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Schadenfreude
Major victories do not come often for the Royals. As far as relatively recent history goes, we mostly just have that time we swept the Cardinals in St Louis. The next best thing is for the Yankees to lose. If we are the ones to beat them then so much the better, but watching the Yankees lose when it really matters almost literally leaves a sweet taste in one’s mouth. There are many things to hate about the Yankees: their arrogance, their selfishness, the fact that they think they are entitled to victories and the fact that their glory hunters fill Kauffman Stadium every time they come to town. Robinson Cano recently added another one by snubbing Billy Butler for the Home Run Derby. Billy is not quite a bona fide home run hitter it is true, but he is having a very good year and has actually hit more home runs than Prince Fielder right now. More importantly, however, the Home Run Derby is there to put on a show for the fans and the show would have been a lot nicer with Billy Butler playing in front of his home town crowd. It does not matter which league wins, in fact more than a few Royals fans were cheering for Carlos Beltran of the National League!
But Cano, after hinting that he might choose Butler, chose Mark Trumbo instead. He decided that his league winning a meaningless contest was more important than entertaining the fans who were paying to watch. It was a very typically Yankee thing to do; he may as well have actually stuck two fingers up at the fans. But Royals fans are a mostly knowledgeable bunch. They recognised the snub and responded appropriately: they booed Cano in batting practice, they booed Cano when he was announced and they booed him when he came to the plate whilst mixing in some ‘Billy Butler’ chants. All that was to be expected, but where they really shone was that they never let up. It would have been easy to throw some boos at him and then return to ‘normal service’, but they did not. They booed every pitch to him and roared every time he failed to hit a home run. It clearly got ot Cano who stepped out twice to towel himself off and take another drink of Gatorade. No other player had stepped out at all as far as I had seen. His reception continued and Cano did not manage to hit a single home run, the only player to so fail. Cano snubbed Kansas City and was brought to his knees by our fans. It almost tastes as good as Alex Rodriguez striking out to end the Yankees season last October. I have never been prouder to be a Royals fan; we may be few but we are the best in baseball.
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Wimbledon finals
Later today is the Wimbledon ladies’ final with the gentlemen’s title being decided tomorrow. More on the gentlemen’s final below, but of the two the ladies’ final looks like it could be the more interesting match. Serena Williams upset both Petra Kvitova and Victoria Azarenka en route to the final and will face Agnieszka Radwanska, who has managed to advance fairly quietly to the final. Being the incredibly partial person that I am, the most notice I took of her up to now was probably when she beat Heather Watson in the third round. Her path was somewhat cleared ahead of time by Sharapova losing, however, and she never really seemed to have a ‘big’ match up to now.
Radwanska and Williams should make for an interesting match because they have very contrasting styles. Williams is a powerful striker of the ball, to use some parlance usually reserved for T20. She is almost a tennis version of a T20 player, though; her game almost begins and ends at hitting the cover off the ball. She serves very hard and hits a lot of aces, whereas Radwanska is more defensive and focuses on cutting out errors. To continue the cricketing analogy, Radwanska is one who plays tennis in a manner reminiscent of Jonathan Trott or Alastair Cook playing cricket. It’s not terribly flashy or expansive, but it tends to be very technically correct and without a lot of risk of errors. Williams has defeated Radwanska in both of their previous head to head matches, but both were four years ago. In this tournament at least, I think the contrast of style favours Radwanska.
Looking at the stats from their first six matches, it is quickly clear that Radwanska has won a lot of matches through her opponents errors, whilst Williams has won hers with aces and winners. Radwanska has got this far despite conceding more winners than she has hit, but her opponents have committed twice the number of unforced errors that she has. For Williams, the inverse is true: she has committed one more unforced error than her opponents, but has hit close to twice the number of winners. It is certainly possible for Williams to overpower Radwanska. However, Radwanska will not give Williams very much at all and Williams is going to have to be fairly accurate with her shots. If she starts to have a comparable number of unforced errors to winners then Radwanska will find herself in a very comfortable position. It is on that point that I expect the match will turn and for two reasons I think Radwanska goes into it with an advantage. The first reason is the simple one of adrenaline: Williams is a seasoned competitor, but she has been away from the top for some time and I would be quite surprised if there is not a bit more zip to her shots. This can lead to inaccuracy at the best of times, but especially when combined with the other factor: weariness. Williams has also reached the doubles final with her sister and has thus been playing every day all week, sometimes more than once due to the rain. Tired players in any sport tend to be less precise and Williams’ schedule could be her undoing.
