The Duckworth-Lewis Method

Not, as some readers might assume, the method your significant other uses to prevent you watching The Premiership on Sky, because they have to watch Coronation Street, and then the continuing adventures of Inspector Morses brickie turned detective sidekick.

Nor the method of calculating the target score of the second cricket team to bat following a break in play due to rain.

But very much cricket related, for Duckworth and Lewis are the alter egos of one Thomas Walsh (whom I've never heard of), and Neil Hammon - he of The Divine Comedy, Father Ted theme tune, and seminal work for the aforementioned show, My Lovely Horse.

With the Ashes just 4 days away, it's perfect timing for an album based around the joys of Cricket. There are dozens, if not hundreds of football related songs, with a couple coming out each year for the domestic finals, and then countless others at every Euro and World Cup, but when it comes to cricket, there are woefully few.

There's 10ccs Dreadlock Holiday, and Rory Bremner had a stab with n-n-nineteen


By far my favourite was one that my friend Nick brought back from Australia entitled 'Come on Aussie Come on'. I managed to find a copy of it on YouTube, but it was it's B-side 'Lah lah la la laaaah West Indies' that was the real crowd pleaser. Nick, if you've still got it on vinyl, and have the ways and means to digitise it, I'd love a copy.



But back to present day, and a whole album of cricket.

Piss take, parody, or pop gold? Lets find out.....

1) The Coin Toss - Set's the mood nicely. Let's play.

2) The Age of Revolution - It's got a 20's baseline, modern electronica, and conjures up the modern history of the game nicely. Duckworth and Lewis' first delivery finds line and length, but doesn't really challenge the batsman.

3) Gentlemen and Players - A bit like if 'Love' had put down their spliffs and knocked the ball about a bit. Wistful and summery. Just how village cricket should be, but not the Ashes. No balls to it, a no ball it is.

4) The Sweet Spot - Glam-rock-tastic. Hits the sweetspot, and it's over the pavilion and out onto The Edgware Road.

5) Jiggery Pokery - The tale of the First Test 1993 as told by Mike Gatting. An easy first innings target at Old Trafford. Merv Hughes, Ather's, Dickie Bird, and the debut of a certain young leg spinner taking him for a duck. I remember Gatts, and I hate Shane Warne too. We all do.

6) Mason on the Boundary - Delightful. Dreams of long summer days, and having a little sit down in the outfield. Just how fielding should be.

7) Rain Stops Play - Instrumental break in the proceedings, pull on the covers and go and make a cup of tea, it's only a shower....

8) Meeting Mr Miandad - Hannon/Lewis at his witty best. Off to Pakistan in a VW Camper Van. An historical, phantasmagorical destiny. I'm going to be humming this for days. It's another six.

9) The Nightwatchman - The melancholy song of the fall guy brought up the batting order at the end of the day so one of the big hitters doesn't lose his wicket to failing light. I remember Jack Russell coming on as a nightwatchman against Sri Lanka in the 80's and still being there the following lunch time, nearly making a century. Not bad for a banana eating, floppy hatted, wicket keeping Derek Smalls lookalike.

10) Flatten the Hay - Still full of whimsy. Duckworth and Lewis clearly like their cricket in the cucumber sandwiches and tea in the pavilion variety.

11) Test Match Special - Who doesn't love a bit of TMS.

12) The End of the Over - The official end of the album on the sleeve, but as I bought it from itunes, it's patently obvious that there's a hidden bonus track....

13) Pedalo - The funky misadventures of a man on a pedalo in the Caribbean. What on earth could this have to do with cricket?

All in all it's quite a nice little listen. As expected from Neil Hannon, it's clever lyrics and generally full of optimism for an idyllic English (or Irish) summer, watching gentleman players as the sun goes down on the village pitch. Neither piss take nor parody. He proper likes cricket, alhough his glasses are rather more rose tinted than the sporty wraparounds favoured by players these days.

I will be mostly watching the games finish via a pop up window on my pc at work Ball by ball scores, praying for a miracle. And that's provided each Test isn't all wrapped up in 4 days...

You never know, Australia might lose.

Because that's what it will take, not England winning - we're clearly not good enough for that, Australia need to lose. But given their (Andrew Symondsless) showing in the Twenty20, anything is possible.

At least we won't be beaten by Duckworth-Lewis in the event of rain (unlike Twenty20), because in Test Cricket you can still play for 5 days and come away with a draw.

