West Indies Losers XI

I think it's time to infest West Indies with players who are not West Indian. Why? Do you even need to ask that question?

The real question is, where should we import these players from? I say we get perennial losers from any cricket playing country and make them Honourary West Indian citizens like Herschelle Gibbs and Michael Hayden. Then make them play for the team. I can garauntee you that this lot will win more games than the current bunch.

So without further ado, I give you the West Indies Losers XI:

1) Darren Sammy: He's not really a loser. In fact, with that face and that fearless attitude, he is always a winner in my books, but he is also a good leader of losers as proven by his current efforts. Sammy is really the only West Indian trying to win any matches for his stupid maroon team.

2) Dwayne Bravo: See above.

3) Nathan Bracken: Poor guy is a loser by association, with Cricket Australia that is. Any other team in the world would have ignored his Keira Knightley look and put the bugger in their test team. But not Cricket Australia. They would rather keep him hanging till he fades away. They would also rather pay for Brett Lee's numerous injuries. Brave Nathan continues to look for new opportunities and then the doctors tell him he needs another operation on his knee! Loser's luck indeed.

4) Imran Nazir: What high hopes one had for this lovely opener, although the same can be said for most Pakistani cricketers. Regardless, Imran had the agression, the cover drive and the fielding to be a regular in the team. But then he played  a couple of tests...and now he is just a 28 years old with a double chin who is only called for the national side as an afterthought.

5) Monty Panesar: In order to feel bad for Monty, I need to make space in my heart by getting out my real feelings for him...BAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I find his situation wonderfully funny. Yet another promising English bowler replaced the minute he hits bad form. He too is 28 with a double chin, but these days with Swann (UGH!) and numerous other young spinners in the horizon, poor ol' Monty isn't even an afterthought. Again, BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

6) Dinesh Karthik: Who likes Dinesh Karthik? Do you like Dinesh Karthik? Do I like Dinesh Karthik? Does Dinesh Karthik's mother like Dinesh Karthik? See, I've mentioned his name one too many times and your face is already taking a disapproving shape. He is everywhere: keeping, a batting, fielding, captaining, preventing Sachin from getting a century...but it gets him nowhere. He's just one of those losers that we know is in his rightful place and refuse to let him leave LoserVille. May his lifetime membership continue, in maroon, doing a little bit of everything with the Windies.

7) Ireland: Pick any player, they have all been forced to live in LoserVille, sadly. They do not belong there at all and I for one would like to see them storm the ICC headquarters, confiscate all their adult diapers and threaten to shred them into pieces unless they receive a test status.

8) Martin Guptill: Why the fuck this person got any sort of nomination and recognition is beyond me. He has played in 30 ODI's and has a stunning average of 36.46. He's scored 948 runs so far...122 of them came in the SAME GAME. We will pardon him for his equally woeful test average because he's played in only 11 of them but what's all the hype about? Till I see it Martin darling, you are a loser.

9) Lance Klusener: How this breaks my heart! How it kills me! I feel like dolling up and doing a full Elizabeth Taylor-esque tragic scene when I hear his name. He got shafted by a BUFFALO! Sure, he was in crap form during that period but he was dropped because the young captain, who hadn't even secured a spot in the team, thought Zulu was disruptive and a bad influence. He never returned. He is a loser purely because of circumstances.

10) Mohammad Ashraful: Please don't ask and please don't defend him. If you would like to defend him, your team can have him.

11) Shane Watson: Because no losers team is complete without him.

Bowling is skin deep

When Binga was injured for the umpteenth time Dougie B packed his bags and waited for the call. Actually, he might have waited even before Binga injured himself. Everybody knew it was coming. He is paying back mankind for unleashing his atrocious Hindi song upon us. One injured limb for every record sold.

But the call never came. Dougie waited with his tomato face till someone gave him a squeeze and said,
"The peacock is in its way, Dougie"

"Why Hildy why?" Dougie asked.

No answer.

Dougie and Harris arrived at the IPL at the same time, both were easily the best bowlers of the tournament and both won matches for their teams. Dougie's team...eventually...won...the IPL!

So when the time came to replace Binga and Hilfy was still unavailable, most thought the new IPL3 champions AND the one who kept his Aussie colours with his IPL team, would be an automatic choice. But it was not to be. It was Ryan Harris who got the call, the same Ryan Harris whose chest is placed too highly, just like a peacock's.

How can Binga, one of the prettiest men in cricket, be replaced by Dougie tomato face? Getting people to come watch the games in the Windies is tough enough and on top of that they lose Binga and his applebutt. So they replace the butt, with a chest.

Dougie has none of this. I mean, the man makes Simon Katich look handsome for fuck's sakes!

No, Dougie has no place in the Australian squad. Not when he is replacing Brett Lee. Not when the people will come back to watch Ryan Harris till they can figure out why his chest is so oddly placed.

Unless Witchy picks up an injury and McKay, MacDonald, Moises, McGrath and Bracken are all unavailable.

