The First Test: Pakistan v England, Day Three

Facing a 100+ run deficit, a good spinner and the history of England in the subcontinent, will England show fight and pull off a Brisbane 2010, or will they reassure us that the England we grew up watching from behind a cushion, probably weeping whenever the grainy statistics came up with the words "slow" in the bowling action column, is still in there, somewhere?

Here's what happened on a quite eventful day 3 from Dubai way back in mid January.

The First Test: Pakistan v England, Day Two

About a month late (so I'm going to pretend that it was published in January), here's the second day of the first Test v Pakistan. I had a laptop malfunction, but a new hard drive and a lot less money later, here's some ducks playing cricket. If you don't know what happened, you've been living in a cave for the past month.

A very disappointing day for England on day one, as their batting capitulation had put Pakistan in a relatively strong position at the beginning of day two. Could England's bowlers pull it back?

Here's day two from Dubai.

The First Test: Pakistan v England, Day One

They've been gathering dust on a book shelf ever since they were put away back in October, but England are back, so guess what? The ducks are back too. Welcome to my desk Dubai, for England's first Test of 2012, and first test of their number one status, against a rejuvenated Pakistan side.

Despite early chatter about England breaking character and going with five bowlers, England went with the usual four. Despite concerns over Broad and Bell being injured by their own compatriots, Tremlett came in for the injured Bresnan. Had Bresnan not been injured, perhaps they would've gone with the five, but you can't ponder too much on injuries.

Here's what happened on day one from the Dubai International Cricket Stadium.

That dragged on a bit, didn't it?

The last international match of the summer finished a few hours ago, with England clinching the ODI against Pakistan 3-2. A much deserved victory and one which must be a massive relief to captain Andrew Strauss, who in the past couple of days has had to defend his team's honour after the ridiculous accusations of Ijaz Butt. Strauss has rightly been incredibly angered by the statement from Butt, and has been working tirelessly with the ECB to make sure the press releases are correctly worded and throughout all this the team spirit seems to have been high.

When Vaughan resigned as captain, I always thought Strauss should've been captain. I was absolutely distraught when Flintoff was made captain for the Ashes in 2006/07. But I guess had he been made captain, the result wouldn't have been different, because behind the scenes wasn't right and basically the squad selection was dire. Anyway, that was four years ago and completely off the point of this long old 2010 summer.

It seems a long time ago since April and I was sat freezing down at Chelmsford watching Ryan ten Doeschate destroy Hampshire's lower order to hand Essex their first win in the Division One of the County Championship. Five months later, we finished bottom and were losing sem-finalists in both the Twenty20 Cup and CB40. Brilliant. Hello Division Two. Injuries didn't help Essex's season. Had RtD not got injured in the middle of his superb run of form, he may well have performed better at the Rose Bowl. But the major news that came out of Chelmsford over the course of the summer was that allegation of spot-fixing, something that the world of cricket would soon find out about and has now put the integrity of the sport in danger.

During the Essex vs Hampshire game, the news broke that two Essex players were being interviewed by police about a televised Pro40 game in September 2009. For the first time of the summer, spot-fixing was mentioned and rumours began to circulate as to who the two players were. There were some high profile names on offer during the Durham vs Essex match, but in the end it turned out to be Pakistani leg-spinner, Danish Kaneria and the youngster, Mervyn Westfield. They were released on bail until 15th September, and it was revealed a couple of days before that Kaneria was not going to be charged. Westfield, however, was charged with conspiracy to defraud. With these allegations hanging over the county's head, it was no surprise that Mark Pettini resigned as captain. The amount of pressure he must have been under is huge. His form dipped and during the Twenty20 season, he was given leave for 10 days. He came back refreshed and the captaincy was handed over to James Foster.

To put it bluntly, it was a fairly disappointing season both on and off the pitch for Essex. After so much hope and expectation, it ended in a whimper at the Rose Bowl, horrific collapses in the County Championship and another terrible collapse in the CB40. Never mind, at least I met Scott Styris, eh?

Still, putting the disappointment of county cricket behind me (it could've been worse, I could've adopted Somerset as a second team and seen them finish runners up in everything. Oh, wait...), England's international summer has been a rather fruitful one. Whilst Bangladesh and Pakistan weren't the strongest opposition (I say this, but Pakistan's bowling attack did destroy us), we still found out some things during the 6 Tests England played. Not entirely useful, but some.

