I feel for you

 Inspiration thin on the ground with the ODI series. The feeling that India is more concerned about being "concerned" about things than winning in Australia - that winning may actually be beneath them - is nothing new. I have followed up my annoying Boyd Rankin “Full Toss” chant of 2013 with an equally annoying and compulsive “Shikhar Dha” rap, Chaka Khan-style, whenever Shikhar Dhawan appears on screen, which is obviously a lot.

A propos, we seem to be moving into a new Golden Age of the cricket moustache, assisted but not quite accounted for by the Movember phenomenon. The great summer of Mitch of course, some fine examples on the Indian team, and the delightful vision of Jake Lehmann laying down his volume of Valéry to deliver a 6 for the Strikers. Are we seeing the Batting Moustache coming into its own after the long dominance of the Bowling Moustache?

Another question to throw out there after yesterday’s final ODI: do we now think Dhoni deliberately delays his “run” in ODIs to make things interesting for himself?

Lots of Hussle

I’m so pleased the BBL05 final is bringing us some hot Hussey-on-Hussey action. I call David Hussey “the Sexy Hussey”, which I’m sure he finds ample consolation for never wearing The Baggy Green. When you throw Hilfy into the mix on top of that, I cannot but back the Stars tonight. They have the irresistible whiff of danger about them, whereas even Dre Russ can’t overpower the strong scent of Upstanding emanating from the Thunder.

Sogfest

Bogfest, even. I was at the SCG on Day 2, when the last fitful efforts at play took place. I always feel sorry for the spectators when I see these days on television, but it was surprising how tolerable it was to sit watching the rain falling on the ground for most of 6 hours. Under cover, with mild temperatures, it was almost pleasant. It's a day out, the ground is pretty, one chats, or not, and grazes constantly from a full cooler bag of delightful foodstuffs. Expecting interruptions, I brought distractions – newspaper, knitting, trashy magazine – but I didn't even get to the last one. I have a theory that driving is enjoyable because you really can't do anything else while you're doing it and there are very few opportunities for guilt-free single-tasking in this world that aren't about work. It's the freedom of having no choice, between work and leisure. Waiting in the rain was a bit like that.

Chase Girly

Another situation where I wonder "What would CLR James say?" I'm disappointed to see that the analysis of the Chris Gayle Incident has turned to the idea of "cultural (in)differences", ie. that Chris Gayle Comes from somewhere A Bit Backward. That strikes me as simply chasing one instance of extreme rudeness with another. There are more churches per square kilometre in Jamaica than any other country in the world, but we can leave the empirical arguments aside here. We know a priori that Chris Gayle's behaviour is not appropriate anywhere, because his bad boy persona is built on not behaving appropriately anywhere. If there were a planet on which Gayle's behaviour didn't skirt the limits of polite society, he would change it immediately. That's his 'brand'.

In that sense I had some sympathy for the commenter who basically said, directing his comments to Gayle's employers rather than Mel McLaughlin, 'if you play with fire, you're gonna get burned'. I have never seen Chris Gayle not be palpably flirtatious in on-field interviews with female reporters and actually wondered how he would handle himself with Mel when the situation arose. There were plenty of opportunities to coach him on manners before this. I would not want that job, but that's the one they signed up for.