I would not want to be nailed into a firm prediction, but that is how I think the odds favour and I do hope that I am correct as I very much dislike the way Serena Williams plays. It is an awful, ugly ‘brute force’ style of tennis and one that I very much do not want to be rewarded. If she finds success it will simply encourage other players to follow that style. Already the women’s game is showing signs of turning into a game of errors and Williams winning will only worsen it. Furthermore, her attitude toward the officials bears a striking similarity to that of a New York Yankee. We saw it most clearly at the US Open last year; there is a strong sense of entitled smugness and I hate it. Beyond any desire for my analysis to be correct, I simply hate watching her play tennis and I hope she loses and loses badly.
Of course, it is the final on Sunday on which most will focus their attention. Regardless of the winner, some sort of history will be made: either Andy Murray will become the first British man to win Wimbledon since 1936 (and he has already become the first one into the final since then) or Roger Federer will return to the number one ranking and break the record for most weeks at number one. The former would certainly be more dramatic, but it is the latter which is far more likely. Djokovic may have been a bit below his best in the semi-final, but Federer was still extremely impressive. Murray has had the benefit of Nadal going out early and has never really looked convincing. He has certainly done well, Tonga and Ferrer are not pushovers, but still he has never really looked dominant against the opponents he has faced. One very strongly gets the impression that Federer will not let Murray off the hook if the latter slips a bit, but that Murray might let Federer off if the reverse happens. Britain has ended her wait for a gentlemen’s finalist at Wimbledon, but I expect her wait for a gentlemen’s champion will go on for a bit yet.
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Poor preparation
With now exactly two weeks before the start of the abbreviated series against South Africa, I have been thinking about scheduling again. Obviously I am cross and have been for some time that the series is only three matches. Even without questioning the ECB’s rationale in playing five ODIs against Australia (though it is a very foolish rationale) the scheduling is poor.
That the series against South Africa is too short is not in doubt. It is the number one side in the world playing the number two side with the winner getting the top spot. To play it only over three matches is lunacy; it ought to be at least four. What is maddening is that the schedule could have easily accommodated a full length Test series and the ECB’s desired ODIs. Even if there were no way to squeeze in seven Tests and 13 ODIs (and the only reason that there is not is because of the World T20 and even then it’s close) then the arrangement could have and should have been different. For one thing, there was no need for a third Test against the West Indies. Whilst no one could have predicted so far ahead of time that it would have been a washout anyway, almost everyone managed to predict that it was going to be a dead rubber. I am no fan of two Test series, but in this case it would have been very much the lesser of two evils. A far better option, however, would have been to simply reduce the number of ODIs being played against South Africa and the West Indies. We are playing a combined eight matches against them, it would have been very easy to cut out three and play a usual seven Test/ten ODI summer.
Those solutions assume we have to play those five ODIs against Australia this summer for the ECB to accomplish its goal of preparing England for the World Cup, but that is not even true. These ODIs are actually supposed to be more for Australia’s benefit than England’s; it is allowing them to prepare for the Champions Trophy in reciprocation for England playing in Australia ahead of the World Cup. But the Champions Trophy is next year and we are playing the normal Ashes related ODIs against Australia then anyway. Surely Australia would prepare better by simply having those ODIs moved in front of the Champions Trophy, just as England’s matches in Oz will immediately precede the World Cup. This seems like a solution that would not only allow us to play four (or five) Tests against South Africa like we ought to, but also to allow the ECB to get their desired pre-World Cup preparation and actually improve Australia’s pre-Champions Trophy preparation.
