South Africa win by an innings and 27 runs

In a way it is a bit difficult to know what to make of New Zealand’s performance in the Cape Town Test. On the one hand, it was clearly poor; they were bowled out for 45 in the first innings. But after that they actually fought back well and although there was never a chance to win the match they actually came rather closer than they ought to have to avoiding an innings defeat. The fact that they were bowled out so cheaply cannot be glossed over, but at the same time there are teams who would not have bothered to show up on the second day after being bowled out for 45 and then conceding 252-3. It’s also worth remembering that the Kiwis were up against a very good South African side who bowled Australia out for 47 on the same ground 14 months ago.

The 45 all out cannot be ignored, but I do think New Zealand would be well advised to put it out of their heads for now. It was perhaps not a freak occurrence, good bowling and poor batting will generally produce low score, but the magnitude was such that at least for now they should treat it as a one-off. I suspect that dwelling on it ahead of the next Test would be counter-productive. The bigger problem is that I don’t think they would have won the Test even without being bowled out so cheaply. The 275 they put up in the second innings was a decent effort in the circumstance, but it was effectively a first innings pitch and would still have represented a sizeable deficit had they made it in the first innings.

It is hard to say what New Zealand ought to do because they have the problem that South Africa are simply a better side and everyone knew that even coming into the series. The batting will be the obvious thing at which to look and it does need to be more disciplined (which has actually been true for some time), but it might be worth working on the bowling too. They were a bit slow to recognise the value of simply bowling line and length on that pitch (although some of that might be put down to shell-shock at what happened to the batting) and South Africa actually scored quite freely for much of the innings. The improvements on the second day meant that it wasn’t a bad bowling performance overall, but with the batting consistently suspect they can ill-afford to concede 250 runs in two sessions at any time. This is not to excuse the batting, but the problems with that are much deeper and probably cannot be fixed in between Tests. The bowling can improve though.

After being bowled out for 47 a year ago, Australia came back to win the next Test. Although New Zealand have tended to play rather better in the second Test of their recent series, Hobart and Colombo being the most notable examples, I doubt that they will manage to win in Port Elizabeth. They might, and hopefully will, make the Test interesting. But South Africa are rather better than Australia and Sri Lanka and I think they will simply be too good for the Kiwis. Even if Vernon Philander does not pull up fit for that Test I do not think that New Zealand have the batting to put up a competitive total and even if they bowl well I think South Africa will score too many for them. I had similar thoughts before Hobart and Colombo, however, and would love to be wrong again.

2011: England’s dominance, India’s collapse

My original plan for this post was a month-by-month review of all sports. I got halfway through May before realising that I was even boring myself and that there was no way anyone else was going to read past the end of the Sydney Test.

I’m not sure if it was the biggest surprise this year, but I don’t think anyone expected England to do as well as we did. England finished 2010 well by beating Australia by an innings at the MCG, but even after the Sydney Test it was not clear if England were very good or Australia very poor. Strauss and Flower’s stated ambition to become number one in the world was clearly possible, but if it was going to happen it looked like it would be a long climb to the summit. Instead it took eight months. India did not play well, but the extent of England’s dominance over the course of the 4-0 whitewash was incredible. There are no weak links in the side; even though Trott finally started to look mortal Ian Bell picked up the slack. He averaged 118 this year, 23 runs more than the next best batsman. Cook was as brilliantly obdurate as ever, KP had a resurgence and Morgan started to look comfortable at Test level. Prior is easily the best wicket-keeper in the world, both with the gloves and with the bat. Broad stopped trying to be an ‘enforcer’ (though I still haven’t stopped making jokes about it) and instead took a shedload of wickets. Bresnan and Tremlett would share the new ball in probably every other country bar South Africa, but right now they can’t both even get into the team unless someone else is injured. Graeme Swann is still the best spinner in the world and Anderson is second only to Dale Steyn. The calm leadership of Andrew Strauss has ensured that no one has got carried away. In eight Tests in 2011 England won six and lost none. They averaged 59.16 with the bat (and that’s the entire XI, not just the top order) and 28.45 with the ball. With Prior, Broad, Bresnan and Swann in the side England could reasonably be said to bat down to number ten. No other side came close to playing better than England in 2011, and the question is no longer if England are the best side in the world but if they can turn their current success into the kind of dominance that the West Indies and Australia did.

