Things I decided while drinking JB and gingerbeer

• Sunshine - good. But not good enough. The Windies lost by 9 runs via Mr Duckworth and Mr Lewis.
• Chris Gayle - good. But not good enough. His middle order sucked gigantic penis.
• Man hit in face by six - funny for us, not so much for him I'd imagine.
  
• Ross Taylor in the field - good. Took 2 stunners, one while running along the boundary. Infact the Black Caps fielding as a whole was good.
• Batting wickets - nice for a change.
  
• Scott Styris giving away team secrets - funny.
• CONSTANT duck quacking noises from the stands - really fucking BAD. WTF?? YOU WANT ME TO GET MY SHOTGUN? DON'T THINK I WON'T!!
• Simon Doulls hair - receding and greasy.

The crux of it all was we won the (serious rain interupted) series 2-1. Pity they didn't hold all the matches here in Nelson. We haven't had rain since Christmas and our ground is so small everyone could have had hundreds. Live and learn New Zealand cricket, live and learn.

Notes on a rain delay

Basin Brat has asked me to make some comments on the 4th ODI in Auckland this afternoon as she is tied up in the lions den with a hot boy.

It was a great pity that the game didn't get to be played until the end, if only for Martin Guptill's sake (side note: having never seen Guptill play before I was expecting him to look more Jeetan Patel, less Sean Pollock).
His 122 not out on debut was the highlight of the match and to see him salute his home crowd was pretty damn special.

The Windies were just getting underway after the first rain delay, chasing a revised target when the covers came on again. We were treated to The Coolest Man in Cricket hitting it all over the show as he does and Chattergoon just getting into this stride. Alas the fickle January weather came in and ballsed up another game. You'd think this was England the way this series has gone.

Sky did make up for it by showing highlights of a match from the Teal Era. Back when Nash had hair and Parore was our angry little man. Chris Cairns was doing a fine job impersonating Burt Reynolds with his porny 'tache and Scott Styris was thinner. Back when we could beat a substandard outfit 4 matches on the trot and look damed stylish while doing it. Back when I knew the players in the team. Who the hell is Neil Broom??
I'm going to go and sit in my rocking chair on the porch and bemoan the youth of today because Sky has managed to make me feel old.

One other thing I'd like to say.
How many more chances does Jesse Ryder get? Seriously, the boy needs a good smack. Who is he screwing to have kept his job this long?
And same goes for Skippy Sinclair. Send him back to CD and throw away the key.

See you in Napier on Tuesday, don't forget the brolly,
Lucy

Fly-by updates

Notes on the game at the Cake Tin.

- See. Bowl first. Really, really bowl first.

- Who knew we could bowl like that? Really?

- A tip in the tradition of Pulp Sport, spirits can be gotten into grounds inside those big bottles of gum. Just take the gum out first, thicko. This will also leave you chewing gum for the next week.

- I had some pics, but they all turned out to be of Tim Southee. Sorry about that. And they get worse the more gin I drink.

- What were the young women draping themselves over Flynnyflynnflynn at 3am on and where can I get some?

- And finally seeing some live, international cricket? PRICELESS

Updates will continue to be sporadic as continue to work 11 hour days. Hopefully Madame can keep things ticking along. And keep an eye out for some guest entries!

HAPPY NEW YEARSSSSS

Oh yes. I have cricket. I have beer. I have Chattergoon (note: Best Name Evar) getting out to Gillespie.

This is good.

Updates as I drink more they occour.

ETA 1: Oh yay, go Kyle.

Freya thinks the uniforms are pretty.

I need better friends.

ETA2: George thinks the uniforms are ugly.

And dan is being athletic.

And Muffin from Melbourne thinks I should stop drinking.

ETA3. Timmeee. Oh yes. Oh yes. Thats orgasmic. x2

ooooooh yyyeeeh

ETA4: Rain. it NEVER rains in high country Otgao. Never. They have constant droughts. Oh well, at leat we can go back to a time when our uniforms were cooler than the Windies. And Oconnor was playing. And Vettori didnt even need to shave.

ETA5: FUCK THIS RAIN I AM GETTING DRUNK!!!

HAPPY NEW YEARS FROM US IN THE CHEAP SEATS!!!

Boxing day Twenty20

Forget, for a minute, that we should be having a real boxing day test, but there is something else I need to draw your attention to.

We are wearing silver uniforms.

We are doomed.

Also, WTF is with the gold underarms? A wee homage to another Underarm Travesty?

ETA: A tie. Another one.

Now we have the farce that is the "super over"

Let me describe this to you in layman's terms.

The Windies get their over first, they choose three batsmen. New Zealand has one bowler and the normal field.
The kiwi bowler bowls the one over, the Windies batsmen attempt to slog the absolute shit out of it.

Then the kiwis get their over. Whoever scores the most runs in their over wins.

This is stupid. But less stupid than the old bowl-offs (ignore Mark Richardson, those things were awful)

ETA2: And, we lose. I blame the uniforms.

Sun WTF?

Once again my need for actual gainful employment meant my cricket watching was cut short yesterday.

Someone should give me some money.

I did get to see all of the wickets. Who knew Jesse Ryder could move like that? May I suggest the nickname "Flubber".