It is, of course, a bit late to be complaining about fixtures that were set over a year ago, but the reason I bring it up is because I think England may not only have robbed the fans of a good series, but also put themselves at a bit of a disadvantage by playing so much white ball cricket ahead of an important Test series. England will go into the first Test against South Africa with many of their players having played seven limited overs matches and no significant red ball cricket since the end of the second Test. Strauss at least will play a bit for Somerset and I am hoping Jimmy and KP (both of whom are missing some or all of the series against Oz) will play in the Surrey v Lancashire match at Guildford the week before the Test series starts, though I am not optimistic. It probably won’t be a massive problem for England, but it is a bit troubling especially given how good at preparation Flower and Strauss usually are. It is worth remembering that when England were playing warmup matches before the 2010/11 Ashes, Australia were playing ODIs against Sri Lanka. This was not the difference in the series, England were always going to be far too good for Australia, but it was another advantage given to England. With the series against South Africa looking like it may be a very close one and every difference magnified due to the shortness of the series, this is certainly an area where England should have done better.
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An improvement for T20s
This is not a rant about T20; as I believe I have said before I do not mind the format per se but rather some (indeed many) of its applications. So my suggestion for improving it does not involve scrapping it entirely or anything radical such as that. It instead deals with the problem of rain shortened matches such as the one we saw today between Nottinghamshire and Lancashire. Lancs batted for twenty overs as set Notts 179 to win. The rains came with Notts 7-0 after one over and left them a D/L target of 49 off five overs which they chased comfortably. The obvious problem was that the D/L revised target was quite low. Notts had all of their wickets in hand and could go for it. One big over against Arafat was enough to all but end the match as a contest. However, I think to blame D/L misses a deeper and more important point.
The D/L discrepancy was a problem, but I actually think it is a very minor one. Theoretically the system can be tweaked (and I believe that it is tweaked as new data comes in), but I do not think there is any adjustment that could have helped in this situation. No matter what total is set over five overs it will not have the same dynamic of a full chase and more importantly I don’t think there is any ‘fair’ way to do it. Only playing five overs means two things: that wickets are entirely irrelevant, run rate is all that matters, and that the required rate will almost always jump to either unobtainable heights or drop so low that it becomes easy. In effect then it is a one over contest. Today, Notts got 18 off a single over to render the required rate miniscule. The low target and wickets in hand made it easier for them to do that then the corollary of Lancs bowling a very tight over, but if Lancs had done so it would have come close to ending the match in their favour as well. And that would apply even if the D/L target had been higher; it would have just made it easier for Lancs to have a good over than Notts. Either way though it isn’t a proper contest. Five overs is simply too few.
The best way to improve T20s then is not to tweak D/L (though I still think that should happen, it just isn’t the most important thing to do) but to increase the minimum number of overs for matches interrupted halfway by rain and more flexibility in shortening matches before the rain starts. Most people suspected ahead of time that today’s match would be rain-affected and if they had decided ahead of time to play ten, or even five, overs a side instead of Lancs getting a full twenty and Notts getting five it would have been a perfectly fair contest. In situations where that is not feasible, however, the minimum number of overs has to be increased. If start times are brought forward and cutoff times moved back (as well as being made more flexible) I believe this can be done without a considerable increase in the number of matches without a result. Even if there is some increase, however, I think the majority of fans will understand the logic though I concede that is speculation. Certainly there should be some sort of effort to get the most overs in as possible. The current system does not produce a proper contest.
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T20 format and situation
We’re just past the summer solstice and that means that in England the county season has shifted entirely to the group stage of the Friends Life T20. I have not been following it as closely as the championship, but the timing does make it substantially easier for me and I have kept an eye on it. The structure is much different this year with the effect that it is shorter. Instead of each team playing sixteen matches each team only plays ten and as a result they are all much more meaningful. There is a strong incentive to finish in the top two of the group and a fairly strong one to finish at the top and there is not a lot of room for error. It is early yet, but I think the ECB have hit upon a successful format. Which is why they are trying to change it for next year, of course.
