cricket with balls

There seems to be almost no proof of Shakib’s existence before he topped the world’s all-rounder rankings.  It was like he wasn’t there, and then, wow, there he is.  Was made captain of the Bangladeshi team because he was the only one with a driver’s license who had kissed a girl.  His left arm spin looks shit at times, but occasionally he gets it right.  Takes a lot of 5 wicket hauls, although at least some of them have to be because all other Bangladeshi bowlers are heaps shitter than him.  Is also a decent batsman, currently he bats in the Bangladeshi death seat of the middle order.  Has the captaincy insticts of a rotting seagull.

For months I have been living in a endless spire of two particular countries playing each other over and over again with the result ever changing. Today I had to give up a ame of cricket because I can’t move my neck, so the last thing I wanted, was to watch another one sided bashing of young kids.

The team that was losing is very likeable, they have a breath taking opening batsmen, a hard working all rounder as captain and a bunch of kids who all have some talent but didn’t look ready.

Then there was the coach, that embittered bald angry violent scowling hard man who had given three years of his life and probably a easier job somewhere else because he wants to make this a tough side to beat. He becomes the face of the team because he can’t hide his emotions and tells it like it is in interviews.

When the other hangers on cheered his opener’s many runs from front and square on the balcony, the coach was usually nowhere to be seen or way in the background gently clapping while the others celebrated like they had won the Ashes, World Cup, World T20 Asia Cup in one go. He expects these guys to make big scores, and doesn’t get carried away.

On Thursday this team started their third series against England this year, it has been 247 days since they have one an international match, they’ve never beaten England and yet again their opposition treat them like a joke by resting their ket batsmen and bowler.

It should have just been a continuation of defeat.

But there were changes made, the captain was given a break so another all rounder could come in and captain his side while making about his 17th comeback from injury.

He didn’t captain like they couldn’t lose this game, he captained like they had a real chance.

Their batting was plucky and safe, their main man hadn’t fired but they had 236.

A team that has performed this bad in the recent past shouldn’t be able to defend 236, but they kept hanging in, taking wickets, playing as a team, they even had time to give a mate an over for fun.

They had an ally in the opposition. A grizzled batsman who seemed to be batting for his career and not quite thinking.  The opposition also lost a man to injury during the game and their big middle order weapon never fired.

That didn’t mean this team of underdogs had it easy, it still went to the wire.

With 8 balls to go they looked like their team performance was in vain, but they kept at it, and they even had a moment of premature-celebration when they took the 9th wicket assuming the injured batsman would not come in.

He did, and that must have put them young team off.  Two balls later the opposition only needed 6 runs off 4 balls, and it looked all over.

That was the moment when the big bad old boy of world cricket steals the game and leaves the fans with nothing but embarrassment at ever having hope.

Instead a slower ball was bowled, the only opposition batsman that really scored was caught behind and this nation finally beat their one bogey side.

It was just a one dayer in just another meaningless series, but when they won it was everything.

The players celebrated like they had never won before, the coach transformed from the most miserable man in cricket to its happiest, the support staff were so happy they were almost hurting each other with bear hugs.

This isn’t going to change this team.

The next game against England isn’t going to be magically easier, this young side isn’t about to take world cricket by storm, but when you haven’t won in 247 days, a win is a massive event.

Maybe this will give them confidence, maybe it will be a blip.

But when this side wins a match cricket fan’s smile, and that is a good thing.

Well done, boys.  And I think I speak for almost everyone who loves cricket when I say that.

My neck is still very fucken sore, but now it is sore from screaming like a dickhead when you took that wicket.

Now, how about one more win?

There was once a play called “Six Characters in Search of an Author”, which was then parodied as “Six Characters in Search of a Plot”. Now, thanks to the global recession, we are now being brought the slimmed down version, “Two Captains in Search of a Plot”.

All we have learned from the Bangladesh/England Test series is that neither Alistair Cook nor Shakib Al Hasan has it in them to be an international captain.