Australia did not play for several months after the Ashes, but have made a good effort to rebuild their side. They’re batting is yet to really come around, though Shaun Marsh is talented and the dropping of Phil Hughes for Ed Cowan was long overdue. Ponting and Hussey are still in the side though, and although they made some runs at the MCG they cannot be allowed to stay much longer. They both have had poor years and are in the twilight of their careers. The real improvement for Australia has been their bowling. In Nathan Lyon they finally seem to have found a long term spinner and the injury to Mitchell Johnson was probably the best thing that could have happened. The introduction of Pat Cummins and James Pattinson in particular are major improvements. They still have some way to go, but the strides they have made since the Ashes were clear when they were playing an Indian side who did not adjust at all to being beaten by England. Australia have become a side very difficult to predict, collapsing to 47 all out against South Africa and losing at home to New Zealand, but also recording big wins over South Africa and India. It might be some time before we know how good they are, however; after what should be an easy tour to the Windies next March they do not play again until November.

There was cricket amongst the non-Ashes sides too, although not very much. (It’s not just this year either. If you want to despair look at the number of Test matches in the Future Tours Programme.) The West Indies lost twice to India, and barely avoided losing a Test against Bangladesh. They beat Pakistan in a Test at the beginning of the year though and they made India work for their victories. (Though that’s not too impressive, see below.) All things considered it was probably a positive year, albeit not by much. South Africa didn’t play for nine months after the New Year’s Test, but looked quite good when they did. Then in the Boxing Day Test they looked dreadful and lost to Sri Lanka. It could simply be another attack of their well known mental problems, they’ve lost four Boxing Day Tests on the trot, but their batsmen are starting to age and they will find themselves in a similar position to Australia before too much longer. Pakistan were overshadowed by the spot fixing judgements, but played very well against weak opposition. Statistically they were the second best team in 2011, after England. Sri Lanka had a bad year, but they ended the year on a high with their first victory in South Africa. They need to find more consistent bowling however, over the course of the year only Bangladesh were worse. No one really expected Sri Lanka to play well after the loss of Murali though. Zimbabwe returned to Test cricket and beat Bangladesh and almost beat New Zealand, neither of whom played enough cricket this year to make an impact.

The worst team in 2011 was surely India. They started the year as the number one Test side, but never looked interested. They did not try to force victories in Tests in South Africa or the West Indies, although the former was to win the series. They never bothered to turn up in England and then used their (self-inflicted) lack of preparedness as an excuse. They didn’t try to improve and looked just as bad at the MCG. That match was only close because Australia are not as good as England and collapsed themselves. As bad as India’s performances were, the fact that they do not seem to care is probably worse. Their batsmen are massively overrated, especially Sehwag, and all of the possible replacements are limited overs specialists. They were the worst team this year and unless there is a massive change in attitude they will be next year as well.

Twenty-eleven also featured the 2000th Test of all time. Officially it was a close encounter at Lord’s in which 20,000 people queued for a mile to get into the ground on the last day and England finished off India in the last session. The actual 2000th Test was a week later at Trent Bridge and saw Stuart Broad and Ian Bell turn a close game into a blowout. Outside of the performances of the individual teams, the year was most notable for the resurgence of bowling and some very close finishes. England twice won a Test in the last session, India drew with the West Indies with nine down and the scores level and Australia won by two wickets and lost by seven runs in fairly quick succession. I lost count of how many debutants took five-fers this year, but I can remember at least four, plus Doug Bracewell’s match winning performance in his third Test. It was a year of fascinating and absorbing Test cricket which highlighted the short-sightedness of the administrators who had been increasingly marginalising the longest form of the game. Hopefully next year we’ll see more good performances and those in charge will give Test cricket the respect it deserves.

Ten best sporting moments of 2011

I know the sporting year isn’t over yet. I actually had a conversation on Twitter about whether I ought to write a ‘year end’ style post or save it for after the Test. I decided to save my full year in review post for later, but at the same time I would be very surprised if anything happened that warranted an inclusion on this list. If I’m wrong I can always write a revision as well, so with that in mind here are my top ten sporting moments of 2011:

10 – New Zealand winning the Hobart Test
I know my Aussie readers won’t like this, but it was a pretty important moment. New Zealanders probably care more about winning the Rugby World Cup, but they had not won a Test in Australia for 26 years before this. Doug Bracewell may be a great find for the Kiwis and the conclusion of the match was one of the most thrilling you will see.

