Nicholas Hogg
How long will they keep turning up?
The hardy, seasoned supporters of the county game still show up, but something like the latest KP episode might leave the younger generation of fans disillusioned
Nicholas Hogg
17-May-2015
That the idea for this particular column, an ode to the joys of county cricket, would be hijacked by 355 unanswered runs, should be of no surprise considering KP's gift for timing. However, until he bats his way back into this piece a few paragraphs on, I shall try and focus.
I'm originally from Leicester, and the last time I watched Leicestershire play was quite possibly when I was on the pitch myself for the Under-19s. That I managed to pull on that wool sweater with its embroidered fox emblem was a boyhood dream that had begun the day I walked though the gates at Grace Road as a spectator, aged 11.
School summer holidays of the 1980s followed the flux of the weather. Rain in the morning, which was set for the day, meant indoor games of Test Match on the kitchen table. If we got some rays in the afternoon I'd be out with my cricket-mad friends, playing with a tennis ball, down the side of my house. If the sun was set to shine all day, I'd be on the bus into town, sandwiches packed in an old Walls Ice Cream box, and the LCCC membership book, on loan from the local Working Men's Club, tucked in my pocket.
Full postWhen defeats haunt
The losing team has much to ponder over the what-could-have-beens in close matches; in a one-sided game, the past is put to rest quickly
Nicholas Hogg
27-Mar-2015
I doubt that Richard III, just before he was clubbed to death in a field in Leicestershire in 1485, envisaged that crowds would one day throng city streets for a glimpse of his coffin, 500 years after his death, when he had been dug up from a car park. Who would want to lionise a monarch who had died with the rumour that he'd murdered his nephews? Moreover, who'd want to commemorate a defeat? Henry Tudor would take his crown and end his dynasty. Yet there he lay in a horse-drawn carriage, white roses scattered over his bones while the news crews filmed.
Seconds after Grant Elliott had lifted Dale Steyn's ball into the delirious crowds at Eden Park, he was lifting a prostrate AB de Villiers off the pitch and on to his feet. It was touching gesture, on par with Andrew Flintoff's arm-around-the-shoulder moment with Brett Lee at Edgbaston in 2005. This was a famous victory for New Zealand, which meant a famous loss for the South Africans. However, and unlike the last Plantagenet Richard, de Villiers had to take the post-match interview stand and, holding back the tears, admit defeat while thanking the opposition, his own players, and apologising to their fans. "Hopefully the passion we showed made a difference and people can still be proud of us." Judging by the reaction of press, players and pundits, this was indeed a heroic loss. Kevin Pieteresen admired how de Villiers had "led the team wonderfully well" and Shane Warne asked the South Africans to "hold their heads high".
South Africa were beaten, yes. But humiliated, no. The same couldn't be said for England in the tournament. Defeat is only ennobling when the contest is close and valiantly fought.
Full postLet's talk about the ECB's strategy document
There has been all too much negativity in the wake of news that plans are afoot to overhaul English cricket
Nicholas Hogg
05-Mar-2015
Judging by the comments on George Dobell's article announcing the grandly titled "Strategy Conversation Summary" commissioned by the ECB - an acronym that will possibly become CEW: Cricket England and Wales, as the ECB brand is considered "toxic" - it's highly unfashionable to ever agree with the national game's management.
At the risk of being uncool, I'm going to support some of the proposals put forward in this "wide-ranging review", which, as critics keep forgetting, is a debate, a work in progress, and not a tablet carved in stone.
Analysing from a point of pragmatism rather than dogmatism, I do know that English cricket has problems - many. From the results of our three lions, lack of a dynamic T20 structure, morbid county cricket, as well as appalling player management from the boardroom to the coaching staff - see Kevin Pietersen, Michael Carberry, Steven Finn et al for details - I can plainly see, as can the majority of cricket fans, that someone, whether it is the ECB, the CEW, the BBC, the CIA or the FBI, needs to shake things up.