Cook, for his part, appears to be going through the motions of captaincy. He doesn’t look to do anything interesting, he just moves players around with the absent-minded air of a chess player who doesn’t really understand the game. He doesn’t seem to encourage his troops, or indeed to interact with them in any meaningful way. For example, during yesterday’s play Jonathan Trott committed two of the sort of fielding howlers that would make even Monty Panesar blush, but not a word of consolation came his way from the captain – in fact, Cook simply shook his head and went back to biting his fingernails.

The most glaring example of his inadequacies came with the freak wicket of Junaid Siddique. You might think “How can you blame Cook on the back of one of the strangest dismissals of the last 25 years?”. But if you wind back a couple of balls, you see Cook setting the same field as for just about every over James Tredwell has bowled. And then Tredwell walking downt he pitch to him and making him move the extra cover fielder squarer. The result was that Siddique attempted to drive into the new gap, got it wrong and the rest will be repeated over and again on those cricket dvds that sell so well every December.

Cook’s saving grace is that he is nowhere near as appalling as Shakib, who has to be the least impressive international captain since Michael Atherton (who was, despite everything, shit). Shakib really does not know how to lead a team. He looks completely lost when it comes to setting a field, thinks that ‘leading by example’ means finding new and increasingly daft ways to give your wicket up, and has so little trust in his own team that he feels the only way to bowl the opposition out is to send down 1/3 of the overs yourself (and almost twice as many as any other bowler). That’s not the action of a good captain, it is the action of an egomaniac who thinks that no-one else is as good as him (admittedly this is true in the case of Naeem Islam, who isn’t even as good as Nathan Hauritz, but even Shakib could see that and only gave him seven overs of non-spin)

Clueless Cook is, mercifully, only a stand-in. Quite where Bangladesh go from Shakib Al Hopeless is another story, but they have to go somewhere or they have no chance of winning another Test for many years to come.

While some people have been watching the Dirk Nannes League I’ve been watching the Bangladesh England test for test match sofa (as I will be for the rest of the test).

It may not have cheerleaders and Lionel Ritchie, but it does have Shakib Al Hasan.

I’ve been a fan of his for a while now, but in this match he has performed some amazing feats.

Winning the toss and bowling even though you have four spinners in your team.

Bowling himself for the most overs even though his best ball for two days was naked junk.

Spreading his field regardless of the situation of the game.

Fielding like it was his first experience with a cricket ball, including dropping a catch.

Then batting for stumps with aplomb until closing his eyes and skipping down the wicket to give up his wicket only for his team to use a nightfuckingwatchman for a number 7.

If you told me he finished the day by sleeping with another player’s wife or burnt down a nandos on the way home I’d believe you.

Moyo captained an awful game in Sydney, but compared to Shakib in this game Moyo is the Robocop of captains.

If I was Jamie Siddons I would rip the limbs off Imrul Kayes and beat Shakib with them.

Which is a win/win situation.

You know how it is with some people. Just when you think you have them, that they’ve given you a nice easy article to write about how, say, any talk of them not being able to play left arm spin is just bollocks, and what do they go and do? They go and get themselves bowled by a sodding left arm spinner, and on 99 to boot.

And then you think “Well, that’s not too bad, I can write about him butchering another hundred by slogging” and have to remind yourself that he was bowled having a tame little prod at the ball.

Heck, the guy even teased us by hammering his way from 80 to 94 in the space of five balls from Shakib Al Hasan, leading everyone to think that a skied slog to mid-off was only moments away. Instead of which he went into his shell and played with uncharacteristic caution, nurdled another five runs and then got himself out.

But that’s the thing about KP. He disappoints you in so many new and original ways. Like back at the start of his career, when every time you thought he was going to beat his Test best, he would run himself out. Or having a massive hissy fit and quitting as captain, just as he was starting to make a decent fist of it. And you don’t even have to build him up in order for him to disappoint. He’s quite capable of doing that all by himself.

And then he goes and ruins my bloody articule, too. I was all set to point out that only 12 of his Test dismissals have been to left armers and that, whilst some of those have been to purveyors of utter filth, such as Paul Harris, Ryan Hinds and Yuvraj Singh, a third of them were to Daniel Vettori at a time when he pretty much was the New Zealand bowling attack. But now he’s gone and got himself bowled by a man who, at the time, had a bowling average of 87.43.

Bastard. Evil, evil bastard.