England should go for the throat and wrap series up

Newlands, Cape Town, third Test:
South Africa v England (3rd - 7th January)

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ENGLAND go in to the new year Test at Newlands confident of winning the match and series following their stunning innings win in Durban last week.

With Paul Collingwood struggling, England have called up Hampshire batsman Michael Carberry as cover. If, as seems likely, Collingwood is ruled unfit, Carberry will make his debut, with England sticking to their six batsmen, keeper, four bowlers policy.

It is South Africa, however, who have the biggest selection headaches - their leading batsmen, to a man, failing dismally in the second innings at Kingsmead, and their leading bowler, Makhaya Ntini recording figures of 0-114 to go with his match haul of 2-119 in the first Test at Centurion.

Ntini’s iconic status - he remains the only black African to have made the grade for the Proteas - makes him virtually undroppable, the pressure to pick him immense, and a worry that weighs heavily on Graeme Smith’s shoulders.

  

All of which begs the question of whether England wouldn’t be better off fielding a 5-1-5 line up if Collingwood fails to pass his fitness test. Instead of drafting in Carberry, England could do worse than select Liam Plunkett or Ryan Sidebottom.

Following the return to form of Alastair Cook and Ian Bell, and the scoring potential of Matt Prior (60 in Durban), Stuart Broad (37 runs this series) and Graeme Swann (85 in Centurion and a quickfire 22 in Durban), it is difficult to see England being significantly worse off with only five specialist batsmen - especially given the travails of the South Africa attack.

Ntini, playing what would be his 102nd Test, looks shot to pieces, a shadow of his former self; Dale Steyn and Jacques Kallis have only just returned from injury; Morne Morkel lacks consistency - evidenced by just one five-wicket haul in 35 innings - and Paul Harris went from taking seven wickets at Centurion to just one in Durban.

South Africa will not bat as badly again. Kallis, AB de Villiers and JP Duminy won’t be shouldering arms again in a hurry. Failing to field an extra bowler could be the biggest gamble of all; for all the runs in the world, if you don’t take 20 wickets, you ain’t gonna win no Test match.

• Cricinfo: Live text commentary from Newlands
• Test Match Special: Live audio commentary

2010: Dare to dream

2010, a new year, a new decade,
A new dawn, or the same old gloom?
To look forward or to look back,
To bemoan past disasters or anticipate future glories?

Looking ahead, it’s all to play for,
Defeat is not inevitable, victory can be ours;
With the best man at the helm,
And the best men on the ball

So pull together and cheer on the boys,
Come on England, bring home the Cup;
44 years of despair, 44 years of hope and fear,
Jo’burg July 11th, England atop the world

Rooney, Rio, Gerrard, Capello,
England expects, England awaits;
Brazil, France, Germany or Spain,
We don’t care, we don’t give a damn;
Coz We’re England, we’re England,
AND WE’RE GONNA WIN THE CUP!

2009: The good...

... the sad:



... the missed opportunity:



• High point: January 20th: Barack Obama sworn in as President
• Low point: June 25th: Michael Jackson’s death shocks the world
• Turning point? Gordon Brown clings, clings on to die another day

EXCLUSIVE: Archie’s killer unveiled

WHO’d’ve thought it, eh?! Look at him, beaming brazenly next to the ancient, decrepit, centuries-old relic - and a bust of Queen Victoria as well.

Though as these pictures, smuggled out at great risk from ’Enders’ Elstree studios prove, he’s got previous...

    

... bitch-slapping and then torturing poor Archie in fits of rage rarely seen in public from the amiable buffoon.

Yeah, I know, I know what you’re all thinking, if only he would give up his day job and turn to acting full time; alas, ’tis not to be, and the Square’s loss is London’s gain even bigger loss.

• Watch Uncle Archie get bust-ed
• Interview with Larry Lamb

Miaowy Christmas to one and all

WHATEVER your age, species or cuteness, may Santa bring you all you desire!

Merry Christmas everybody!! :)

12,970 reasons to love Sachin the great

SIT back and admire the genius that is Sachin Tendulkar, one of the all-time greats and possibly the greatest batsman in history; certainly the greatest I’ve ever had the privilige of seeing - better even than B.C. Lara, whose individual genius seldom led to team success.