• Steven Finn falls over. A lot.
• Stuart Broad can break a man's thumb with his throw. Don't make him angry.
• England suck against a swinging ball.
• Alastair Cook can score a hundred with his eyes closed. Only if the bowler hurls the ball for four though. 
• James Anderson is quite good when it's cloudy.
• Bangladesh were more challenging than Pakistan were in the first two Tests.
• Eoin Morgan will probably play Test cricket again for England.
• The England batting line up isn't all that spineless.
• Lord's does booing. 
• Australia can be bowled out for less than 100. 
• Graeme Swann is actually a fantastic spinner.
• Matt Prior can bat. And wicketkeep.
• Kamran Akmal can't. 
• Kevin Pietersen's head is messed up and he needs a hug. Preferably off Lalit Modi. 
• Neutral Tests don't attract crowds. 
• Neutral Tests shouldn't be sponsored by the 'Spirit of Cricket'.
• Neutral Tests involving Pakistan probably won't be hosted here again. 
• Nasser Hussain, Ian Botham and Ramiz Raja are still bloody awful commentators.
• And for all the terrible rumours surrounding the Pakistan team, it's refreshing to know that there's someone like Zulqarnain Haider in the side.

On a more serious note, it is only a matter of hours until the public find out who's on that plane to Australia in November. It will be an extremely gruelling tour for England, but this time, they're actually spending time warming up to get used to the conditions. This, hopefully, will be beneficial to England. Graeme Swann will prove crucial in the Test series, as he always does and it's good that he's on the shortlist for ICC Cricketer of the Year, despite being initially overlooked for reasons we cannot understand. I blame Bob Willis. He probably sent everyone to sleep.

The Test series against Bangladesh was fairly routine for England. Bangladesh weren't used to the English conditions, so they couldn't put England under pressure, like they did in Bangladesh. The one highlight for Bangladesh was the superb Tamim Iqbal, who routinely gave England's bowlers a headache as he thwacked them all over the place. Luckily for England, the rest of the Bangladesh batting line up weren't tigers, but instead kittens, as they limply got out to James Anderson, or Steven Finn bowling a loosener and hitting it to mid on. Good one, Rahim.

May seems a long, long time ago now. I miss Bangladesh. I really loved their positive outlook and the fact that they played cricket for the love of it. Yeah, they weren't very good, but everyone has to start somewhere. They play with a smile on their face, they're a young squad and exactly what cricket needs. Even if Geoffrey "corridor of uncertainty" Boycott doesn't think so. To quote Tamim Iqbal, "If you start a chocolate company you can't compete with Cadbury in the first 10 years because they are a big company." With gems like that, I won't begrudge Bangladesh Test status.

Then you come to Pakistan. At the start of the summer, I was drooling at the prospect of seeing Amir in action again. I remember him playing for Pakistan Under-19s as a 15 year old and the fact that someone my age (I'm repeating myself) was playing international cricket was fantastic. After drawing the 'neutral Test' series with Australia 1-1 and giving everyone a huge laugh after Australia were bundled out for 88, we began at Trent Bridge for what everyone hoped was going to be a hugely exciting, keenly contested series. Sadly, it ended up as who could collapse the least against the swinging ball and that honour went to England.

The Test series saw Stuart Broad's maiden hundred. First-class and Test. Jonathan Trott nearly scored two double hundreds at Lord's. Eoin Morgan scored a hundred at Trent Bridge. Andrew Strauss was out of touch, Collingwood wasn't great at bolstering the middle order and Pietersen. Well, Pietersen's demise has been well documented in the press. His confidence is shot, which was unthinkable five years ago. Perhaps Test cricket isn't where his heart lies, perhaps the passion isn't there. Perhaps I should stop speculating and just let him get on with it down in South Africa to make me shut up about his mental state, technique and general life things.

I, like many other cricket fans, was enjoying the Test series until BOOM! No, Afridi hadn't come out of Test retirement, but the News of the World published an article about the mysteriously large Pakistan no-balls. The news broke on Saturday night, as England had enforced the follow on on a completely shell-shocked Pakistan, after a world record partnership between Broad and Trott (which was still awesome and despite the allegations surrounding the Test, should not be tainted, because it was superb batting). On Sunday morning, MCC members could be seen reading the News of the World, something I never thought I'd see! Even on the Pakistani dressing room balcony, there was the paper in the hands of the tour manager with the team locked in the changing room behind. England carried on as normal, warming up on the outfield and focusing on the job in hand. When the wickets tumbled and the accused Pakistani players finally ventured out to the middle, a smattering of boos were heard. Boos! At Lord's! It was definitely serious.

