f13.net

All right ladies and gents, we have 10 tests between now and January 2014.  We have an England team who is looking good, although had a shaky tour of the shaky isles.  We have an Australian team who has been written off as the worst to tour England ever (the last Australian team to be called that was the 1989 team, who ended up winning 4-1) who have just sacked their coach, got a questionable batting line up, and a skipper who is a great batsman but has a dodgy back.

So hows it going to play out?  After the first session things seem even, maybe a nudge towards England - 2/98 - Cook gone, Trott is looking dangerous, and that pitch is going to be ugly on the 4th and 5th days...

I look forward to this girl being in the news again:

(http://i.imgur.com/WCzopiM.jpg) (http://imgur.com/WCzopiM)

 :why_so_serious:

Finally some real sports discussion! I'm just glad I'm going to be in Oz so I can finally watch some of this (along with State of Origin III).

That 1989 team though......this team certainly ain't them. '89 team was legendary (Border, Taylor, Waugh! Healy, Hughes, Boonie! good times, good times) and kicked almost two decades of Australian cricket dominance.

C'mon Aussie but I'm not fond of our chances.

What's next, a thread about curling?

Die in a fire.  :grin:

6 for 205, not a great start for the Pommies, still hows the pitch supposed to hold up?

I take it this is the long version and not the 20s?

5 days baby!

Hrrm 8/213...this one probably ain't going that long..

Correction 9/213..:D

Also interesting that you mention the 89 team which featured Chris Broad (and I remember him KILLING us in '87) who's son Stuart is on the '13 team.

Well that was one hell of a day.  The pitch didn't look to be a minefield, but both batting lineups seemed to make it so.

And now the Australian hopes are on the steady shoulders of Steve 'Im in the team to have fun' Smith and Phil 'my technique is fine, honest guvnor' Hughes.  Saint Siddle, come and save us again!


And yes Paelos, this is the real deal, 6 x 5 x 10 = 300 glorious hours of cricket!

Edit: Yeah, I do like the father-son thing of the Broads in the two teams.  The fact that Stuart is such a great pantomine villain to hate is even better.  I was at the Gabba for the last series in Australia, and got to see Siddle's opening hat trick.  Broad was one of the victims then, and the sending-off was beautiful :)

Holy Christ Agar.

Is it 5 matches? Are there draws?

THE RULES OF THIS ARE INSANE.

6 matches, and yes draws.

Correct, it is insane...and glorious!

This is one hell of a match already.  It will be interesting to see if this is the start of a glorious career for Agar (or St. Ashton as the interwebs has christened him), or if he'll become a trivia question.

Damn I'm tired at work today - this is going to kill me if it keeps up.

Give it time, wrong season. My home rink is being used for Roller Derby this time of year.

So how many people have been bowled over in the wickets so far?

This Agar kid is pretty good eh?

I read the recap of Day 2. I still have no clue what's going on, except Agar apologized for not getting a century, and some guy named Anderson is pretty good.

Cricket is basically like baseball or American Football but with all the boring bits cut out.

That seems a little bold considering they have tea in the middle of a game.

Welcome to civilisation

Wait...baseball has boring bits?

Yeah pitching changes.

Fify.


Oh and fucking broad was out.

Who won?

England won the first test in a close game. Four tests remain in the series.

Oh so this isn't even close to over.

Good lord.  :oh_i_see:

Don't worry, it'll finish sometime before the Cowboys kick off yet another 8-8 season.

Chivalry (the cricket version) is dead, it seems.

I'm feeling ambitious this year. It's gonna be 9-7!

Hmm, getting nervous again, yesterday did not look like a low scoring wicket, I'd say England need 350 to be happy with a first innings.

Also, I don't know what Bell is putting on his cornflakes but he should keep doing it. Always felt he has been overrated in the past.

Hmmm, 361 not a disaster, but Australia must fancy batting on this wicket.

Broad handy with the bat again.

OK I was wrong, Australia 74/4.

Also, is DRS really so hard to use? Just don't appeal when you know you are out for Christ's sake.



Edit:
86/5 and TMS is starting to talk about the follow on.

I'm guessing 74/4 is bad? It sounds bad.

94/7, whelp

So beyond somebody going a century, this is probably over.

They each get another innings, but second innings are usually lower scoring because the wicket deteriorates.

They need an England batting collapse and then a record breaking batting performance.


108/9

This sounds like a baseball game where it's the 3rd inning and it's 11-2.

That's about right, but if they reach the fifth in this position the winning team is allowed to go 'fuck this we want to go home, you have bat all your innings straight through so we can humiliate you by winning with half our wickets in hand'.

Heh, I wish baseball had that rule where they could look at the other team up by 8 runs and just say fuck it, we're done batting. Let's roll your outs in a row.

128 all out.

But England not enforcing the followon.

Which is technically the right move with 3.5 days left, since there is no risk of the draw.

England could use the batting practice I guess.

Can't see Australia winning the ashes in the next 4 years with this shit lot.

Can someone explain cricket scoring PLEASE?

I was watching some big Indian championship a few months ago - entertaining, but no idea how the scoring worked.

The team that scores the most runs over two innings wins. To actually win they also have to get the opposition all out in both innings; if they don't do that by the end of the game it counts as a draw. A game lasts approximately 30 hours over 5 days, unless time is lost to rain, around 2700 balls are bowled in that time.

You score a run by running between the sticks or hitting the ball out of the field (for 4, or 6 if you do it without the ball bouncing).

A batsman is out if the bowler bowls over the stumps directly, or the batsman's legs stop that happening (leg before wicket), or by fielders catching the ball off the bat before it bounces, or by a fielder knocking over the stumps with the ball while the batsmen are running between the wickets (run out).

Scores within an innings are expressed as X for Y where X is the number of runs scored, and Y is the number of players out (wickets). Once 10 players are out the innings ends.

The Indian thing you saw was probably ridiculous 20 over pyjama cricket. In that version each team only gets a single innings of 120 balls to score off, and you do not have to bowl the opposing team out to win. This is all over in about 3 hours and is "not proper cricket".

As an Australian, I'm happy to see Australia lose the Ashes. We spent way too long being arrogant assholes about how good we were, then that generation of players retired at once (or, if Shane Warne, sold his soul in some sort of Dorian Gray-esque pact) leaving a lot of young players with the same attitude but without the skills.

A good few years of thrashing might see some humility start to creep back into the Australian ethos.

Priceless  :awesome_for_real:

And yes, this is going to get ugly quickly.  Even uglier than it currently is.

Well that went better.

Really? Rain? How very fucking English.

Starting to wonder if the Umpires have been paid off by some fellows from the sub-continent.

Welp, we're off and running again.  However, based on halfway through the 2nd session of the 1st day, I don't know if I want to watch any more.

And worst of all, its shit bloke Stuart Broad who has got all the wickets.  :ye_gods:

To quote some discerning members of the Gabba crowd. "Broad is a wanker".

Who is winning?

Little early to say, but day 1 was better for England.  We will know more after England bats.

This is why cricket is so impossible for me to understand, you never know who's winning!  :why_so_serious:

The Australians are in control after day 2.  An epic collapse by the Poms. Reminded me of the good ol days

For Paelos's benefit the Australians are winning the second test as well.

Mitchell Johnson is a god.