Graeme Smith likens playing Australia to Groundhog Day
The fatigue is setting in amongst the South Africans as Graeme Smith has likened 4 months of play against Australia to the repetitive movie Groundhog Day. The situation is similar to Australia in the 80's where we played tour after tour against the rampaging West Indies. What was the reasoning behind that? Perhaps it was a pre-emptive punishment from the ACB for World Series Cricket.
Nevertheless, Graeme Smith has a point seeing his team repeatedly making the same mistakes, dropping the same batsmen who go on to score the same big hundreds, getting dudded by the same umpiring mistakes and getting beaten by the same guys day after day for 4 months. It seems the South Africans have as much chances of defeating the Aussies as Bill Murray has of getting lucky with Andy McDowell. No, wait, they won their home one day series. Sorry, Bill.
| Posted by JC on Fri 31 Mar |  2 comments |
Ponting talks up Ashes after series win
Ricky Ponting is talking up Australia's Ashes chances after defeating South Africa. He cites the fact that Australia have won 8 of their last 9 Tests (the other one a hard fought draw by South Africa in Perth). While it sounds impressive, you have to consider our victories have been against an insipid World XI, the flighty West Indies who are ranked 8th in the world (above only Bangladesh and Zimbabwe) and South Africa who are ranked 6th. Plus Australia were outplayed in Sydney and it was only Graeme Smith's desperation to force a victory that handed the match to us.
Admittedly, South Africa are better than their #6 ranking indicates, coming off two losing series against #1 Australia and #2 England. But it's a little early to start crowing about how we've fixed all the problems exposed during the Ashes. Can our batsmen now play reverse swing? Can our bowlers take wickets on pitches that don't suit seam bowling? And what the hell is Andrew Symonds still doing in the side? Don't even get me started on Damien Martyn. I'm starting to get nervous that Australia have regained their swagger without any real justification. Let's hope Ponting just has his game face on and they're still doing the hard work in the background (and bring on Troy Cooley).
| Posted by JC on Thu 30 Mar | 1 comments |
2nd Test, Day 5: Shane Warne takes 6-for in Australian victory
Day 5 was a wonderfully tense day of Test cricket as the advantage see-sawed between Australia and South Africa throughout the day. South Africa began with 10 wickets in hand and slight favourites to force the draw considering the dodgy light over the past few days. Graeme Smith and de Villiers began comfortably for the first half of the session, building their opening partnership to 91 runs. At that point, a draw seemed likely.
However, the match turned when Warne came on to bowl, had de Villiers stumped in his first over and took 3 wickets before lunch. When Warne dismissed Smith, his Test wicket tally went to 666. I'm sure the South Africans are convinced he's the anti-Christ. Herschelle Gibbs was caught behind off Clark leaving South Africa 4 wickets down at lunch. At that point, my money was on an Australian victory.
Australia took 3 more wickets during the middle session so at tea, Australia only needed 3 tailend wickets to win the match and series. Considering South Africa lost 5 for 12 in the first innings and the new ball was due in the 3rd session, the matched looked all but over barring bad light. However, Mark Boucher and Andre Nel survived a long period throughout the last session with a ring of fielders surrounding the batsmen. Throughout, the spectre of bad light and Steve 'light-meter' Bucknor threatened to end the match at any moment. Finally, inevitably, Warne induced an edge from Nel to slip and shortly afterwards, trapped Ntini LBW with a wrong'un.
Interestingly, it was Gilchrist who captained the side today as Ponting didn't take the field due to food poisoning. Team management were baffled as to the cause as he'd eaten the same food as the rest of the team. He's obviously having a reaction to his recent glut of runs.
Also, I've enjoyed listening to the South African radio commentary, particularly the many SMS messages from predominantly South African fans. I was initially surprised at all the negative comments about their own team until I realised I'm probably just as negative with the Australian team, ready to pounce on the slightest weakness and write a player off (I still say drop Symonds and Martyn).
