We should be talking cricket
 

Cos I am an expert (well I tell myself that)
Nods

I guess you would need to be Aussie, Kiwi , Yarpie, Paki, Indian or English to be interested.

I know its far too complicated for the Yanks and their short little attention span.
Canadians have been known to play , in fact a Canadian held the record for the fastest ton in World Cup Cricket for quite a while.

Most of the men I know follow cricket, at least casually and some quite ardently.

My Dad played for his work team for years, so it's a big thing for him. I remember going to watch him play, but I only really associate it with warm picnics and getting sunburn on the back of my neck (because I was reading and I didn't like wearing my hat).

I don't understand it at all. I have little to no interest. I'd go if I had tickets, but I'd take a book and some Pimms. And a hat.

"The batsmen" always seems like the plural of "The Batman" to me.

Is there a match on, and what day is it.

It's been said before and it's worth saying again: only the English would invent a game that takes 5 days to play and often ends in a draw.

Oh and where you break for meals :)

Well.....you have to break for Tea....anything else'd be downright rude.

I think this is a sport I could get behind!

wait, cricket... is that the thing with the guys in the funny suits they always show on the news when they should be giving me updates on summer football transfers? The scores are always outrageous? Today Bumfreddersfield County was trounced by sommersetinghamfordshireton 8,756 to 865.

You bunch of Phil O,Steins!

Cricket is a gentleman's game played by gentlemen and Gay women.

England are playing South Africa as I type

apparently you could retype that same post in 5 days and it would still be true.

Timeist bastard!

This is about all I understand about the game:


http://www.bentler.us/eastern-washin...d-cricket2.jpg

Its a darn shame that the sheer pleasure gained by playing this sport will never be shared by so many people.
the ones I call the unenlightened

Shhh, Miketrees!
We don't want everyone to know. They'll spoil it.

I'd take you up on the Let's Talk Cricket idea, except that it's footy season in Australia just now. AFAIK, the Aussies aren't due to play anyone soon, and IMO the only games presently worth watching would involve (two of) Australia, India, Sri Lanka and South Africa. Apologies to you English fans, but that's the present status.

So, that said, I cast an eye over recent cricket, and put forward the assertion that the most interesting games in recent years have generally been ones where Australia has been defeated. Since the Aussies normally play very well, an Aussie defeat means the other team has played excellently. I am thinking of the high-scoring one-dayer at the Wanderers in S.A. in March 2006, or India's brilliant comeback win at Calcutta in March 2001.

Your views?

Yes I can see your point.
Its a shame that cricket has been a one horse race for a while there.

The Poms are coming back tho.

Its a shame that the once mighty West Indians are now on the Zimbawe/ Canada level.

India should be the undisputed cricket champions of the world, however they just cant seem to get their act together

Indeed, now that Warne and McGrath have retired, our attack is back to "pretty good", down from the "holy shit!" status it had for a while.

Let us together lament the decline of the Calypso Kings.

OMG - you really are talking Cricket!

yay! i know nothing about cricket but I'll listen in and see if I can learn anything.

Naw, they're not talking about Cricket, they're talking about the current state of international competition.
That's like going to see a war movie, and it turns out to be a UN debate on international strife.... Just ain't the same. :headshake

I'm vaguely thinking about the joke...."The U.S. didn't know what "rest of the world" meant."....

Cricket? The rest of the world plays a game called cricket?

Don't feel too lonely, Joe. MOST of the world does not play cricket. Its pretty much confined to the old British empire (plus Holland who got it via South Africa).

The point of test cricket is that in the height of summer, when it is 40 degrees (100F) outside, you get to spend the hottest part of five days inside sitting on the couch with your mates drinking beer and eating chips. And since many test trophies are decided not by a game but by a series of three, four, or five matches (in the past, sometimes six), this can mean almost a month of male idleness elevated to an art form.

Any further questions?

Does the game require any athletic talent?

Does baseball?

To play? Well, it certainly helps, as you leap and dive for a catch or chase down a ball racing away toward the boundary, or stand in blazing sun in heavy protective gear for a day and a half swinging a wooden club as hard as you can at a fast moving ball, without losing concentration.

To watch? Not now that we have the remote control. You'll need a beer fridge near the couch, though.

fuck the cricket

I'm sick of cricket, regardless of what country happens to be playing it!

Blasphemers!

And non believers

Now I know how the early missionaries must have felt

Cricket? .... Bollocks, more like.

I'll be the cricket. :D

Yes.