Hail!

According to Stuart MacGill, England were outplayed on the first day of this test when Australia lulled them into a false sense of security with their uncanny imitation of themselves. Obviously they had me going as well. You guys! Such kidders.

Speaking of impersonators, there was some talk back in 2010 of Mitchell Johnson having an evil twin. You could never tell in a game if you were going to get real Mitch or fake Mitch. I think this game has made it clear that evil twin Mitch is absolutely the one we want and if the other one is tied up and gagged somewhere, we're comfortable with that. Don't shave the moustache Mitch, you need it to twirl. How many times have I stressed the crucial role of hair in this game?

And speaking of hair, I didn't think the "Armageddon" player backdrops were really working for Nathan Lyon...

... until I grasped the Nicolas-Cage-in-Con Air inspiration...

... which makes Nathan the natural leader. Do you think people would laugh too much if he grew out his hair?

And back to impersonators again, I was going to suggest that Tremlett was more Lurch in the end than any of the other monsters that get thrown up, then I felt bad about someone getting compared to a monster so much and decided to go down another track:

I know David Bowie is still many people's idea of a freak, but it's a comparison that preserves his dignity.

And on to something else. Great post-match press conference from Alastair Cook, he was the perfect pouting private-school boy, snapping "You don't need me to explain it to you" at a journalist when asked why England lost. You won't win friends with petulance, Mr Cook, ask Ricky Ponting in 2005. Keep it up though, because it's great fun to watch.

P.S. Is there a better advertisement for veganism than Peter Siddle? Plenty of energy and no high ground (as far as I know. His girlfriend is an animal activist). I would like to get my hands on some of his recipes, though I'm guessing he's a "food as fuel" sort and just inhales bananas and nuts.

P.P.S. Anyone else noticed Chris Rogers' manky arm guard? Maybe a lucky one like Steve Waugh's cap/hanky? It looked like he lent it to Peter Siddle. Who in turn seemed lent it to James Anderson. Is there but one arm guard in the world? No wonder it's manky.

Broadsides

Much as I love to see Mitchell "Guy's my middle name" Johnson get going with the bat, here we are again. Again with the B-team trying to salvage something from the A-team's wreck. Again with an innings where a stoic middle-orderer (how often is it Haddin?) partners plucky Tail-enders. They really are fun to watch when they make something of it, but it's not the way it's supposed to work. There was an audience comment pasted on the ESPN ball-by-ball commentary "England need not be complacent with their current position. These lower order partnerships are always a characteristic of the Ozs for the last few seasons". Yes, yes they are. Is it an official strategy? Why not straight out reverse the batting order? Is the problem with the upper order that they think they're batsmen?

Tremlett provoked much comment, mainly to the effect of whether he was actually flesh and blood. The word from the loungeroom was that he was Frankenstein, and in the same spirit James Brayshaw described him (his word was actually "that") as "an incredible physical arrangement". The word "unit" came up a lot. But he didn't fool Warnie, who spotted the human vanity in his figure-hugging body shirt. The England shirts show a fair bit of cunning tailoring. Darts the likes of which are normally only found on blouses. I'm guessing there's some very advanced sports science behind them, and then at the end of the presentation Q says, "they'll also look really hot".

We were going to listen to some Grandstand commentary and then found they weren't streaming online. Now here's the thing. My boyfriend is what's called a "hi-fi dag". In our lounge room there is... One set of speakers on either side of the television, another free-standing set around the sound system. Two large flat boxes, one black with with two big knobs next to the television and a silver one with the sound system with one big knob, and I know they are amplifiers. A turntable. A smaller silver flat box next to the silver amplifier that I'm pretty sure is a CD player. On top of that a smaller black flat box that according to the writing is a "pre-amplifier". Next to that an even smaller silver box that's a "DAC". And on top of that, my favourite, a small plain black box with nothing on it except a small button in the middle with the word "POWER" above. I suspect this is a flight recording unit so that other hi-fi dags can work out what cabling mistake my boyfriend made if we go down in a flaming conflagration.*

Now, is there a radio to be found in this array? There is not. It looks like we could be plugging in the digital clock radio from the bedroom (if I can find somewhere to plug it in), or even - god forbid - digging out my crappy all-in-one CD-cassette-radio from its box of shame in the spare room. Just like olde times!

Come on Grace, sit down by the wireless and I'll make us a cup of tea.

* Update: this is apparently a "buffer", whose purpose is "to make Jim Maxwell sound more chesty and less nasal".

Said are you ready

I decided to save the Falafel Coronation Surprise for an upcoming family picnic comprising several vegetarians. That might sound a bit mean seeing as I described it as 'vile', but maybe it will be more to their taste and either way there'll be more mouths to get rid of it. Meanwhile I have addressed myself to the matter of the famous Piri Piri Breaded Tofu and you can read all about it here.

I forgot to mention last time that I enjoyed a fair bit of World Series Baseball over winter. So many people who look like W. G. Grace (I'm thinking of you in particular, Mike Napoli) standing in front of other people who look like Hannibal Lecter. It's a winning combination. Plenty of Buddha Warriors in that code. I'm very pleased to learn that Mike Young, a former baseball player and coach born in Chicago, has been recalled to the Australian cricket staff. Hope he can improve the standard of cricket ground hotdogs while he's here.

