What? I check SBS’s TV schedule and find that something’s kicked the Tour off SBS1? What could that be? Some cricket match in Cardiff?
Yep, The Ashes begin tonight. As Peter Roebuck notes, England have a decent team, while Australia’s preparation has been poor:
Excitement is mounting because local supporters know that their team has a good chance of winning. England has an astute leadership combination and a notably cosmopolitan squad consisting mostly of Africans, Asians and sons of past players. Besides its two colossus, Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff, the hosts field a lively attack containing more swingers than a jazz club, a spinner (a species under threat down under) and a boisterous batting order. Form has been patchy but the team has been improving and, in the nick of time, things have fallen into place. Now England expects every man to do his duty.
They know the visitors are vulnerable. Australia’s gamble on including proven players returning from long-term injuries has backfired. Before a ball has been bowled, resources have been stretched to the limit. Shane Watson and Brett Lee have broken down. Stuart Clark is still upright but has not sent shivers down many spines. Nor is it much use sending for Andrew Symonds. Recalling these players was a high-risk strategy because it undermined the team that so recently subdued the South Africans. As well, it affected the touring party’s balance.
Roebuck touches upon the Australian selectors’ strange approach to picking a spinner – picking them for a test, maybe two, and dropping them immediately thereafter never to be seen again. Instead, we have an offspinner less attacking than Murray Bennett. While I wouldn’t for a moment claim that Jason Kreza, Bryce McGain, or Beau Casson are or were likely world-beaters, where would we have been had a certain Australian legspinner been dropped forever after taking 1/150 in his first test outing?
And here’s a second ponderer – how will Johnson and Siddle go on English pitches?
Johnson will be fine and should be a handful.
Merv Hughes did alright in England, so I suspect Siddle as enforcer will also be fine.
I’d fancy even my chances against Hauritz!
Kreza has just helped Australia A to a victory – If Hauritz gets plundered (if he plays), then I expect the big K will get a callup. On current selection standards, probably next week!
There is no worse cricket writer than Peter Roebuck. I don’t think I have ever been able to delve past his third paragraph, full of flowery rubbish that invariably criticises the Australian team, interrupted only for the odd occasion when reality is forced down his throat with a particularly dominent Australian victory.
Cricket has become so much more interesting since we came off the boil, with at least three other teams in the mix for top ranking. Roebuck does nothing to add to this interest.
kymbos @2: yes, Roebuck is tedious. He seems to mistake flowery expressions for insight. He occasionally says something interesting, but everytime I see him use language like “leather-flingers” I want to hurl — not merely fling — what I’m reading at the nearest brick wall.
The contrast with e.g. Ian Chappell’s pieces at cricinfo is pretty stark.
On the topic of selection, I do wish the selectors would stick with a spinner for a bit, but given the mediocre results they’ve all been getting I do sympathise with their plight. I wouldn’t mind seeing more of Krejza in a baggy green, though…
Agreed, Andrew B. Krejza picked up some good wickets in his one (and only?) test in India of all places, and I was surprised he got dropped so readily. Although I understand he was very expensive, which is why he got dropped.
I’m looking forward to a good arm wrestle. It’ll be very interesting to see if we have the firepower to take enough wickets. If not, the spin bowling gap will look pretty obvious.
To be fair to the current selectors, some of whom were contemporaries of Shane Warne, Warne’s position in the team for his first handful of games was anything but certain. It was really only after routing the West Indies (and the famous Richie Richardson flipper) that Warne’s ability was clear for everyone to see. Some important differences between Warne and the current batch of spinners is that while not everyone may have been convinced by Warne’s early attempts, there were astute observers such as Bill O’Reilly who could see the extraordinary potential, and a captain in Allan Border who believed in Warne’s potential, and teammates (such as Merv Hughes, Greg Matthews) who believed in their mate.
I think it’s going to be closer than Roebuck expects. England have put a lot on the shoulders of Strauss, Pietersen and Flintoff, and if the other players fail to contribute then the series is going to be fairly embarassing (a la 2006/7). Australia, on the other hand, are doing their best to level the field by insisting on having the half-baked allrounders (Watson, McDonald) in the squad (but hopefully, please, not in the final XIs).
But just to put in a word for Roebuck, a much maligned and bullied person, he often writes articles that are contrary to the MSM cricket orthodoxy, and that is quite refreshing. Especially while all the dramas with India v Aus were going on, it was a relief to read an author who wasn’t wrapping up Australia’s long history of awful and disgusting on-field behaviour in the Australian flag. Similarly Roebuck tends to avoid those boring “evil BCCI ruins everything” stories that the Australian cricket press seem so fond of.
Finally though, on a sad note, it is a shame that this will be an Ashes series without the great Shane Warne and the great Glenn McGrath. I’ve had many wonderful hours of watching their extraordinary cricket masterclasses as they’ve dismantled even the finest English batsmen.
