In the world of Women’s Cricket, the big news this week is the upcoming India vs. England Test at the historic Wormsley Ground in England.
Worthwhile reads on the match can be found at The Telegraph, Wisden India and The Cordon. (That last one is from your friend and mine, Raf Nicholson.)
Unfortunately, the match will not be available to stream online. Which is a real shame. (All three England vs. India ODIs will be available, however.)
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You certainly haven’t missed this story, but just in case: Cricinfo has the scoop on Lendl Simmons’ now infamous “drug bat”: “Simmons was travelling through the country between games for Guyana Amazon Warriors in the Caribbean Premier League when his bat attracted the interest of customs officials. In a sure sign that cricket remains a mysterious and largely unknown sport in the USA, the officials feared that the bat could be used to transport illegal drugs so drilled several holes into it to enable closer inspection.”
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Congrats to the ladies from Nottinghamshire on clinching the T20 title. The Nottingham Post has it: “At the NatWest Women’s County T20 finals day at the RAF Sports Ground in London, Notts Ladies narrowly came out on top after bouncing back in fine style to losing their opening fixture to Kent.
With Middlesex having already beaten Kent by 45 runs in the first game of the day, it gave Notts a chance to make amends in the three-team event.
And they took the opportunity in fine style in a crushing victory over Middlesex in the final game to clinch the trophy on run-rate after each side won one and lost one.”
(As kind of an aside, the first sentence of that article is more than just a little sexist.)
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Speaking of sexism. From the Daily Maverick: “…for all the propaganda the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) likes to bang on about, there is still something curious about the way they treat the longest format of the women’s game. Starting next week, England and India will contest a Test match for the first time in eight years. It’s a great thing for women’s cricket and refreshing to see women’s teams other than England and Australia playing each other. But there is one small problem. The match is not easily accessible to the general public and, when it comes to putting women’s cricket on the map, accessibility is one of the biggest stumbling blocks.”
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Oh, USACA, you so crazy. Cricinfo: “Just three days out from the USA Cricket Association National Tournament, no arrangements have been made for USACA’s incumbent selection panel to come to the event in order to evaluate talent for the country’s next international assignment in October – the ICC WCL Division Three in Uganda.”
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For great stories on what’s happening at the farthest reaches of the cricketing world, be sure to “like” the nonprofit Cricket Without Boundaries on Facebook. Stories like this one via the New Times on Rwanda’s impressive showing so far in the U-19 ICC Africa Division Two tournament in Lusaka, Zambia.
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I would be remiss if I did not mention the Caribbean Premier League knockout stages start this afternoon. The matches will be live on ESPN3 here in the States. In other programming news, the Scotland vs. New Zealand A ODIs will be streamed live on dailyrecord.co.uk.
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Cricinfo has the news that India are buying Afghanistan a new stadium in the suburbs of Kandahar. Whether or not this means they will be able to host international matches down the road is not mentioned in the article.
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Absolute bonkers stuff out of the Netherlands. Story via the good people at CricketEurope: “Last Sunday’s match at Thurlede between Excelsior and Hermes was never likely to be a cozy affair, with potential escape from a four-way relegation battle on the line as well as the usual pressure of a Scheidam Derby. But few expected things to get as ugly as they did, with consistent over-appealing and rising tempers eventually culminating in Luuk van Troost finding himself on his back in the middle of the pitch courtesy of a body check from Borg Lenstra, prompting Excelsior players to storm onto the pitch to remonstrate – the most egregious of several regrettable scenes in a game which saw no less than three players written up by umpires Jansen and Hilhorst.” The whole article is worth your time.
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