I also didn't share my discovery of the Boyd Rankin Parlour Game. It's pretty simple. You see Boyd Rankin and you start singing the Beat's "Ranking Full Stop". Then instead of "Full stop... Rankin full stop", you cleverly change it to "Full toss... Rankin full toss" or even "Full stretch... Rankin full stretch" if he makes an impressive outfield catch. Rankin has a disappointing tendency not to bowl all that full, but to be honest it makes no difference to the game. I see him and even before he bowls I can warm up with, "Said are you ready, are you ready to toss (x 2)..." before falling back on the standard "Full toss, Rankin full toss" (x infinity). Draw out the fuuuuull and roll the r for maximum satisfaction. My endless source of amusement could make for a very long summer for others. Don't start me on my George Bailey "Mr Cellophane" whistle.

I'm ready. Play ball!

Micromanagement

Well, here's my 'in'. I can hardly hold back when the English go and put out a tour cookbook for the team. Mostly it looks like the sort of thing you'd get at an upmarket health spa. Lots of 'superfoods', lots of things chopped up and mixed together and a sort of faux multiculturalism - dishes that are Indian/Thai/Moroccan/Greek/Japanese 'inspired' or 'flavoured' rather actual Indian/Thai/Moroccan/Greek/Japanese dishes. Not much you'd need a knife for and no bones at all. The standout of the Herald's sample of recipes was the "Butternut Squash and Falafel Coronation", a sort of Coronation Chicken (above) as if interpreted by Mollie Katzen, which looked pretty vile, and hence will have to be tested out immediately.

Looking through the cookbook and catering requirements, I was mainly overcome with 'variety fatigue': tired of too much of the 'different' thing instead of too much of the same thing. It's deceptive, because obviously the idea is to cater to a variety of tastes rather than impose variety on one person, but if I was on tour I would want more food that could have come out of a home kitchen instead of a sanatorium. It's an openly over-designed diet – "Every item in the ingredients listings is there to aid the performance and recovery of the England Cricket Team" – and I think they should relax a bit for everyone's sake.

***

It wasn't a bad off season, though I thought I'd blown it when I missed Finch's 156 runs off 63 in England: surely there wouldn't be anything better to look forward to. There wasn't, in a way, because there were so many other spectacular runs fests that by the end they all ran into each other and lost their edge. I felt for poor George Bailey who managed to score so many runs and still be a charisma-free zone. A Cricket Australia honcho said that if he was picked for the Ashes team the deciding factor would be his 'character', and I laughed, but actually I'm starting to think the vacancy has a Zen edge and I suspect that's what's appealing to CA.

I'll be back for the Coronation.

Lights out

I had all my "damp squib", "bang to a whimper" remarks lined up, but they managed to put on a show in the end. I even predicted the Australians would open their second innings with Warner and Watson and went off to make popcorn, though that gambit didn't quite pay off. I suppose English supporters might have been whimpering at stumps, but it seemed poetic justice to me: if you wanted to win, you shoulda played to win, all the way through. 

I missed the "show" on Friday, a propos, and missed no show at all apparently, my friends seemed only to have seen red. Jonathan Agnew was crazy enough at the beginning of yesterday to hope - and think it possible - that England might declare, but I don't know what England he was thinking of. He'd seen Jim Maxwell propose to his lady friend the night before, so his head was obviously full of hearts and flowers and fairy dust.

I suppose there was poetry in the umpires getting the final word as well. I felt sorry for them, and a bit worried for their persons. I think a lot of the hoo-ha about the DRS in this series was more to do with poor umpiring on the field and poor understanding of the burden of proof between the on-field and third umpires. Someone somewhere has done a diagram of all the alternative universes that might have existed had all the wrongs been right. But what would we have had to talk about? Tony Hill giving Ryan Harris out lbw to an empty field must be one of cricket's most poignant images.

I mostly listened to the radio, reverting to the Fox team during the breaks. I really enjoyed Damien Martyn on the radio. For someone who had a bit of a reputation as skittish and aloof when he was playing, and who bizarrely ended his career by skipping the country in the middle of an Ashes tour, he just seems relaxed, smart, understated and easygoing. I don't know whether he is more so now than he was on television in 2009, or whether it's just easier to hear with the hypnotic effect of his face out of the way. He sounds very different to how he looks.

On the field, I really, really liked Steve Smith this series. I don't know how he conveys calm and focus when he is such a twitchy little bird, but I always felt like I was in good hands when he came out. Maybe it's that his nerdiness is reassuring. Something about his slight overbite reminds me of Judi Dench, but I'm not sure I can get many people to go along with that.

Maybe Ashes series seem so intense because most of the audience is sleep deprived and emotional in any given game. Ashes series on the other side of the world take over my life in a way that home series don't. They're more demanding, because I'm not on the light duties of summertime, and I will sit in front of a whole "day" of the cricket at night in a way I tend not to when it's on during my day and I'm going about my business. It's great, but messy - I have to go do some cleaning.

