Cricket

Morgan apparently retiring from international duty

Best limited overs captain we will ever have

I assume this means the end of Matthew Mott's tenure?

Came here to post almost exactly this. Sad news.

I'm guessing Morgan plays the rest of this season, then coaches for a couple of seasons in the IPL, before potentially being the next England coach.

We will take the splitter back, if as penance he promises to dedicate himself to Ireland for the rest of his career.

Bottle of wine or two beers (500ml) - per person.

https://www.lords.org/lords/match-day/plan-your-day/what-to-bring

They don't check too thoroughly though.

I'm out of the loop on this, heard it mentioned on TMS.

Is it this batch issue? https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/may/17/counties-receive-fresh-batch-after-dukes-balls-go-soft-cricket

Vaughn was says that the "new duke" was reason enough to have Butler as an opener in tests.

Sangakarra was advocating Buttler to open as a next step for England's new style. Has Vaughan borrowed someone else's idea to put forward as his?

Last time at Lords was for the Hundred (forgive me, Father...) - didn't bring any booze, but they guillotined the bar shut at (I think) 7pm, right in front of my nose after half an hour queueing. Going to the India game in a few weeks, will risk taking a 4-pack.

Nice ball. But it did rather expose Pope's slightly iffy defence. Big gap. Though to be fair, it's no worse than most.

Nah he actually said it was Sangakarras idea on the TMS podcast last night

Some of the pissed up behaviour in the Hundred/Blast games is getting a bit too much, so they've been shutting the bars earlier and earlier. (Yes, I know there's some pissed up behaviour at a normal test match, but it seems much less than the games that go on into the evening/night. Haven't ever done a day/night test match though.)

Of course, this means people either stockpile lagers just before closing (I've seen people coming back with 4 pints each) or keeping their stash of cans until the end.

Depending on who I go with I often get to use their allowance too. My wife will drink lager but not my 80yo mother-in-law, yet she gets to have two cans of 5% lager assigned to her as I go through the bag check. Haven't tried to sneak in an extra two assigned to the 12yo yet.

Fair enough. On the face of it, you're bringing in an occasionally destructive player (with his Test form) in place of a regular walking wicket (Crawley). So at worst it's x = 0. Interesting. I didn't catch all of his piece - but assume Sangakarra left Foakes with the gloves in that imaginary situation?

Yep, just be aware you can't bring in any booze to the blast/hundred. I've smuggled rum and coke and a flask of ice to that oval before though. The queues at the bar a few weeks back were pretty much a T20 innings long.

On the plus side, daughter collected nearly £50 quids worth of discarded cups / carafes so she was happy with her night's earnings.

Just re-read the Lords rules, and looks like you can take booze to any international though, regardless of format. All very confusing.

Onya Jonny

Crazy series. I'm enjoying the positivity and aggression in the england batting approach but i do wonder if talk of a total renaissance is a bit premature. Be interesting to see how the wham-bam strategy works in any situation other than chasing a nothing-to-lose score against a fairly shallow-pool of bowling talent.

Yeah, there is a bit too much shitty behaviour in the grounds these days. It would all be greatly improved if there was a blanket refusal to admit:

Anyone with a musical instrument
Anyone in fancy dress
Anyone who views themselves as a member of a 'Barmy Army'
Anyone in a football shirt
Anyone who looks like they may make a beer snake
Michael Vaughan

^ + Anyone who has bought a ticket for "The Fosters Party Stand".

@kl earlier

I almost (and should have) added ‘anyone in a striped blazer’.

I do my level best. Tough work but someone has to put in the hard yards...

he's not wrong though

It kicked off in the West Stand on Sunday and I can understand why. Atmosphere in there on the Saturday was mostly good-humoured until late afternoon, when all the lairy lot had finally had too much to drink and started chucking paper cups around. We ended up leaving when they went off for rain due to the arseholes around us, which is a shame as we missed the three wickets late on.

Western Terrace has always had a horrendous reputation. I was there in the late 90s for a match v Pakistan when some idiots started chucking round a pigs head that they had smuggled in, which was NOT well received by many. EDIT 1992 according to this article https://www.guerillacricket.com/news/445,english-cricket-has-evolved-pushed-many-us-into-margins-personal-experience-racism

Test cricket will die in a generation if it restricts itself to “TMS and Wisden” people like me. Most of those objections are just snobbery (except getting caught under a beer snake).