Lastly, it's funny how small the difference is between victory and defeat (or a draw) and yet the great contrast in reactions. If South Africa had forced a draw, Ponting would have been lambasted as an overly conservative, unimaginative captain (they always call bad captains 'unimaginative'). Instead, Australia are up 2-nil in the series (or to take a wider perspective, 4-nil in a 6 Test series) and focus will instead be on Ponting's batting (the best since Bradman, one over-excited journalist called him). I'm just happy to see Warnie grab a 6-for as he hasn't been that effective up till today. Seeing what he did on a 5th day pitch though, maybe Graeme Smith was right to bat on that first day in Cape Town!
| Posted by JC on Wed 29 Mar | 3 comments |
Queensland obliterate Victoria to win Pura Cup final
As a Queenslander, it would be remiss of me not to mention Queensland absolutely crushing Victoria by an innings and 354 runs to win the Pura Cup final today. The most extraordinary aspect of their win was their first innings total: 6 for 900. You heard it right. It's the 11th highest score in the history of first class cricket and they would've gone for the 1000 mark if they weren't concerned about a little thing like winning the match. Shane Watson and Jimmy Maher both scored double centuries, with Clinton Perren and Martin Love also scoring big hundreds. Mitchell Johnson who copped flak after conceding over 110 runs in the recent South African ODI was the pick of the bowlers taking 10 wickets. It seems a long time ago that Queensland seemed unable to win the Sheffield Shield (what the competition used to be called) - now we dominate the local comp. Life is sweet.
| Posted by JC on Tue 28 Mar | 1 comments |
2nd Test, Day 4: Ponting scores another century but bad light cuts time short
The 2nd Test is turning out a lot more interesting than the 1st Test even if there's no chance of Australia losing (that's not necessarily a bad thing). For starters, it's lasted a lot longer than the 3 days it took Australia to mop up the Proteas in the 1st Test. There's even a chance of my dream situation of an Australian victory late in the 5th day. There's also been plenty of spice with Shane Warne caught by the stump mike abusing Andre Nel, calling him a "f---ing dill". I haven't heard someone use the word "dill" since primary school but hey, if it works for Warnie...
The greatest controversy though were the illegal repairs made to the pitch overnight after the 3rd day's play. Apparently, the curator plugged up a hole in the pitch, right about where Warnie lands the ball bowling to left handers. The umpires ordered them to undo the repairs. It looks like Mickey Arthur made another offer the curator couldn't refuse. I'm imagining the ground staff scuttling out to the pitch in the middle of the night in black ninja suits, mission impossible style, to make covert pitch repairs.
But of course some cricket has been played as well. Ricky Ponting scored another century and amazingly, this is the 3rd time this summer that he's scored 2 centuries in a Test (twice against South Africa, once against the West Indies). I hate to drag out the B word but his form has truly been Bradmanesque. No wonder Bradman has been practically deified in this country if he maintained that kind of form throughout an entire career. Cricket is a great sport for digging up obscure statistics and another interesting one is that Ponting has scored more 100's than 50's. This is the cricket equivalent of a negative split (something commentators gushed about during the Commonwealth Games) and an indication of how often Ponting goes on with it once he gets a start.
Australia ended up declaring at 4 for 307, leaving South Africa 410 runs to chase down in 4 and a bit sessions. They reached 29 for no loss before bad light stopped play early into the 3rd session (so no hattrick for Brett Lee, dangit). It's a situation just like Perth and I think Ponting made the same mistake as in Perth (and yesterday I praised him for learning from his mistakes). What he did in Perth was delay the declaration so that South Africa had no chance of winning. But the Proteas also had less time to bat out the draw which they achieved easily in the end. One couldn't help thinking if Ponting had given South Africa a chaseable target and more time to dismiss them, he would've had a much greater chance of taking the ten wickets. Instead, South Africa shut up shop and blocked out 4 sessions.
This is the case here as well. Instead of South Africa taking a risk and chasing down the score, their sole goal on Day 5 will be to preserve wickets and save the Test. They did it just a few months ago so there's no reason to expect a different result this time around. Nevertheless it should be an intriguing day so let's hope Lee and Warnie can mow through them tomorrow.
| Posted by JC on Tue 28 Mar | 5 comments |
2nd Test, Day 3: Brett Lee takes 5 for 69 to decimate South Africa tail
I had a good sports day yesterday. The Brisbane Broncos shrugged off their poor form to defeat Paramatta, the Queensland Bulls are cruising to victory in the Pura Cup final and Brett Lee skittled South Africa to put Australia in a dominant position in the 2nd Test. South Africa began Day 3 hoping to establish a first innings lead. They had just over 100 runs to polish off with plenty of wickets in hand and Jacques Kallis at the crease. They ended the day 227 runs behind Australia who still have 9 wickets in hand. It was a major turn around in the match, brought about when Australia took the new ball.
