Inside Cricket January - February 2016

Cricket rightly celebrates its illustrious, fascinating past. Because it does, we get a sharp sense of the old and the new, and how they meet; we feel sentimental for that past and new sentiment as we embrace young players and want to give them a revered place in cricket history. First, the past: we’ve been doing far too many of these lately. Two more great characters of the game, Frank Tyson and Lindsay Kline, passed since we last went to print. Normally we’d run a tribute page, but sadly, our 98 pages were planned and commissioned long in advance. Tyson (pictured) was, to those who saw him and experienced his bowling, simply the fastest bowler in history for a short time. He exploded like a flare star, momentarily casting an…

There are many contenders for Australian batting places right now, but few as exciting as Chris Lynn. Lynn has proven that he excels with the blade in all forms of the game, but he takes particular pride in his batting in first-class cricket. A sensational catch brought Lynn to the world’s attention in 2014. He was playing for Kolkata against Royal Chargers Bangalore in the IPL and fielding square on the fence, when A.B. De Villiers got onto one and hoiked it savagely in his direction. There were three balls to go, six runs for the Chargers to win, and De Villiers’ six would have finished it. It was hit hard, but would have been a conventional catch, if a stinging one. Lynn moved in slightly from the boundary, then…

“I wouldn’t be buying tickets for the fourth and fifth days.” Steve Waugh’s acerbic summation of the West Indies tour. The West Indies scored Tests in Sydney and Melbourne. "I don't think he needs to apologise. I just don't think he needs to do it in the future." Steve Smith on Mitchell Starc’s last-day explosion in the first NZ Test when he threw a ball at NZ batsman Mark Craig after Craig blocked one of his del iveries. "I'd describe it as a jigsaw with hal f the pieces missing." Kiw i coach Mi ke Hesson after the Kiw is refused to bat i n t heir tour match following Aaron Finch and Ryan Carters’ extraordi nary op ening stand and the CA XI’s declaration at 1-503. They had no…

BATTING BEATINGS At one stage in the first Test between England and Pakistan in Abu Dhabi this October, 804 runs were scored for the loss of nine wickets, almost 90 (89.33) runs per batsman! Pakistan declared at 8 for 523 and England 1 for 281. The highest score by a team in Test history is 6 declared for 952 by Sri Lanka against India at Colombo in August 1997. This works out at 158.66 runs per batsman. But the record of most runs per batsman in Tests is 263.33 when West Indies amassed 3 declared for 790 against Pakistan at Kingston in February 1958. England captain Alastair Cook is the only batsman to play two Test innings of over 12 hours each: 773 minutes (12 hours and 53 minutes) when…

On February 7, 2016, the Bradman Foundation XI play the Massai Cricket Warriors at Bradman Oval in Bowral. “Massai” is not just some team emblem, like Proteas or Silver Ferns. These are the real thing: the Kenyan Massai, or Maasai tribe. The Warriors play mainly shirtless, in colourful headpieces, beads, robes and often sandals – though more modern footwear has, sensibly, begun to be used. Though the team’s main purpose is spreading awareness in their Kenyan community about HIV/AIDS and women’s issues, it began life as the brainchild of a South African woman, Aliya Bauer, who came into the Likipia region to research baboons. Isolated from her own society, she missed her cricket, and decided to introduce local schoolchildren to the game, using basic gear she’d had shipped from home.…

For twenty years from the mid-Seventies, the West Indies were the scourge of every international team. Now they’re more like a punching bag for the major cricket playing countries. Despite the poundings handed out by those all-conquering West Indies sides, I haven’t heard one opposition player from the past gloating about their current plight. Instead I hear, “Isn’t it sad to see West Indies cricket in such a parlous state?” There are many reasons for the precipitous decline of the West Indies as a cricketing power. However, it can’t help that there has been constant bickering and outright animosity between the players and the administrators for much of that period. The fact that the energy wasted on in-fighting and constant carping hasn’t been turned into a determined endeavour to resolve…