A little more conversation

I was dozing on the couch last night during the tea break, and BBC radio seemed to be playing an episode of Life Matters in which Mickey Arthur was "in conversation with" a Kleenex-soft interviewer about journeys, journeys, and growing the players as people. 

I don't know, Mickey. I was impressed with you at the post-sacking press-conference, still with you when you said you were taking Cricket Australia to court, and I didn't think there was anything so scandalous about your interview on Tuesday. But you're kind of losing me now, Mickey, and when you realise that your loss is Shane Watson's gain, you get a sense of how big a moment that is in my own personal "journey". I think you might be a bit smitten with people being so interested in what you have to say, and the more you say, the less convinced I am about your coaching style. 

Jim Maxwell muttered something about "control freakish" when TMS got back to the commentary, and that's just it with touchy-feeliness: it's as much a disciplinary regime as ice baths and laps of the oval, but a whole lot more intrusive because it keeps trying to touch you and feel you.

On your way, journey man.

P.S. Having just caught up with Darren Lehmann's latest shenanigans, I'm rather losing the love there as well. Firstly, that walking incident is so old and I can smell the sour grapes (verjuice?) from here. Secondly, it's not funny to ask people to gang up on someone, and thirdly, egging the crowd on in that way is a bit like the bloke in the band who pleads with the audience to dance - "come on, guys, get moving!" I'll do it when I feel like it and you can't make me feel it if I don't.

Gold'n green spiral

I went to bed about when Shane Watson came because I didn't have a very good feeling about things. There seemed to be some sort of Fibonacci thing happening where the number of runs scored since the previous wicket was half the number of runs scored since the wicket before that, and that sequence does not have a happy ending. I thought: if they don't lose any more wickets, they can manage without me, and if they do lose any more wickets, I can't help them and I can't cope with seeing it.

As good as that opening partnership looked and was, it was hard to get rid of the feeling that just one wicket would break the spell and that without the talismanic power of Warner in particular we'd be back in the desert of the real. Was there ever a glummer No. 3 than Usman Khawaja? Isn't that supposed to be where you put the best batsman? Isn't he supposed to be a reassuring presence? Why can I not put aside the depressing suspicion that they leave the better batsman down the order so that there's someone to clean up the mess after the traditional top order collapse. Or, equally depressing, to protect injuries.

Mark Waugh tipped the series before it started to be a 2-2 draw if he was betting with his heart and a 3-1 loss if he was betting with his head. It seemed sensible at the time and it would be nice to get one at least.

Chapelle's Beauty Spot

Moving right along, what about the set of GEM's cricket anchors? I expect Chenille from the Institut de Beauté and House of Hair Removal to be along any moment. Perhaps she will materialise out of the alien life-form on Skype in the background. Just what kind of show is this?

The picture above is from last night, but the night before the two Ians actually colour-coordinated their ties with the decor, thus reinforcing the overall womb-like pink glow.

Perhaps it's to create a supportive environment for when the Australian viewer feels the urge to adopt the foetal position.

KP POed

I wish I was young enough to know instinctively how to make a gif loop, but this will have to do. Pissing off Kevin Pietersen to this extent is surely a close second to retaining the Ashes. It is also a sign of my age that part of me was relieved when it rained so I could get a proper night's sleep.

Thoughts, briefly, as I am SO behind with my homework.

Geoffrey Boycott raised more philosophical issues than Socratsy during the Third Test, to wit:

• "There's no such thing as ifs, buts, thoughts..." and
  
• "How can you get rain wrong?"

Discuss.

Why is Jim Maxwell's the only voice you can hear at the back of the box when the other commentators are on? Is he unusually heedless of interrupting the broadcast or is it an unusually stentorian voice? You'd think the latter.

This season's ads:

Usually there's just relentless blokiness, but I noticed a lot of "girl car" ads in the first couple of Tests, eg. zippy Mitsubishis for girls nights out. My couch companion suggested that it was so menfolk watching the cricket could recommend cars to their girlfriend, but that seems poor thinking to me. Because after we both watched an ad for hot pink Asics runners, I turned to him and said "I covet those", and he said "What?"

At the other end of the spectrum, however, are the Schick Hydro ads, that once again show what lengths must be gone to avoid certain implications when selling grooming products to men. Lest you have concerns about a shaver with a moisturising bar, its effect is helpfully illustrated by a computer animated boxing match where a punch lands as a slo-mo blast of water. Why, it's like a FIST of WATER in your FACE. Like being GLASSED with HYDRATION. Like an EXPLOSION OF MOISTURE SHRAPNEL. Mrs Marsh, eat your heart out.

In for a duck

I don't want to say it was the duck that did it, but it certainly did it for me. As fine a dish as was finally served up by our top order, and as delectable as Khawaja's dismissal was unpalatable. I just thought you'd want to have a look.