The current table in the North Group sees the Red Rose in third following a disappointing loss away in the Roses match. Yorkshire actually top the table, but Lancashire are still very much in the hunt. They would actually qualify for the quarter-finals as one of the second best third place sides right now and have a match in hand against most of the other sides in the North Group. Of four matches left to play, two stand out: the home Roses clash against top of the table Yorkshire is the most obvious but there is also the trip to Trent Bridge to play second placed Notts. Winning both of those would give Lancs some leeway against Derbyshire and Durham. As I said above though: every match is important in this new tournament format and Lancs will be very keen to avoid another slip up against Derbyshire. Lancs could easily be two points better off and in a fairly comfortable position were it not for an early defeat to Derbyshire in a match they ought to have won comfortably and that could yet cost them.
I think that Lancashire have played very well so far in the T20. They had just hit a good run of form in the LV=CC before the break and their batting in particular has been incredible. Lancashire’s run rate in the competition so far is over 8.5 an over; that works out to 170 per innings. That will win most matches and so far it has done. A horror over by Mahmood cost them early though and they were outplayed by Yorkshire (and I so hate typing that, even in a T20). Those are the only two losses so far, however. I think we can win at least three of the remaining matches, though I am not sure how we will do against Notts. We have not yet played them and they look fairly good. All things considered then, I think Lancs will make it to the quarter-finals and although it’s a crapshoot from there we can have a go at improving on last year’s result.
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2012 Cowdrey Lecture
Tony Greig was invited to give this year’s MCC Cowdrey Lecture on the spirit of cricket. It appeared slightly an odd choice; the name Greig is hardly synonymous with ‘spirit of cricket’. With his reputation and the rather tough act he had to follow in Sangakkara last year it was always going to be a bit tricky for him, one felt. Still, I felt that he acquitted himself as well as could be expected. I am no fan of Greig, in fact I think there are few worse commentators in the world, but he did give an interesting and mostly intelligent speech.
It did not go down well in all quarters, however. Specifically it was very poorly received in India where it was interpreted as an attack on them. This is not unfair; the main theme of his lecture was to call for greater responsibility from the BCCI. However, the only thing he said about India that was factually incorrect was when he conflated the Indian broadcaster, ESPNStar Sports, with the board itself. In fact, I thought he was rather generous overall, making sure he gave credit to India where it was due and in one case where I thought it was not due. Looking through the #CowdreyLecture hashtag on Twitter during the speech, the biggest thing I noticed (apart from the predictable and laughable accusation of jealousy) was that none of the complaints addressed what he actually said about India. Most of those criticising him were complaining that he was just attacking India as though that was a legitimate counter. It did not seem to cross their mind that perhaps he had a reason to do so, that perhaps India were actually in the wrong. There was also the slightly more legitimate accusation of hypocrisy given Greig’s involvement in World Series Cricket and continued involvement with Channel Nine. Whilst not unreasonable on the face of it, this is still a tu quoque logical fallacy. Greig is not a paragon of virtue; he has erred with respect to the spirit of cricket before. But, and this is important, that does not invalidate what were statements of fact about India.
Those statements of fact centred on India’s current dominance of the world game through it’s finances and it’s apparent indifference to Test cricket. No sane person could deny that India control the world game right now and I very much doubt any sane person would deny that they do so with only their own best interests in mind. At almost exactly the same time as Greig was giving his lecture, the BCCI managed to quash without a vote a recommendation by the ICC to make the DRS universal. Every board save India use the DRS. It’s accuracy has been independently verified and it has clearly been shown to reduce incorrect decisions. And yet India’s knee-jerk Luddism and privileged position on the ICC mean that it can unilaterally opt out. That is but one stark example of the BCCI being able to do as they please without any regard to the rest of the world. Arguably the biggest, however, is the IPL. The BCCI take no notice of the international calendar when scheduling it and have no qualms about poaching players from national sides for their own profit. The excuse usually given, that ten per cent of the contract goes to the home board, is entirely spurious: it still undermines and devalues all international cricket played during that time. (In any case, the boards only get that money if the player signed a contract with them. Thus the West Indies got nothing when Gayle was absent and the same would apply to any player who declined to sign a contract.) Greig was absolutely right to take the BCCI to task over this because it is not only a great threat to the game it is one that could be solved. The BCCI’s actions are not cricket in the most literal sense. The entire game would be better off if they would play.
