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Cricket: ODIs Aren’t Proper Cricket Edition


Hereward

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Putting the player and crowd behaviour to one side, I’m enjoying this SA v Aus test series as much as any contest I’ve seen in recent years. Just brilliant stuff from both sides on competitive pitches that offer something to both bowlers and batsmen.

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This series has been great so far, pretty competitive and good to see the bowlers getting some success. Makes for a much more exciting Test when sides aren't routinely posting 400 in the first innings, every run counts just a little bit more - as evidenced by Lyon's slogathon that has really impacted the match.

The South Africans really need to get some batting form. Faf has not got a score all series and Amla never looks like getting one. The No.6 position (de Bruyne, Bavuma) hasn't yet produced so that's half of the batting lineup not contributing, which is worrying.

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19 hours ago, Paxter said:

Hmmm the Auckland forecast is looking pretty lousy to say the least. I wonder if that offers England an (undeserved) glimmer of hope...

I think the New Zealand plan from here ought to get to 300 or 350 as soon as possible, then declare. Without the weather, we could aim for 400 and grind England into the dust, but there's no longer time for that.

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2 hours ago, Jeor said:

The South Africans really need to get some batting form. Faf has not got a score all series and Amla never looks like getting one. The No.6 position (de Bruyne, Bavuma) hasn't yet produced so that's half of the batting lineup not contributing, which is worrying.

True, though it’s (so far) been similar from the Aussies. Amla has outscored Khawaja and Shaun Marsh hasn’t exactly set the world alight. Plus SA has the three top scoring batsmen from either side in its lineup (AB, Elgar and Markram). 

Faf’s form has been a worry for a while I think. He’d be on the chopping block for mine if he wasn’t captain.

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8 hours ago, Paxter said:

Faf’s form has been a worry for a while I think. He’d be on the chopping block for mine if he wasn’t captain.

His five innings in this series he hasn't gone past 15, so he'll want to turn that around in the (presumably) three innings he might have left in this series. With Markram and Elgar scoring well, that's masked the guys coming in later on who have now collapsed twice pretty comprehensively. Although admittedly some of the troubles might be more to the reverse swing capabilities rather than the batsmen themselves.

10 minutes ago, Hereward said:

Bloody cheats!

Yeah, Bancroft looks very dodgy there. Commentary mentioned it might be sandpaper?

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Must have been pretty guilty if he was willing to put sandpaper in his crotch to try and hide it!

A few quick wickets falling here again. It seems to be that time of the innings.

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2 hours ago, Hereward said:

Looked like it. Dropping it down his trousers and insisting it was only his sunglasses cover isn’t going to help.

I've just seen the footage. It does look pretty blatant, and Bancroft's attempts to cover it up were a bit comical, I think he'd have been better off leaving the yellow thing in his pocket rather than trying to stuff it down his trousers - he somehow managed to forget that there were cameras watching him.

ETA - now he's admitted it. Not sure I believe Smith's protestations that this is the first time it has happened and he would still regret it even if they hadn't been caught.

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I already had an extremely low opinion of Smith and co, but this just cements it. We’ve known since the Bangalore test that Smith is a brat who will do anything to win - and turns out that another brat (Kohli) was right to use the “c” word on that occasion! Throw the book at ‘em!

Oh and match-wise, they look to be in big trouble. AB again.

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1 hour ago, Raja said:

I love how he says 'leadership group' - I'm astounded that they went with this at this time, where *everything* is under scrutiny. It's so dumb. 

I'm not sure his statements are really helping him much, saying

Obviously it didn't work, the umpires didn't see it change the way the ball was behaving or how it looked or anything like that, so it was a poor choice and deeply regrettable our actions.

does have a definite undertone of 'we regret cheating, particularly the fact that it didn't work and we got caught attempting it'.

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The “leadership group” stuff is pretty funny. Surely Smith knows that the ICC and the public will rightly want to know exactly who conspired in this mess.

And speaking of the public: will fans of the Australian team want this guy to continue as captain? 

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