Full postTalking kit
Bats, artificial pitches, blingy bails - we've come a long way in terms of cricket equipment
Nicholas Hogg
18-Feb-2015
"Does kit imitate cricket?" begins the famous Andy Warhol quote, "Or does cricket imitate kit?"
Okay, so Warhol was really talking about life and art, rather than cricket and kit, but the question is genuine: has the game changed, especially with the introduction of bigger, harder-hitting bats (and batsmen) because of the gear, or has player evolution forced the kit to mutate too?
Arriving at the Lord's AOC Cricket Expo, a trade fair where suppliers of anything remotely to do with the game - from player insurance, tours to Barbados, and websites to record player and team averages - gathered to parade and sell their wares, I wondered if I might discover a genesis moment.
Full postSwitching from pace to legspin
In which the author, compelled by the depredations of age, attempts a change in cricket speciality
Nicholas Hogg
22-Jan-2015
When Brett Lee, my favourite pantomime villain of the 2005 Ashes series, announced his retirement from cricket, I admit I was sad. Firstly because any withdrawal of a player from the game they love is a melancholic day. The moment they hang up their boots, their career is nostalgia. The earth turns, and retirement is a marker of ageing - for players and spectators. And considering Lee was still launching missiles in the Big Bash, not forgetting his Piers Morgan rib-breakers last year, many of us were as surprised at the sudden timing.
Neither did it bode well for my first net of the year, last week. Now, I'm not for one microsecond comparing myself to Brett Lee. But as a medium-fast bowler who comes in off a full run I understand my days are numbered. This season I shall be 41. Lee is a puppyish 38, and he's already called it quits.
I was only halfway through my first ball of 2015 when I was wondering if I had marked out my run-up correctly. Surely it wasn't this far to the crease? And looking into the distance where the batsman stood, I doubted if the Lord's indoor school had got their measurements right. Although I eventually creaked into my delivery stride and that ball finally meandered the 22 yards towards the wicket, my body complained at every movement - that night, the next morning, and still now, nearly a week later I feel like the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz.
Full postAwards for the year
In which gongs are handed out and wishes drawn up
Nicholas Hogg
30-Dec-2014
Now the Christmas turkey has settled, and the last dry mince pie has been washed down with another glass of sherry, it's time to reflect on the year in cricket, and resolve how to make 2015 even better.
Best promotional campaign
The man "who shall not be named" was on every TV and radio chat show across the globe. A one-man circus, KP's book tour came with as much fanfare - and hyperbole - as a political campaign. However, although the World Cup doesn't begin until 2015, it is the uplifting and slickly filmed ICC advertisement for the competition that trumps the Pietersen bandwagon.
The man "who shall not be named" was on every TV and radio chat show across the globe. A one-man circus, KP's book tour came with as much fanfare - and hyperbole - as a political campaign. However, although the World Cup doesn't begin until 2015, it is the uplifting and slickly filmed ICC advertisement for the competition that trumps the Pietersen bandwagon.
Worst drop (catch, not player)
In 2005 Shane Warne dropped the Ashes. On his way to a match-winning 158 at The Oval, KP sliced one, at a perfectly catchable height, and the urn went in and out of Warne's hands. Did the captaincy, and the selectors' faith, hit the turf when Alastair Cook spilled Kumar Sangakkara on 41 in Kandy? Sangakkara went on to make 112, and Cook was lbw second ball.
Full postIn 2005 Shane Warne dropped the Ashes. On his way to a match-winning 158 at The Oval, KP sliced one, at a perfectly catchable height, and the urn went in and out of Warne's hands. Did the captaincy, and the selectors' faith, hit the turf when Alastair Cook spilled Kumar Sangakkara on 41 in Kandy? Sangakkara went on to make 112, and Cook was lbw second ball.
Would Brearley have picked Cook as captain?
Cook lacks certain qualities the ex-England captain listed as those necessary for an ideal leader, in particular, charisma
Nicholas Hogg
19-Dec-2014
If the Twitter mob ran the board of selectors, Alastair Cook would be dropped and Eoin Morgan installed as the new England captain.