Dread conviction

Well, all the second test did was go where the first test would have gone but for the grace of God. They are a bit sad in the end, miracles, because every time your team is in the shit, you say to yourself, "well, you never know..." and cross your fingers that something against the odds will happen. Then it actually does happen and rather than justifying your "you never know" attitude, it just seems to underline how unlikely it was that it was ever going to happen. Because it's fantastic in direct proportion to how unlikely it is. The more fun you're having seeing the miracle, the more you're pointing to the fact that this is probably not going to happen again in a long, long, time. 

That long time began with the second test, and this is where it put us:

This was an SMH poll the day after the last test finished (still 90% yes by the time the poll closed, though I don't supposed many people voted after the first day it was up). It was the day the "you never know" died. "You never know" is always a bit of a bluff, but it's part of the game and we vote with our hearts. Hearts officially broken!

In the great tradition of soothing the soul with the senses, I will be girding my loins for tonight with confit duck thigh, red cabbage and turnips. I am advised by a learned colleague that Shane Watson should gird his loins with the below:

Phrenomenology

I blame Watto, obviously. Do I need to say why? Getting out on 30 is fine, but the hubris of that horrible, speculative, selfish review obviously set off the kind of Lords cosmic ruckus once again that led to Swann’s horrible ball, Rogers’ horrible lbw, Rogers horribly not feeling he could review the horrible lbw… no good was ever going to come of Watto’s review, and so it was. With each successive wicket, I shook my tiny fist at Shane Watson. He’s not a cancer, he’s a canker. A blight, and a bonehead.

Sillygisms

“You know when you’ve hit it,” Vaughn was saying at lunch time. 

 I will bite the next cricketer who says this. Or rather, Socratsy will:

Vaughn: You know when you’ve hit it.

Socratsy: How do you know?

V: You can feel it.

S: You know you’ve hit it because you can feel it.

V: Right.

S: I’m with you, Mr V. If you felt it, I reckon you definitely hit it.

V: There you go.

S: But you’re trying to say the opposite: that if you hit it, you definitely felt it.

V: That too.

S: HOW SO that too?

V: When you hit it, you feel it.

S: How do you know?

V: Because you feel it.

S: No, we’ve been through this. You know you’ve hit it because you feel it. That means IF YOU FEEL IT -> you hit it. It doesn’t mean that IF YOU HIT IT -> you feel it. You’re getting tangled up between your ratio cognoscendi and your ratio essendi.

V: ….

S: The fallacy of the converse.

V: ….

S: You’re reasoning backwards. And you’re thinking of all the times when you “knew” and no one else was sure, which gives you a false impression of privileged knowledge. And before things like hot spot and reviews, you had no way of knowing that there were times when you’d hit it and hadn’t felt it, so I can understand you thinking those times didn’t exist. But I never even got started on my reductio ad asburdum rebuttal.

V: Oh, please do.

S: If it is true that you feel it every time you hit it, then you’re saying that Philip Hughes asked for a review of a ball he knew he’d hit. That he knew he’d hit the ball, and asked for a closer examination of the situation. Can you tell me why he’d do that?

V: …

S: Right. But I still prefer the fallacy argument. It’s always better to keep Philip Hughes’ head out of things, including for Philip Hughes.

Other things

Boofcam: It's like the Academy Awards, something happens and there's a cross to Darren Lehmann for a reaction shot. A commentator referred to the Australian team as "Darren Lehmann's men".
Has there ever been such a celebrity coach? 

Longroom cam: I lerved KP giving the cordon rope post a good bang into the floor on his way back to the sheds.

I wish Mike Holding had an advice column. It would be called: Ask yourself and every reply from Aunty Mike would start: "Ask yourself..." or "I ask you...". Then after every reply, there'd be a PS from Geoffrey Boycott: "Well, if you'd asked me..."

Le quatorze juillet

I had indigestion watching the countdown last night, though that might have also been about eating too much Bastille Day lunch.

It was a good show. Tension was relieved by heckling the pretty boys: "Don't come the Blue Steel with me, Mr Finn, your cheekbones won't save you now!"

The commentary seems unusually weighted towards the English, numbers-wise, this series. I haven't seen any Australians in the commentary box on the television – where's Warnie? – and on the radio there's just Jim Maxwell and Glenn McGrath against Aggers, Bloers, Tuffers, Boycott and another one whose name I can never remember but who is definitely English. It's not that they're not appreciative of the Australians or not critical of the English, but in a game like this especially, they can't not have an undertone of excitement at an English success and an undertone of anxiety at an Australian one. That's why you balance the numbers in the commentary box, so everyone has someone to emote with. And even as Australians, Jim and Glenn don't give you a whole lot to work with on that front. 

Geoffrey Boycott offers some relief because he has the sort of temperament that relishes misfortune and is suspicious of success. When the English are doing well, he is the voice of doom, and when they don't do well, he is the cackle of glee. Of course, a lot of his satisfaction is because he "could have told you that was going to happen." Like Terry Alderman, Geoffrey lives in a state of permanent amazement at other people's stupidity, but he has a lot more fun with it.