Clark took a wicket with his first ball, and the prize wicket of Kallis which sparked a major collapse. Even though Ponting is not the best captain around, he does learn from his mistakes. He hasn't sent the opposition in since Edgbaston (even though he insists he made the right decision at the time). He took half a day to introduce Clark yesterday - today, he gave Clark the new ball.
Things went seriously pear shaped from there as South Africa's last 5 wickets fell for just 12 runs in a tail-end collapse that would have embarrassed the West Indies. Brett Lee went past 200 Test wickets when he bowled Mark Boucher, a nice landmark but even more impressive was his brutal and hostile bowling with the second new ball. His first ball to Andre Nel was a 159km/hr bouncer. You'd think he'd save such a scorcher for South Africa's top order but somehow Nel brings out the best in the Australian bowlers. His final figures were 5 for 69 and in taking the last 2 wickets in 2 balls, is on a hattrick in the 2nd innings. Considering he'll be bowling the hattrick ball to Graeme Smith, you have to fancy his chances! :-)
The last session saw Australia build their strong position as Ponting and Hayden took us to 125 with the loss of only Langer. Hayden turned up as Mr Hyde again, batting in a cautious manner that would have Geoff Boycott nodding his head in approval. With a lead of 227 runs, it's hard to see South Africa getting back into this game barring an Australia collapse to rival their own. If the difference between Australia and South Africa in the 1st Test was the partnership between Ponting and Hayden, you'd have to say the difference in this match so far was Hussey's work with the Australian tail.
Lastly, on a non-cricketing theme, thank goodness the Commonwealth Games are over! I love sport and it's always great to see Australia win but you have to admit the genepool is somewhat diminished when you're only dealing with Commonwealth countries. Except in cricket - why isn't cricket a Commonwealth sport?!
Click here to check out Craig Mann's website
They say you never get sick of hearing your national anthem but frankly, I have to concur with Craig Mann's cartoon in this week's local rag. Opening and closing ceremonies are tedious enough as it is - when it comes down to it, they're just a huge, glorified rock eisteddfod. The Melbourne Commonwealth Games ceremonies are even worse, full of obscure local references that even other Australians don't understand. But most importantly, the Games radio coverage was given priority over cricket coverage so finally I can listen to the Test commentary uninterrupted.
| Posted by JC on Mon 27 Mar | 1 comments |
2nd Test, Day 2: Hussey helps Australia to 369 while Jacques Kallis leads South Africa fightback
South Africa began Day 2 poorly as Australia's tail wagged and South Africa lost early wickets. Andrew Symonds and Adam Gilchrist went cheaply but Mike Hussey has helped scraped a vital 110 runs from the last 3 wickets. It's encouraging to see Mr Cricket has slipped easily into the role of Mr Fix-it, adding important runs with the tailenders. The downside is it used to be Adam Gilchrist who achieved this - Gilly seems a pale shadow of his former self.
South Africa's innings began even worse than Australia's with Graeme Smith nicking Lee to third slip on the first ball of the innings. Herschelle Gibbs was lucky not to walk two balls later which would've had South Africa 2 down for 0 runs. Instead, Ricky Ponting dropped him at second slip. Fortunately, Gibbs fell soon after for 9, clean bowled by Kasprowicz.
The match turned in the 3rd session. After a poor start, de Villiers and Jaques Kallis built a strong partnership, dominating the bowling and scoring quickly until bad light stopped play. Kallis batted particularly well - scoring at a faster rate than he does in the one dayers. If anything, it was like the two teams were playing against type. Australia played a dour innings yesterday while South Africa were aggressive and looked to dominate the bowling today.
Australia didn't do themselves any favours either. Inexplicably, Ponting bowled Symonds ahead of Clark. His only excuse might be worried about bad light but I don't buy it - he had one and a half sessions to bowl him. Isn't Clark the guy who took 9 wickets in the last Test? No, let's use Symonds to let Kallis get his eye in instead.
Brett Lee and Michael Kasprowicz also bowled a bucketload of no-balls. If South Africa's bugbear is dropped catches, Australia's is no-balls. A major turning point during the Ashes was when Michael Vaughan was bowled off a no-ball then went on to make 150. You'd think the bowlers would have learned their lesson - would bowling a few inches back kill them?!