9 – Tigers winning Game 5 of the ALDS
I love watching the Yankees lose. I love watching the Yankees lose deciding games in the playoffs even more. But most of all I love watching Alex Rodriguez strike out to lose a deciding game in the playoffs in front of a very put out Yankee Stadium crowd.

8 – Royals winning a three game series in New York
The Royals spent most of the month of April this year in or near first place. (It’s true, look it up.) Whilst losing six in a row to the Rangers and Indians at the end of April basically put an end to any notion of contending, there were still bright spots after that. In the second week of May the Royals travelled to New York and won two out of three against the Yankees. The deciding game of the series saw the Royals score six runs in the second inning, including Eric Hosmer’s second major league home run and some terrible defensive mistakes by the Yankees. It was the Royals first series win in New York since 1999.

7 – Manchester United 1-6 Manchester City
It was the match that that caused the media to accept City as genuine title contenders. More importantly it was the match that made United supporters very cross and thus made Liverpool supporters like myself very happy.

6 – Australia reduced to 21-9 at Cape Town
With apologies to my Australian readers. Though as much as I enjoyed this I was more astonished to watch the innings unfold. On no fewer than three occasions I thought there must surely be a recovery, surely they couldn’t lose another wicket. I was wrong on all three occasions, as by the time the recovery did come I had stopped expecting it. Almost as amazing as the innings itself was the shot selection of Brad Haddin and the fact that he wasn’t immediately dropped because of it. Both defy belief.

5 – England winning the Cardiff Test
I already used this in my best moments in English cricket this year, so there isn’t a lot more to say. Nonetheless, it was incredible watching England go from just wanting a few wickets to Sri Lanka not even coming close to saving the Test and certainly belongs on this list as well.

4 – Virender Sehwag making a king pair at Edgbaton/Stuart Broad’s Trent Bridge hat trick
I’ve included these together for their similarity, not only because they both involve Indian wickets falling cheaply. Broad’s hat trick marked the end of the last time India would have an advantage in the series, but I think Sehwag’s king pair marked the last time India had any real hope. It was also a moment of personal pleasure, because Sehwag is massively overrated. He has a good record on the flat pitches of the subcontinent and that is it; his aggression is not suited for English conditions or anywhere the ball does a bit. After the second Test I read about and saw Indians claiming that he would save the series for them and I rather enjoyed being vindicated.

3 – Cardinals winning Game 6 of the World Series
I’m a Royals fan, but years of living amongst Cardinals fans in Kirksville made me rather sympathetic to them. (Though I always hated when they would gripe about ‘barely being .500’ or some such.) Add that to the fact that I hate the Texas Rangers and I was definitely cheering for the Cardinals in the last World Series. Even if I hadn’t, however, I think their multiple comebacks in Game 6 would have had to rank high on a list of best sporting moments, as it was absolutely astonishing.

2 & 1 – Lancashire winning the County Championship and England winning the Ashes
How could I not copy these from my first list? England winning the Ashes in Australia is the only thing that could possibly trump Lancashire winning the title outright. Neither had ever happened before in my lifetime and for them both to happen this year is almost an embarrassment of riches. I have little doubt they will be on a list of best moments in the decade should I make one in 2020.

Edited to add: The Guardian have produced their list of cricketing moments, but there is a lot of World Cup stuff at the expense of Lancs.

Why Phil Hughes should not be dropped

It has been suggested that Phil Hughes will be ‘rotated’ out of the Australian XI for the second test at Hobart. If there is a change it will almost certainly be either Hughes or the equally out of form Hussey to make way for all-rounder Daniel Christian. Hussey has already expressed unease at the prospect of rotation and has counselled Hughes not to change his game. Hussey appears to be worried he will be the one to miss out in a rotation policy and is trying to make sure it’s Hughes instead.