Within a few days, the PCB still hadn't taken control of the situation. I'm not going to go on a massive rant about the PCB at the moment, as that warrants its own blog, but I'm just going to say I'm pleased the ICC took a hold of the situation. Even if the three players are found not guilty, for the sake of cricket, it is better to provisionally suspend them whilst the invesigation is on going. Why Kaneria and Westfield were not suspended is beyond me, but Westfield didn't play for the Essex first team at all during the season, so perhaps the club knew something that we didn't. Or they didn't want to lose Danish. The other fast bowler, Riaz was interviewed by the police and on Monday, found himself in the grasp of Jonathan Trott as emotions finally boiled over after Ijaz Butt's VERY WELL TIMED statement.

I can understand why Mr Butt is annoyed. The ICC are investigating British media claims about the Pakistan team. What Mr Butt does not understand is that match fixing and spot fixing are very different. Spot fixing focuses on a specific part of the game. Match fixing is throwing it. And, having watched England play for over 5 years, you just know that a collapse is never far away. Just because Pakistan won the third ODI doesn't mean they can't be guilty of spot fixing. Mervyn Westfield apparently is. Another thing Mr Butt needs to remember is that Pakistan could easily be at home not even playing Test cricket, had England not extended an olive branch to them and allowed them to play a Test series on 'neutral' soil. To the ECB, it must feel like a giant slap in the face. Instead of accusing the team of the country that has allowed them to use their facilities (at a loss), Mr Butt should take a look at the politics of the PCB. Then he can talk to us about corruption.
 
I'm pleased the summer is over. I love cricket, but in the last month, it's been a hard slog. England have beaten Bangladesh and Pakistan in their two Test series and beaten Bangladesh, Pakistan and Australia in ODIs. I'd like to say congratulations to Bangaldesh as well for their win in the second ODI in their series against us. It was a superb performance and thoroughly deserved and the celebrations at the end showed how much it meant to them. And that warms the cockles. However, the over-riding feeling is of anger towards Pakistan. I hope for the sake of Pakistan cricket that the allegations are not true, but then a part of me doesn't. A part of me wants them to be true so that corruption can be looked at and can begin to be dealt with instead of being swept under the carpet. Cricketing boards around the world need to get their heads out of the sand. Corruption is present in our beloved game and it needs to be harshly dealt with. If the fans don't know that what they're watching is real, then they're not going to go. Even if Amir is only 18, should he be found guilty, will fans want him to come back? He is a fantastic talent, but the trust would be broken. It has been for years with Asif and it angers me that someone who has failed so many drugs tests is still allowed to play.

I'm also pleased that the summer is over because it brings us closer to the winter. And the winter means the Ashes. Pundits are already bigging up England as having a chance to win Down Under. I think it'll be a close series. Some of the England players were there last time and will have hopefully learned from the 5-0 drubbing. We have a settled wicketkeeper and arguably the best spinner in the world at the moment. The coaching set up is relaxed and I think the two Andys have formed a great partnership. And this time, I think we have the right captain. I'm also excited about the Ashes on a personal level. On December 21st, I fly over to Melbourne to have a dream come true in seeing the Boxing Day Test live. Then, on New Years Eve, I head over to Sydney.

I cannot wait!

The Lord's Test

I was looking forward to writing a blog about how fantastic Jonathan Trott and Stuart Broad were in England's first (and in the end only) innings. How they built a partnership that smashed one record after another. How Stuart Broad hit his first ever century (Test or first-class) and looked likely to get a double until Ajmal used the UDRS correctly. How Trott was at the crease for effectively a day and half and how he came so close to scoring two double hundreds at Lord's. But no. All this is now over-shadowed by the allegations surfacing against Asif, Amir and Butt.

England looked shell-shocked taking to the field at 11. The Pakistan dressing room doors had been shut until 11, with only a few players venturing onto the balcony. The two not out batsmen were greeted with a ripple of applause. When Azhar Ali's wicket fell, it brought to the crease Kamran Akmal, who was also named in the News of the World's report. How must his brother have felt at the other end? It's not the first time Kamran Akmal has been allegedly involved in some kind of 'fix'. The Sydney Test earlier this year saw a suspicious amount of simple catches dropped and routine run outs missed.

When he got out to Anderson for 1, it brought to the crease 18 year old Amir. I've been singing his praises. He mauled the England middle order on Friday and got on the Honour's Board at Lord's. There was a smattering of boos for him, but not much applause. He was quickly bowled by Swann, whose celebrations were quite muted compared to the previous day. When the other accused party in Asif came to the crease, Lord's fell silent. There were a couple of boos, but from the member's pavilion, there was nothing.

