Until recently, I was bored witless with cricket having spent my whole childhood, adolescence and junior adulthood, rapt in its glory.
The one day games were exciting, the Windies were amazing and the Poms were there for the slaughter. The Indians, Sri Lankans and Pakistanis were there to make the numbers up. South Africa was Un-PC.
Then for some reason it just got boring. Australia was on top and vanquished almost everyone (except the Windies) and it was just one big yawn. Couldn’t wait for the footy season to start (Go the Pies!)
Then a couple of things happened which breathed life into the game. The sub-continent woke up and became giant killers. How good was it to get a kick in the pants from the minnows?
But also the standard of Australian cricket actually went down to the others. A commentator on the wireless was saying that just recently and I have to agree with him. But he was saying it as though it was a bad thing. Not me!
I enjoyed the last two tests for the closeness of the result, for the intensity of the players, of the variety of bowling and the stroke play of the batsmen. The reason the Tests were exciting was because both teams were about the same quality. Nothing wrong with that.
The Aussie fast bowlers were chucking (?) them down at around 135 – 148 kph. Yeah? Well Brett Lee and Jeff Thomson, Michael Holding et al, and John Snow whirled them down a bit faster than that! So did Alan Donald. Mitch Johnson was the only bowler to approach that of those guys.
He’s more like a Glenn McGrath or a Dennis Lillee than an express bowler.
Seeing the emergence of young batsmen getting hundreds in Adelaide and Brisbane was tops for me too. Go Davy Warner. Such aggression and such flair. Go Captain Smithy, get on with it Watto. Shame keepers have to bat cos Haddin is the best keeper in the world and battling for his place cos he is in a trough with the bat and there are young guys circling.
Bring on the Poms, I’m back in the fan club!
Maybe soon, they’ll be as good as the Aussie Women’s cricket team?
Loading ...
