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The Cricket Thread

It sucks Adam Gilchrist had to retire, he was a great wicket keeper batsmen.

Drop Hayden, he just makes the top order fail. He goes early and its a downer for the other team. Ponting is just unpredictable, one match he makes ducks the next match he makes 200+ in the match, then a duck again.

Hopefully Australia can bowl well tomorrow and not choke when they put the South Africans under pressure.
 
Yeah I watched (some of) the game today and changed my mind about hayden, if he doesnt score again soon he is gonna have to go. He is all at sea.

It is a pity he is old enough that he wont be given a chance to get back into the team no matter what he does, but he really cant stay.

NZ lost an ODI to WI. We are missing MacMillan and McCullum down the order, at the moment in the last 10 overs there is Oram and no one else..

This is kind of an unfamiliar position for NZ sides, a solid top order and a weak middle.. They should definitely bring back Franklin though, it would be very harsh to drop Elliott considering his average and the fact that he is playing well. The only other option would be to drop How and move Flynn to 3, then have Oram at 5? I dunno how that would work out..

Have a nice day.
 
New Zealand have become hopeless all of a sudden. Getting thrashed by West Indies is something that I find funny since West Indies have become very weak after 2006. Australia played well today. That makes me happy. I hope Australia won't lose after scoring 445.
 
Did you watch the game Taxie? NZ didnt get thrashed at all..

It was extremely close, and of course losses are going to happen from time to time, especially in 28 over games..

Also if you pick players only based on their averages McGraw I dont think you are going to have much success.. I'd stick with Flynn if I were you, his average is woeful, but he is a lot better than he was when he first played ODIs.

Have a nice day.
 
Lets see how Hayden does in this innings :).


On another note how good was Peter Siddle in the end today? Once again, our attack was in trouble from our inability to bowl out the opposition.
Taxie said:
Oh no! What is happening to Australia? They've failed another match. 267/7 is not a very comfortable position and Ponting was gone for a duck. Australia must bring back Nathan Bracken instead of Peter Siddle. I think there must be better wicketkeepers than Haddin in Australia. Cameron White must be brought back to the Australian side.
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Lol.


Although admittedly, the fuckwit Billy Bowden didn't give Doug Bollinger two plum LBW decisions which made it harder for us (when we had momentum too), its shit like that which make me think that if there is ever a shadow of doubt, that decisions on LBW should be referred to the third umpire.
 
If your bowler does better than your batsmen at batting then that is not a good thing. Lol at haddin with a 94
 
Hipmonlee said:
I love the west indies left arm spinner.. Suileman Ben or something. He's 6'8 and he reminds me of the dude from a nightmare before christmas when he approaches the crease. It's almost like he is sneaking up on the batsmen to steal their christmases.

Then he has this huge armspan, and you cant help thinking that if he would try bowling fast he'd be unplayable.. And he does have his variation ball.. His normal delivery is at around 90ks and then his variation, which doesnt seem to require any effort whatsoever comes out at 110ks..

Too bad once the initial surprise is lost he isnt really up to much, but he is great to watch.. But you cant help wondering why he doesnt bowl fast.. With that height even if he did only bowl at 110 I'd expect he'd be pretty hard to face..

Have a nice day.
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i remember seeing shahid afridi bowling his quicker ball at like 130kph. if that west indies guy youre talking about could develop something like that then yeah.....



as for hayden etc, my opinion is that he is going through a "regular" form slump. the problem being that maybe he is too near the natural end of his career to put in the energy/effort required to come back. he's done it before, but what will the reward be if he comes back from it? another year or two maybe? thats what made steve waugh's return to "form" quite surprising.....


i semi-agree with the guy who mentioned nathan bracken. not to replace siddle, but i just wonder when like 3-4 of our top choice bowlers are out of action, why wouldnt they consider him? at least he has a proven track record in ODI's.


meanwhile, its getting a bit overcast here in sydney, with only one more wicket required to pull off a consolation win. cant blame anything for this series loss except some crap cricket from the aussies, and some amazing stuff from the south africans. what a series!! the series IN south africa should be interesting. im guessing they'll win it.....

EDIT: we won :) only just, though....... i cant believe graeme smith actually came out to bat! and he almost got them there. i thought we'd lost it when hayden dropped a sitter off ntini.....
 
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/cricket/england/7815038.stm

Yeah, what the hell. Apparently it was either I go or he goes and the ECB said well you can go and fuck off. And the coach has gone anyway which makes it all the more stupid

The worse part is that there is no clear successor, Strauss is probably the best bet but hasn't done enough (although two centuries in India with virtually no preparation goes a long way) to ensure his place in the side. The only other guy who's really assured his place apart form KP is Flintoff and the last time he was captain he got drunk and stranded in a pedalo in the sea.
 
It is sad that Pietersen has resigned. He was such a nice captain. I wish to know why Ottis Gibson was dismissed. He was better than Moores. Strauss is getting back his spot as a captain though I feel Flintoff is more deserving than Strauss since has much higher experience captaincy. I think Pietersen must re-consider his decision.
 
Hm derailing the topic here a bit, I've been interested in learning how to bowl better leg spin. Problem is, I live in the U.S., where there are about as many cricket fans as there are black presidents (oh snap, can't use that line anymore). So I decided to consult smogon for tips. Does anyone know of any good videos, or anything that I could do to work on learning it? I have a vague idea of how to bowl leg spin, and I've even gotten some turn a couple times, but for some reason it just feels like hell for my arm, and I'm inconsistent enough that I think that I probably am doing something really wrong.

