Chris Woakes benefited from taking a break from the game and England’s winter schedule will test how far cricket has comeIt has been 15 years since England played in Pakistan, a stretch that feels, nowadays, more than half a lifetime ago. They may go back there again in January. Wasim Khan, the chief executive of the Pakistan Cricket Board, has invited them out to play three Twenty20 games in the new year. And given the efforts Pakistan made to help the England and Wales Cricket Board fulfil its own fixture list by touring here during lockdown in the summer, the ECB is bound to agree. The difficulty is England are also supposed to play two Tests against Sri Lanka around...
Not since 2005 has the ECB sent a touring team to the country but it is hard to see how they can decline this invitationThe likelihood of England’s cricketers participating in a tour of Pakistan for the first time in more than 15 years is now strong. Wasim Khan, the chief executive of the Pakistan Board, sent his invitation on 12 October, which has been welcomed with all the usual provisos by the England and Wales Cricket Board.However, a situation has been reached where it is very hard to see how the ECB can decline that offer barring unforeseen developments (of which there have, admittedly, been a disturbing number of late). Related: ECB reveals new County Championship structure and South...
Prizes go to Michael Holding for showing why Black Lives Matter and the BBC for bringing cricket back to the massesAt first, after the unbeatable thrills of 2019, the men’s international cricket season of 2020 looked like being an anticlimax. Then, as one nation after another locked down, it looked like not happening at all. Next, it looked like happening after a fashion but being too weird to cast a spell. And finally, it happened, without a hitch, and with many a magic moment. Now was our Easter of discontent made glorious summer.After four months of nothing at all, we had 10 weeks of escapism without leaving the sofa. Now, at the end of term, it’s time for prize-giving. Continue...
It has been a vintage season for England’s men despite empty grounds – but a hard financial winter loomsThe way Douglas Adams told it in Life, the Universe and Everything, the world ends right after England win back the Ashes on a glorious late summer day at Lord’s. “The sun was shining on a happy crowd,” Adams wrote. “It shone on white hats and red faces. It shone on ice lollies and melted them. It shone on the tears of small children whose ice lollies had just melted and fallen off the stick. It shone on the trees, it flashed off the whirling cricket bats.” If the last few months have taught us anything much, it’s that there would be...
The Yorkshireman’s relentless ODI form saw him compile a 10th century in the format in which he is one of England’s finestThe England men’s last match of the summer started with a slash, a catch, a cuss and a quick apology. Jason Roy threw his bat at Mitchell Starc’s opening ball and sliced a drive straight to backward point. In the silence of the empty ground, the curse he shouted out as he stomped into the dressing room came through loud and clear on the effects microphone. “Sorry for the choice language,” added Mike Atherton. It got worse. Joe Root was lbw to the very next delivery, so England were nought for two. Eoin Morgan was in now, while Jonny...