The Reverse Sweep

Giving test cricket a bad name

Pitched against the football World Cup, the US golf open and in cricket, the Asia Cup and Nat West Series between England and Australia, the 2nd test between West Indies and South Africa was never going to capture the imagination of the sporting world.

And a good thing too. In what was perhaps one of the most turgid test matches of recent times, the match petered into one of the most dreary draws that you could hope not to see. For those that missed it, South Africa won the toss and ground out 546 for 6 declared in 147 overs. Insomniacs in the crowd would have been cured by typically efficient and drab hundreds from Graeme Smith and Jacques Kallis.

West Indies at least showed they had rediscovered some semblance of backbone by responding with 546 all out from an excruciating 181.1 overs. This included 53 from 215 balls from the normally attacking Dwayne Bravo and a typically dour hundred from Shivnarine Chanderpaul.

We shouldn't be surprised at the apparent utter tedium of this test match. Five day cricket in the Caribbean has become irrevocably linked with dreadful and lifeless pitches and sub-standard test cricket. In the last year or so, we've seen the remarkably boring series with England, which but for the visitors inexplicable collapse in Jamaica would have been a 0-0 stalemate. Then we had the series between the West Indian 3rd XI and Bangladesh.

Now we have the South African series. Hashim Amla and Dale Steyn apart, the Proteas lack flair and are notoriously conservative, but even Smith has been complaining about the dead pitches and painfully slow cricket on show.

Test cricket in the Caribbean used to be one of the most exciting in the world. Now West Indian cricket followers not only have to contend with a sub-standard and disinterested side not fit to wear the famous maroon cap, but they also have to put up with insipidly boring cricket.

Chris Gayle got a lot of stick in England last summer for his negative comments about test cricket. But having seen the pitches he has to play on at home, one can hardly blame him for yearning for the 50 or 20 over formats. The shambolic West Indian Cricket Board needs to do something about it now before test cricket in the Caribbean becomes even more marginalised. 

Who will be the Lovers & the Shaggers of the World T20?

Last week we introduced you to two categories of T20 batsmen - the Lovers and the Shaggers. 

The warm-up matches and the opening match between New Zealand and Sri Lanka has taught us that the pitches in Guyana, Barbados and St Lucia are slower than an arthritic tortoise who has had a particularly heavy night on the sauce. This means that the shaggers may not be as prevalent as they were in the IPL where Robin Uthappa, Yusuf Pathan and Kieron Pollard in particular shagged themselves silly around India for six weeks.

I always had Tillakaratne Dilshan down as a shagger; and an unconventional one at that, but to see him struggle today to score only three off 19 balls suggests that he won't put as many notches on his belt as he did in England in last year's World T20.

So predicting the Lovers that will aim to provide pleasure all night, be chivalrous with their foreplay and then maintain a steady and patient momentum with the occasional shout out loud moment. Similarly, trying to fathom who will be the Shaggers that are too selfish for foreplay and start banging away from day one looks like it is going to be more difficult than we thought. But, to the hell with it and here goes.

The Lovers - Looking to give some lurve will be the following: Jacques Kallis, Mahela Jayawardene, Paul Collingwood, Michael Clarke (if anyone can manage to stay awake), Gautam Gambhir and Shivnarine Chanderpaul.

The Shaggers - Warming up with Robin Uthappa's medicine ball will be: David Warner, Bangladesh (yep, the whole team are testosterone fuelled sex maniacs), Eoin Morgan, Murali Vijay, Shahid Afridi (who is probably a bit kinky), Albie Morkel, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Chris Gayle, Kieron Pollard and Elton Chigumbura.