I hope it isn’t Hughes to go, however, I like having Hughes in the Australian side. A look at his career statistics and history shows why. His first class form is very impressive, but in tests overall he averages 36.13 with three centuries and three fifties. That’s six times he’s gone past fifty in thirty innings. Hughes’ career is based almost entirely on the second test of his career, in which he scored 115 and 160 against South Africa in Durban. It was only a decent series apart from that. He scored nought and 75 in his first test and 33 and 32 in the last test of the series before going to England for the 2009 Ashes. He fared poorly against shorter bowling in England and was dropped for the third test. (And announced it himself, on Twitter.) He was dropped to give him a chance to work on his technique, but he never really improved. He had one-off tests against Pakistan and New Zealand after the 2009 Ashes, but his best score in those two matches was 86* against New Zealand. Regardless of his failure to improve, the injury and subsequent dropping of Katich during the 2010/11 Ashes gave him a more permanent place.

Since his debut tour to South Africa Phil Hughes has scored just 633 runs at an average of 27.52. His lone century in that time was against a Sri Lankan ‘attack’ at Colombo a few months ago and he has passed fifty only three times. The only time he has done so against an international quality attack was his 88 in Jo’burg last month. His technique was lacking against in England in 2009 and he has never fixed those problems. His footwork is non-existent and he can only play the short ball in the sense that he can play it in the air to gully. And this is why I want him to stay in the side. I hope the selectors continue to look at his extremely impressive domestic form and drop Hussey instead because in 2013 I want to see him walk on to the pitch at Lord’s on an overcast July morning and face Jimmy Anderson with the new ball. I really, really want to see that.

Why I disagree with the ECB

There has been a very interesting discussion on Twitter about the logic of England’s schedule next summer. After the clearly too short South Africa v Australia series there has been a lot of discussion about why South Africa are only playing three Tests on these shores in 2012 and the soundness of that decision. I think I have probably made it known here and on Twitter that I think it is a bad idea, but it is not a straightforward issue and I want to spell out my thoughts.

The ECB are axeing one Test to fit in a five ODI series against Australia. From the standpoint of a spectator this looks like lunacy, but there is a reason. By agreeing to host the five ODIs against Australia England will play a reciprocal series in Oz just before the World Cup, so as to get their eye in. Also, it has been pointed out that the ODIs are money spinners and the ECB need money to fund nice things, like central contracts.

I still don’t like the decision though. For one thing, I question the soundness of the reasoning. It’s true that England have not done well at recent World Cups, but the problem goes deeper than preparation. That’s not to say that England will necessarily continue to fare poorly at World Cups (they used to fare poorly in Test matches too), but extra preparation time is still unlikely to dramatically improve the performance. Australian conditions are not as alien as Indian conditions and acclimatisation was not England’s problem in the last World Cup. (Whilst the conditions were problematic, England played better near the start of the tournament. If the issue had been acclimatisation they would have improved over the course of the tournament. The same would have happened in the most recent five match series, but clearly didn’t.) Certainly more preparation will not would not hurt, but it will only be a benefit if a lot else goes England’s way as well. Given that there will be warmup matches against other sides before the World Cup it looks like overkill. It’s not by itself enough to justify losing a Test match.

I’m not convinced that this series will offer a significant boost to the ECB coffers either. We saw this summer that there is still a strong appetite for Test cricket in England. (Wales not so much.) The four match series against India was about as one sided as they come, yet there were very large crowds every day. The images of the queues for the final day at Lord’s are still incredible. The crowds will clearly come when England play a strong side like South Africa. A Test match against the second best side in the world is not less likely to draw crowds than a meaningless five match ODI series, even against Australia. It can’t even be said that it is due to the Olympics, as the 2012 games fall during the Test series anyway. The decision would make a lot more sense if it had been a Test match against the West Indies to go, as the Windies are less of a contest, but we only played a two match series last time. I don’t know if that has a direct bearing on the current decision, but it would be understandable. There are still other, better ways that the ECB could have fit in five ODIs against Australia though. They could have reduced the number of ODIs against the Windies and/or South Africa, for instance, and played Australia at the tail end of the season. It is not a reasonable decision and I have yet to see a good explanation for it.