My first reaction to this news was of shock and anger. After Broad and Trott had worked so hard to get England into a commanding position, the allegations surfaced and seemed to taint their hard work. I felt angry towards the match fixers, the Pakistan team, even the News of the World. Match fixers were putting the sport that I and many millions around the world love on the front pages for the wrong reasons. They ruin others enjoyment, break the law and have now dared to attack the most sacred of cricket matches, the Lord's Test. 

The more I looked at it though, the shock and anger subsided and was replaced with an overwhelming feeling of sadness and disappointment. At the moment, Pakistan is in the grips of awful flooding and the entire country is facing a humanitarian disaster. The political state of the country and the attack on the umpires and Sri Lankan cricket team mean that Pakistan cannot hold matches in their own country, hence the Pakistan-Australia (how must the MCC feel after sponsoring that?) series being played here. The Pakistan team also has some heartbreaking stories in it. The back-up wicketkeeper, Zulqarnain Haider lost his mother when he was 12 and when he made his Test debut donated half his match fee to a hospital in Pakistan.

After the Oval Test, Pakistan were on a high. They had England 102-7 and were then batted out of the game by two sublime innings. On Sunday morning, only the injured players were sat out on the Lord's balcony, looking glumly on as their fit counterparts were talked to by the team director. If proven guilty, Amir's career will effectively be over. And if it is, what an absolute waste. The kid clearly has a lot of talent. He was playing for Pakistan Under-19s when he was 15. Now he could face a life ban. If you were born in a slum to extreme poverty and a man came up to you and offered you £50000 for bowling a no-ball at a stated time, would you turn it down? You would hope that the pride of playing for your country would cause you to do so. But the other bowler, Asif, is so used to controversy that the fact he's still playing is unbelievable. He has battled drugs and his own team mates and now he must battle these allegations. Salman Butt replaced arguably the most controversial and maverick player in world cricket, Shahid Afridi, as captain. And now he's been dragged into these allegations too. When asked if he should resign, he answered, "Why?" But should the allegations be true, then he'll probably be banned too. He's only 25 and his career may well be over as well. 

When it was announced back in April that two Essex players were being questioned by Essex police on the charges of spot-fixing the televised Pro40 up at Durham in September last year, I was absolutely gutted. When it surfaced that Danish Kaneria was involved, I was even more disappointed. I'm disappointed now as well. I really admired Mohammad Amir. He was the youngest player to reach 50 wickets and get on the Lord's Honours board and he has so much to give. But the evidence is not looking good for him or Asif, as those no-balls were not just over, they were massive. Had they not been guilty, surely they would have protested their innocence, like they did in 2006?

This one will rumble on for a while and should Pakistan play the ODI series, the reaction they get will probably be heated. But since Kaneria is still playing for Essex, despite being on police bail, will the PCB stop Amir, Asif and Butt playing in the ODI series? Looking at its track record, I would expect them to play, which is why I think the ICC need to step in and do the discplining here. The PCB banned Mo Yousuf and Younis Khan, then unbanned them a couple of months later on appeal.

Sadly, the cricket world will remain in a sombre mood for a while yet.

Pakistan bamboozled by James Anderson

Before the beginning of the Test match at Trent Bridge, it was widely believed that Pakistan were "in form" and this Test match wouldn't be a damp squib. Over night, the disastrous tour to Australia was forgotten and that match at Lord's was history. Yes, Pakistan played well up at Headingley. They bowled Australia out for 88. However, they won by 3 wickets. It was painfully obvious that the Pakistani batting line up is about as brittle as a breadstick.

The two bowling line-ups were very well matched. The 18 year old Mohammad Aamer (or Amir) is already being tipped for great things. I remember seeing him when he was a 15 year old (or similar) playing for the Pakistan under 19s. Makes you think when someone you're only a few months older than is playing international cricket. Mohammad Asif, who is prone to a controversy or ten, took a 5 wicket haul in England's first innings. Yet both of these fast-medium bowlers were overshadowed by another. The man with the eyebrows that look like tiny caterpillars have wandered onto his face, James Anderson, took 11-71 in the match, with a 5-fer and a 6-fer in each innings respectively.

Having a bowler friendly wicket was refreshing to say the least. After the non-event in Sri Lanka in the second Test, it was nice to have the return of battling batsmen and the new ball being so vital. Both sides struggled against it. England were 118-4 at one point before the vital partnership of Lord Collingwood and Eoin Morgan came together. Yes, Anderson bowled well, but it was this 200+ run partnership that set England's victory up. Pakistan didn't use their referrals at all well this match. Had they not wasted them on Pietersen, who was likely to get out quickly himself due to being out of form and his on-going feud with Hampshire, then they could've got England out for 200, or less. Instead, Morgan batted beautifully for his 130 and apparently brushed aside his critics. However, in a quite unique way, Morgan answered an interview with Nasser Hussain honestly and effectively said, "I've still got a lot of work to do, shut up Nasser."