Oh and three cheers for SBS covering the Ashes again. Long may this continue!
My tip? (for what’s it’s worth) … Australia 2-1.
Despite being on the wane, the Aussies still have just a bit too much class which should help them win enough ‘key moments’, particularly in the batting department. I suspect we’ll see a few 5/150s becoming 8/380s once Haddin and Johnson get together. Ponting should still be good for a sparkling century (maybe 2), despite his steady decline for the heights of 3-4 years ago when he dubbed “best since Bradman”.
However they’ll have to be prepared for a lot of attritional cricket, matches going deep in the 5th day. Johnson and Siddle will give yeoman service – both young and strong – but I’m not sure Johnson will be as effective in England. Lucky he’s learned how to cut the ball. Did anyone notice last summer how many wickets Johnson was able to take of batsmen gloving down leg-side, or chasing wide balls and nicking them? This suggests that he was able to extract that extra bit of bounce and/or pace, which the softer pitches in England might not yield as readily. The same applies to Clark.
Brad Hodge is as good a cricketer as any in Aust. at all forms of the game and his absense from the team year after year highlights the lack of nous in selection.
Absence maybe.
Roebuck is a dissenting voice, but so is Bill O’Reilly. Doesn’t make it worth listening to.
Here’s a good piece from Peter Lalor:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25748256-28737,00.html
As a card-carrying non-ball-botherer, can I please use this site to ask for my TV channel to be released, alive and unharmed?
Of course there is always plenty of sport on SBS, but it is usually scheduled so that at least some entertainment appears on the channel as well.
Oh dear, bloody cricket, the world’s most boring game.
I’ve just endured 2 weeks of hannah’s mum staying up all night watching tennis and ogling Roger’s bum.
Now we’ll have friends who are cricket fanatics visiting next week and we’ll be stuck in front of the Teev watching rain fall on green grass probably and,if we are lucky, watching some action occur for a few seconds every minute or so whilst voices drone on about something that happened elsewhere decades ago.
One of the fanatics is so obsessed she will bring DVDs of past glories in case of rain.
And the gods forfend that there is action and we, as in the good guys the Aussies actually lose.
There will be a dark cloud hanging over the house, a cloud of gloom unfortunately which will bring no rain.
O dear, woe is me.
There are plenty of books out there just waiting to be read.
One I happened upon recently was Dead Aid, in which the author proposes to cut off all government-to-government aid to Africa within five years on the basis that it does more harm than good. Not entirely convinced, but definitely worth a read.
Or you could enjoy a DVD or two. My girlfriend has been working her way through Wire In the Blood, perhaps the most gruesome television series ever made.
Are you interested in the Ashes at all, Robert? Or is that why you quoted Peter Roebuck?
Is this post just a sop to the demanding cricket tragics?
It is partly a sop to the cricket tragics
Look, I’m interested, but this time around I do have a particular interest in the Tour, OK?
Besides, I am a bit disenchanted about the Australian cricket brains trust. Jeff Thomson may have been undiplomatic, but I don’t think he was too far off the mark when he described Ponting as a great batsman, but a crap captain.
Is there going to be a rugby test at Lord’s?
What is is with this recent tendency to take great sporting events to unlikely places? World Cups in the USA, cricket competitions in Sharja, Qld v NSW NRL state of origin in Melbourne and so on. I can’t see any reason to move from the traditional English grounds that have so much tradition attached to them. What next … an Ashes series in Beijing to attract new audiences to the game? The Augusta Masters in Baghdad to cheer up the troops?
I don’t know what to make of this, but it’s yet another sport which I can’t watch in England without paying for satellite. It’s like none of their national endeavours are actually free to air. Is Australia unusual in this regard, or England? It seems like having cricket and rugby on pay channels is like Japan having sumo on pay channels, or Melbourne having the AFL final on cable (it’s not, is it?).
Maybe I’m being overly cynical, but it makes me think that for all their obvious national pride (and anxiety), for the british money trumps patriotism every time.
Australia has anti-siphoning legislation. Britain doesn’t. It’s that simple.
Right – time for dummy spit.
Time for Cadel Evans to give Silence-Lotto and or Marc Sargent the arse. Sargent has been unable to build a powerful team to support the rider who has come second a the last two TDFs. They have let go excellent Lieutenants like Chris Horner and Popovich was a failure last year. I understood when they had McEwen as one of the best sprinters that you needed a compromise, but not any more.
Last year at the TDF, Sargent let Popovich attack on the penultimate stage before the Alpe d’Huez stage without result which meant that he was too tired the next day when he was needed to support Cadel.
