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Wait a minute.  Something’s not right.  But I just cannot put my finger on it…

Oh, yes: No IPL matches today.  None.  First time in what seems like ages.  In fact, the only real cricket of note today is the match above.  And Pakistan look to be firmly in control there.  I am hoping that the Windies can hang on for a draw and take the series.  However, that is seeming more and more unlikely, considering how poorly they have been batting.  I predict a early declaration from Pakistan today – and heck I could see them taking all ten of the West Indian wickets today, as well.

In the IPL, however, the first playoff match (AKA, the “qualifier”) is tomorrow, with Bangalore taking on Chennai in Mumbai. The second match (AKA, the “eliminator”) is the following day, also in Mumbai, and features Mumbai and Kolkata.  The 2nd qualifier is the 27th and final is the 28th.  And then the cricketing landscape goes dark until the next T20 tournament starts up.   You know, because the IPL has killed cricket.  Right?

Not right.  In fact, a cracking summer of cricket is just getting started.  This week alone features county cricket, the first test between Sri Lanka and England at Cardiff, and, most intriguingly, an ODI between Pakistan and Ireland in Belfast.

I saw the latter match this morning on my Google Calendar and thought: “hm, that’s right, Ireland declined the ECB’s invitation to the CB40 to concentrate on international duties.   They must have a wholes series of ODIs this summer.”

So I looked it up.

Five.

Five ODI matches.  That’s it.  Two against Pakistan this spring, and then one each against Sri Lanka, Scotland, and England.  Five matches between the World Cup last April and the end of August.

Of course, their elite players, for the most part, play County Cricket and will play in the CB 40 anyway, but goodness, what about your non-elite players?  What better opportunity for them to play against some of the best cricketers in the world?

I just do not understand the decision.

Now, I like Ireland, and I like how they have become a darling of the cricket world, but honestly, as I have mentioned before, they seem to be letting things go to their head.

Oh, well, Sussex won yesterday and are now top of their group in the CB40, thanks, in part, to an Irishman.  So I guess I should stop complaining.  Until tomorrow.

Today is the final test between West Indies and Pakistan.  The Windies can wrap up a famous series win this weekend, but goodness me two test series really shouldn’t count as “famous”.  But, hey, when in Basseterre…

Warner Park was built in 2006, like most of the cricket grounds in the Caribbean it seems.  It is located, as mentioned above, in Basseterre, which is on the island of St. Kitts and Nevis…

…which is located here:

I do apologize for turning this blog into a geography lesson, but I find it fascinating to imagine world class sport on these tiny little island outposts.

As mentioned several times previously, I most assuredly have a soft spot in my heart for the West Indies cricketers.  Which brings us to an interesting topic: Being that the US will never, ever, field a competitive cricket team, at least not in my lifetime, sooner or later I will have to adopt a favorite national team, right?  I mean, we are a global society and a global economy, what is wrong with “choosing”  a country to support?

Now, England would be the obvious choice.  I have been to England, I love England.  They are very, well, American, and it is the country that birthed the sport.  However: boring.

And when it comes to cricket, I have always enjoyed India, mostly because of the insane levels of popularity the sport has achieved there, and I totally dig on their baby blue One Day International kits:

…but that would be like “choosing” Manchester United or the New York Yankees.

Australia and New Zealand?  No thank you.  Not sure why.  South Africa?  Same boat.  A total snooze.   Pakistan?  Too…terroristy.

Which leaves, I guess, the Associate nations.  Ireland is a good bet, and I love Canada.  But, just like the US, neither will ever really field a competitive squad.

So I guess that leaves us with the West Indies.  We will see how that goes.  They have been in the gutter for a decade now, hopefully they will win this series against Pakistan and become, once again, a world cricketing power.

Hey, one can always dream, right?

Until tomorrow.

Honestly, I never much understood these tour matches.  I mean, how are the England Lions different than just plain old England?  Or Sri Lankans different than simply Sri Lanka? Yes, I realize the squads are very different, and that the matches are simply a tune up for the traveling country, but why the odd names for the squads?  How about just calling them an exhibition?

Insular American Alert.  Insular American Alert.

