wouldn’t have had to worry about improving his form just to get picked.

In T20 cricket Clarke is an albatross made of excrement.  His batting is pathetically bad, his strike rate is worse than that and his only redeeming feature is that his arms don’t look bad in those stupid green arm stockings they are forced to wear.

Now that Clarke has proved his bad form to the world with the bat (and his captaincy wasn’t exactly Mike Brearly like either) in the T20, the easy, and probably correct decision would be to give White the role.  It seems the main reason not to give White the role at this stage is that he might be good at it. That will make Clarke’s promotion harder to justify.

It is clear that Hilditch is still not prepared to take pick the best T20 side and this is why he has given the role to someone who all but claimed he shouldn’t be picked.

Clarke’s continued selection means that T20 cricket is not being taken seriously by Australia, and is actually being seen as a development format.  Which is fine, if they take it seriously as a development format.

I don’t really care that much about T20, if Australia got bundled out of every tournament early, and won every test series I’d be more than happy.  But don’t do it fucken half assed.  Don’t pick a good T20 squad a lumber it without a project captain.

Drop anyone over 28 other than Clarke.  Bring in Starc, Wade, Marsh, Keath, Pattinson, Hazelwood and Cutting.  Make sure all these guys are used to International cricket so that one day they may flourish in the test arena.

Either develop or take it seriously, Hilditch, don’t do both badly.

I’m not sure what kind of kid Michael Clarke was, but I doubt he was a brawler.

He looks like the sort of smooth adult that was also like Teflon in the play ground.

Perhaps people tried to abuse him, but he probably had team mates from various sporting teams who would step in for him.

Plus the teachers probably kept on eye on their golden boy, don’t want the local cricket star being found dead behind the portables.

With all that in mind yesterday was probably the first real beating he has ever taken.

And he was beaten, hard.

It was public too, while everyone was at lunch, crowded around as Clarke didn’t even try to defend himself.

He just sat there been moved by the force of England’s blows.  He was more a punching bag than a fighter.

There was nothing he could do to stop it, so perhaps he thought by hitting himself a few times he might confuse England and gain some respite.

Instead it just made the English beat him up harder.

Finally his lifeless body was put out of it’s misery well earlier than anyone had thought possible.

Battered and bruised he will be returned to Cricket Australia, who may not want him anymore.

I thought Clarke was unlucky, Kieswetter won the man of the match award, but surely no one did more for England’s victory than Clarke did.

The only good news for Australian cricket was that this might mean Australia don’t automatically turn to Clarke when they need their next captain, they might actually look at who would be the best captain, and not just the guy who speaks to media without saying anything and who grooms himself well for photoshoots.

England were nerdishly efficient and brutal on Australia all day. They still had some great luck, dropped catches finding other fielders, Haddin caught of the hip, but surely there biggest slice of luck was that Clarke was playing.

Swann and Collingwood are lucky their team won, because conspiring to get Clarke out could have been the worst thing either of them had ever done.

For the next few days there will be no posts on cricket with balls.

Without wanting to get into details, Mrs cricket with balls has some issues that I need to help with.

Sure she could get through it on her own, instead I have decided to take some time off work to help her.

This makes me a great husband, even if it means that I will not be doing my job for the next few days.

Some of you might think I’m putting my personal life above my job, but this is not an easy decision.

During this time I would appreciate it if you don’t speculate what the personal reason is, and just give us our privacy.

Thank you.

Greg Shipperd has recently stated that Cameron White should be the captain of the Australian 2020 team.

And it makes sense.  It won’t happen, but it makes sense.

Imagine if Australia actually picked the right captain for the job rather than the best batsman around, their world would implode.

I can already see Cricket Australia officials premeditating their spontaneous combustion at the very suggestion.

Clarke is the next captain.  That was decided at the meeting at the Melbourne Club that was hosted by the Freemasons and catered by the Jewish Mafia.

Any other suggestions of Marcus North for the test job, and Cameron White for the white balls jobs should be disregarded before you get yourself into an “accident”.

It doesn’t matter that Michael Clarke doesn’t seem to be any good at 2020, he is the man for the job, case closed.

It is written, and etc.

Shipperd’s selection would make sense in some sort of bizarre world where Australia took 2020 seriously or one where the white ball captaincy wasn’t an apprenticeship for the main job.

If Clarke wasn’t the captain of the white ball games where would be learn to captain?

He doesn’t play for NSWales anymore; he is either “ill”, resting himself or off beating it to video footage of Katich choking him.

Ponting will never get suspended for poor over rates; the ICC has given up on that rule.

And Clarke doesn’t even play IPL; apparently he has enough money already.

So what is left? The 2020 job, and sweet fuck all.

Ofcourse a professional outlet who wanted to win at all three formats would have the choice of having three different captains, and even 3 different coaches.

Greg Shipperd’s record as a 2020 coach is better than anyone else’s on the planet.  Although my record as 2020 coach is probably as good as Nielsen’s.

In the world where White and Shipperd were the captain and coach of the 2020 side I would be routinely raped anally by my biggest fan Natalie Portman and her 12-inch Strap-on named Virender.

I like Ship, but the dude must stop taking acid.