AB wants your kids

Okay, yeah yeah, great knock today. The team were fantastic. England were awful. Blah blah.

Of far greater importance was the advert I saw after the game. AB, who has never met a product he wouldn't put his face on, showed off his awesome new Off The Wall Ball!

AB's pitch detailed the story of a young lad who had nobody to toss with...err...toss a ball with, who can now toss solo and sharpen his hand eye co-ordination.

But I have a couple concerns.

1 - This isn't a "ball"



2 - Talking about young boys, tossing and then throwing in that phallic shape is a little troubling.

3 - Even worse, surely the skill sharpening it fosters is less likely to produce a kid who is good at catching a cricket ball and more likely to produce one who is good at grabbing onto penises.

4 - The main feature of the ball is that it is designed to bounce off a wall and back towards you. Even better, the harder you throw it - the harder it will come back at you. I can't believe nobody ever thought of that before.

"SA Bowlers Are Crap", says Vaughan

I paraphrase, but that's the gist of it.

What he ACTUALLY said was:

"I thought to start with it was going to be a real tough trip but I'm quietly confident. I think we'll win. I also look at South Africa, and their bowling attack doesn't put the fear of life into me."

Here is a picture of Michael Vaughan at his most "fearless" against SA.

Panic!

Credit to England. Sunday's performance was almost German like in its efficiency and SA were definitely a bit below par in the batting and bowling departments...and lets face it, there aren't exactly a whole other departments that matter.

Parnell is back and will almost definitely play on Friday. Morne Morkel is also back in the squad. And so is prize knobhead, Herschelle Gibbs.

There's of course talk to Roloef has lost it. Albie can't hack it as a proper batsman (I loved how they finally had a chance to give the guy the opportunity to build an innings and they totally bottled it). Langeveldt isn't fit. Mclaren isn't quick enough.

I'm all for asking questions but Jesus, can we at least calm down till we play a second match? No? Okay, fuckit. Call up CJ De Villiers!

10 questions for SA - ENG

The first ODI is about to get underway and I thought I would post up the questions that this ODI series poses for the SA team.

1) Can Alviro Peterson contribute enough at number 5 to keep his place in the team and is he really a better option than someone like Justin Ontong, who is used to batting that low and can contribute with the ball as well?

2) If Alviro doesn't do enough, will they consider opening with Loots instead and just moving everyone else down a place?

3) Can Albie Morkel step up as a number 6 batsman and deliver more than 45-50 over cameos?

4) Is it wise to drop our two spinners approach that has served us so well for the past 12 months, simply because they struggled in one key game in the Champions Trophy?

5) And is Botha, the hero against Australia earlier this year, really the one who should be dropped?

6) Can Ryan Mclaren do enough in the first two games to keep Parnell out of the team when he becomes available for the 3rd ODI?

7) Will we even manage to get a game of cricket today with the weather looking bloody awful up in Joburg as we sweat our asses off here in Cape Town?

8) Will Trott and KP hum along to the words of the SA national anthem in their heads?

9) Will Darren rue his decision to do ten questions instead of a much more manageable six?

10) Can Kallis adopt his game to opening the...what am I saying, of course he can!

Kallis eats humble pie (no fat jokes edition)

Did I say eats? I meant Jacques Kallis IS humble pie.

When responding to Kevin Pietersen calling him "the greatest cricketer that has ever lived" (which sounds like I'm joking but its true and is probably the smartest thing that Kevin has ever uttered), Jacques had this to say:

"But you've got to look at the stats - sure, the runs might be there and the wickets might be there, but we're playing a lot more cricket these days than the guys in yesteryears. I'm sure that if they'd played the amount of cricket that we play today, they would have achieved what modern-day cricketers achieve as well.

"If you play long enough, you're going to have a few runs and wickets behind your name," he laughed.

Look, Jakes is a nice guy so he didn't want to admit the obvious. Luckily, I'm a dick so I have no problem revealing the truth of the matter.

Kallis would have smashed worked around the likes of Lillee, Hadlee, Barnes and Marshall to all corners of the ground.

Then he would have taken the ball and cartwheeled the off stump of Richards, dismissed Gavaskar LBW, induced the edge of Bradman and dived at second slip to catch a WG Grace shot. All in consecutive deliveries.

Cricket started the day I watched Kallis in his first game for Western Province and cricket ends the day Kallis hangs up...errr...puts down his bat.

That's just the honest objective truth of the matter.

This Man Is Now Your Problem, England

It's the early Christmas present I've always wanted! Robin Petersen is no longer eligible to play for South Africa!

Armed with a batting average of fuckall and a bowling average of shitloads, Robbie P has decided to persue options of a Kolpak contract.

The sad thing is that I should LOVE Robin. I love left handers because I'm a leftie. I love spin bowlers because I'm a spin bowler. I love middle order hitters because I drink beer. Unfortunately, Robbie was never really very good at any of those disciplines.

My favourite Robbie P memory is of Brian Lara carting him to all parts of the Wanderers for a world record 28 runs in one over in a test match. The sequence was 4, 6, 6, 4, 4, 4.

Robbie, please email me. roscoepalm@gmail.com. I'll pack your bags myself and carry you to the airport on my back with a big smile on my face.

There's only space for one Petersen in SA anyway. His name's Alviro.

Todays game was a bit like...

Stick Cricket come to life.

It seems almost a shame to break up the Bosman and Smith partnership for the ODI's.

Portly power hitting FTW.

What SA Batsmen See When Confronted With A D/L Chart

"Ah fuck it. Let's just knock the singles and let the chips fall where they may"

Good thinking

I was initially thrilled to hear that Albie Morkel would be moved up the order for South Africa and be considered as a batsman who can bowl (badly most of the time) a bit. There's no room in a team for a specialist "last 5 overs batsman".

The added bonus would be that Bouch would drop down where he belongs - number 7. A very good keeper with lots of experience in finishing games, that is the ideal spot for him.

Unfortunately, I happened to watch most of the game yesterday, in which Bouch came in at 4. 4!!!

Thankfully he floundered around for 18 and with Kallis and Duminy due back, he'll hopefully never bat that high again. There's absolutely nothing embarrassing about being a keeper and coming in at number 7, yet one feels that it can only be Boucher's seniority that keeps him coming in ahead of more viable candidates.

17 000

Today I got a score of 17000 on my favourite computer game. In as humble terms as I can muster, this is potentially the greatest achievement of the century thus far.

Sorry I have nothing to say about cricket. There's just nothing happening right now.

But fear not, South Africa play Zimbabwe this weekend. Finally some excitement!