This is not to say that Greig’s speech was perfect, far from it. He at one point advocated the use of lie detectors to root out corruption despite their being laughably inaccurate. He said that he expected it would only be a burden on a handful of players, but his expectations fly in the face of reality. He also praised India for touring smaller nations and thus giving them a significant cash boon. It is true that they do so, sometimes, but they are required to under the Future Tours Programme and in fact have not played Pakistan in five years now. They have also never invited Bangladesh to tour and overall do less to help the smaller nations than most! The threat of their contravening the FTP and refusing to play smaller nations is also what allows them to form a voting bloc in the ICC.
His proposed solutions also left a bit to be desired. He stated, quite correctly, that no domestic event should take scheduling preference over international matches. This needed to be said, despite the fact that it ought to be self evident. England do not get to try to poach players from international matches for the County Championship. No one has ever discussed putting an LVCC window in the international calendar. Greig did point out, however, that this is area for potential compromise. In exchange for shortening the tournament and giving smaller nations a greater financial stake the international boards could agree to leave a window for the IPL. Given that the BCCI have expressed no desire for a window, however, this seems unlikely. He also wants a northern hemisphere franchise based T20 with English, Irish and West Indian teams competing. I have heard other calls for an English franchise league, but there is no reason to believe that this would be a good thing. Given that England are number one in the world in T20s and current T20 world champions, there is absolutely no reason to tinker with the current model.
Tony Greig is not a man I admire. He is not a man I even like; when I saw that he would be giving the lecture my first thought was to try to guess what bit of authentic memorabilia he would be trying to hawk. But as the cliché goes even a broken clock is right twice a day (assuming one has an analogue clock) and so too was Greig spot on in his comments about India. The BCCI’s selfish actions are not cricket and if they are allowed to continue in this manner the game in twenty years will be a poorer one than it is today.
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England v Italy suggestions
England play Italy in the last of the quarter-finals tomorrow. It’s hard to say who are the favourites; England have done better, but in an overall worse group. It is I think certainly far to say that England will need to come up with a far better performance than they did against Ukraine in the last group match.
In that match England sat back for long periods of time and whilst they did do a good job of soaking up the pressure, they never looked particularly comfortable. They looked weak in the midfield and very weak in attack. The one goal came rather fortuitously and even more fortuitously for Rooney who had been sub-par. He was not helped, however, by the midfielders putting balls into the box that were much better suited for someone like Carroll. I wanted Carroll to start before the match and he probably would have buried a couple of chances that Rooney did not, but the other players on the pitch should have known who was up front and adjusted accordingly. England were also a bit fortunate with a goal not being given against them, but it was a case of two wrongs making a right: the striker had been offside anyway. It was a victory, and ultimately more than they needed with France losing 2-0, but not convincing and it seems unlikely that such a performance will be enough for a win over Italy.
For that match, I think England need to start Carroll alongside Rooney. Rooney looked like he should have come off the bench against Ukraine, but hopefully now he has shaken off some of that rust. He and Carroll offer contrasting options in attack and I think the combination of them will suit England well. The obvious person to leave out would be Milner who has not done much so far, but our midfield looked weak anyway against Ukraine and a 4-3-3 might not help matters. That said, I think part of the reason for the midfield being weak was that they had little desire to attack. The strategy was to sit back and let Ukraine have the ball. A 4-3-3 might give some encouragement to the midfielders to get the ball and go forward. In the end, I would leave out Milner and play Walcott in his stead with Welbeck the unlucky man. (Though a probable sub.) There is a good argument to be made that Walcott’s pace is best used in reserve against tiring defenders, but I think England will need to play at a higher tempo against Italy from the word go and Walcott is a good way to do that.
If England play well, they can certainly win; Italy did not look terribly convincing in their group matches. I would put England slight favourites and am guessing a 2-1 scoreline.
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England v India preview
The Indian women’s team are in England this summer for two T20s and five ODIs. They return having played in the quadrangular series last season and fared quite poorly then. For England, it will be the first series since the retirement of Isa Guha. To say that the smart money in this series is on England would be an understatement. More correct would be to say that the sane money is on an England side who won all ten completed T20s they have played since the start of last summer and nine out of ten ODIs.
