Why England going to #1 will be bad for cricket.

I'm sorry, English cricket fans, but I must now fervently hop for two days of rain to finish the current Test, and an Indian victory in the next match, for the good of the game.

If you would cast your mind back to when India assumed top spot, there was a sudden flurry of interest in real cricket in India. Now, as our friends from India keep telling us, India rules the cricketing world off the pitch so the rest of the world must just lube up and take it. So, with India about to meekly surrender top spot, the Indian focus will now return to the shorter forms of the game, especially that f...ing awful t20.

Be prepared for the renewal of the demands for an 11.5 month window each year for the IPL 3, which will feature 65 teams, with each playing the other twice in the round robin stage, followed by a finals series involving the top 23 teams.

RIP Test cricket 1877-2011

Bit melodramatic and apocalyptic, no?


I was actually thinking the exact opposite today.

An Indian setback might sharpen an appetite to see the top spot regained. For all its bipolar disorders of ups and downs, the Indian public is customarily highly enthusiastic and "ever hopeful" - traditionally far more consistent in its enthusiasm than for example in Aussie, where great swathes of supporters turn off their TV set in a huge, sour, bitterly despondent huff immediately the national side starts to lose.


The effigy-burning is the downside of that enthusiasm, of course ...

A 1-3 reverse would be better (for that purpose) than a 0-4 drubbing, it's true ...

Ah, there's Pete in his 'sanctimonious old sh!t' mode.

Indian interest in Tests was virtually non existent for years, until their team went to number one. Funnily enough, the drop off in interest in real cricket in India really commenced in about 1983. What happened in cricket that year, I wonder?

As for Australians turning off in droves 'immediately the national side starts to lose'... What tosh. Sure there's a drop in viewer numbers, but the Ashes last summer here still rated its arse off on the teev here, as will the Indian series this summer.

My initial post was designed as a wry observation, mixed with a bit of exaggeration, but you seem to have missed that completely in your new role as self-appointed forum arbiter.

The forum arbiter? Where forummers go to get cut up into little pieces?

The humanity!

Is hopping for rain an Aussie form of a rain dance?

I've already seen posts elsewhere saying ' we may be getting dicked but we're world champions' as if the difference between the two formats isn't really there.

Oh yeah and you're 'jealous'

eowyn wrote:Is hopping for rain an Aussie form of a rain dance?

I didn't drink enough last night to get completely legless...

JKLever wrote:I've already seen posts elsewhere saying ' we may be getting dicked but we're world champions' as if the difference between the two formats isn't really there.

Oh yeah and you're 'jealous'

Indeed JKL, when Australia lost the Ashes in 05, and again in 09, there was no consolation in the Aussies being the winners of the previous two, and then three, world cups.

Zat wrote:Ah, there's Pete in his 'sanctimonious old sh!t' mode.

Indian interest in Tests was virtually non existent for years, until their team went to number one. Funnily enough, the drop off in interest in real cricket in India really commenced in about 1983. What happened in cricket that year, I wonder?

As for Australians turning off in droves 'immediately the national side starts to lose'... What tosh. Sure there's a drop in viewer numbers, but the Ashes last summer here still rated its arse off on the teev here, as will the Indian series this summer.

My initial post was designed as a wry observation, mixed with a bit of exaggeration, but you seem to have missed that completely in your new role as self-appointed forum arbiter.

Mate, when you open up a thread on this topic and sign off your 'piece' with "Test cricket ... RIP ", it doesn't sound all that cool and urbane to me. It sounded pretty much like a grim lament all through.

You seem to have got your hackles up at an opinion that runs counter to your own, and is similarly speculative - with the difference that it says it is speculative ("I was thinking .." "might..." etc.)

Do you really think your "sanctimonious sh!t", "self-appointed forum arbiter" etc. are anything but cheap put-downs, designed to smear sh!t on a view you dislike?

Are they much more than a bit of cheap Forum demagogy? In any case, they don't seem statements worthy of much of a response in detail.

Far from me closing down views on the forum, the question here is rather: do YOU allow ME a different personal view? ~ Only with great irritation, it seems, if it conflicts with yours, and "misses" a supposed laid-back coolness nowhere in evidence in your lines.

As for the "sour loser" tradition in Oz: I was referring to a long tradition of patriotic Australian public opinion, also measured in TV ratings. Don't you recognise any validity in this point?

I was emphatically not referring to those Aussies on this forum (the majority), who as far as I can see are as fair-minded (however dismayed, and however annoyed by individual flops) when their national team loses as you would hope any cricket supporter would be.

And as I hope I am.

Or do you consider that sententious crap too?

What's going on lately? Why has everyone suddenly got it in for Petey?

It's harshing my mellow.

Stop harshing my mellow.

Not cool, man. Not cool.

Don't you start, mate.....

Pete, I've made references elsewhere to how good I think it is for England to go top of the heap. Further, the third par in the original post, which comes before the RIP Test cricket bit makes it more than clear I was taking the piss:

Be prepared for the renewal of the demands for an 11.5 month window each year for the IPL 3, which will feature 65 teams, with each playing the other twice in the round robin stage, followed by a finals series involving the top 23 teams.