Glenn isn't exactly setting the airwaves on fire with his contributions. The other day he was trying to get mileage out of the fact that the Australian uniforms are cream and the English ones are white. He didn't actually have anything to say about it, it was just "So... one thing you notice is... the Australians, their clothes are cream, and the English... they wear white..." and then dead air as the other commentator waited for a point that never came. He may have followed it up with a plug for his wife's art gallery in Chippendale. 

He did call Aggers (I think it was Aggers) on the POV problem though when the latter referred to the wickets of Agar and Starc as "relieving the tension a bit". A pause, and then Glenn: "Well, a relief in tension for... the English spectators". And Aggers actually tried to argue that a couple of wickets could equally be a relief in tension for Australian viewers, but he sort of tapered off. He seemed to realise that he was basically saying that Australians would be grateful for the opportunity to abandon all hope ("Now I can give up. What a relief!"). Yeah, thanks a lot.

Can't think of pithy sign-off... ever notice the Australians wear cream and the English wear white?

God help me, he was only 19

All Hail Ashton the Astounding of House Aegar, the First of His Name, Hero of Trent Bridge, Sustainer of the Hopes, Judge of the Length and Punisher of the Short Ball, nineteen years of age, a bit of a Cutie and a Very Good Boy, according to his Mother, Sonia.

There's not much to add. I – everyone – was speechless with horror at the first drinks break, I – everyone – was speechless with delight at lunch and I – everyone – was crestfallen when he was caught on 98. My "everyone" is a bit parochial of course, on the first two counts at least.

I can only add: Warner's moustache has to go. Hopefully he leaves it in Africa.

Test 1, Day 1

It's funny how quickly you forget. Australia lost the toss and us on the couch and in the studio were going, "This is all right, our bowling's stronger than our batting, we can put our best foot forward and shield our ulcers from that crumbly top order for a bit." And our bowlers were indeed a force - when they managed to hit the pitch - and we had those Sassenachs on the run and made some of them very cross indeed, ahem Trott.
Going into our first innings, it seemed like maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all. Except that, hang on, what were we just saying? Our bowling is stronger than our batting. The bowling. Stronger. The batting. Weaker. Something about a "crumbly top order". Something about ulcers. That's right.

Lookalikes

I think Nasser Hussain is quite dashing-looking generally, but when he was doing some analysis of Bairstow's batting last night they found a horrible camera angle on him  that made him look like Dobby the House Elf.

On the subject of Bairstow, I am still looking for the appropriate Ronald Searle illustration. He has an unpleasant nostrilly schoolboy look.

And speaking of unpleasant, I listened to the streaming Grandstand commentary for a bit, and I was enjoying hearing all the old boys again - Bloers, Aggers, Tuffnell - but then internet echo started making Bloers sound like Davros.

Latecomers

Well, obviously I love Steve Smith at the moment. He's surprisingly reassuring for one so fidgety. Wasn't he one of the great white spinner hopes when he started out? Please mum, can he be our all-rounder instead of Wotto?

As for our littlest baggy green, I'm reading the Game of Thrones books at the moment, so I prefer to think of him as Aegar.

He gave me hope on the names for things front. I watched him bowl a couple of balls and turned to my couch companion: "Would you say he "flights" the ball a fair bit?" "Yes." Yes! On the other hand, I thought Peter Siddle had abandoned his first delivery when he was actually just practicing his run-up and didn't even have the ball in his hand. Note to self: small, round, red.

Defenestration

-->

The window for pre-Ashes thoughts is rapidly closing. I’d better jump through it.

I thought sacking Mickey Arthur was rearranging the deckchairs, but then I heard they’d given the job to Darren Lehmann, and then I saw said Lehmann at the press conference and, well, he’s a stroke of genius. Stroke as in cat. He was completely mesmerising. That smooth, heavy-lidded, drop-dead calm… I think the word is sangfroid. Beware the big man with long eyelashes. For all his goofy smirks - and that sly, winking undertone is a bit of a mafia kiss in my opinion - he’s terrifying, charismatic, self-possessed, in short, everything that the Australian cricket team is not and one yearns for it to be. 

Someone on the Back Page asked whether he’d be able to maintain team discipline, as “good old Boof”, and I thought “Are they crazy? Have they seen him?” I would not want to run into him in a dark hotel corridor if I was coming home after curfew. Well, maybe I would, in a parallel universe, but not the rhetorical “I” that is a member of the Australian cricket team. He’s another Buddha Warrior of course, and bless him for giving a soupçon of excitement and hope to what was a wholly depressing prospect. The reality will hit and no doubt blow the soupçon out of the soup, but I sure needed the lift.

Having said all that, Mickey Arthur’s performance at the same press conference was extraordinary grace under pressure and compelling in its own right. I have no actual cricket judgement on these turns of events, I just emote with the times, like a baby groping at a mobile. That’s also about my level when I’m watching the game, something brought home to me more often now I watch cricket with someone who actually knows the names for things. I see a man get out because the ball went “through” him. “So, was that… the blockhole?” “No, that was the gate”. I see a batsman go swish (yes). “Was that a… sweep?” “No, that was a drive”. You’d think I’d pick these things up after almost 15 years watching. It makes me wonder what I’m actually looking at. Coloured shapes in motion, apparently. Fuzzy dice.