In County Cricket, Sussex bowled Somerset out for a paltry 213, then proceeded to fumble eight wickets themselves over 38 overs.  113/8 right now and at risk of a follow on.   There are other matches happening of course, but goodness writing a bulletin for all of County Cricket is something I just not prepared to do.   For now, I will concentrate on Sussex unless other, “bigger” matches are happening.

Over in the IPL, Kolkata looks to seal a playoff spot against Pune.  First ball in 34 minutes.  Should be a fun one.

Finally this morning, great article last night on the evolution of the game thanks mainly to the helmet.  The sport must truly be unrecognizable to those that have followed it through both eras.

Until tomorrow.

This blog is helping me fall in love with cricket all over again.

I am not sure if it is just because it is forcing to pay more attention to the game, or if it is providing me with a deeper understanding, but all I know is that yesterday I pulled up this picture of Lord’s and felt that old familiar thrill that I felt when I initially fell for the sport back in the spring of 2007.

One of these days I will tell the full story of my courtship with the game, but that is best left for another day.

Last night I watched Gilchrist’s “aggressive” and “violent” IPL innings for KXIP against RCB over on IndiaTimes.  All the pundits were correct: it was an amazing spell.

At first it looked like his batting versus Sri Lanka in the 2007 World Cup (scoreboard here), where he hit 149 off of 104 deliveries over 2 1/2 hours, but as the innings continued yesterday, it was pretty clear that this was something altogether more brilliant.  His strike rate was more than 50 runs higher, and his strikes were like poetry.  No meathead baseball swings, just one beautiful stroke after another.

And, honestly, good thing his batting is so attractive, as Mr. Gilchrist is one funny looking dude.

Also, important question: does he still put the squash ball in his glove?

In other news, there were a couple CB40 matches yesterday: Derbyshire earned a hard fought with the Dutch in Holland (didn’t know Holland played their home matches away from England) and Middlesex beat Worcestershire by six wickets to move to the top of the table.

The ECB live tweeted the latter match from Lord’s, which was a nice treat.  As mentioned before, I was able to briefly visit the ground last March.  I do hope to get back for a match at some point.   From what I can tell, I won’t have to worry about finding a seat.

And, finally, more County Championship matches this morning.  I am off to follow Sussex v Somerset at Hove.  Until tomorrow.

Love that there is a Clydesdale Bank match to follow this morning.  It was also great to see the West Indies bowl their way through the Pakistani batsmen on Sunday.  Only one more test to go, can the Windies take the series?

Here’s what I do find interesting: there are three groups in the Clydesdale Bank competition in England.  On top of the 18 English Counties, each of the three has an invited guest squad playing – The Netherlands in Group A, Scotland in Group B, and in Group C?

The Unicorns.

I surfed around but found very little information on this oh so poorly named sports franchise on Cricinfo, but thankfully their wikipedia page was more than helpful.

Now, great idea for a team (group of contract-less cricketers or “free agents” formed initially to fill the spot in the 40 Over competition vacated by Ireland….also: they are UNPAID), but oh my goodness who came up with that name?  Is that really the best you could do?

Also, does anyone else feel that maybe Ireland is getting too big for its britches?  I mean, they had a nice world cup and have some fine players, but they  are still an associate member – why turn up your nose at an English competition?

Finally, this morning Middlesex is taking the Sri Lankans exhibition squad in some odd three day test match.  The Sri Lankans are chasing 213 with ten wickets left.

Until tomorrow.

Yesterday, I followed Sussex as they thrashed Nottinghamshire by 9 wickets, afterward I watched as Pakistan’s spinners ripped through the West Indies batsmen.

It is Day 2 down in Guyana, and Day 4 across England in County Cricket, so again lots to follow as I put my head down and try to get through another work day.

Honestly, having Cricket to follow throughout the day really does help the hours seem a little less painful.  It is always welcome to have scores to check and tweet about.

If only I had a position where I could listen to the BBC’s coverage of the County game – now that would be ideal.

In other news, Sri Lanka’s tour of England unofficially starts tomorrow, with an exhibition match against Middlesex.   The match is only three days, so I seriously have no idea what type of match it is going to be…. Also, the match is being held in Uxbridge on the deep outskirts of London.  Why not at Lord’s, Middlesex’s home ground?