Champions Trophy injury list continued...

Aditya reminded me of some that I had forgotten and some new additions.

India: Zaheer Khan
What: Shoulders as well
How: Sympathy pains for Virender Sehwag (or vice versa...whoever sustained the injury first)
Prognosis: Well he had his surgery in South Africa, where India is currently playing in the Champions Trophy against South Africa...so I'm going to say don't be too hopeful :).

India: Gautam Gambhir
What: Groin strain
How: When Gary Kirsten mentioned going solo at the absence of a partner in his dossier, the Indians were confused. So Gambhir volunteered to demonstrate...during which Jesse Ryder saw him and decided to help.
Prognosis: If you really want to know, it doesn't seem to be functioning very well...

Australia: Nathan Bracken (Goldilocks)
What: Knee injury
How: Papa Bear found him eating his porridge and snapped his twiggy limbs into half.
Prognosis: Mama Bear has adopted him for the time-being as the girl they never had. So whenever she is ready to let go.

CA TV Videos

Cricket Australia TV is cool. They follow the team around and give us insights into the team, video analysis of their games, interviews and behind the scenes stuff. The behind the scenes videos used to be the best ones, till Nathan Bracken's blog came around. That man has the personality of a hair band. Which he wears.

Anyway, sometimes they run out of ideas for the videos and make up fictitious stories. Like this one, where an American man is telling us why Ricky Ponting is the best fielder in the world.



First of all, Ricky's two run outs in the 6th ODI were stunning. Second of all, this is the first time he has hit the stumps in a long time. To be the best in the world you kind of have to do that consistently. Punter doesn't really make the batsmen think twice before taking a run the way Rhodes, Duminy, De Villiers and Gibbs does. I mean he is better than most, but the best he is not. Stop giving him titles. He will lose them in a few days anyway.

BTW, CA TV, if you are going to make a case about cricket don't use a man with an American accent who keeps on calling your skipper 'Rick'. Which brings me to, why is there an American in your camp? Have they actually discovered cricket before unearthing the weapons of mass destruction? What a shocker!

There's another video. Before you get to it, I must apologize because the video shows Binga and Watto playing some pop-sickle version of 'Sweet Child O' Mine' on their guitars. As a huge fan of the song and the band, I was curious to know what could posses them to act in a way that could lead to a bloody revolution. Turns out, they know that they annoy people with their 'singing' and do it in their rooms nowadays. At least that's a start. Mankind may be saved after all.

Backing up my claims

I never lie.

Ravi, the Bollywood Clown.. how did the casting people of Bend it Like Beckham miss you?

Why didn't Ryan get the cool green hair?

Spot the real Nathan Bracken

Cameron White, The Albino Convict

A cure for depression

The ODI's between Australia and England. If you are not watching it, you should. It will bring a lot of joy in your life.

The Pommies were actually offered a contract with a traveling circus called the English Clown Board. We got a great demonstration of how good they are at their job today. Strauss, the head clown, lead they way by making sure that the first over of a One Day International match was a maiden. He then got a little serious with the batting so Bopara, the Bollywood clown, tried to run himself out. But they had underestimated the comedic power of the Yellow Convicts (YC). Goldilocks, a prominent joke machine, fulfilled his duties and duly missed the stumps while Bopara dived heard-first. The YC's did well to continue the entertainment when the Clowns got too serious again (after making sure that they had lost two wickets of course), with three players running after one ball that still made it to the boundary.

Look mommy, I am funny!

The highlight of the act came with Wato, the buttery-limbed convict, yelling out 'YEAH SEXYYY' when Goldilocks actually managed to keep the ball in his two hands to dismiss Colly, the sad clown. The YC's haven't been allowed to be with their women for a long time as punishment for losing the Ashes. Hence, they have forgotten what sexy really means. Or maybe they have been seeing too much of Bingle lately.

Many amusing wickets and one miserably funny power play later, it was the YC's turn to chase. Just when we thought it couldn't get more hilarious, they proved us wrong. YC's batting began at such a slow pace that even the turtle gave up his trophy. There were many moments in between the painful trudging though. Sidebottom, brother of the legendary Krusty, worked very hard on his inadequate bowling and got rewarded when one of his useless balls hit White, the Albino convict, in the nuts. White took revenge by scoring a strapping 105 from 124 balls. It went down in history as the most boring 124 balls every played.

'Spinner' Swann, simply titled the Clown, trumped YC's disgusting fielding all by himself when he dived for a ball and nudged it towards the boundary with his head. He then laughed at the replays to show how confident he was while making fun of himself. The Clown scouts had come to see the game you see.

The YC's won...but not before making sure they needed a run a ball to overtake the Clowns' daunting 228.
Ex-convicts Hayden and Gilly's thrashing, thumping approach to cricket was successfully flushed down the toilet today. You can find it in your sewage system.

The Clowns dropped two catches, missed three run outs and will continue to do so...oh the tears of joy!