Speaking of superficiality, I got a little look at some of the English players during the ICC Champions Trophy and was struck as always by how peachy their complexions are. It seemed to me watching Cook that “thin skin” can go the other way, he seems to be lacking a layer that would stop you from seeing his thoughts. Pouty when things don't go his way, despite the jawline. I don’t know if that’s a bad thing or not, it just seems so different to a hide like Steve Waugh’s that seemed impenetrable in either direction. 

I used to think English cricket was floppy because their summers were so mild, and while they were traipsing on village greens, every other cricket-playing nation had developed a playing style hardened in one sort of furnace heat or another. That’s past now, of course. I suggested they burn the smelly dressy gown and they did. We may need to have a look at the smelly baggy green. Ashes! Ashes! Ashes!

Golden goose

I've been strangled by cookbook translations this quarter - currently on my third of four - but obviously Thoughts are called for re: ARTHUR WATSON HOMEWORK SHOCKER.

They are:

1. I always start from the assumption that I don't really know what's going on. Whenever I've had first-hand experience of a situation that's been in the press I see how much more there is to it than what is reported, so I assume that about any report. It's not conspiracy on anyone's part, it's just the nature of the beast. It's one of the reasons I don't read the sports pages that much. Drama, drama, narrative, archetype, drama, inevitably limited by space and partial information. I prefer to read glossy magazines where the confabulation is shameless and hilarious.*

2. Having said there's no conspiracy, you don't think that assignment was cooked up by Mickey Arthur as a way of getting rid of Watson, do you? God, who'd want him, I think a lot more of Clarke now I've heard he doesn't get on with old Swotto. Surely they pick him under sufferance because, exasperatingly, he delivers, but he hasn't really done so in India. Shame Arthur's cunning plan caught a few others in the net.

3. Wotto has inevitably magnified drama because a) he's a blow hole, and b) he was going home anyway because his wife's having a baby, so moving it up a bit and going now has created a whole extra layer of theatre that wouldn't necessarily have been there in other circumstances.

4. Everyone says "it's like they're schoolboys", but I think it's Wendy Crew in the Herald's letters page today who in fact nails the vibe. It's like "the necessity to include your company's 'mission statement' when tendering for a contract". Any corporate employee (as a free-wheeling mercenary I thankfully only hear about them) will be miserably familiar with the need to come up with a personal narrative and vision and account of "what they contribute" on a regular basis. Justin Langer would not have helped (or would he? "My plan, Sir, is to keep my head and see the sunrise"). Those cricketers are lucky. They could have been divided up into small groups and given craft materials to make a bird that reflected their image of the future of the team.

My friends made this.

Or, if they were under Steve Waugh, they might have had to write poetry and read it out to the rest of the team (oh, to be a fly on the wall). Some league players submit sexcapades. I suppose it's new to actually be axed for not coming up with the goods, but a) I guess that's the threat that lurks behind all of these touchy-feely (steady, league players) reeducation programs and one of the reasons they're so maddening and b) we don't really know what's going on.


*I'm reading a really great book called "Being Wrong", by Kathryn Shulz, so maybe I'm sensitive, but it introduced me to a fantastic concept to describe the phenomenon of expressing confident opinions and having intense discussions about topics we really don't know much about: we are all contributors to a magazine called Modern Jackass.

Boxing Days

Boxing Day was the kind of day where, by 3 pm, lying on the couch and watching cricket felt too much like hard work and I headed off for a nap. It’s still a bit like that. Plus I’ve have some actual too much hard work to do, and all work at this time of the year is excessive. The Boxing Day test: I was very sad to see Sangakkara have so much bad luck and very happy to see Mitchell Johnson have a good bat and there was a lot of good Cricket Lovin’ and some excellent turkey sandwiches.

But I did get to rifle through some boxes. I rifled through my Useful Box for Ponting tidbits and found an awful lot of clippings of Shane Warne’s centenary (400^th, 500^th, 600^th…) wickets. I think an early comment by Trevor Marshallsea about Ponting’s “single-minded desire to consult those around him” was supposed to be tongue in cheek. I found the “Romantic Double Century” poster (not triple as I’d thought), and I don’t think it has escaped anyone how effective Swisse vitamins have been in reversing hair loss.

The bigger surprise was when I was unpacking a box of crockery that had been sitting in my sister’s garage for a good 15 years. After pulling out a fun Age sports section cover from 27 November 1994, with pictures of Australia’s “dynamic duo”, Michael Slater and Mark Waugh, the jackpot was unwrapping a dinner plate to reveal this spectacular pin-up:

 

When moving pictures went colour, Lucille Ball was known as “Technicolor Tessie”, because her blue eyes, red hair and lips and fair skin came up so well under the new technology. I think of Warnie as the “Technicolor Tessie” of cricket because of the way his greens and golds sparkle under the camera lens, and they’re on-theme to boot. I was a bit surprised at there being a pin-up at all in the Age sports section, and I’m not sure why it’s Warnie at this stage. It’s the middle of the first Ashes Test in Brisbane and it’s the batting that’s the big story, Warnie’s hat-trick is still to come in the next game. Something for the kiddies, I suppose. Or just because he’s so damn photogenic.

