Can You Say Mismatch

Australia v Pakistan
New Zealand v Bangladesh
West Indies v Australia

and now

South Africa v India

What a waste of bloody good sunshine!

Another Great White Hope

I know you are all marveling at the wonders of Dale Styen at present but those of us in Black Cap Land are quietly excited(?) about this Andy McKay.

A left armer who can swing the ball at pace, and with accuracy, does not happen along every day in NZ.

Yes the Aussies will be a sterner test, but with James Franklin the next best left arm pace man, you can't blame us for jumping on the bandwagon fairly quickly.

A Great Day For The Beards

After a tough summer for big bearded batsman Hashim Amla's 253 not out has rescued some pride for the extremely hirsute.

The Bigger The Nose ...

... the better the coach.

Well done to those who recognised the famous Wessels nostrils. That toothy grin would have given it away far to easily.

You would have to say that he currently deserves to smile as his "boys" continue to bat India into submission.

Name That Nose

An easy little distraction while we wait for something of importance to happen in the cricketing world.

What famous cricketer is attached to this great honker?

Kiran Nagaraja supplied me with this image so he is automatically disqualified from answering - sorry Kiran.

Does It Hurt When I Do This?

All this talk of sadism has got me thinking about pain and it's relationship to cricket. Either that or watching Bangladesh play NZ last night made "painfull" the word of the week.

Being one to dwell on such things you can anticipate a few pained expressions cropping up in the next week or so.

Here we see Graham Gooch testing his pain barrier while having a splinter extracted by a blind physio - or something like that.

The Marquis De Afridi

Why would Afridi do that?

Brain explosion?
Tantrum?
Sub concious self destruction?
For a bet?

I can now reveal the real reason. It was all about PR.

Yes, Great Uncle Jrod and his minions got to the boy wonder and set up the perfect promotion for their new venture, the Cricket Sadists Monthly.

Never has blogging imitated life in a more poignant way, and it helps that Afridi is nuts to start with.

India Here We Come!

Very little done to this image as it stands on it's own. The unvarnished truth is that Central Districts were too good for Auckland and they have a great shot at improving on Otago's very quiet performance last year at the Champion's Trophy.

Exciting for us local lads to see it happen in New Plymouth and to see local boy Peter Ingram to the fore. I just hope they sober up in time and do grasp that conditions might be just a little different on the subcontinent.

Tamim Iqbal Says ...

... "I am coming to kick your Black Cap arse".

Fresh from his hot hundred Tamim, and many of his team mates, will arrive in NZ with a bit more confidence than they have had in the past.

OK, they didn't beat India, but an evolving Black Cap team could well be a ball of string the kittens can have some fun with.