It's All Beige Here

So I thought it was about time I put up a few pictures I took at the test on Saturday afternoon. Yeah, they're a couple of days late, but I've been either too drunk, too hungover, too fucking busy or too drastically underslept to do anything about it until now. But hey, if you wanted up-to-the-minute coverage, you'd be at Cricinfo. (In any case, I just don't have the liver for journalism.)

Peecture number one is of Lionel Baker being Third Man while the ferocious Fidel Edwards was bowling at the other end. (I could watch Fidel bowl all day, as he is a thing of beauty. However, like any show pony, he looks great but is horribly inefficient -- his run rate hovered between 4.1 and 4.5 the whole time I was there. And he frightened Jimmy Franklin into falling over and going out hit wicket. But this picture isn't of Fidel because I couldn't get close enough. So here's Lionel, being all shy because he's just spotted the camera.)

And here's Lionel again, being a class act and signing autographs for some small boys.

One of the great joys of going to the test was ringing the Brat to tell her Jesse Ryder had just gone out. Neither of us particularly likes Jesse, mostly on the grounds that he has a better reputation for cocktail-fuelled hilarity than either of us. Here he is on his way in from the creases. Check out the sulk. Dude, you'll trip over your bottom lip if you're not careful.

And last but not least, Dan Vettori, Captain Extraordinaire, and Kyle Mills (who replaced Jesse) coming in for tea. Add two more players and paint some stripes on the concrete, I reckon you could do a pretty good imitation of the Abbey Road album cover.

Playing in the street

So... Its a draw, and those who saw it coming (that is, all of us) can sit safe in the knowledge that no, it never gets any warmer than that in Dunedin. Madame enjoyed it though.

I broadened my sporting horizons by heading to the cake tin on Saturday to check out the Phoenix playing against the Perth Glory. What was served up was eighty minutes of execrable football followed by ten minutes of actually exciting football that made us all wonder why they couldn't have played like that earlier. It was a 1-all draw because New Zealand A-league teams never actually win anything. The cake tin is a marvellous structure though, and it was nice to visit the Cheap Seats spiritual home (Aisle 21, row GG, seat 74)

And I have noticed something, through my summer ale induced haze (this haze should dissipate some time around February) There are some really silly scores being reached in cricket games around the country. The Uni Oval pitch appeared to have been modelled on Castle Street, minus the broken bottles and second year girls vomiting. Have all the groundsmen in the country been told to produce flat batsman's wickets?

Kitty Litter Stopped Play?

Madame is at the cricket, I am on the couch. We are both indeed very happy that the rain gods have co-operated with some cricket, although there hasnt been much before some strange occurence with kitty litter and dustpans and shovels (only in Otago) has paused play. We live in very strange times my friend. Very strange indeed.

Its all wet here

On the day I invite my mates to join me in the Cheap Seats for some very unhealthy drinking, it rains. Bloody Dunedin. I bought Mackintoshes specialy (I'm going to make as many jokes about that as I can.)

So, with little else to post about (We all know poor Flynnyflynnflynn was unlucky, and Ross Taylor needs a spanking every time he even thinks of playing on the on-side) I'll post the rules of the great cricket drinking game - otherwise known as The Reason I Failed Biology.

Rules:
Drink 3 when…
A bowler gets a hat trick (on top of the drinking for each wicket)

Drink 2 when…
100 is scored, either by a player or a team.
Someone gets out
A bowler gets five wickets. (4 for a ten wicket haul)

Drink 1 when…
A boundary is scored
50 is scored
A Nelson comes up (when the score is 111 or 222 etc…)
The fielding team makes an unsuccessful appeal
A run out is referred to the television umpire

When watching on TV…

When the commentators refer to a shot or player in a sexual way – drink 2

When watching at the ground…
When the player fielding closest to you gets the ball – drink 1
When a player starts gesturing in the direction of your increasingly drunken group – drink 3
When the player fielding nearest you swaps (not just between overs) – offer him a drink.

But I cant play with no cricket! Come on weather, sort yourself out!

It's all pink here

So, finally we get some international cricket. The kind that we might be able to win. Might.

But I have a few questions.

1. What is with this whole starting at 12 noon business? In Dunedin, yeah it might work given the latitude, but are they going to do it in Napier as well?

2. Tim McIntosh took 38 deliveries to get off the mark. All well and good, but although they say you cant score runs in the shed, you also cant score runs if you're, y'know, not scoring them.

3. Also, Tim McIntosh is 29. Why are we continuing to give debut caps to guys who, lets face it, are old (in a sporting sense, don't kill me Mistress Backslash!)? Why aren't we using the fact that we're in a slump to blood some new guys and build some experience that won't be retired before we can use it?

4. How many times is Ian Smith going to get Tim McIntosh and Jamie Mackintosh confused?

5. Could whoever has the voodoo doll of Jacob Oram PLEASE PUT IT DOWN!

ETA: Oh look, we are 88 for 1 at lunch. I may have to be nicer to McIntosh. But that will probably jinx him.

ETA2: MOTHER OF GOD I NEVER WANTED TO THINK OF TONY COZIER IN SPEEDOS AND NOW I HAVE, KILL ME NOW!!!!!

On a better note, Daniel Flynn has managed to stop being attractive, and instead play attractive cricket. Never thought I'd see that.