Twenty years ago last month Sachin made his debut, a milestone celebrated by Cricinfo, who have split his career into five phases in this graph of his one day international and Test run-scoring prowess. The graph I have compiled, shown above, illustrates his year-by-year contribution to the cause. (Stay tuned for his 20-year ODI graph come the conclusion of the current series against Sri Lanka).

What it best shows, aside from the sheer weight of runs the Little Master has racked up, is his consistency over the years, only four times averaging below 40 since his debut series in Pakistan, topping 50 in eleven years, 60 in nine, 70 in four, 80 in three and, incredibly, averaging more than 90 twice: in 1993 (91.42) and 2004 (91.50) - the year he hit a Test best 248 not out against Australia.

No one has scored more centuries (43) nor runs (12,970), with few having so high a conversion rate of fifties into hundreds (44.33 per cent). Since India’s inaugural Test in 1932, Tendulkar has played in 53 of the country’s 101 wins - more than half - and he has missed only 14 Tests since his debut.

To date, 2002 is his most prolific year, 1,392 runs from 16 Tests - six of which were won - with 1999 his best for centuries (five). Gaps remain, however, most notably his failure to make the honours board at Lord’s - something he’ll be determined to put right 18 months hence.

• Summer 2011: Draft schedule of India's tour of England
• July 2007: Little Master looks to set record straight

The unlikeliest players

    

It was soooooo much easier in the days before text messaging and Facebook eh John?!

Tiger, Tiger, burning bright, with the laydeez of the night;
What immortal hand or eye, could`st predict thine tearful fall from high...

• AP: Scandal aside, Woods changed golf in last 10 years

PICTURE EXCLUSIVE: Guy News behind the scenes

“Every day, millions of people mix up serious political news with scandals; that is why every evening I am forced to have soothing jacuzzi bath...

“Guido, bubbles!”

Compare the gossips dot com, compare the evidence dot org

Seemplez!

With apologies to Sergei and @Aleksandr_orlov; comparing meerkats since AD 2009

The last time Avram met Fergie, Moscow 2008:

GETS better and better and better every time you see it!!

I would’ve loved it, really loved it, if Terry had said after his miss:

“Go into exile I must ... failed I have.”

Speaking of which, I reckon dear old Avram looks a lot more like Quasimodo than he does Yoda:

    

I’ll leave you with some more pearls of wisdom that pointy-eared little Jedi Master once said:

“Around the survivors penalty area, a perimeter create.”

Avram, heed the Grand Master’s advice, and from today’s game emerge with a win you might!

• The Sun: Avram, Yoda - seperated at birth

The Taxpayers’ All-Lie-Ance unmasked

Surprise, bloody surprise! The Taxpayers’ Alliance have been at it again, peddling lies about the European Union - this time in a cinema ad.

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We’ve torn it to shreds over on Left Foot Forward, everything from their 13,333 per cent mark-up on the cost of membership and their blatant fabrications about the costs of the Common Agricultural and Fisheries Policies, to their implausible assertions on the cost of each MEP, which is the point I’d like to delve a little deeper into here.

Their figure of £1.8 million, which they get from some highly dubious Open Europe research, is about £1.5 million more than the actual annual cost, albeit having failed to include travel expenses and attendance allowances - which could never in a million years amount to £1,476,000; unless...

Each MEP was compensated for a combination of the following:

5,507 days’ attendance (in one year!) at official meetings of the Parliament bodies on which the Member serves that are held within the European Community at €298 (£268) a day;

3,354,545 km of car journeys claimed back on expenses at 49 cents (44p) a km;

11,015 days’ at meetings held outside the European Community at €149 (£134) a day;

3,332 return flights from London to Brussels at £443 a trip;

3,432 return Eurostar journeys from London to Brussels at £430 a trip.Plausible? Only if your name’s Kilroy, Hannan or Iain Duncan-Smith; Eurosceptics: the gifts that keep on giving!

• T’Other Taxpayers’ Alliance: Holding the fantasists to account
* Journeys are business class, fully flexible, 25th-29th January 2009
† Conversions carried out at the rate €1 = 90p