Ah, the England ODI team will become better!

The England and Wales Cricket Board have confirmed there will not be a domestic 50-over competition from next season onwards.

Source: Cricket365

As if the above statement isn’t seriously fucked up, here’s what the ECB has to say about the axing of the 50-over competition…

The ECB do not believe this will necessarily weaken England’s international chances in the 50-over one-day format, pointing to the fact that South Africa do not have a domestic competition of that length yet are ranked number one in the world internationally in that format.

This is even messed up!

South Africa were always quite good at ODIs and so, with some serious people at the helm in the form of Mickey Arthur and Graeme Smith, they’ve become extra good!

However, England has always been shit in ODI cricket.

Actually, they’ve been shit ever since they lost in the World Cup 1992 final to rank-underdogs, Pakistan.

Therefore, the ECB decide that their team is as good as SA and decide to axe their domestic 50 over competition.

It’s like not giving a guy the relevant injection even though he has rabies, saying that he’s really healthy and so he doesn’t need a rabies injection!

Wow! Now we can see where England’s priorities lie, and so, a small word of advice to all you Englishmen…if you really do like limited overs cricket, then switch allegiance to some team other than England because they’re going to become even more shit than they actually are!

And, pray, can anyone tell me what’s the use in salvaging Sunday League cricket (40-over)?

BTW, England are 59/2 in 20 overs against Ireland…man, they sure are skinning the Irish! :O

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Gerrie Snyman for England?

It’s a well known fact that England really don’t have a lot of big hitters….

Was just looking through cricinfo and saw this article on Gerrie Snyman, a Namibian dude who has played 35 first-class matches and scored 2285 runs at a strike rate of 72. Limited overs cricket: 1951 runs @ a SR of 110.

Perhaps they should try to find some long lost English uncle of Snyman so that they could get him in the squad for the T20WC, like the Netherlands did for Aussie Dirk Nannes, and get him to teach the other English players to play shots like this…

ECB, I require a commission for suggesting the idea, or I shall kick you in the arse, Mr. Clarke (some relation to Michael Clarke? Possibly another Aussie spy who knows Urdu!)

Giles Clarke and the ECB have…

…, in the words of satirist Andy Zaltzman, …emerged from this with egg on its face, in its hair, all over its jacket, and dribbling apologetically onto its shoes.

Well, I should have known that something was up with Al when I read that his financial ventures are recession-proof.

It’s now all in the open. The SEC has served Al with papers, and he’s gonna be busted anytime soon.

Good for the bastard who said that Test Cricket is boring!

Apparently, he had went AWOL for some time.

Federal investigators caught up with him.

Therefore, from now on, we should all heed the words of Andy Zaltzman, and remember what he said.

Never trust a sentence that has ‘Texan’ and ‘cricket’ in it

News roundup for today!

Wow, within about 3 hours, there’s been a surfeit of some quite big news.

First things first, Younus (or Younis, not really sure!) Khan has been made the captain after some really dismal performances by Malik.

It’s a really big relief because Pakistan have so much talent, I’m often so envious and wonder why SL never gets such a big talent pool to choose from. From what I’ve been reading on the net, Malik doesn’t have a really good relationship with a lot of players (including the likes of Afridi, Akthar, Yousuf and even Gul!), and, would you believe, from time to time even presented a list of players which he didn’t personally like to the selectors to have them kicked out!

However, there is a bit of scepticism regarding the appointment of Younus because he did decline the captaincy twice, once for the Champions Trophy 2006 and after Pakistan crashed out of the World Cup. However, I’ve watched a couple of matches where he was standing-in, and he was very very impressive!

GOOD LUCK TO YOUNUS FROM THE OFFICE OF ‘OFF-CUTTER’!

Staying with Pakistan, the legal firm handling the case of the ICL players from Pakistan has sent a letter to the PCB asking why they have been banned from playing domestic and international cricket and the premise for it.

Taufeeq Umar and Yaseer Hameed had, in 2007, filed cases against the PCB, but it kinda’ petered out because the then PCB chairman Nasim Ashraf had too much influence in Pakistan. Now, with Ijaz Butt having expressed a desire to ‘un-ban’ the players earlier this year, they feel that now is better to pursue it.

I hope that everything goes well so that we can, once again, see the likes of Yousuf playing his silken shots and Hameed banging the ball around once again!

Shifting over to the neigbours, the IPL have got a 2-year commitment from the ECB to allow its players to play in the IPL this year and the next.

This is totally fab news as the franchise I support, the Chennai SuperKings, plan to go all-out for Freddie Flintoff, and he would be a great asset in our quest to win the IPL!

Staying with Flintoff, he’s been given the thumbs-up to continue playing the current warm-up. Good news for England and CSK!

I’ll see you all the next time something ‘commentable’ comes about! 🙂

England are going!

Well well, am I surprised?

Not really!

Why?

Come on, did anyone, for a moment, actually think that anyone would really skip this tour? OK, now that the security report from Reg Dickason was positive, everyone’s hugging and kissing each other. If it was negative, would the players have actually skipped the tour? This is the best chance for everyone to parade their skills in front of IPL talent scouts, and would the players have forgone the chance? No way, Jose!

Well, everyone is now slapping KP on the back and saying “Well done mate, you’ve done everyone proud by not cowering to the terrorists”, but (I don’t mean to sound extremely negative) would they have really gone if the same thing happened in Pakistan? or even Sri Lanka, for that matter?

Pakistan and SL are not lucrative at all, so it’s subject to extreme doubt!