Curates are yesterday's news as a Pope comes of age

17 January 2020

3rd Test, Day 2: England 499 for 9 declared, South Africa 60 for 2

There was nothing remotely rotten about England's performance today. By contrast, more or less everything went wrong for the hapless hosts, enabling a resurgent touring side to put themselves in an unassailable position in this contest - and most likely the series itself.

The initial blow to South Africa's prospects was struck even as the teams took to the field after a frustrating delay for rain, with the scarcely believable news that Kagiso Rabada would be banned for the final test in Johannesburg. Just deserts for his serial misdemeanours or a bureaucratic over-reaction to his understandable excitement yesterday at dismissing the England captain? The debate apparently raged all day long on live commentary and social media. I, for one, am disappointed that we will all be deprived of his talents next week - and I fear for the South African bowling attack in his absence.

I'm pretty sure England won the first session

When it's not your day, the agony can be unrelenting. So must Faf du Plessis have felt for huge swathes of today, as he and his flagging team did not benefit from a single slice of good fortune. That said, England's batsmen arguably made their own luck, as a dominant opening session paved the way for some fun and frolics later on and saw Ben Stokes proceed serenely to a brilliant 120. One of his two sixes threatened to endanger life and limb in the family enclosure but in the end sailed harmlessly overhead into some neighbouring gardens. It's a mark of the man that he appeared so disappointed at his eventual dismissal after lunch, providing Dane Paterson with a deserved first Test wicket and Dean Elgar with one of three outfield catches.

Ollie Pope - how can anyone be this good at cricket?

And so to Ollie Pope. Still only 22, this young man batted with a maturity far beyond his years, combined with the innovation of someone whose skills have been honed in the modern T20 format. I was worried for him when Stokes was dismissed, as he had thus far played the subtle foil to the buccaneering hero, accumulating his runs almost unnoticed. Even before that, he had been perilously close to LBW, yet this proved to be his only error of judgement in almost six hours at the crease. After fretting visibly through his eighties, Pope then advanced to his maiden Test century as calmly as he had faced his first ball. Even his forward defensives are a thing of rare beauty. Batting with the tail, his successive “ramp” shots off Radaba appeared to defy any laws of science as he helped the ball on its way to the vacant boundary behind Quinton de Kock. A joy to behold.

Mark Wood preparing to unleash another six

Just as joyful for England fans were the cameos played by Sam Curran (44) and Mark Wood (42), albeit against a now demoralised attack. South Africa's misery was compounded by another overturned dismissal, this time with added comedic elements. Wood was practically in the changing room and Joe Root had declared the innings closed by the time the TV umpire ruled that Rabada's delivery to dismiss Wood was, in fact, a no ball. And so it was that Wood was reprieved and Root withdrew his declaration, enabling England to add a bonus 23 runs to reach 499 for 9. Incredibly (but indicative of England's batting struggles of late), this was the first time England had reached 400 in their first innings in over two years. The only real blot on today's batting copybook was another tame dismissal for Jos Buttler, who must now fear for his Test place as incumbent wicket-keeper/batsman (clue: the answer is Ben Foakes).

A further blemish was the strangely insipid performance of England's opening bowlers Broad and Curran, who more or less presented South Africa with their first 50 runs on a silver platter. But after Pieter Malan got his bat stuck in the pitch to present Dominic Bess with the simplest of return catches, England mercilessly regained control. Mark Wood's latest injury lay-off has clearly not dented his pace, with one of his explosive deliveries registering 150 km/h (or 93 mph) in the approaching gloom. The resolute Elgar took a painful blow to his arm, while Zubayr Hamza looked like the proverbial rabbit in the headlights as he scampered a single to reach the safely of the non-striker's end. Sadly for him, this reprieve proved only temporary as he succumbed to a bat-pad catch off Bess - just before the rain returned to end an entertaining but ultimately very one-sided day.

