You can excuse the odd batting collapse occasionally, the Sunday side on some of their more…er… experienced outings have slid to something similar and the odd match on tour can subside to farce on the basis of a hearty liquid lunch beforehand, but the Test team??? New Zealand are a tight enough outfit but it wasn’t like the Three Lions were batting on a Sabina Park minefield against a fired up Curtley Ambrose who had just caught you in bed with his wife. With due respect to Daniel Vettori and the boys it was more like being bundled out by Rod, Jane and Freddy with Bungle behind the wicket.
Every sportsman has their off days. Ian Botham got a pair before his historic swashbuckling effort against the Aussies at Headingly in 1981, the prolific John Aldridge became the first man to fluff a cup final penalty in the shock defeat to Wimbledon and even my old man knew bad days at the Domino table in his Axe And Square (Countesthorpe) heyday but 110 all out to a nation cast in the convicts shadow is pretty sorry.
Every side can get off to a bad start. Do you remember that fateful moment some 14 years ago when San Marino scored against England in about 20 seconds when England needed to win by a hatful to have any chance of making the 1994 World Cup? However you would hope that there would at least by some form of fight back along the way rather than Kevin Pietersen shouldering arms as England collapsed like they had been hit by a David Haye right hander.
Will there be changes? It is difficult to know who could come in to steady the ship, at this rate Jonathon Agnew might be dusting off his bowling boots and David Gower might fancy landing the old Tiger Moth for another stint out in the middle. Our nations best have to be better than this.
The whole thing got me thinking. You could actually get the basis of a decent XI together (if you were to forgive dates on birth certificates) from the press corps. The opening bowling attack could feature Botham and Bob Willis with Agnew as first change, Angus Fraser as second change and Vic Marks to bowl some left arm tweakers after tea, not forgetting the liquorice allsorts that Dermot Reeve could bring to the party. On the batting side Gower could nick one to second slip on any surface you care to mention, I’m sure Mark Nicholas could look smug against all but the quickest bowling attack and don’t forget good old Boycott who could display the makers name all day long on his trademark forward defensive. The wicketkeeper situation is less clear but at the rate England seem to pick them up and discard them I’m sure there would be at least one spare knocking around the place.
Laughing? It isn’t exactly unprecedented. Leicestershire made it to Lords in a one day final a few years back and when one player broke down injured Agnew was summoned from the press box to bowl his 12 overs at a very reasonable economy rate despite being retired for a number of years and possessing something of a middle age spread. If Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield can cast aside the pipe and slippers for one more slugfest I see no reason why the old sages couldn’t give it one more dig.
The more I think about it the more I like it. No bad headlines from drunken pedalo antics, you don’t tend to go loopy after a milky coffee in the afternoon. If we are going to lose why not go down with an air of comedy and set a decent sponsorship from SAGA into the bargain that can channel more money into the grassroots of the game to produce a side who display a little bit of backbone.
