County Championship, Cricket, ECB, Rants, T20, Thoughts

My Name’s Ned Seagoon, Sorry, David Morgan

The news that David Morgan’s review into the county season is to be accepted by the ECB comes as no real surprise.  Coming on the back of England’s number 1 test side status, this effort by Morgan seems a bit odd to say the least.  Yes, we’re the best test side in the world so let’s cut the first class cricket that made us so and bend over for the Champions League.

Currently we have two Championship divisions of nine teams.  16 games is the sensible, logical and balanced approach to have – each team plays the others in its division home and away.  How is a cut to 14 games per season going to work? Which teams miss out on playing each other, why and under what process is this determined?  The idea is fundamentally flawed.

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Fixing, ICC, International Cricket, Pakistan

The Spot-fixing Mess

The trial is over.  Though we still have the inevitable appeals to come.  The fixer and the three cricketers are now spending their time at the invitation of Her Britannic Majesty as sentenced by Mr Justice Cooke, whose comments are worth reading.

This whole thing has been bemusing, bewitching, infuriating, confounding but above all deeply saddening.  As revelation after revelation was reported on Twitter by @Cricketer_RDJ, Yates could be seen going about his work with looks of all those feelings on his face.  The game Yates loves, the game which stood as a byword for everything right and proper, the game Yates has spent years of his life watching, discussing and following has been betrayed, vilely soiled upon from a great height.

And it may never be the same again.

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BBC, Broadcasting, County Championship, Cricket, Reporting

Save County Cricket From BBC Axe

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The cuts announced by the BBC have caused a lot of concern for those employed by the nation’s public service broadcaster.  The Licence Fee is a unique way of funding, some argue it to be anachronistic and tax-like in these modern times but it supposedly serves to keep the BBC as a public service broadcaster.

The possibility that the BBC’s local radio stations are under threat from these cuts and a review exercise brings the unpleasant possibility that its excellent coverage of county cricket may fall under the axe.  If that happens then I believe that the BBC will have completely lost the right to call itself a public service broadcaster and should lose the Licence Fee completely.

The BBC does a lot wrong.  Paying Jonathan Ross obscene amounts of money to make knob gags being one.  Not bidding for the rights to show test cricket on television is another.  There are things that need to be changed at the BBC.  However, it must be said that the BBC does at least a few things right.  Its coverage of county cricket on the radio and over the internet is excellent.

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Rants, Reporting

Tabloid Crapola Spreading

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Seems Yates is a bit cranky of late.  Well too bad.  My blog, I write what I like.  There’s a lot of good things to write about and a couple of bad ones.  It’s one of the bad ones that gets an airing tonight though.

Yates is getting pretty annoyed with the regular references to the overseas birthplaces of England players in reports.  ESPNCricinfo’s report on the call up of Surrey’s Stuart Meaker being the latest example.

Meaker is yet another player to have been born in South Africa

Now Yates would expect tabloid crapola from the likes of the red tops and the Daily Heil (none of which Yates reads) but to see ESPNCricinfo going in for this is, quite frankly, extremely disappointing.  It smacks of poor and lazy journalism.  I expected better from ESPNCricinfo and Andrew McGlashan.

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County Championship, Thoughts, Yorkshire

Yorkshire Down, Graves Fires From The Hip

Yorkshire’s relegation from Division 1 of the County Championship has met with a stinging, scathing response from executive chairman Colin Graves.  Given that he’s underwriting the club’s £20 million debt he’s probably justified in being somewhat critical of his club’s 1st XI performances this season.

From what Yates knows of Yorkshire folk, there will be plenty of them wanting to have their say about the 1st XI’s performance too.  And you can bet that they won’t be holding back in their criticism either.

One thing that’s always irritated Yates is the saying “We don’t deserve to be in the [whatever division is lower than the one a relegation threatened team is facing] division.”

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BCCI, ICC, International Cricket

Alternative ICC Awards

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The annual self-congratulatory ICC Awards bash is being held today.  There will be the usual awards which won’t really inspire, surprise or generate pages of discussion on the internet.  Unless we include the “OMG! Why isn’t SACHIN the winner of every award?” fandrones out there.

Cynical? Maybe.  But what purpose does this bash actually serve other than a self-promotion tool for the ICC?

So let’s jazz things up a bit by suggesting a few awards of our own for Haroon Lorgat to consider.  Let’s start the ball rolling with a couple of suggestions…

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BCCI, Commentators, International Cricket

Oi! BCCI! Back Off!

The stuffing that India’s cricketers have taken from England has focused attention on several aspects of India’s cricket.  Most notably the fielding of the India team has been some of the worst Yates has seen in recent times.  When Yates says “I would be embarrassed to have fielded like that!” then you are in trouble.  Yates has seen plenty of village fielding and had a few of his own village moments.  That India team did not perform like a team whose fielding coach is Trevor Penney.  Yates has seen better fielding efforts from five year old children and mid 30 year olds coming out of hospital after operations on their knackers.

So when Nasser Hussain compared India’s fielding efforts to those of donkeys many will have felt the comparison justified if somewhat lacking in critical sting.  Yates has heard far stronger and less politically correct terms used to describe India’s efforts in the field in this series.

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CB40, County Championship, Cricket, T20, Thoughts

Cricket Thoughts: Scheduling

There are plenty of discussions going on about the state of the game and in particular the scheduling of games during the cricket season. Legside Lizzy and George Dobell are two whose thoughts are well worth reading.

Yates has heard a fair few people say that the schedule is crazy and needs to be streamlined and is not unsympathetic to both sides of the discussion.  If you’ve tried to schedule something involving groups of people you will know that it is nigh on impossible to please everyone and that someone somewhere will always have a whinge and a bitch.

As a returning spectator this season here are a few things that have struck me during my visits to the Kia Oval.

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Cricket

Opening Up

We walk out to bat, call for a leg stump guard and dig a trench along that line.  We dig like Jonathan Trott, of whom we are great supporters.  We walk away, get into our little bubble – we don’t care if anyone is annoyed by it – walk back to the stumps and take our guard.

Welcome to Don’t Chase The Wide Ones, a new blog centred around cricket.  Things may run off at a tangent but the central aspect of DCTWO will be cricket, often with a Surrey and England slant.  Some posts will be humorous, some will be reportage and some will be questioning, critical and/or challenging of something or someone that we think needs Cluesticking (that is, a smack upside the head with a Clue stick).

DCTWO is a journey.  Check out the Author & Agenda page to learn a little more about DCTWO.

There are some sincerely held beliefs here at DCTWO, just so people can see where we’re coming from.

  • We enjoy good cricket, from whichever team it comes
  • We like good fish and chips and a bar that serves cider and soft drinks at reasonable prices
  • We don’t have it in for any team, not even Glamorgan (Yates is a Jamie Dalrymple fan)
  • We’re not malicious unless it’s the PCB in which case it’s well deserved
  • A 6 is a 6 and not a “DLF maximum”
  • We’re alarmed at the number of people in cricket administration who need Cluesticking
  • Ijaz Butt and Andrew Hilditch are two people in dire need of severe Cluesticking
  • Justin Vaughan needs to be cut loose from his BCCI branded gimp outfit and readjusted to society.  His gutless role in the Shane Bond story will never be forgotten
  • The BCCI is far too big for its boots and needs bringing down to size
  • Quite why Daryl Harper and Asoka de Silva stayed as international umpires for so long bemuses us

The guard is marked, DCTWO’s innings has started.  Let’s play.

Remember: be smart, be safe – don’t chase the wide ones.