More broadly though, I oppose the notion of playing extra ODIs at the expense of a Test match. I understand that ODIs are important, that smaller nations need them to develop and that more matches mean more money for the ECB. (And I don’t think the ECB are being greedy, there is a lot of good they can do with more money.) This sends a message that the ODIs are a priority though, which is not a good message to send. Unless England actually win the World Cup, a good ODI performance is unlikely to raise the profile of cricket as much as a good Test series is. If I ask about the summer of 2005, how many people will wax lyrical about the tied NatWest Trophy final? It was a very good ODI series, but it was not in the same postcode as the Test series. I think the same will hold with the World Cup. It would be very nice if England win it, but it will not be a disaster if we don’t and anything short of making the final is very unlikely to be as exciting as a full Test series. Even if England do go to the final I don’t think anyone will be saying that it was down to the extra preparation (see above). It’s possible, of course, and it’s possible that South Africa will be two up after three matches, but neither are likely. More likely we will be denied a conclusion to the series, just as South Africa and Australia were today, in exchange for a World Cup performance that still fails to capture the imagination

One all going into a nonexistent third Test

I’m still a bit amazed at the finish to the second South Africa v Australia Test. Australia won by 2 wickets after the advantage had changed hands several times. Pat Cummins, the eighteen year old on debut, hit the winning runs after coming within about a centimetre of being LBW on review. (He was struck in line, but not so much as to overturn the umpire’s decision.)

Australia were probably deserved winners. They put their previous collapses behind them and managed to put together timely partnerships. The individuals who were under the most pressure to perform did so; Ponting made 62 and Haddin 55. Hussey also chipped in with some useful runs in a partnership with Haddin that put Australia in the ascendancy after the early wickets of Clarke and Ponting. Mitchell Johnson continues to look better with the bat than with the ball; he scored an unbeaten 40 that went a long way to winning Australia the match. His contribution might be a bit overlooked with the headlines about Cummins, but it was probably more important and at least as important as Haddin’s 55. The manner of the result probably eases some of the pressure on the selectors. They could probably justify naming an unchanged XI for the first Test against New Zealand. (Though they did so after the win at Perth last year and we know how well that turned out.) I would still drop Johnson. Australia may hove lost this Test without his batting, but the rest of the bowling attack has had to carry him this series. I don’t think they can go on like that.

It could be, and probably will be, said that South Africa choked. I certainly made that joke on Twitter when Australia looked like they were going to cruise to victory. It probably isn’t fair, but they did not play as well as they ought to have. Smith’s bowling decisions and field placings as Haddin and Hussey betted were not particularly sensible. At the time he had runs with which to play, but neither really attacked nor really defended. The batsmen could and did find the gaps and were not under a lot of pressure. His best decision was to take the new ball straightaway, but it transpired that it was not quite enough. The deciding point was probably when Steyn dropped a sharp return chance off Cummins with nine still to win. The TV was showing Nathan Lyon looking so nervous that it is hard to imagine that he would have survived long. We’ll never know, unfortunately. More unfortunately we won’t get a deciding Test match after the two thrillers to which we have been treated. Hopefully the absurdity of this will sound a wake up call to the administrators.

It’s late and I’m tired

As I write this it’s just gone past 03.00 CST. I haven’t been to bed yet. It’s Sunday morning so this isn’t too unusual, but I got up earlier than I had planned today so I’m quite tired. South Africa are 255-5 and they are holding my attention well, which is good because I want to see how the day’s play pans out. If the Proteas get another fifty Australia are probably just about out of it. They only got near 300 in the first innings because of Watson and Hughes, but neither of them, nor anyone in the Aussie batting order, can be relied upon to get a score in the second innings.

It’s the run chase to which I am looking forward. Amongst other things it could be the last time we Ricky Ponting play for Australia. As much as I have enjoyed seeing him struggle, especially during the last Ashes, he has had an excellent career and it will be interesting to see if he can prolong it. If he can’t it is always nice to have watched such endings instead of reading about it in the papers the next morning. Even if he fails it may not be his last innings; he has said that he wants to keep playing and the Australian selectors have not had a good year. Other, though slightly less likely possible departures are Brad Haddin, Michael Hussey and Mitchell Johnson. If the new chairman of selectors decides to really wield the axe most of the players that I so enjoyed watching during the last Ashes may be gone. (Though I only really enjoyed watching Hussey bat in the last two Tests.)

I don’t think they will be that ruthless though. Ponting ought to go, though it would not be unreasonable for him to get a farewell series at home. It’s hard to think that a wicket keeper could do much worse than Haddin is currently, but I don’t think Australia have a clear potential replacement for him so he might stay. There is a clear replacement for Johnson though, so he will be lucky to face New Zealand. Ironically given the difficulties Australia have had in finding a spinner, Nathan Lyon is probably more secure in his place than most of his team-mates.

