GerryShedd
Super Moderator
When I brought the name of Allen Stanford into the discussion, I hadn't realised that Lalit Modi had branded the ECB proposals as "a big fat Ponzi scheme" but Stanford would know all about that.
UrsaMinor wrote:
More comment today from Lalit Modi (perhaps not an impartial observer) who believes the financial projections to be "disconnected from reality" and "more like wishful thinking".
If I were a serious investor, I'm not sure whether I would view the ECB as a bunch of chumps who could easily be taken for a ride or as so incompetent that I wouldn't want to touch any business that they had started.
It's just a pity that the ideal investor, Allen Stanford, happens to be serving a 110 year prison sentence.
According to The Telegraph, the 87-page document distributed to interested investors sells the Hundred as “dominating the British summer sporting calendar” as the ECB tries to tempt buyers. It also boasts that the Hundred is the “premier destination for men’s and women’s global cricket superstars” despite a less-than-stellar roster of overseas men’s players who appeared this year with stars such as Pat Cummins choosing to play in Major League Cricket in the United States instead and Indian players not available.
The document also highlights W G Grace and Alastair Cook as examples of great English short-format players, despite the former dying nearly 100 years before the invention of T20, and the latter never participating in the Hundred.
Possibly not surprisingly, the ECB declined to comment.
I think this looks like the best team that the Club could put out in the (injury-hit) circumstances.
There are eight players in the team who have taken Championship wickets this season and eight who have registered a score of 50 or more - and that's not counting OH-D who would have scored several 50s if his partners didn't keep getting out.
Romance isn't dead!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/articles/cn7yx3y1rpxo
Good luck to Olly and his bride
Delayed start - pitch inspection at 12.00.
In the preview of the Notts game, Mark Robinson seems to confirm the reason that Will Rhodes is leaving - "players need to do what’s best for them at different times in their career and we understand his desire to play T20 cricket. "
The obvious conclusion from this is that he had been told that there was no chance of T20 cricket with the Bears. I must say that I would have been inclined to give him a run in the T20 side in an attempt to keep him.
Graham Smith covers all the final round options here:
https://deepextracover.com/2024/09/preview-of-final-round-of-vitality-county-championship/
paulbear wrote:
Should imagine he would be captain in any cricket team and you can just guess at all the meetings, all the other team members, "Bloody Albert, I mean, he is a decent bloke but these meetings, I mean, can anyone understand a word he is on about and when he gets his pen and paper out and tries to explain what is on his mind, I am just lost. Oh! And I wish he'd get his flippin' hair cut, he shows us up in the team photos".
He says if the hairstyle is ok for Lasith Malinga, it's ok for him.
Ed Barnard declared as Player of the Tournament for the second successive year.
As in the Blast, the Bears beaten by the winners! Congratulations to Glamorgan.
What a sensible decision (for a change) for the authorities to look at the forecast and reduce the match to 20 overs a side which they just completed before the rains came down again. And well done the groundstaff!
I worry about you if your day is that easily ruined.
Without wishing to rain on Highveld's parade, can I just point out that there is no evidence that Einstein actually said the words attributed to him. And maybe we should consider the opposite sentiments of a man who did actually play first-class cricket, Samuel Beckett, who said: "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better."
Meanwhile - 20 overs a side at Trent Bridge, Glamorgan to bat.
If no play today or tomorrow, trophy shared.
Fair comment, though Bramall Lane's only Test was in 1902, not 1912 and I wasn't able to get a ticket.
This was back in the days when, as a Warwickshire member, you could sit in the members' area at Lord's for the Final so I was in front of the pavilion and got a fantastic view of the match. I think that practice came to an end a year or two later when some Lancashire members at a Final behaved badly and the MCC members objected to having to share the pavilion with plebs.
Alan Smith was quite an unorthodox batter and I don't think Sussex knew how to bowl to him or set a field for him.
When Dennis started out he was seen as an all-rounder - batted right handed and bowled left arm seam. But early on, he had back problems and largely gave up the bowling. He did bowl his quota as an emergency fill-in in 1968 when Warwickshire beat Sussex to win the Gillette Cup (and yes, I was there!)
He bowled left arm seam that day and I really don't recall him ever bowling spin, Chinamen or any other form but I could be wrong about that.
Extracted from the Wisden website, Dennis said:
"We were a bowler short and Tom Cartwright was declared unfit for the game so I had to step in. I started well with the ball but wasn’t so good after lunch so then I had to get back some runs with the bat. I wasn’t used to bowling so I lay in the bath for hours to loosen up before it was my turn to bat and it was nice to be able to retrieve some of those runs that I’d given away with the ball! Alan Smith came in and played a gem of an innings and it took us through to win the cup which was very special because we had lost in the final previously."
Here's the table with just this one match to play:
https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/county-championship-division-one-2024-1410191/points-table-standings
Details of the Members Forum here:
https://edgbaston.com/news/members-attend-season-review-forum-qa/
Not sure about the legalities of re-printing a protected article and this may just be a ploy by Highveld to get me arrested - but here it is:
Warwickshire are set for a September performance review to decide whether they will keep their head coach after just one County Championship victory with one game to play this season
Mark Robinson's future as head coach of Warwickshire hangs in the balance after another underwhelming season at Edgbaston.
While Warwickshire reached the quarter-finals of the T20 Blast and the semi-finals of the One-Day Cup, they have won just one Championship match this season and are still at risk of relegation. They have looked overly reliant upon seam bowlers on the wrong side of 35 and have sometimes lacked penetration on the flat wickets which characterise Edgbaston these days.
Robinson led Warwickshire to the Championship title in 2021 and has seen several home-grown young players settle into his sides. But Warwickshire's targets for each season include a top three finish in the Championship and reaching finals day in the Blast. They have been unable to achieve any of those aims in the three most recent seasons, however, and his relationship with some in the playing squad is not everything it might be.
Warwickshire were fourth in the Championship in 2023, eighth in 2022 (when they avoided relegation at the last minute through the bowling heroics of Liam Norwell) and remain in danger of relegation this year with one game to play. They have reached the Blast quarter-finals for four years in succession but have not progressed to Finals Day. Indeed, they have not reached Finals Day since 2017.
Warwickshire, like most clubs, review their season each Autumn. This year, however, the review will start in September with club insiders suggesting a change is necessary if they are to challenge in 2025. The review, which will involve confidential interviews with senior players and members of the support staff and management, is expected to be completed by the end of October.
"We have been unlucky with injuries and the weather but, ultimately, others have been through the same, and I can see why some will say these are just excuses," Stuart Cain, the Warwickshire CEO, told The Cricketer. "We need to develop a squad and level of resilience that can manage what the season throws at us. We've not performed to the standards we set ourselves.
"We conduct a review at the end of every season. This looks at whether we have the players, facilities, back-office support and coaching staff that we need to succeed. And, at the end of that, if we need to change anything, we will.
"We do have both more batting and bowling bonus points than any other side in Division One, and have consistently topped the Blast group, so I would say we can't be all bad. But we are disappointed and we do have to find a way to improve."
While the review will be conducted, primarily, by director of cricket, Gavin Larsen, there may also be some questions about his position. When he was appointed, ahead of the 2023 season, it was suggested his contact book would enable Warwickshire to access top players from around the world. As things have transpired, it has enabled Warwickshire to attract journeyman seamers from New Zealand who were playing club cricket in England.
Cain, meanwhile, has confirmed that he has no intention of leaving. With a new hotel to be build on the ground, the sale of equity in a Hundred team to oversee and on-going improvements in community relations to build upon, he remains focused on the future.