The nearest I'll ever come to a Test wicket

A couple of final thoughts: I read various comments after the first Test defeat claiming that this is one of England's worst ever teams. It isn't (anyone who followed England in the 90s knows that). But it is a team currently in transition to a younger generation, so will inevitably suffer its ups and downs. Though the current opposition is average at best as they face their own struggles, the transition now seems to be bearing fruit. A valid remaining concern is whether England's bowling attack is strong and varied enough to take 20 wickets and win Test matches - especially without the talismanic James Anderson. We may be closer to knowing the answer by close of play on Saturday.

Saved from the curate's egg

16 January 2020

3rd Test, Day 1: England 224 for 4

At last, totally uncalled for and never lamented in its absence, Burton’s Barmy Blog returns after an interval of nine years.

An hour before the end of play, I decided I had my strap-line - “a curate’s egg of a batting performance by England”. Then I realised I actually had no idea what this expression actually meant, other than it seemed to sum up perfectly what had unfolded - very slowly - in front of a patient audience for most of today.

After some brief research, the consensus seems to be that a modern-day curate’s egg is, simply, something that is partly good and partly bad. (Though the original meaning, supposed to originate from a late 19th century cartoon in Punch, was something that is actually bad but is declared good - in that case by a curate who was served up a rotten egg by his boss, the local bishop, but did not wish to offend by saying so, as he was presumably eyeing his next promotion.)

Indeed, I spent the first three and a half hours of today trying to persuade my fellow spectators - and myself - of all that was good in England’s batting performance:

• Another 50 partnership for the opening wicket

• Dom Sibley building steadily but surely on his century at Cape Town with another assured knock

• Zak Crawley resisting further temptation after a couple of early scares to grind out a resolute 44

• How wonderful to see two Kent players batting together for England again (possibly for the first time since 1981)

• The two Joes - Denly and Root - surviving a torrid time under examination by Rabada and Maharaj.

Yet, in the remaining 30 minutes up to tea, it became harder and harder to escape the feeling that I was on the wrong side of the argument and maybe the Punch definition was right after all. A veteran Barmy Army supporter from Yorkshire appeared wholly convinced that the curate’s egg was not only rotten, but“complete shite”. Soon after lunch, I had also set my stall out and predicted a score of 140-150 by the next interval, so was feeling a little let down myself at our boys’ paltry return of 118 for 2 off 58 overs - as low a total as I can ever remember at this point on day one without a team being bowled out. Between lunch and tea, the run-rate was just 1.8 per over, mmm.

St George's Park looking resplendent in the early morning sun

A couple more calamities struck soon after tea and, at 148 for 4, England were once more confronted with an under-achieving first innings score, despite Joe Root winning yet another toss and choosing first use of a slow, flat wicket. The scorecard also bore a worrying resemblance to so many first innings of recent memory - all top four batsmen had a start, looked pretty comfortable in the main, but none went on to reach fifty, let alone a hundred. For this, credit must also go to the South African bowlers - but less so to their captain Faf du Plessis. Not only is Faf a useless tosser (ahem, of a coin, OF A COIN - it was his sixth loss in a row) but his decision to give the first new ball to the pedestrian Philander and Paterson, rather than the much quicker Rabada and Nortje, was just bizarre. Seeing a ‘keeper standing up to the stumps in the first ten overs on day one of a Test is a first for me.

Faf later compounded his error at the second new ball by ignoring Rabada’s conspicuous warming up exercises and handing the ball - again - to Vernon Philander, who continued to be economical but unthreatening. Field placings from early on were sometimes canny but always ultra-defensive, the seamers bowling wicket-to-wicket with five fielders on the leg-side, including two on the boundary.

Pitch invasion at lunchtime

The pick of the bowlers - maybe surprisingly after being flayed to all parts at Cape Town - was the wily Keshav Maharaj, whose first 20 or so overs went for only a run an over while he deservedly won an LBW decision on review against Denly and came within a whisker of repeating the trick on Ben Stokes. At the other end, Kagiso Rabada was - well, Kagiso Rabada, a supreme fast bowler and aggressive with it. His ball to dismiss Root, who had looked untroubled on his way to 27, cannoned ferociously into the stumps in the blink of an eyelid, yet it seemed Rabada was already celebrating right in Root’s face. Superb, attritional Test cricket.