Another England player that deserves credit is Matt Prior. He deserved his hundred after England were tottering in the second innings. Having been run out by Swann in the first innings and then running out Eoin Morgan in the second, Prior got his head down and played out Asif, Aamer and a fired up Gul. He got reward for this perseverance by facing the hopelessly out of form Danish Kaneria and the part time off-spinner Shoaib Malik. Whilst he may've crawled to his century (I think he owes Steven Finn about 20 pints), he certainly deserved it and ran rings and rings around his counterpart, Kamran Akmal.

Akmal struggled against the swinging ball an awful lot this match. He also struggled against the barely spinning ball. He took a sublime catch to dismiss Kevin Pietersen in England's second innings, yet the next ball he went to the cor blimey by dropping Collingwood first ball. It didn't really cost them many runs, but it was the second time he'd not got rid of Collingwood when given the chance. He didn't have much luck on the batting, as his brother seemed to use his referral chances. Umar Akmal was plumb LBW, Kamran Akmal was not.

So now we head off to Edgbaston where England will remain unchanged. This is fair enough. Alastair Cook is having problems with his technique and Pietersen is clearly struggling. Some of his trademark shots did come out during England's innings, but they didn't look as fluent. No player is big enough to not have a county. He may live in Chelsea, but there are two county sides in London, so there is no excuse. He needs to play cricket to get back into form, so he'll retain his place in the Test side.

On the other hand, Pakistan have made some surprises. Mohammad "Banned-Unbanned-Retired" Yousuf has been recalled into the squad to provide, I would assume, a backbone to their batting line up. But he's got to be flown in from Pakistan. He also hasn't played cricket internationally for a while, as he was banned due to the goings on Down Under. The Pakistan side is a very young one, so what kind of message does this send to them? Yousuf is 35. Yes, he scored hundreds of runs against England last time, but I think even he would've succumbed to the England seam attack. Pakistan need to move on from that time. Inzy's long gone and Younis Khan is in the wilderness. It's all part of the rebuilding process. England have gone through it after the Pietersen captaincy debacle, Pakistan will have to as well.

As said earlier, Danish Kaneria has been hopelessly out of form. He has been for most of this year, to be honest. Ever since the allegations of spot-fixing came against him, he hasn't been right. The Pakistani selectors seem to have finally realised who's in England's team and backroom staff. Alastair Cook plays with Kaneria at Essex. Gooch coaches at Essex. And more importantly, Andy Flower, played for years at Essex. They know about Kaneria's weaknesses, and now Kaneria has been sent back to Essex. Where he can't play. Because Essex have signed Bryce McGain. That'll be one to watch over the next few weeks.

Friday will be an incredibly interesting day. Especially if the conditions and pitch are suited to bowling. The bowling attacks are both incredibly talented. It's the batting and fielding that shows the gaps between the two sides. And at the moment, Bangladesh seemed to put up more of a fight. Take that, Geoffrey Boycott.

England lose 6 for 23

Well, you wouldn't expect anything less given the fact it's England. Had it been Australia, it may've raised a few more eyebrows and been celebrated by the national tabloids. Instead, the hero of yesterday Eoin Morgan* and partner, Lord Paul Collingwood, lost their wickets and sparked a collapse of the tail. Swann ran a ball watching Prior out. Then a brooding Swann, given out LBW,  glared at Tony Hill, who had a pretty good morning. Jimmy gifted his wicket to the jubliant Asif by leaving a pretty decent delivery. Happy birthday to you Mr. Anderson. And finally, Broad got bowled. At least, I think it was him. It might've been Finn.

Normally, England's tail is pretty good. This is when the top order has failed, for example Cardiff and Headingley in 2009. And South Africa. And various other places across the globe. Anyway, from 331-4, England were all out for 354. At least this didn't happen yesterday, when we were 118-4. 

The ball appears to be moving around at Trent Bridge today. The pitch looks good for spin and has variable bounce. So over to you Anderson, Finn, Broad and Swann. Pakistan's batting is inconsistent to say the least and England's fielding should be superior. Hopefully England can get themselves back into a decent position. Either way, after the very, very high-scoring draw out in Colombo between Sri Lanka and India, this Test match should really whet the appetite. 

*Congratulations to Eoin Morgan by the way. That was a superb innings and yeah, he may be Irish but the man is too talented to be playing minor country and county cricket. He deserves a chance against the world's best and on the international stage.