Thanks in advance.
 
um go to a cricket club like maybe the philadelphia one and watch BBC's masterclass videos.ALso I'm a leggie as well :P Try it like this...........the index finger (first joint) is over the top of the seam,then the middle finger(both joint) are on the seam on the opposite side of the ball. the third finger and the little finger are held together away from the other fingers. release the ball around the third finger so thast it "turns",and deliver it this way in the air so that it gets flight in other words spins the air. Try to pitch it at leg stump BEHIND THE LEG! so that it breaks into the wicket.

Your run-up should be something like this. stand full chested,take your first SMALL step with your leftleg ,cock your wrist,take the second step with your right leg,take the next left step,on tghe next right leg movement get into the side on position and just befor landing on left foot throw your hold body into the air for your delevery stride with your rightr wrist coked near your ear and your left elbow bending and facing mid wicket,release the all,like i earlier described and follow through hope that helped my fellow leggie!
 
Ah thanks, it might have been my run up, but using your description, I've gotten much better accuracy and consistency. Woot, now just time to practice it.
 
Jenigmat said:
Ah thanks, it might have been my run up, but using your description, I've gotten much better accuracy and consistency. Woot, now just time to practice it.
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try it on some american guy with a baseball bat lol......

if you get good at it, please become an australian citizen - we are missing warnie something terrible!!

and yeah this england stuff is crazy..... i read on cricinfo that pieterson didnt "resign" voluntarily. i can just see "wtf" written all over his face when he got the phone call that said "we have accepted your resignation". poor guy....... he seemed way over-confident, but maybe thats what the england team needed. hopefully strauss can do something with the team.

meanwhile, last night's 20-20 (aus vs rsa) seems to confirm more and more that its a matter of win toss, bat, make big score, take early wickets as 2nd team panic too early, win game. what do you guys make of 20-20?
 
20-20 is australia's game full stop.

with all these young guns coming through its hard to stop them, even experienced bowlers like dale steyn and ntini couldnt hold back warner (in his first match for australia)

Our bowling attack is perfect.. some minor changes though:

Remove Marsh from the team and opening.. Put hodge in.
Remove Hauritz and put another all rounder in, that can actually spin the ball quite a bit.

Those are for the twenty-20 teams.. although I cant see why marsh is in and hodge isnt, hodge is in really good form.. I just dont think australian selectors like the victorians.
 
Jima619 said:
20-20 is australia's game full stop.

with all these young guns coming through its hard to stop them, even experienced bowlers like dale steyn and ntini couldnt hold back warner (in his first match for australia)

Our bowling attack is perfect.. some minor changes though:

Remove Marsh from the team and opening.. Put hodge in.
Remove Hauritz and put another all rounder in, that can actually spin the ball quite a bit.

Those are for the twenty-20 teams.. although I cant see why marsh is in and hodge isnt, hodge is in really good form.. I just dont think australian selectors like the victorians.
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is this bill lawry's smogon account? lol....

seriously though, you wouldnt happen to be a victorian yourself would you? i lived in melbourne for a couple of years, and i LOVED it!

i wouldnt say 20-20 is australias game though. ok, one guy had a good match the other day.... but we didnt even make it to the final of the 20-20 world cup. i just think its a game in which the toss has even more bearing than other games......
 
Lol, how did you know I was victorain xD

We didnt win the twenty-20 cup since we took players we didnt need in.. Plus we didnt have half the players we have now.

All the young guns are rising through and by the next world cup we will win :)
 
At the very least, I'm kinda interested in seeing where Duminy ends up in 5-10 years. He's got potential practically oozing out of him, and he's definitely shown that he can take on pressure and still do well.
 
Duminy saves the south african team whenever they are in trouble, he is great.

I will be interested to see him in the one dayers (50 overs)
 
Duminy is somewhat a slow batsman. He was already given some chances in ODI but he couldn't shine. Lol at the 20-20 game between Australia and South Africa. Cameron White just bashed the South Africans and I found it funny when the South African team had Amla in their team.
 
Duminy Plays well again. Mckenzie finds some form and australia fail.. again.

Theres nothing wrong with our bowling, but its our batting. Ditch cameron white and bring brad hodge in. Michael Hussey shouldnt be opening the batting, and that should be Warner or Hodges spot and hussey takes the spot of cameron white in the middle order.

I like that they are playing david hussey and michael clarke as spinners. I lol because they dont even bowl cameron white and he is a good spinner, and he bats low.. so why is he in the team?

Second ODI will be interesting, especially when Mckenzie found the middle of the bat and that might just save him and keep him in the team. Althought ABdevilliers needs to come back asap.
 
Very very close, only Morkel and a very smart/lucky use of the power play denied us the win. Can't wait for match 2.
 
Oh no! This is very unsatisfactory from Australia. I switched off the TV when Duminy was batting slowly and I confirmed that Aussies were going to win. Surprising! Excellent show from Johannes Morkel it seems. Anyway, the World Champs will be back. Come on, Kangaroos!!!
 
Yep.

Michael Clarke is out, Warner in. Clarke has a thumb injury and will be out for the One day series against the south africans.

Michael Hussey is back in the middle order and warner will take his place opening.

Australia will win the next one, I know it ;)
 
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