Posts by Kyle Matthews
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You just run the risk of someone in your audience also having gone to St Andrew's.
Good ice hockey school.
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The author's guild needs to send some of their statements to focus groups before they send them out.
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It was a six month course.
How can you learn to be a journalist in 6 months?
How can you learn to be anything in six months?
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Who decides whether to doctor the pitch?
Well my suggestion was that the rules decide it. If the two innings finish within a day and a half they go one way, if they take over 3 days they go the other.
What if it doesn't work? (pitch preparation is an inexact science, after all)
Then nothing is lost.
What's to stop a groundsman putting a little extra water on the pitch in return for a wad of cash from a bookmaker who wants a particular result?
What's to stop that now before the test starts?
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The problem is that it would require the teams to have achieved some degree of parity after the first innings, otherwise the actions are going to disadvantage one of the parties.
I don't see why that's a problem. If one team is 100 runs behind and they know that the groundskeeper is going to doctor the pitch so those 100 runs are harder to get, that's just tough luck, shouldn't end up 100 runs behind.
And you still have the problem that traditiionally a pitch deteriorates in the fourth innings. So if you start tinkering with it after each team has batted twice, will it even be playable for the team batting last?
Yes, but if the pitch was going to get into the 4th innings at an appropriate time, you wouldn't need to doctor the pitch.
You'd only do it if the 4th innings was going to start on day 2, or on day 7 of a test.
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Well, that's cricket. You can present the other team with the only options of losing or playing out the time for a draw.
Oh yes. I was just confused that we wanted things to be more that way, rather than less.
If it's possible for a chasing team to get the big score in the 4th innings, surely that's good for the game.
Not during a match though.
Yes, that's my (barely thought out I admit) suggestion.
Would there be a problem with allowing the ground staff to do something more than roll the pitch after both teams had one innings? Water it, cook it a little more, sprinkle some magic chemical on top.
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I insist we call him Michael Lhaws from now on.
That is evil, and needs to be spread more widely around New Zealand.
I tip my hat sir.
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The biggest problem I have with non-wearing pitches is that previously unattainable victory targets can now be chased down, which makes it impossible to set a target.
What's the point in playing the game if a team can by no means possibly win?
Surely there shouldn't be any such thing as an unattainable victory target. You want to give the chasing team hope that if they play brilliantly, they will win, against all odds. That's what makes great sporting events.
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That pitch at the WACA was deteriorating, as it should, making the last day heroics so memorable.
Yeah. I don't mind a draw where you don't know until near the end that it's going to be a draw. A great rearguard effort that gets the team to the end of day 5 with tailenders scrabbling around to keep the bowlers at bay. That's worth watching despite the lack of result.
But this was fairly obviously heading to a draw before the end of day 4. That's not good for spectators or the game.
(I wonder idly if, in the interests of the game, if the pitch could be doctored after both teams have completed an innings to either stretch the game out, or shorten it. Not sure how much you could do that though).
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After five days (two of which featured the good version of the Black Caps) the Napier test limped to a draw, which is a strange thing considering that one team scored more than the other team.
3 days. The way they worked their butts off to get India out in the first innings was really impressive.
I wonder if the other way to ensure that most cricket test matches have a result is to go with controls over the wicket. I can't think of any other sport where the playing surface has such a massive influence over the way the game turns out.
We want neither the green tops where the match finishes in 2 days, nor the tarmac roads where it could go on for 10.
I'm not expert on groundskeeping, but surely they must be able to set some reasonable expectations boundaries for a wicket in terms of grass, bounce etc so that most tests finish in the 4-5 day bracket, a few end in a draw, and a few finish early.
That big shots blog is fantastic.