Sri Lanka have lost their first wicket in the New Year’s Test and I’m off to the ground tomorrow. I think I explained at some length last time how going to the ground isn’t really about the cricket, so I shouldn’t complain that I won’t be seeing too much Australian bowling or Sri Lankan batting. As per usual, it will be about the cryptic crossword and damn fine egg sandwiches.

Cricket in the age of mechanical reproduction

Jim Maxwell did an Ozzy Osbourne on Monday and bit the head off poor Tony Harrison, Chair of Cricket Tasmania, for not getting more people to Bellerive. Sometimes you can sort of hear Jim Maxwell steam up and froth a bit, and it’s often about ground-attendance related things (killjoy security staff is another red rag). Jim, even if I completely agreed with you, it’s not okay to froth at people, especially a guest, and remember, as Richie says, that you are also in my loungeroom.

But in any case, I’m a bit tired of this conversation.

In this particular case:

1. Tony was right. As he kept saying, his number-one problem was scheduling. This is a time of year when you tell good friends that you don’t know when you’ll see them next because there’s so much stuff on and stuff to do in the lead-up to Christmas. Yes, I could enrol in a time-management course. You ask too much. I do however think that Cricket Tasmania should have wheeled Ricky out on a non-working day and I hope they promoted it properly.

2. Kerry, watching all five days of cricket at the ground is a “tradition” in England because they desperately need the vitamin D.

More generally:

1. Attendance at the ground is no gauge of interest in Test cricket. Test cricket is broadcast on television. Plenty of people must be interested in watching it there or it could not be sold for high prices to commercial television.

2. If people anywhere prefer to watch it at home it is not because they’re soft anti-social cocooners. You get a lot more insight into the game and the theatre of what’s happening in the middle from television coverage. It offers more to both the aficionado and the novice. Being at the ground is a different kind of theatre, about pilgrimage and rituals and sacred ground and being part of a mass of humanity. It has a lot of ‘aura’, as Benjamin would say, but most of that is not about the actual game, it’s about wearing watermelons on your head with your friends, literally and figuratively speaking. When all that aura converges on a big game moment you have an unforgettable experience that’s all about the game, but those moments are only what they are because most days and most games are not like that.

3. Cricket at home is its own ritual. An early cricket memory is my family visiting an uncle and aunt in Mornington in the 70s, and us all sitting together quietly in a darkened room with the hot sun outside and a bright black and white TV set in the middle. We didn’t go there to watch the cricket, it just happened. I have no memory of what was happening on the screen and wouldn’t have understood it at the time anyway, but I remember well the quiet and concentration and sharing something with people we only saw once a year. I remember the aura, the “field of subtle, luminous radiation surrounding a person or object”.

“Cricket” also means a backdrop to summer time and down time, the murmur of the radio or television through the house as you wander about your business, dipping in and out of it, checking up on it from time to time if you’re out and about. It surrounds you like the weather, it’s a mood that fades in and out, it’s a constant but undemanding companion. That’s Test cricket, that’s part of its special beauty, mechanical reproduction doesn't dim that. Even being at the ground can be about the charm of dropping in and out: you come across a suburban or country game and pull over for a few overs. I always find myself a bit affronted by the requirements of punctuality and relentless attention in other sports.

4. Ok, I am a soft anti-social cocooner. I want a couch and a good beer and the chance to have a nap, cool quiet and time to think. As Lucinda Williams ponders, is it too much to ask? Am I going overboard with all that stuff?  Commentators don’t have to ponder, don't have to choose, they can enjoy the comforts of the home and the theatre of the ground at the same time. Now, I’m not saying that commentators, who have a guaranteed seat behind the wicket, good television and internet access, shelter from the elements (I include other people in that category), and private catering (with bonus gifts of strawberries and lobster), have lost touch with what going to a Test Match means to other people, namely losing all of that, but… oh, wait, I am. People in corporate boxes shouldn’t throw stones.

5. Three or five days is an enormous commitment, no other game asks you to take time off work. For this reason, most cricket is and has always been played in a limited format, counted in overs or wickets or runs – a weekend, a day or afternoon, an evening. Test cricket might be the “high” form of the game, and a wonderful thing it is, but it’s not the original or vernacular form, and arguably not its lifeblood. Historically, Test cricket is the spin-off from the limited forms of the game, not the other way around, stop with the moaning about the 'decline' of cricket into T20.

But thinking about conditions and policies at the ground and what I’d do or not.

1. Gimme shelter. As many sheltered areas as possible. We all wear anti breast cancer scarves on McGrath Day while courting skin cancer. I realise there are light and line of vision problems to overcome, but we can put people on the moon. Somewhere for unsheltered people to go when it rains, see comment on passes out below.

2. The security is fine, Jim. Baiting and barracking the security staff has become part of the fun at the ground and you only need one arsehole experience to be grateful they’re there.

