Monday 9th February
New name, same old dribble, but will be on various days of
the week depending what is going on in the wonderful world of cricket.
So what is going on? Well if you hadn’t noticed the World
Cup starts this weekend and England are in the thick of the action right from
day one, when they play one of the host nations, namely Australia.
An early start Saturday morning as the fist ball is sent
down (or in the case of Mitchell “porn star tash” Johnson, thrown down) at
3.30am GMT. Admittedly I will be trying out different sleep patterns this week
to get myself ready, I have even changed my alarm tone to the theme from Test
Match Special, so that is bound to get me out of bed for cricket, surely?
It has been well documented that no one, apart from myself,
expects England to win. The experts and critics also expects England to reach
the Quarter-Finals, which isn’t exactly rocket science, as there are two groups
of seven, of which the top four go through to the quarters. Out of those seven
in the group, four are which are Test playing nations, and the other three are
so called the “minnows” of cricket (bit don’t tell Ireland that, remember the
last World Cup?).
So who are in England’s group? Well there is a small matter
of Australia, New Zealand and Sri Lanka, which makes up the four Test playing
nations and then there are Scotland, Afghanistan and Bangladesh (who are a Test
playing nation, but not a very good one).
If England manage to win four of their six matches they should
avoid the likes of South Africa and India in the QF’s, then surely a Semi-Final
is in reach, from there anything could happen. But we are talking about England
and anything could happen from the first match.
As I said earlier and previous articles I do expect England
to win the World Cup, but they must do one thing to enhance their
chances....... send Ravi Bopara home, as I have said on numerous occasions in
previous articles. Unfortunately England cannot drop him now as their 15 man
squad has been announced, so can someone injure him, trip him up or something
so he cannot play. I’d rather have Mark Sortwell playing than Ravi, now that’s
saying something.
No offence Ravi, but you have been given enough chances at
the top level, and have hardly performed, the Tri-Nations has proved that no
end. I have no doubt you are a good County cricketer, but it takes a different
type of player to play internationally. There are a lot of people agreeing with
me, even the national papers are, but I did mention it first, some years ago in
fact.
So come on England, shock the cricketing world and hammer
those over rated, confident, arrogant bunch of Aussies, so as to set the tone
for a cracking World Cup. Remember 1992, when the whole country came to a stand-still,
and it seemed like the whole of Stowey was up at “Rats Gaff, as he was the only
person in Stowey who had Sky TV, watching the Semi-Final against South Africa.
Oh happy days.
Time for cider and skittles.
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