Entertainment For Lively Minds
Ashes to Ashes...
As a Scot the hype surrounding the Ashes pretty much goes over my head, but even I know that all-out for 260 isn't very good.
By way of recompense I give you Bill Bryson's take on cricket, which sounds pretty accurate to me;
After years of patient study (and with cricket there can be no other kind) I have decided that there is nothing wrong with the game that the introduction of golf carts wouldn't fix in a hurry. It is not true that the English invented cricket as a way of making all other human endeavours look interesting and lively; that was merely an unintended side effect. I don't wish to denigrate a sport that is enjoyed by millions, some of them awake and facing the right way, but it is an odd game.
It is the only sport that incorporates meal breaks. It is the only sport that shares its name with an insect. It is the only sport in which spectators burn as many calories as players - more if they are moderately restless. It is the only competitive activity of any type, other than perhaps baking, in which you can dress in white from head to toe and be as clean at the end of the day as you were at the beginning.
Imagine a form of baseball in which the pitcher, after each delivery, collects the ball from the catcher and walks slowly with it to centre field; and that there, after a minute's pause to collect himself, he turns and runs full tilt toward the pitcher's mound before hurling the ball at the ankles of a man who stands before him wearing a riding hat, heavy gloves of the sort used to to handle radio-active isotopes, and a mattress strapped to each leg. Imagine moreover that if this batsman fails to hit the ball in a way that heartens him sufficiently to try to waddle forty feet with mattress's strapped to his legs, he is under no formal compunction to run; he may stand there all day, and, as a rule, does. If by some miracle he is coaxed into making a misstroke that leads to his being put out, all the fielders throw up their arms in triumph and have a hug. Then tea is called and every one retires happily to a distant pavilion to fortify for the next siege. Now imagine all this going on for so long that by the time the match concludes autumn has crept in and all your library books are overdue. There you have cricket.
The mystery of cricket is not that Australians play it well, but that they play it at all. It has always seemed to me a game much too restrained for the rough-and-tumble Australian temperament. Australians much prefer games in which brawny men in scanty clothing bloody each other's noses. I am quite certain that if the rest of the world vanished over night and the development of cricket was left in Australian hands, within a generation the players would be wearing shorts and using the bats to hit each other.
And the thing is, it would be a much better game for it.
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I'm Scottish and I quite like Cricket
Thing pishing me off is the jingoistic histeria being generated by the media - principly Murdochs parasite network - about the whole thing. Feckin "God speed" messages from Cameron: you'd think he's have more to occupy his time.
It's only game...
Oooooh
Think i've virtually wandered in here by mistake?
Cricket's great but
excessive media coverage of anything is not great and usually defeats the purpose if said media outlet is wanting me to tune in/buy papers.
Take Formula 1. BBC gets the rights and suddenly it's in every news bulletin as though it actually matters. I ain't watching.
Adverts masquerading as news items seem to be everywhere in the media at the moment, with the BBC laying it on thick with all its Strictly Come Prancing coverage. Thankfully, I don't read The Times/Sun/watch Sky News, so I haven't been put off the Ashes yet.
I don't like cricket
But I wouldn't want to rain on anyone's parade 'cause I hate it when people run down my favoured sports. I hope those that like cricket enjoy the ashes.
A Brit and an American
are sitting side by side crossing the Atlantic by air. The American says "Say, why don't you explain that cricket game to me". The Brit happily obliges. As they are disembarking in Los Angeles (it was the 10 hour flight) and the Brit is only just bringing the explanation to a close the American turns, thanks him and says "And imagine, you do it all on horseback".
Nice work from Bill "Britain's most tolerated American" Bryson.
Not Around Here
Bill Bryson is not on my list of tolerated any things but I will leave the issue there.
The Ashes are less cricket than a great England versus Australia contest. Any body loves to beat Australia in any sport because it means so much to them. I am not a cricket fan but I enjoy great sporting contests. The Ashes falls in to that category. The only shame is that it is over night and the audience shrinks to 5% of what it should be. Can't they play at night?
As a Scot living in Australia
That's getting emailed round the office on Monday.
Cheers!
As a Scot living in Australia
That's getting emailed round the office on Monday.
Cheers!
I'm Scottish and really like Cricket
In 1984 during a period of unwelcome unemployment I watched a lot of telly, meaning by day I watched a lot of cricket. That year the West Indies toured England and over the course of a summer slaughtered England by 5-0 in the Test series.
Ignore any mad gloating anti-English connotations : I was transfixed by the West Indies. I knew a little about cricket and knew England were a good team then, but with the Windies it was like growing up with Muhammed Ali, whom I idolised and seemed on another planet from his opposition. Watching Viv Richard and Gordon Greenidge in the pomp, and then, especially, their fantastic line of fast bowlers hooked me for life.
I love football, of course, but for drama and twists and turns in a single game it takes a really great football match to match a really great Test Match. Longer, I admit...
I am really looking forward to this Ashes series. England finally seem to assembling a team capable of turning up, but are still fragile. The Aussies have been fantastic so long and seem to be on the way down, but they have an awfully long way to fall, especially at home.
Trouble is it is on feckin' Sky.
Anyone know..
...if the Aussie radio streams, and if Poms can pick it up ?
It's on the ABC website
www.abc.net.au/cricket
However might not be available out of Australia.
FWIW I recently found a TV stream of the Australia v India test series by googling and following assorted links.
Anyway back to the commentary with Aust nearly 200 ahead....
Or imagine a game of cricket....
- That is only played by one country (to any decent level) and yet hosts a World Series.
- Where players are allowed to use buckets to catch the ball.
- Where bowlers can bowl straight to third slip if they think the batsman is a bit too good for them.
- Where batsmen throw punches at the bowler if he manages to hit them.
- Where all drugs from chewing tobacco to steroids are considered compulsory.
For Bryson to use Baseball
For Bryson to use Baseball as an exemplar to criticise cricket is simply ludicrous. Baseball is essentially rounders, a game played by young children.
Mmm
I could be wrong, but isn't the World Series called the World Series because the original sponsor was 'The World' newspaper? I don't think the original intent was to claim at as a world championship.
And baseball is the most popular sport in Japan. They seem to play it pretty well.
And...
Cuba. And Venezuela. And the Dominican Republic. And most other Latin American Caribbean-rim countries.
I like baseball precisely because - like cricket - it doesn't really lend itself to YouTube best-of compilations. It's about what's been done and what remains to be done in the light of all the different types of conditioning factors (balls, bases, outs, innings, runs, hits, and so on) that apply, rather than what's actually happening at any given time. I like it because a bunted ball dribbling off a bat can, in certain circumstances, be as dramatic and game-changing as belting the ball out of the park - not unlike how Boycott taking what seemed like a fortnight to notch up a fifty would ultimately be of more import than Botham swinging like a madman with a machete.
I also like baseball because it's inspired some of the best writing in the English language of the last few decades. If you think Neville Cardus was more than a good sports writer, wait till you've read Roger Angell.
And, finally, anyone tempted to dismiss baseball as glorified rounders and therefore somehow beneath Real Men should listen to this: a YouTube compilation that does do baseball justice. It makes Big Sam Allardyce sound like Brian Sewell. (NSFW but, hey, it's Saturday:)
World Newspaper
I hadn't heard that but wikipedia claims it to be a myth.
I love baseball...
But the story about the World Series being named after a newspaper or corporate sponsor is a myth. As it says on Snopes:
Full story here.