South Africa have lost another two wickets though, so it’s game on. A win for Australia may save a few careers.

Saturday review – 19 Nov

I’ve decided to make it a regular Saturday feature on the blog where I gather my favourite stories from the week. Unsurprisingly, a lot of the media focus this week has been on the deaths of Peter Roebuck last Saturday and Basil D’Oliveira earlier today.

Jarrod Kimbler at Cricket With Balls wrote an excellent piece about Roebuck being the lone dissenting voice in the Australian press corps during their years of dominance and how the manner of his death may affect how he is remembered. (As an aside, I am very glad that CWB is back up, the style is unmatched.)

Peter English wrote for Cricinfo about the irreplaceability of Peter Roebuck.

Vic Marks wrote about both for the Guardian – Roebuck last Sunday and D’Oliveira today. Both are excellent pieces; the Roebuck one is a more personal tribute, whereas the D’Oliveira piece gives some fascinating background to D’Oliveira’s move to England and his role is starting South Africa’s isolation.

Jonathan Agnew wrote for the BBC about D’Oliveira showing that sometimes sport and politics must mix, with a lovely reminder that racism in sports used to be much worse than it is now.

Other things did happen in cricket this week too, and King Cricket wrote about the absurdity of Australia being out of a Test series after only three days.

Calypso collapso

This South Africa v Australia series will probably be remembered for the collapses. After the chaos of the first Test, South Africa collapsed from 241-4 to 266 all out yesterday. Today Australia went from 191-1 to 296 all out. Watson and Hughes both managed to get runs, 88 apiece. The next highest score after that was Mitchell Johnson’s 38 not out. He has done a lot more with the bat than with the ball in this series, but I don’t think that will save him from the axe. It’s true that Australia are in need of batting (and his 38 was enough to give Oz a first innings lead), but it’s far more likely that they will try to find an actual batsman to get the runs. Ponting picked up a third ball duck, once again shuffling across the line and being trapped LBW.

The game is well set up for the third day; I think South Africa are probably on top. Tahir took three of the Australian wickets and he will have a fairly helpful pitch by the time Australia’s run chase starts. Also, whilst none of the batting looks strong, South Africa’s still looks stronger. Australia’s batsmen have still not fired as a unit, and at they won’t be confident of chasing even a very low total. South Africa may struggle again, but if their batsmen get set, as they did in the fourth innings at Newlands, Australia are in danger of losing the plot. Australia will probably not want to chase more than 150-200, so they will have to keep wickets coming at fairly regular intervals. I still think South Africa are favourites to win.

Can Australia bat?

We’ll find out tomorrow; South Africa were bowled out for 266 today, rather sensationally after being 241-4 at one stage. Australia did reasonably well, but South Africa were a bit brainless at the end. (A cruel person might make choking sounds here.) Australia will be a bit disturbed though that in an innings of only 71 overs they used seven bowlers. (Well, I say ‘bowlers’ but Hussey had four overs.) Clarke was one of them and he took 2-6 at the end of the innings. Part of this was because Watson pulled up in his fourth over, but that won’t make Australia feel much better. Also problematic is that Johnson and Cummins only took one wicket apiece. Siddle, who might have missed out if Harris had been fit, took three and their current spinner, Nathan Lyon, took two.

Still, this does give Australia a good chance to level the series, if they can bat well this time. It’s a big ‘if’ though. Watson is out of form, and carrying a knack now, Hughes hasn’t been in form for a few years, Ponting hasn’t had a big score in some time and may be playing in his last test, Khawaja has only played three tests and hasn’t amazed anyone, Hussey is back to his pre-Ashes form and Haddin clearly doesn’t have the nous to bat in a pressure situation. That just leaves Michael Clarke as the only batsman in the top seven in which Australia can be even remotely confident. He was up to the task in the first innings of the first Test, but failed along with the rest of them in the second innings. Australia cannot rely on him scoring two hundred again, so they will need a few of the other batsmen to step up. There’s really no-one who stands out as being that batsman, however. We’ll see tomorrow if one of them can, but right now 266 looks like it might be enough for a first innings lead.