A tale of two averages

By Greg Hurvitz

Undoubtedly the purist cricket enthusiast is in cricket heaven over this festive season and rightly so, with the Proteas dismissing the Indians for another surprisingly low first innings total, this time 205 all out. These are the “ranked” number one and two teams playing against each other.

Way down under we have a distant third and seemingly an even further placed fourth International test team. Stats aside one does not need to be an expert to see how much Australia have slipped in the last cricketing year. Justifiably, one would feel, around this series is the hype of the Ashes a series born in 1882/83, quite frankly the little earn for me is all that holds appeal here. These two teams were the first two cricketing teams to be awarded test status, March 1877 being admitted to the ICC. I can honestly say that not one of the cricketers on display holds any excitement for me. The Ashes has unfortunately been devalued over the past few series, as a contest that is — we cannot release tradition that easily. So for me the Ashes is a tale of two average teams, the tale could be expounded in fairytale format or just told like it is. On this blog I prefer the latter.

England have this innate belief that they are unbelievable cricketers, which on one hand is very important in the quest for success. A lot of my countrymen have laid claim to some of the players in the English team, newsflash if they were South African they would be playing cricket in SA and/or recognised in South Africa so as an aside, let’s get over it and support the Proteas 100% rather. Australia forgot that the wheel turns and you cannot rest on your laurels at any time — the factory runs low on output at some point, this is that time. A mild and sometimes nursery school like bowling attack with no frontline spinner has the Australian public practically begging Shane Warne to make a test comeback. I reckon that the Channel 9 commentary team could perform better than the current test team in Australia … where will there next batch of world-class cricketers come from? No-one is actually quite sure.

England’s performance against Australia reads as follows in Test cricket:

—— Won Tied Lost Drawn Total

Home 45 — 0 — 47 — 64 — 156

Away 55 — 0 — 86 — 27 — 168

Total 100 — 0 –133 — 91 — 324

Lost more than they have one and almost drawn as much as they have won, not the reading of a world beating team. They certainly have never dominated world cricket like a West Indies did for a patch or an Australian group for a good 10 years.

In the current test rankings the top five batsmen:
1. 882 KC Sangakkara — Sri Lanka
2. 880 SR Tendulkar — India
3. 846 JH Kallis — SA
4. 832 V Sehwag — India
5. 806 AB de Villiers — SA

In the current test rankings the top five bowlers:
1. 876 DW Steyn — SA
2. 821 GP Swann — Eng
3. 768 M Morkel — SA
4. 755 MG Johnson — Aust
5. 744 JM Anderson — Eng

Certainly far more improved representation in the bowling department for the distantly placed Ashes teams. However with respect Mr Swann, he won’t be bowling any test team out, ever the Aussies. We got this rousing applause at the 90 000 people filled MCG for Hussey getting to 6 000 runs … yay! well done. In SA five days ago Sachin passed 14 500 runs and scored his 50th century, Kallis scored a double ton and Ab de Villiers hit the fastest century in SA cricket history, in one session. Now that’s the best, that’s what people want.

My point, after all this blabbering, the Ashes currently between Australia and England is a tussle of who can be the best average test team in the world and how sad that is to the 133-year-old tradition. They both need to remove the illusions of grandeur and understand that the two best cricket teams are currently at war in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Two of the top five bowlers in the world are flying into two of the top two batsmen in the world. People want the best of the best not third and fourth. It just is not the spectacle it was and that it should be, how very sad.

The tale of two averages will remain in place for a while and then the bubblegum cricket in colour and shortened versions will infest the TV screens — don’t worry about ratings and rankings when this comes about it means nothing, except for Kevin Pieterson to further work on his obsession with his image …

Greg Hurvitz hosts the breakfast show on 101.9FM, a community radio station, and is involved daily in sports administration.