Cricket

A while back a friend remarked that a piece I’d written – on cricket probably though, perhaps, darts – was “worthy of Frank Keating”. I can’t say if the compliment was earned but it was appreciated mightily. To be compared to Keating, on however dubious a basis, was the kind of pleasantness guaranteed to put a smile on your face. That sounds vainglorious but it’s a really a measure of how good Frank Keating was. Keating, who has died aged 75, was one of this country’s great sportswriters. For many years he was the Spectator’s sports columnist and his weekly epistle, though the last thing in the magazine, was always

Well he’s done it. At last. Surprisingly, this was Sachin Tendulkar’s first ODI century against Bangladesh. One hundred international hundreds – 51 in test cricket and 49 in the abbreviated game – is an achievement so astonishing it becomes mesmerising the more time you spend contemplating it. Better still, however, is the fact that it is impossible to imagine how anyone who loves cricket can fail to be pleased today. Tendulkar is a rare creature: a master without enemies or begrudgers. Everyone likes him; everyone feels a little protective of the Little Master. And so we should for we will not see anyone match this mark in many a year.

I wrote about the great man here, but cricket-minded readers should also scamper to Cricinfo to read Ed Smith’s reflection on his former Kent team-mate. This is the telling passage: What a brilliant inversion of the usual myth told by professional sportsmen: that they had unexceptional talent and made it to the top only because they worked harder. Dravid spoke the truth. Yes, he worked hard. But the hard work was driven by the desire to give full expression to a God-given talent. Emphasis added. Smith could have gone further: this isn’t just the “inversion of the usual myth told by professional sportsmen”, it is, more importantly, unusually modest and

Rahul Dravid’s retirement, announced with typical elegance today, is not just a sad business because it means we’ll never see the great technician again but because it is the beginning of the end of India’s greatest generation. I think it is possible to argue that Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar and VVS Laxman have been the finest batting trio since Worrell, Weekes and Walcott bestrode the West Indian stage in the 1950s. There have been other great batsman, of course, but few trios whose achievements are quite so inextricably linked or whose careers have overlapped quite so completely. Add, at various times, Saurav Ganguly and Virender Sehwag to the mix and you

It would take a heart of stone not to laugh when reading about Australia’s latest cricket crisis and, reader, I’ve no heart of stone. Much more of this and we’ll have to wonder if the Aussies really deserve a five test series these days. The present crew are, apparently, “The Lowest of the Low”. To which one can only say: not while anyone who played for England in the fiasco of 1988 is alive they ain’t. But this is the thing about Test cricket: its habit of sneaking up and whacking your senses when you least expect it. This was a humdrum, low-key Test in tiny, sleepy Hobart (of which

Watching Roger Federer destory Rafael Nadal the other day and knowing how many people can recognise their brilliance while always holding a vehement, even visceral, preference for one of these superb athletes I wondered if there was a correlation with another bitterly divisive sporting divide. I mean, of course, David Gower vs Graham Gooch. That is, how many people love Nadal and Gower and how many Gooch and Federer? Precious few I suspect. How could you? Even allowing for different sports and their different demands these things have an aesthetic quality. Gooch, English cricket’s greatest monster these last 25 years, is obviously allied with Nadal; Gower with Federer. Perhaps I

Who dares say the County Championship is a useless anachronism? Rumours of its irrelevance have been much exagerrated for years and we were reminded of this again today as Lancashire took their first outright title since 1934, defeating my beloved Somerset by eight wickets and with just five overs to spare. It still, even in the evening glow of victory, seems improbable that a county with Lancashire’s cricketing resources and tradition could have gone so many decades without a championship but whenever Lancs were good someone else was just a little bit better and, of course, sometimes – or so they’ll tell you in Manchester – the rain would make