Maybe you were too busy looking in your thesaurus to get what I actually thought was a way too obvious pisstake.

And Jay, don't give us that 'Mellow Dello' crap. None of us believe it.

I don't think there has been any loss of interest in Test cricket in Australia, not even a shred of declining interest. There certainly was bitter disappointment that we played last season so appallingly badly, and there will be massive intent - hopefully at 2006-07 strength - to reverse this trend when the teams meet again.

England's readiness to proclaim itself a comfortable number 1 after a relatively short period is reminiscent of 2005 and augurs well for an early Australian rebound.

well the poms are bad for cricket as they will take it back to BORING BORING BORING they will sit there and sit there like boycott did. where the crowd will be asleep and the the whole world will turn it off.

"England's readiness to proclaim itself a comfortable number 1 after a relatively short period is reminiscent of 2005 and augurs well for an early Australian rebound."

Suspect strongly that even if England does develop a collective ego the size of Greater Manchester and disappear up its own backside any time short or medium term, it won't be Australia in any position to benefit.

lardbucket wrote:
England's readiness to proclaim itself a comfortable number 1 after a relatively short period is reminiscent of 2005 and augurs well for an early Australian rebound.

I think you're wrong on a few levels, your lardship.

1. It's more the fans and press rather than the cricketers making an issue of the number one ranking. The players appear to be concentrating on maintaining current standards and even improving where they can.

2. In 05, winning the Ashes seemed to be the sole aim, with little thought being given to the way forward in subsequent years.

3. Injuries meant the 05 XI never played again.

4. Changes since 05

a. Cook as good if not better now than Tres was.
b. Trott = Vaughan
c. Bell 05, young nervous lad v BelFOHL
d. Prior a much better bat than GoJo
e. Swanny rather than the King ...... nuff said
f. Numbers 8-11 both as a "bowling unit" and lower order bats ...... they can both rescue a poor situation or if needed score quick runs to allow a declaration.

I think this team is better by some distance now. Add to that the closeness of the squad now compared with 05. I think there were a couple of distinctive "camps" then, particularly off the pitch.

5. Finally, with the best will in the world, since 05 Aus have lost Mtb, NLWL, Gilly, TGM, tgm and BLee, with Punters star fading fast. Half a dozen of the best players in our lifetime. Last winter their replacements were handed their arses to the tune of three innings defeats, and there's not much to suggest things will improve in a hurry, especially with the bizarre selections of your NSP.

"I think there were a couple of distinctive "camps" then..."

KP, and who else?

Freddy - I think he was often a law unto himself ......

Good for cricket. I'm hoping to see another Ashes 89 at some point in my life. I won't last until 2089 but, so get on with it, you Aussie farkers. At the very least we should be cloning another Warnie - RIGHT NOW!!!!

Lardy, rarely I find myself disagreeing with your views to any substantial degree, but:

lardbucket wrote:
England's readiness to proclaim itself a comfortable number 1 after a relatively short period is reminiscent of 2005 and augurs well for an early Australian rebound.

sounds like a bad case of wishful thinking to me.


All indications are that Flower and Strauss are an intelligent and astute team - unlike Fletcher and Vaughan.

The "laddish" element a la 2005 is gone, as is the Fool's Paradise mood of actually winning a series against Oz once more. If you actually read what even the brassy Swann, the dashing young buck Broad - even the Showy Rainman Pietersen ffs - actually say, what they say is usually collected, reasonable. Even pretty modest, God help us. (I'm not talking here about Bell's recent infamous robotspeak about his run out. He clearly hadn't digested his lines.)


You might be thinking of the English redtops, or beguiled by the Barmy Army at its most rambunctiously irritating - or perhaps missing Merls? - but I don't know what you base an assumption of everlasting, presumptuous English complacency on.

I am not at all saying that if England do take over the "#1" spot - the Germans have a nice phrase, "Namen sind Schall und Rauch", basically meaning titles and honours are temporary, and overrated - that they won't soon lose it, maybe almost immediately. ~ South Africa, obviously, will have something to say about that.

But I'm fairly confident it won't be for lack of nous, decent planning or application. Just for lack of relative talent and a certain amount of luck and rub of the green, I think. Beaten by better teams on the day.

You seem still to assume something about "the English" which as far as I can see (and I do look) isn't really there. I'm not sure why you generalise in that way.

Or who you have been reading. Lever?


[Sorry about the sanctimonious sh!tty arbitration lecture, etc. etc. .... ]

no easy answers for the aussies but least we won't be bad for cricket anymore.

there term at the top may well be as short as indias' was.

Hmm, not sure CT. They have a pretty settled side at the moment. If they can get Trembles fit and firing, they could be formidable for a few years.

peterCs wrote:All indications are that Flower and Strauss are an intelligent and astute team - unlike Fletcher and Vaughan

no strauss and flower are just plain boring and dull, least vaughan and fletcher has some spunk about them.

maybe skulls but that only a few years or it could be just a few months their egos could be their undoing.

We can but hope.