In the final hour, England’s day was saved from its curate’s egg fate by sensible batting from Ben Stokes, newly but unsurprisingly anointed as World Cricketer of 2019, and Ollie Pope. Everyone loves the swashbuckling Stokes of course, but I do also admire one of his unsung (or at least lesser sung) abilities - that of dropping anchor for the team when needed and playing an old-fashioned Test innings, in this case 38 not out in just over two hours and 86 balls. At the other end, Pope never looked in any trouble at all, playing his way calmly to 39 not out with seven sublime boundaries - this lad can bat. Both will hope to “go big” when play resumes tomorrow, with Jos Buttler also champing at the bit for a decent score.

Inching up to 2.5 runs per over near the end of day one

In big picture terms, England needed to show today that victory in Cape Town was not just a flash in the pan, another false dawn of many in the last years. In particular, this young team needed to prove - mainly to themselves - that they have the technique and belief to post a big score in the first innings. Their approach was methodical, often laboured, sometimes too slow even for their ever-patient travelling support. In mid-afternoon, it looked like a case of “same old, same old”. But there was something about today I liked and admired - it was never easy out there, nor should it be at this level, but each and every batsman was determined to graft, particularly the youngsters. Who knows, maybe the psychological barrier of an England first innings 300 will finally be breached sometime before lunch tomorrow.

Rules and regulations - Australian style

Monday 10 January 2011

The Apostles - sticklers for rules and regs

In one of my Sydney posts, I implied that the security arrangements in place at Australia's cricket grounds may be considered a tad over-zealous. I will attempt to expand on this theory below.

One thing I have learnt on this trip is that Australians are very fond of their rules and regulations. Given that I live in Germany, you may have thought that this would not unduly bother me, or perhaps that I would not even notice. Both fair points. Maybe it's because of the laid-back reputation of Aussies that I found myself so surprised by this aspect of life down under.

The main practical problem with the security arrangements was that they were so different at each ground. Hence, having got used to one set of more or less draconian rules at, say, Adelaide, you then travelled to Perth and found a completely different set of regulations in place.

Here are some random examples:

- In Adelaide, it was forbidden to take an umbrella into the ground, presumably on the basis that it was offensive to South Australians to imply that it may rain during their summer (it did – very heavily)

- In Perth, I was not allowed to take an empty plastic water bottle into the ground, although a full one would have been fine and water fountains were provided within the ground for free refills

- In Perth, the security guards initially removed a middle aged Barmy Army supporter for wielding two small signs made of a dangerous cardboard-like substance and bearing the abusive slogans "AV IT" and "NO NONSENSE" (in this case, they relented ten minutes later)

- In Melbourne, standing up to cheer on your team very loudly seemed to be tolerated if you were a visiting English tourist with lots of Aussie dollars to spend but not if you were a local and wearing a conical green and gold hat (on second thoughts, this rule was fine)

- In Sydney, it was not permitted to wear a pair of sunglasses when queuing for a drink - indeed, a very strict lady was employed to ensure this did not happen and appeared to have no other useful function but this

- In Sydney, my Barmy Army friend Gabie was required to provide evidence of her age in order to buy a meat pie, even though the pie in question did not appear to contain any alcohol, drugs or tobacco

- Once again in Sydney, it was forbidden to purchase two lagers and one cider in the same round, even though you could buy up to four drinks of either variety at the same time – one could only conclude that there must have been some bad experiences with the illicit mixing of snakebites during play.

And would you believe, while I have been writing the above, Jayne has returned from some last minute shopping in Sydney airport and reported that she was required to produce her passport in order to purchase a jar of vegemite.

What's with all the crazy rules, guys?