3. Price and ticketing. You’ll have the day-off-work cost even if ground entry is free. But yes, I had to spend $130 to get a seat that would be sheltered from the sun all day on day 2 of the New Year’s test at the SCG and that’s a lot of money. It’s a lot less if you have a higher tolerance for physical discomfort, but I’ve done my time on the concourse.

There have to be passes out. You can’t go in and out at the SCG, though I think you can at the MCG. Cheaper test passes and more unreserved seating sections to allow for more floating spectator intake.

4. Drink. I don’t drink the light beer at the cricket (all that’s available at the SCG), but observation suggests that it just means guys buy two drinks at a time instead of one, which doubles the drink queues because the four-drink limit means one person can now only buy for two, and creates enormous toilet queues.

5. Food. I actually don’t know about the food. I started rhapsodising about the possibility of Bourke Street Bakery pies, food trucks and buying picnic packs with your ticket, then I heard how it sounded and imagined what that would look like. ‘Healthy’ options in these settings are generally miserable and even more overpriced than the junk options. A recent Sumo Salad experience left me poorer, hungrier and angrier than any Chiko Roll ever has. In the end, it might just be that bad food you wait too long for and pay too much for is part of the ritual of a day at the game, and the only way to get around that is to BYO. However: please provide vinegar for the chips and you might want to ask an American to explain hotdogs. This is a bog-standard, non-foodie Chicago hotdog:

I want what they're having.

And that’s all. Because I seem to have taken a morning off work to write about the cricket.

The man without scriptwriters

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Do you think the ‘iconic’ Ricky Ponting moments will be the swear-shouting at Duncan Fletcher during the 2005 Ashes and the ARROGANT PONTING MUST BE SACKED headline on the 2007-2008 India tour?

Steve Waugh had that last-ball century at the SCG, and Shane Warne was so blessed from a dramaturgical point of view, had so many ‘defining’ moments, even without the off-field play, that they defined his character – Hollywood, the Human Headline. But I worry that Ricky rather got the rough end of the narrative stick. He has been plunged willy-nilly into a great deal of drama, and been an astonishing performer, but he has possibly not made as much good theatre as he deserved on the field. It’s been said – I’m sure I’ve mentioned this – that Ricky’s captaincy lacked a sense of timing. Is that Ricky’s story? His lack of story?

I stand to be corrected. As of writing, I’ve deliberately avoided any research to refresh my memory. The pugnacious teenage prodigy is a good story, and even if I’m wrong about the above, I reckon “pugnacious” will still end up the dominant motif here. Ahem, Bourbon and Beefsteak. When people described Ponting this week as the most “competitive” of players, a real “competitor”, they mean “scrappy”. He gets into the truant schoolboy story book, no problem, “eternally scruffy and frowning” like William. I remember him blowing a kiss to his new wife when he made a triple century. That wasn't a bad moment, I asked a newsagent for their newspaper poster with the photo.

I also remember him just missing a double century in Hobart some time and just missing a series win in India. He saw out the Steve Waugh era and has seen in what I guess will be the Michael Clarke era. I know everyone has to come after someone and before someone else, but hasn’t he had to tie up more dag ends than most? It's telling that the big significance of Ricky going for me is that it's end of the Steve Waugh era, the last player on the national team who had played under Waugh.

If Michael Clarke suffers from his excessive good looks, I don’t think it is accidental that Ricky came to be tarred with the “ugly Australian” brush. I’ll always believe that people thought a little worse of Ricky during the 2005 Ashes because he didn’t look like Andrew Flintoff, and gave Anil Kumble way too much benefit of the doubt on that 2007-2008 India tour just for looking like Anil Kumble.*

Some people would say the “ugly Australian” era began with Steve Waugh, in both senses, but I think Waugh was redeemed in the public imagination by all that Hey True Blue and poetry in the dressing room stuff (“Clancy of the Overthrow”). Steve Waugh was an unemotional player, but in that respect a sentimental bloke. Ricky could be a hothead on the field, but was also unsentimental. Sometimes his eyes would flash black for a moment and you’d see the hot and unsentimental together. I don’t think I fully believed the lack of sentiment until I saw the bit of the retirement press conference when he said that not going to the Ashes was easy because he wasn’t good enough. It took me back to when he was asked whether Warnie had been naïve to take the diuretic, and he answered, “And stupid."

I'll be going through the clippings in the Useful Box this week to see what comes up that I've forgotten. More dag ends, more scraps. None of this is a criticism: I like a bit of a mess and I like a bit of a fight. The dominant motif after all is not "pugnacious", but "scrappy".

* That Bollyline affair made me so angry I wrote a letter to the Herald that wasn’t published (bit of a theme developing here), probably because it contained the following impossible sentence: “As a thirty-something woman who came to cricket late in life, what leaves the sourest taste in my mouth about this sport is the constant invocation of a ‘gentlemanly’ code of conduct which, when deciphered, seems to mean pretty much what it always has, namely an absolute horror of “fuss”, whether positive or negative, and a rather casual attitude towards racism.”