Also, I love looking up Cricket grounds using Google Street View:

I had fun checking out Hove yesterday during Sussex-Nottinghamshire, as well.  Great little neighborhoods there on the South Coast.

Until tomorrow.

Hey, welcome back test cricket!

Pakistan has never won a test series in the Caribbean and this is a very legitimate chance for them to break that unfortunate streak.  I am looking forward to enjoying a few five day matches – it seems it has been months since we have had any real test cricket to savor.

Of course, there is a 60% chance of showers in Providence this morning, so we will be really lucky if they get a full day in.

The first test is at the Providence Stadium in Guyana.  Which looks to be a real peach of stadium:

It was built in 2006 for the 2007 World Cup in what looks to be a farm/industrial area 50 miles south of Georgetown, Guyana.

I also found it interesting that Guyana is not part of the Caribbean island grouping, it is instead actually part of South America.

The things you learn whilst writing a cricket blog that nobody reads.

My point is this: it would be wonderfully awesome to be at the ground this morning.

My other point is:  is Guyana really in the Caribbean?  Will Pakistan technically break their streak even if they win all three tests? I mean, really, one of the matches is in South America…. I don’t know.  It’s  a judgment call.

In other Cricket news, there is talk of a pink ball for test matches.  Not because the ICC is interested in breast cancer awareness like the MLB here in the states with their pink bats on mother’s day (though I am still not sure how having known steroid user David Ortiz swing a pink bat is supposed to make us more aware of breast cancer (and that aside, who isn’t aware of breast cancer?) but they are looking to use the pink ball, of course, because it is visible under floodlights.  Floodlights mean prime time test matches.  And prime test matches mean more TV revenue.

I am not trying to sound bitter, and I am not ruing the influence of TV money on the game, but I just wish the ICC would be a little more up front about their motives.

They also proposed at the recent ICC meeting the continuation of the “Decision Review System” aka “instant replay”.  Which I think is great news and hopefully it will extend to all levels of the game, where applicable.  I am all for getting the calls right, every time.

That’s that for today. Until tomorrow.

No real post this morning, but if you have twenty minutes to kill (and, really, who doesn’t?), you can read all about the IPL knockout stage scenarios.  Trust me when I say it is just about the most boring thing you will ever read (other than this blog, apparently).

I would love to write more, but I have a meeting this morning.  Until tomorrow.

I have thirteen minutes to write today’s post.  And I just wasted two of those minutes logging into Twitter, Gmail, and WordPress.  There has to be a better way!

An article yesterday from Andrew Miller was 50% wonderful and 50% of the usual IPL bashing.  His musings on the County game were brilliant as usual (though writing articles about the pastoral beauty of County Cricket is like shooting fish in a barrel with a barrel sized fish annihilator) but then he ruins it by calling on the ECB to defend the “sanctity” of Cricket by limited the encroachments of the international game.  It is a valid point, in some ways, the Sri Lankan series should be a real barn burner, but instead it is going to be 22 exhausted cricketers playing in English springtime mud.  But why must he have a go at the IPL?

Note to Englishmen: you invented the game.  Kudos.  But time to let it go.

Until tomorrow.

Good morning from a rain soaked Minneapolis.

There wasn’t going to be a blog this morning, but then a few meetings were moved around at work and, well, here I am.  With nothing to write about.

It’s a quiet morning in the world of Cricket.  There was the announcement of the Sri Lankan Premiere League, a T20 league that is due to start in July of this year.  The winner of the tournament will qualify for the T20 Champions League.

The format is similar to the IPL:  a few internationals, but mostly local players, playing for teams representing their region or county.  What is interesting is that the players will be allocated to the team from the region they hail from.   That is something that just does not happen in any other sport.  (Albeit, yes, most other major sports are not birthing new leagues every 18 months.  There’s a difference, I know.)

But still: I like it.  It is a good way to go about business and drum up local support for the new league.

However, it looks as though all the matches will be played at the national ground in Colombo.   Sri Lanka is a small country, but I still think that will hurt the atmosphere.  But we shall see.

Very, very little going on on the actual cricket pitch this morning. So we will wrap things up with a geography lesson:

Until tomorrow.