England have had the better results for the very simple reason that they have had the better players. If one makes a direct comparison of players, all the lists are dominated by Englishwomen. In the T20s, the two best averages and strike rates over the past twelve months belong to Sarah Taylor and the captain Charlotte Edwards. Looking farther back, over the past two years, India do not have a single batsman who averages over 25, has a strike rate over fifty and has scored at least a hundred runs. England have three. India have an excellent T20 bowler in Jhulan Goswami, but over the past twelve months she has been second best to Anya Shrubsole in wickets per match, average and economy. England also have a much better attack overall; Goswami has not been well supported by her colleagues.
The comparison of ODI statistics is even more dramatic. Each side has played ten ODIs in the past twelve months in which time England have had five centurions and India none. England have also had nine scores between fifty and a hundred to India’s eight. Most damningly, of batsmen who have scored at least 100 runs total there are three Englishwomen who average over fifty, but the top Indian average is a mere 33. As in the T20 stats, India are able to claw a little bit back in the bowling department. England still have a clear advantage, however, especially with Katherine Brunt returning after being rested for the tour to New Zealand.
This should be a fairly straightforward victory for England. They are literally a professional side and are on home soil. On paper at least, India are simply outclassed. Given the superior backing that the England side have, it is probably unfair to expect too much from India. Unfortunately there will be no Tests; those seem to be reserved for the Ashes now. (It is probably just as well for India, however, seeing how their men’s side did in England last summer!) In the seven matches that will be played, I expect England to win both T20s and at least four of the five ODIs. There is no reason why they cannot pull off a whitewash, but all of the limited overs formats can get a bit unpredictable.
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Squad rotation
With England winning the first two ODIs fairly effortlessly, the main talking point ahead of the third has been that like in the Tests England are resting important members of the squad for the dead rubber. In the Test series I was very much against this. Whilst it was a lovely opportunity for Finn and Onions, England were a clearly reduced side and would have had a tough time had the rain not ruined all. (I will note for the sake of fairness that the match was already all but gone when the decision was made to rest Broad.) I am not nearly as opposed in this case, however, and would actually rest players a bit more.
One of the main reasons to oppose rotation in Test matches is that there are no unimportant Tests. (There are other good reasons as well, but that is one of the main ones.) This is not the case in ODIs however and in fact I am rather sympathetic to the argument that there are no important ODIs. A Test is the highest form of the game and is remembered very differently to an ODI. The success or otherwise of a tour is marked by Test results; last summer there would have been a very real difference between whitewashing India and only winning 3-0 or 3-1. But England’s win in the subsequent ODI series made no difference and for me at least was forgot almost before it was over. This is partly due to the format itself and partly due to the World Cup stripping the bilateral series of meaning. (After all, what does it matter if you lose every bilateral series if you win the World Cup?) Every team should certainly do everything they can to win every Test, but it is much harder to say that of ODIs.
Another reason for resting ODI players is that there are so many more ODIs than Tests. (Which is it’s own problem, of course.) This summer England will play six Tests and 13 ODIs. Over the winter it will be a more reasonable seven Tests and ten ODIs, before having to play a Mickey Mouse tournament at home next summer in addition to the bilateral ODIs. Few if any of those matches will have any real meaning and I actually think it would be a very bad idea to try to play the same, or nearly the same, XI in all of them. There is no reason to risk the players getting an injury. If it is used periodically, ie: not just for dead rubbers, it seems like the most logical approach.
The main argument against resting players is that it does not seem fair on the playing public to get a reduced XI. This is a reasonable concern, I think. I am not advocating playing a second XI, however, nor do I think Flower and Cook ever would do so. To play a different seam attack or a few young batsmen is not a dramatic blow to England’s chances of winning, especially if the rotation is done consistently and constantly. The shorter format is random enough anyway that there is no reason to suspect that spectators would get a reduced performance. I also think that the spectators are smart enough to understand the logic of rotation and few if any would be going to see just one player. If even football fans can do this then I am sure cricket fans can.
Defensive Indifference 