Australia gives us the uglies

Australia have given the world of cricket a lot of great things.

The genius of Bradman.

The pace of Lindwall.

The elegance of Benaud.

The showbiz of Warne

Lawry’s commentary

and now it seems they are set to give the world the ugliest opening pair since, er, a very very long time.

Phil Jaques, the most likely candidate to replace Matthew Haydos and Krab Kattich will form possibly the most technically confused, footwork impaired, style-lacking opening combo in test cricket.

Neither seem to have read a batting manual, if they did it was soon used to roll up joints when they were in the dressing room.

With Langer and Hayden, Langer’s balls and Haydens thuggery were a good contrast and often Hayden’s power hitting covered up for Langer playing the ball with his head.

Of course no one says you need to bat like Mark Waugh or Tendulkar (pre 2000) to be good batsmen, just look at Shiv. And if you followed Australia you’d know that Kattich is probably in the top 3 batsmen in the Australian team right now, Phil Jaques averages 50 since he took over from Langer.

But for us we have to, possibly, endure two batsmen fidgeting around and running about the crease like their feet are on fire.

The good thing though, is that both are pretty attacking batsmen, so the chances are high that we will see Ponting or Clarke grace us with some elegance more often than not.

Australia wont mind as long as they get the runs on the board, I wont mind as long as they don’t conspire to bat for days on end.

Ps- Imagine if Shiv ditched the WI team, relocated to Australia and opened with the Krab.

Oh my.

7 Comments

  1. Nesta said:

    I don’t care if they are ugly as long as they score and never take off their helmets. It’s not only their batting that is unattractive!

    January 15, 2009
    Reply
  2. insideEdge said:

    Australia may have the ugliest opening pair but Sri Lanka has the stupidest Captain and Coach.

    Here’s the farce they presided over against Bangladesh. The Banglas must be having a good laugh.

    Sanath Jayasuriya, one of the greats at exploiting Power Play, is at the crease on 40 and Mahela is playing reasonably.

    Do they take the Power Play? No

    Instead, Mahela has a slog and gets out.

    Sanath moves to 50 and Kapu, another powerful hitter, at the crease.

    Do you take the Power Play? No

    What idiotic purpose does keeping it for the last 3 overs serve? You will anyway slog in the last 3 overs. Only difference is that it could be Thilan Thushara with he the bat, instead of Sanath.

    January 15, 2009
    Reply
  3. damiths said:

    Nesta> Well, Dint Katich make it onto that Calendar shoot ? You dont do him justice ! 🙂

    January 15, 2009
    Reply
  4. damiths said:

    Inside> I think we can let this one slide, we dint look like we were really up for it. Mahela better have his balls all lined up on Friday.

    January 15, 2009
    Reply
  5. As an aside, did you see Shiv’s ‘reverse’ sweep the other day against NZ. He actually looked more normal hitting it right handed. The Krab has yet to master that.

    January 15, 2009
    Reply
  6. scorpicity said:

    Phil Jaques ain’t ugly… one of those normal types. Katich is the real pain.

    January 16, 2009
    Reply
  7. damiths said:

    ToB> Not lucky enough to see that series. The Krab is young, he will learn in time

    Scorpi> When you put the two together they dont look pretty. Kattich’s ugliness trumps Jaques normalcy !

    January 17, 2009
    Reply

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