On stage 3 this year Cadel missed a 28 man break away. The guy is a serious GC contender. I’m a rank amatuer crit rider but I can still muscle up to sit between 3rd and 6th wheel in C grade – what the hell is Cadel doing below 28th? – That is why you have a team so he can sit up in the top twenty. And Barne Riis has put the hammer down before in cross wind situations – he has form. I know it was Coumbia-HTC who forced the pace, but it should have been expected.
This year it was obvious that they hadn’t prepared enough for the Teams TT, and Sargent’s tactics sucked. The obvious (yes, hindsight is a wonderful thing) strategy was that while you still had five riders, then the only person you waited for was Cadel, otherwise the first four to drop were to be left. Actually having less on the really twisty bits was safer/faster. As it was they waited twice for a dropped man and in the end lost over two minutes.
Astana will now win, its just matter of whether it is Armstrong or Contador, and if they both blowup/crash then Kloden can do it also.
I don’t know enough about the contractual arrangements between individual riders and their teams. Perhaps Evans is contractually tied to Silence-Lotto in some intractable way.
But assuming that Evans was free to ditch his team, the question arises why he didn’t do it and/or was not sought out by some very strong teams.
I agree with Razor that Evans had a real chance for GC in a good team. Is there something about Evans that dissuades strong teams from seeking his services?
Silence-Lotto’s inability to protect Evans on the Stage 2 breakaway is dumbfounding.
Now the best that Evans can hope for in the coming soul-destroying grind is line honours in some not-too-testing mountain stage.
I don’t think he is tied to them in an intractible way – their contracts are often seasonally based. I believe he owed xxxx-Lotto for intially giving him a break – but they have been well rewarded for that. The Team is Belgian and has been in a three way struggle to build it’s list – support the Belgian passion for the One Day Classics, suppport McEwen, and supporting Cadel. Well they have been trying to do all those not very well. McEwen has gone openig up budget but they botched the Kohl recruitment and were too late to pick up anybody else.
Enough!
I’m hoping Matt Loyd can really shine in the mountains. Now that Cadel isn’t in the hunt for GC, maybe Matt can be let off the rein and have a crack.
Alle!
I protest the intrusion of bicycles into a thread supposedly reserved for cricket tragics.
Sorry – the TDF one had dropped of the list and I needed to vent.
it’s just not cricket.
I’m back on the right thread now.
Is it warm enough for streakers in Cardiff?
Robert: clearly there is a practical cause. But what is the reason?
From what I recall, it came down to the power of Kerry Packer back in the 1990s, who threatened the government with all manner of retribution if the pay tv networks were able to nick the cricket off him.
Sort of Robert. Here is Bernard Keane in Crikey last week on the anti-siphoning laws. The laws were supported by both Labor and the Coalition.
http://www.crikey.com.au/2009/07/02/use-it-or-lose-it-why-is-free-to-air-tv-still-hogging-sports-coverage/
Personally, I’m heaps glad Rupert didn’t get his hands on all the silverware like he did in the UK and other countries. Bernard sheds tears for sports administrators and Foxtel, but has little time for the likes of the general public who would have been forced to take up Foxtel esp. back then, purely to watch the AFL and NRL, let alone the Grand Finals and Origin of the Species series, the Ashes, Olympics etc. Buying marquee sports is just about the only way to get consumers to take up pay-tv in the first place.
There are economic questions, but there are also questions of access for millions of people who cannot afford pay-TV. However, now that there is multi-channel free to air digital TV and online streaming and whatever % of the pop. who do have pay-TV etc – the whole thing needs a re-think, and according to Keane, Conroy already has the report on his desk etc…
Anyways, I would hate to see a bunch of key national & international sporting events and also regular home & away AFL & NRL matches for eg. no longer available on free-to-air. Like having adverts on the ABC, it’s just not cricket!
I enjoy Roebuck.
Only exception was his coverage of the infamous Harbhajahn Indian Tour here (was it 2006) where he was hopelessly off-beam on Australia’s celebrations after the second test win and treated Kumble as a protected species despite Kumble’s extended sook, general bad sportsmanship and unfouned complaints of cheating
Saw a bit of Day 1.
Siddle again was excellent. Shook up batsmen on a docile pitch. Lacked consistent accuracy, but overall v. good. Johnson was unlucky not to get a hat-trick in the over he got Strauss. he has Strauss LBW, then Bopara lucky to sppon one over mid-off then got Strauss with the bouncer. Loved Michael Clarke ginning wildly even as thw ball was still coming to him. Loved Hilfy’s swing and accuracy.
Bopara was dead lucky to make 2 let alone his 30-odd.
Flat track (and flat attack) bully I reckon.
Predication: Bopara to be Siddle’s bunny.
Prediction #2: Many wickets for Hilfy later in more helpful swinging conditions.
Didn’t see anything after lunch.
Oo-roo!
I’m a tad worried about our attack now; 10 and 11 batting out 12 overs to save a match ain’t good enough.