But the online revolution has yet to overrule five men around a table. Between now and Saturday, one would hope that the selectors, Peter Moores, Angus Fraser, Mick Newell and James Whitaker are considering all options. While the ECB managing director Paul "I had to Google him - KP" Downton says he would be "surprised" if Cook wasn't at the helm for the World Cup, coach Moores declared that no one was "unsackable".
Common sense, and just about every living England captain, agree Cook must go. And regrettably - how rare it must be for such a likeable character to receive so many calls to quit. We admire his gritty determination to carry on, in the same way we admire the hardy skipper who ties himself to the wheel of a sinking ship. But when there might be another captain at hand with a chart to navigate us through that treacherous reef system, it's time for Cook to walk the plank - whether at the sharp end of Moore's sword, or indeed falling on his very own.
Full postThe problem with watching England
It's not just about wanting your side to win; there's also the matter of which players you want to do well
Nicholas Hogg
06-Dec-2014
My first negative wish about the Sri Lanka v England game on Wednesday was granted: rain. Selfishly, as I couldn't watch much of the match if it started at 9am GMT, I'd wished for a delay - divine intervention, prolonged streaking, a mass protest at the dropping of Ian Bell, I didn't mind, as long as that first ball was bowled around lunchtime rather than breakfast, when I was supposed to be working. And wishing for this burst of inclement weather I realised, as other England fans might have done, that it wouldn't be my only pessimistic thought for the day.
An Englishman watching England play cricket can be a conflicted being. We don't always want our national team to win. I know this may sound strange to fans of other nations, or even like treason to some die-hard supporters on my own damp island, but the blind worship of our three lions is not a given.
Firstly, there is our dysfunctional concept of patriotism. Love for a nation, in this nation, may result in ridicule by the national press. Last month a Labour MP was sacked after she tweeted a photo of a house draped in the St George's Cross. Although the tweet contained no text, the residents of our hyper-class-conscious country knew exactly what she meant - many on the liberal left see that red cross on a white background as a parade of narrow, right-wing values.
Full postViva indoor cricket
It's one way to keep in touch with the game in the long, dark English winters
Nicholas Hogg
21-Nov-2014
Cricket has always improvised itself into non-traditional spaces. From living rooms, ship decks and landing strips, to the ice of the Arctic. The beautifully filmed advert for the cricket World Cup shows true fervour knows no bounds, with kids across the globe running in to bowl on beaches, in alleyways and backyards.
Years before I first walked onto a cut-grass wicket with teams in white, I played on a tarmac pitch against factory walls. Balls ricocheted off cars and rolled off roofs, and the dimensions of the brick-lined stadia kept the ball almost constantly in play, unless one cleared the gable and a six-and-out was awarded. We played a fast, frenetic game, and all my friends learned how to bowl an array of cutters, legbreaks and googlies, because that non-swinging tennis ball would soon disappear if we just threw down pies.
So it was no surprise that when indoor-cricket mania hit the UK in the mid-'80s I was instantly hooked.
Full postDear West Indies cricket
A letter from a fan who grew up idolising the great Caribbean sides of the '80s
Nicholas Hogg
04-Nov-2014
I am writing to you with concern regarding the recent withdrawal of your players from the cricket pitch. From what I read in the media, captain Dwayne Bravo announced to the board that "the players have taken a decision to withdraw their services from the remainder of the tour of India".
From what I infer this means an argument about money. And money not going in the right pockets, I presume. Well, although I understand that where money is involved there will inevitably be problems, and that where sports administrators and athletes converge, there will be chaos, anger, stupidity and greed. I don't understand how it could come to this.
Cricket as we know it will soon cease to exist. Although this change is inevitable, as all sports must evolve, and then thrive or die - we'd still be watching men in top hats roll balls between two sticks guarded by other men in top hats using curved bats if it didn't - I can't help but be particularly worried and upset by this Windies walkout.
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