What a great sport.

T-2000

As people who read their newspaper from the back page will be very much aware, the country is currently gripped in the excitement of the ICC World Twenty20.

For those who take their sport only when forced upon them like sprouts at Christmas, the World Twenty20 is a cricket tournament where the games aren't longer than the lifespan of a small rodent, you don't have to stop for tea, and there is a definite winner at the end of it all.

Twenty overs (that's 120 balls) for each team, to either bowl the other team out, or score as many runs as possible by smacking the ball out of the ground at every opportunity, rather than just tapping it to the ground and wondering if the cucumber sandwiches have got the crusts cut off them.

No white flannel shirts and woolly jumpers, its all snazzy colours and floodlights.

They've even tried to make the name more exciting by shortening it to T20, possibly so it's not confused with 'Mad Dog 20/20', a drink so rough it will turn you blind, not give you the 20/20 vision you need to play this lightening fast game.

They could have shortened it even further to TT, but that's already been taken, and the last thing you want tearing up and down the wicket is a hoard of touring bikers, or some cock in an Audi.

Now I love a Test Match, but anyone who watched Chris Gayle batter the Australian attack out of the ground (and I'm talking to you weaselly faced Brett Lee), could not help but delight in how good a game it is to watch, especially as now they can't take the piss out of us too much for our woeful display against the Netherlands.

But is this enough to entice the casual viewer, and will it be enough to contain my rapidly depleting attention span?

Fear not, for I have a solution.

T-2000

With it's increasing global domination, SkyNews/SkySports is clearly a front for bigger things to come.

Skynet.

And with Skynet, comes Terminators, most importantly the T-2000 - a shape shifting metal motherfucker with the ability to turn into anyone it has sampled the DNA of.



Given the number of cricketers who've had hair transplants, there must be mountains of DNA floating around the worlds changing rooms and pavilions.

Imagine the terror seeing an amorphous silver silhouette bounding down the pitch towards you, suddenly to morph into Shoaib Akhtar and nearly take your head off. Next ball you're ready for him, only now it's Shane Warne - out of retirement with a deadly leg break.

Metal Billy Bowden stood near the wicket, just waiting to extend that crooked finger..... and extend....and extend....imagine what he'd do with a six?

I'd love to see it, and shall pen a missive to Rupert Murdoch as soon as I'm done here.

And if you think it might all be a bit easy on the bowlers in my thrilling upgrade of the game, don't worry, I've got a little plan up my sleeve for the batsmen.



He'll be back......

Dreadlock Holiday

"I say,
I don't like cricket - oh no,
I love it,
I don't like cricket - no no,
I love it,
Don't you walk thru my words,
You got to show some respect,
Don't you walk thru my words,
'Cause you ain't heard me out yet."

Or so said 10cc back in 1978.



Once wise words, but tonight, I'm pretty sure if I don't like it, in fact I'm rather disgruntled with the whole sorry affair.

Home from work with a couple of brews on board I fancy watching a bit of the second One Day International between the proud inventors of the game, and the Windies.

And what do I find? England all out for 117, and Windies sailing on 91-0

When did we get quite so shit? (Australians need not answer, it was a rhetorical question - however you may need to look up 'rhetorical' in a dictionary)

I know we did very poorly in the Test series, but I blame the pitches (or lack of). When we could bat, so could they. The only reason we won the first one dayer was because their coach (an Aussie), failed to understand the Duckworth-Lewis system (something to do with how many Coronation Street/Inspector Morse DVD's the opposing team can get through whilst it's either pissing it down, or too dark to be able to see which part of he seam to rub grit into), and pulled the Windies off (stop sniggering at the back) before they'd seen all the directors commentaries and making of featurettes.

WICKET!!!......oh fuck, what does it matter.....98-1.....

Mrsslippy has cunningly managed to procure tickets for an England v Australia one dayer, and I am already very afraid of the potential humiliation that we will be able to witness first hand.

A quick look at the BBC website informs me that Freddie was C&B for a duck on his return from injury, and KP only made 3. If memory serves, that's 17 in the first ODI and 12 in the second. If plotted on a graph, I reckon next time he'll score -1. Good luck with that Kev.

WICKET!!!...last chance recovery! They've only got 27 overs and 8 wickets spare to beat us...

Or not. All over before I could even be arsed to look back at he keyboard.




I don't like cricket - oh no

I despise it to the very core of my blackened, disillusioned heart.