So the game is still well poised. Australia will need to dismiss Kallis cheaply tomorrow morning while South Africa will hope for a big Kallis hundred to set up a first innings lead. I'd put Australia in front but it still could go either way which is an exciting prospect.
| Posted by JC on Sun 26 Mar | 3 comments |
2nd Test, Day 1: Ricky Ponting scores 29th century
Ricky Ponting scored his 29th century today to guide Australia to a precarious 5 for 229 on Day 1 of the 2nd Test against South Africa. A late collapse and another dodgy pitch still has Australia's innings teetering on a knife edge. How the not out Symonds and Hussey fare on Day 2 will go a long way in either setting up a dominant position or letting South Africa back into the match. I'm particularly interested to see what kind of ticker Symonds displays after getting bloodied by an Ntini bouncer.
Matt Hayden continued his Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde act as he fell on the 2nd over of the match, nicking a loose drive. He can display great powers of concentration as in his ultimately match winning innings in the 1st Test. But then it's like he's bought himself enough credit for a few Tests and he reverts back to his bludgeoning ways. He just can't stop thinking about the "good ol' days".
Andrew Miller makes a good point at Cricinfo that now Langer and Hayden are no longer the powerhouse they used to be and Australia's middle order has lost it's reliability, we are seeing just what a champion Ricky Ponting is. It's hard to fully appreciate his class when he comes in after a double century stand or when Gilchrist scores a blistering hundred to overshadow his less flamboyant double century.
Still, Ponting's innings would be nothing if it weren't for the dropped chances from the South Africans. Their poor catching is reaching epidemic proportions and have put them behind the 8-ball in almost every Test they've played against Australia this summer. At least Australia are taking advantage of their reprieves nowdays.
| Posted by JC on Sat 25 Mar | 1 comments |
Jacques Kallis and Shane Warne engage in pre-Test mind games
The pre-Test banter between Australian and South Africa is starting to get a bit monotonous as a regular pattern emerges. Act 1: Shane Warne taunts the South Africans. Yesterday, he let loose with his mind games:
"We've obviously got a psychological advantage being a spinner against those guys, with the record that I've got against South Africa and the prospect of even playing two with Stuart MacGill. If we go into those sort of situations and they're telling groundsmen to water [the pitch], then we've got a psychological advantage straight away before a ball is bowled. If they want to juice it up and negate me, I'll take my 0 for 40 and we win in three days. That means a series win and a couple of days of golf. I'll take it every time."Act 2: The South Africans deny Warnie is getting to them. They're handing the baton around this series as this time, it was Jaques Kallis who had a laugh at Shane Warne's latest comments:
"He's there for entertainment. He always comes up with statements, and the guys don't take too much notice of what he says. He creates a laugh or two in the change-room, but we don't worry about what he says."Fair enough, it is hard to take Warne seriously. At least it isn't Graeme Smith playing mind games with Warne. Smith and Warne - not the two brightest bulbs in the box.
The South Africans go to great pains to insist they're hardly worried about Warne at all. However, Graeme Smith took him seriously enough that he scuttled any chance of a South African victory by batting first in the 1st Test, just to ensure he didn't have to face Warne in the 4th innings. So it's not all chuckles and thigh slapping in the South African dressing room. Let's just hope we see an Act 3 consisting of a tight, competitive match culminating in an Australian victory late in the 5th day (that's not too much to ask, is it?)
| Posted by JC on Fri 24 Mar | 1 comments |
South African curator was forced to water
Pitch curator Christo Erasmus has come out saying Graeme Smith and Mickey Arthur pressured him to heavily water the pitch used in the 1st Test. They were worried the pitch would be a raging turner favouring Shane Warne so Mickey Arthur telephoned Erasmus, putting the heat on to produce a seaming wicket. I'm imagining the phone call resembling a scene out of the Godfather, with Arthur making him "an offer he can't refuse". Frankly, it all sounds like a storm in a teacup. Australia batted on the same pitch as the South Africans and the pitch was doing as much on the 3rd day as it was on day 1. Australia just handled the conditions better. More specifically, they held their catches better - something which has nothing to do with the state of the wicket. The Proteas better stop pointing fingers at the curator or the insipid South African crowds and admit they were still in hangover mode after the one day series. I imagine their psychologist is putting in some serious hours leading up to the 2nd Test.
| Posted by JC on Wed 22 Mar | 1 comments |
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