daveydave

I've now done 3 weeks of the level one umpire course. I must say I'm enjoying it, although there is a lot of stuff to learn. The course and supplied materials are free, so now I know where at least some of the money from Sky is going! More later. (if you're interested)

I had a little chat about KP last week, so now that he's England captain I feel I should probably post a follow up. Last week I had called into question KP's place in the Test side because I wasn't convinced that he could control himself long enough to get the big scores required of him. Well, now that he's skipper and his place is guaranteed, giving him the authority and responsibility he so evidently craves, is it going to affect his game as it has others? I can't honestly see his average slipping, in fact it'll probably improve. But what of the flash shots? Well, we were reminded on Friday that he can resist the glory shot and play very well indeed. This could be just what he needs to go from a brilliant if sometimes rash batter, to a genuine great. Only time will tell. He's lucky that he has this dead game to captain (South Africa have already wrapped up the series win, so the 4th Test at the Oval is for pride and practice only) as it gives him much need...

KP, FigJam, call him what you will, Kevin Pietersen is an outstanding batting talent. When on song he is fantastic to watch and is capable of getting you many many runs. The problem is, although he has huge talent, he has a larger ego. He was doing everything so well. When woefully out-of-form Paul Collingwood arrived at the crease, KP coaxed and cajoled him through the early overs to score some much needed runs. The two of them put together a fine, well-crafted partnership which started to look like giving England cause to consider a win. However, as KP approached his century, the ego appeared and he started to play his more flamboyant shots. So, when he was on strike with 94 to his name, he decided to go for the glory shot over the long-on boundary and got himself caught. Having put so much effort in to rescuing the game, to then lose his wicket not due to a fantastic ball, or an excellent catch, but to throw it away tending to his ego is unforgivable. I know this may be controversia...

Yes folks, the IPL is upon us. The official Twenty20 cricket league in India kicks off on Friday with Bangalore Royal Challengers vs. Kolkata Knight Riders . Of course the tricky thing is who to support. Kolkata were an obvious first choice because one of their owners is Bollywood megastar Shah Rukh Khan and let's face it, everyone loved Knight Rider , in spite of David Hasselhoff's hair. They have some great players, including captain Sourav Ganguly. The bookies favourites are Chennai Super Kings , so they would have been a fair choice too. But no, I've gone for the underdogs: Rajasthan Royals because they're the outside bet, Shane Warne is captain and Dmitri Mascarenhas, the only Englishman in the league, is playing for them. All matches are available (in the UK) on Setanta which means you're not tied into an annual contract. The only problem being the time difference, so the games are on during the day - perfect weekend viewing, however. Pick your team!

Yeah I know, more cricket ramblings... So I've just listened to this interesting discussion on Twenty20 cricket and its possible impact on the future of the game. Twenty20 (or T20) was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) back in 2003. Some nations (Australia in particular) scoffed, regarding it as some sort of playtime version of the game. They're taking it more seriously now. This form of the game has been hugely successful domestically , playing to sell-out crowds across England and Wales - unheard of for the counties . The inaugural World Twenty20 went down a storm in South Africa last year, and now the Indians have taken the lead. Firstly, the rebel Indian Cricket League (ICL) was set up promising big bucks to those who would brave international bans (ICL was not sanctioned by the International Cricket Council (ICC), cricket's governing body). Then the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), the Indian equivalent of the ECB, set up its o...

...and other such sites. I know a lot of people (usually company execs) get a bit miffed at the YouTube thing - their precious content being screened for free - but in some cases if it wasn't for such websites, half of us would have no access at all. Here's the latest example which has really peed me off - any one noticed it's getting much easier to annoy me these days! :) If you've seen this blog before you'll probably have realised I'm a cricket fan. In the UK that means not getting to see much cricket on the telly because Sky has bagged all the rights - I have seen approximately 35 seconds of England cricket over the winter. So, I thought I'd sign up to ECBtv and pay for access to highlights. Nope, not allowed. I live in the UK, therefore I'm obviously not entitled to even pay to watch my own national team play. Make sense? No, not to me either. Surely I can't be the only person who thinks this way. I mean, organisations that seemingly go out of ...

By any measure, this summer has been a good one for me and the game of cricket. I made it to my first Test match, first trip to Lord's, saw my first Twenty20 game and went to my first international championship. So the cricket-watching year kicked off for me back in June, with a trip to the Riverside to watch England vs West Indies in the 4th Test. We were very fortunate to see anything as the Friday had been a washout and there was only half a day played on the Saturday. Sunday however, was a nice day for cricket. It's always quite something to see the big names in the flesh and certainly seeing the likes of Michael Vaughan, Shiv Chanderpaul and KP playing at Chester-le-Street was great. Our batting performances late in the day were rather less entertaining, but you can't have it all. Next was two domestic Twenty20 games against Leicestershire Foxes and Lancashire Lightening. I must say, this is a great form of the game and certainly when Durham captain Dale Benkenstein ho...

It's been a while since I created a blog - and this time I've created one with a purpose. Of sorts. To tie in with my forthcoming trip to South Africa and the Cricket twenty20 World Cup, I've made a new blog that will act as a diary of sorts while I'm over there. Those of you out there of a cricketing persuasion can have a look here .

I've gone and done it, I've bought tickets for the Cricket twenty20 World Cup in South Africa. The only time I've ever been to an international sporting event such as this before was the European Football Championships in 1996 and that was in England, so doesn't really count. A couple of posts ago I raised a few points about the Cricket World Cup in the West Indies and the price of tickets in particular. So, it's fantastic to see that the organisers have pegged the prices down - quite unbelievably so. I've bought seats for 4 group matches and 4 super-8s. 8 matches, including games featuring Australia, South Africa and England for a total of 340 Rand. That works out at around £24. Well done Cricket South Africa for making the games affordable for all. I just have to sort out flights and hotels now and then sit back and look forward to a couple of weeks in Cape Town. References: Introduction to twenty20 on Wikipedia Cricket South Africa Cricket 20

I can't hold off any longer. It was all over weeks ago, but you like to think there may be a chance, however small that we may snatch even a draw. It wasn't to be. The last 5 wickets collapsed, leaving the Australians a meager score to reach to achieve a well deserved whitewash. It's so very disappointing to see such little fight and passion from the England team. There were moments - Collingwood's 206 in the 2nd test, Harmison's 4/48 in the 3rd test, Monty's 5 wickets in the same innings - but they were few and far between. We were comprehensively outplayed by a far superior team. So now we move on to the post-Ashes inquest. I suspect this will be run by those who ran the team and therefore produce no useful outcome. The press will be up in arms for a while before returning column inches to football. Nothing will be done, no real changes at the top, no radical overhaul of the way the game is run. And come 2009 we will be no nearer regaining the Ashes than we wo...