*England had a whole over of missing easy runouts against The Netherlands, I think, in the World T20. That may have been Stuart Broad at the bowler’s end but the same principle applies.

Some simple ideas:
- wicketkeeper up at the stumps
- if you can’t do that, train your keeper so that he can hit the striker’s end stumps 3/4 of the time
- if that doesn’t work, have a short leg there to receive the ball
- also have a short midoff to receive the throw to the other end to prevent the delayed steal*

*This would work, right? The non-striker takes the absurd lead he is allowed under current rules and then the striker waits until the non-striker arrives before setting off on the run. There’s no way to get an out at the striker’s end.

Your team needs to practice this for about 15 minutes once and then they’ll know what to do.

Later in his career Warney was ‘just’ an accurate bowler of legbreaks that turned enough to be dangerous who also had a psychological hold over batsmen and umpires. But circa 1994 he was an absolute bamboozler – the flipper especially was unplayable for people that grew up in South Africa, England, West Indies…

This video from 1994 against South Africa is worth watching:

But I really think Australia has a chance of chasing a world record total this time. Somebody is going to do it some time and this Australian team is probably most likely to do it. They can score dominant test match centuries from 1-8 in the order and the pitch isn’t that bad…

So I’ll be waking up at 3 am tomorrow morning. Hopefully I won’t be going back to sleep at 4:30.

Johnson trying to figure out the Duke ball (actually it's not, but you get the idea)

But now I am officially calling for his head after two. It’s not just ordinary bad bowling – he looks terrible out there. Tell him that he’s still the future but he just needs a rest. Play Siddle, Hilfenhaus, Hauritz and Clark.

I think Hughes and North deserve more time. Hughes has looked bad against the short ball but so do a lot of people. He’s figured out grade cricket, shield cricket and playing SA so let him try his way for a while.

Katich 35
Hughes 102
Ponting 170
Hussey 0
Clarke 96
North 22
Haddin 58*
Johnson 15*
Extras (11 byes, 4 leg byes, 7 noballs, 1 wide, 5 penalty runs) 28
Total 526

TdF stage 15:
The peloton makes it over the early mountains unscathed but after defending a few feeble attacks, Alberto Contador accelerates away to the mountain top finish, taking the stage win and gaining 34 seconds on all the other GC contenders.

TdF rest day:
Rumours from within team Astana claim Contador is having some sort of health trouble.

TdF stage 16: Contador doesn’t start! The official reason is food poisoning*. Out on the course the `heads of state**’ all make it over the first hors categorie climb together but on the Col du Petit-Saint-Bernand Sastre attacks and only Evans and A. Schleck can go with him. Armstrong cracks and is left to be pulled up the mountain by Andreas Kloden. Schleck, Evans and Sastre keep their lead on the descent and then through to the finish: all get the same time and Schleck the stage win.

GC standings after stage 16:
Andy Schleck
Tony Martin 0:22
Bradley Wiggins 0:44
Christian Vande Velde 0:46
Carlos Sastre 1:03
Cadel Evans 1:18
Lance Armstrong 2:11
Andreas Kloden 2:57

* Really, Lance Armstrong’s minions poisoned his blood transfusion.

** This is one of the most annoying of Paul Sherwen’s phrases. I like to think of them as the President of France, King of Norway, Paramount Chief of Fiji…

Things that are acceptable in baseball
- Throwing the ball at the head of a player who does something on the list above.
- Managers abusing umpires for a long time from very close range.
- All-in brawls.

- Pakistani cricketers are portrayed as either being cheats or having mystical powers.

- The SMH seems to think that the existence of facebook groups is the most newsworthy thing in the world. I haven’t got a great example but this article just tacks it on the end.

- Isuru Udana. A left arm medium fast bowler who at one point bowled 6 back of the hand slower balls in a 7 ball over.
- Ajantha Mendis. A mystery spinner. Like most mystery spinners most of his deliveries go straight.
- Lasith Malinga. A sidearm slinger.
- Murali. The original freak, he seems quite normal these days.

So with Australia out, I’ll be following the Lankan’s. Some of these bowlers have already been figured out by various teams but in one off games they are pretty threatening.

Unfortunately rain delayed the game so I was forced to set my DVR to record the last 6 overs with the game delicately balanced and left my house at 12:40. I deliberately didn’t take my computer so I wouldn’t be tempted to check the result. I arrived at my office at about 12:50 and waited for the student to arrive, attempting to read a paper on expander codes.

When there was no sight of of my student at 1:30 I left a message on the door and went to a computer lab to check my email. There I received an email sent at 12:30 explaining that the student had managed to enrol through the online system and didn’t need to meet me. Somewhat annoyed with this turn of events I walked home.

There I turned on my computer and unconsciously, automatically, horrifically, went to cricinfo.com. The Netherlands had won.