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Last updated on March 6th, 2018 at 12:29 am
The Australian Test team is too good:
Yesterday’s events re-emphasised how no one country can come close to Australia at present … Australian captain Ricky Ponting could only agree that such exercises in shooting fish in barrels do not bode well for the welfare of Test cricket.
What to do? The Australian proposes a handicap system:
The most obvious solution would be to give opposing teams a head start, based on a sliding scale: say 200 runs for the bottom-ranked Bangladeshis, scaling down to 50 runs for the halfway-decent English. On a similar principle, we could offer our opponents anywhere between one and five extra batsmen and fielders.
Maybe we should force all the Australians to bat left-handed. The ones who don’t already (Langer, Hayden, Lehmann, Gilchrist) that is. Perhaps Harry Hutton, a skilled problem solver and diplomat, can work something out.
I dunno, Tim. The only sport I really follow is Unlicensed Boxing in my local barn. Maybe the Australians could wear panties, to lower their self-esteem? Or play with live dingoes down their trousers.
If I think of anything, I�ll get back to you.
Posted by Harry Hutton on 12/20 at 01:20 PM • permalink
Oh yeah, a handicap system, that’d be great!
Just imagine how much pride the winning team would feel when they lift that trophy/cup knowing that the only way they could win was to have a head-start on Australia. That’s the way to bring back pride into the game! Great idea!
On a serious note, the thing that really turns me off cricket is the sledging by Australian players and the incessant triumphalism. Tone down the fist pumping boys – we already know how good you are.
It leaves me as an Australian feeling a little uncomfortable (a bit like having a dingo down your strides, perhaps?).
Matt from Brisbane
Posted by CausalNexus on 12/20 at 01:45 PM • permalink
Just ‘cause Shoaib (and anyone else for that matter) carries on like a pork chop when he gets a wicket, doesn’t mean Australia should follow suit. I thought it was a gentlemen’s game – as the undisputed world champions, shouldn’t the Aussie boys be leading by example?
Posted by CausalNexus on 12/20 at 02:54 PM • permalink
Good call Crusader, even more than 18 players, up to 22 in some early English tours to Canada and Australia.
Check out some early cricket tours, the tour to France aborted by the Revolution, the first international tour to Canada, the first international series (betweeen Candada and US), first tour to Australia sponsored by the railway pie makers.
Extract “In a special exhibition at the M.C.G. Dr. Grace and partners batted against eleven Victorians to show how he could perform against a normal contingent of fielders. He scored 100 in 58 minutes. Sam Cosstick became disgruntled with his part in the proceedings, and let fly three �beamers�. The press reported �the missiles passed near enough to the. Leviathan�s body to make him wince�. The game stopped forthwith and Sam was placated with the aid of liquid refreshments.”
- Sorry.
early cricket toursCheck out the bottom of the page under the heading The Role of Commerce and Gambling in the rise of cricket.Extracts
Oliver Cromwell�s rule was a critical period. He banned Sunday cricket and one of his strategies to subjugate the Irish was to order that all the cricket bats and balls in Ireland be collected and burnt by the common hangman. Large numbers of the nobility quit London during the puritan administration to pass the time on their country estates waiting for the restoration of a good old�fashioned monarch. There they discovered that their gardeners and ploughmen had a jolly good game going in their spare time.Not surprisingly, betting was a vital part of the early game in Australia. An early single-wicket contest in Tasmania was played for five pounds and a bottle of wine, and on the Sydney domain when negotiable currency in the form of coin and folding money was in short supply, wagers on early matches were laid in such items as sawn timber, fat pigs, boots, butter and salt fish.
When one of W.G. Grace�s teams looked like losing to Victoria, W.G. allegedly used the newly installed telegraph to warn his friends in London to lay off some of their bets. Bookmakers in the main stand at the S.C.G. in 1879 were blamed for a riot which almost ended cricketing relations between Australia and England. The English captain, Lord Harris, claimed that the bookmakers urged a mob of larrikins to invade the field when a Sydney batsman was controversially given out.
I for one am quite content to watch the aussies humiliate one hapless nation after another. I can’t believe any patriotic cricket-loving aussie has a problem with it.
Would you prefer to see us lose?
I love nothing more than watching us smash four hundred on day one, then tear through the opposition batsmen in a session, and then really turn it on the second dig.
Maybe the ICC could arrange it so that only Australian teams have to play in strict accordance with the rules, while opposition teams are permitted to prepare inadequate pitches and bowl with a suspect action. Oh, wait…
I think the situation will correct itself. By pissing off Dennis Lillee, Cricket Australia has ensured that the greatest fast bowler in history will now be helping overseas teams to beat Australia, with the benefit of local knowledge and inside info. And I’ve no doubt that within a few decades, Pakistani batsmen will learn not to limply dangle their bats away from their bodies in response to short balls above off stump inshallah.
Posted by Jim Geones on 12/20 at 11:18 PM • permalink
In the case of Pakistan, Australia can allow the entire Pakistani team to bat but will only have Langer and Hayden bat for them (only Langer’s score counts).
I think that even then, the Pakistanis will be humiliated. It’s sad really.
Posted by Isaac Schrödinger on 12/20 at 11:58 PM • permalink
- The Aussies should bat wearing skis, and when fielding should have to wear those big foam hands that the crowd wear.
And for drinks, they have to each skoll six shots of bundy.Posted by FusterCluck on 12/21 at 09:55 AM • permalink
First time in YOUR history matey…
The one thing I’ve noticed about Poms is that they have loud and strong opinions about sport, yet demonstrate a poor understanding or knowledge (and capability). You are a classic case.
Australia has the world record for test match wins with 16 between 1999 and 2001.
You’re half way there pal.
As I said to some pommy twat who swanned past me in the park on Sunday wearing a Jonny PillowBiter jersey:
There’s a man living in the past.
Get a Bob Willis and a John Snow and I’ll take a look at you.
http://www.howstat.com.au/cricket/Statistics/Matches/MatchConsecutive.asp?Stat=1
Ahhh, cricket… for people who can’t stand the fast pace of baseball…
Posted by richard mcenroe on 12/22 at 12:38 PM • permalink
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Darren Lehmann batting left handed is already a big help to the opposition. He’s great at smashing around Bangladesh, but once the ball starts coming at him at a fast pace he shits himself. Michael Clark is no better against the quick stuff.