Cricket

There’s a 13th man at the table at Lord’s this week as England resume the Ashes contest with Australia, which began so thrillingly at Trent Bridge, where England prevailed by 14 runs. For the first time in half a -century, -Christopher Martin-Jenkins is not present to renew one of the great rituals of the English summer. ‘CMJ’, who passed away on New Year’s Day at the less than grand age of 67, was always going to be missed and listeners to Test Match Special, the programme he adorned with his balanced commentaries, are cursing Time for being so vicious in his reaping. The graveyard, it is said, overflows with people once thought

Forget the Ashes, this is the cricket news you have been waiting for: the Confederation of British Industry vanquished the Trades Union Congress at their annual match last night. Chasing 114 to win, the CBI recovered from 5 for 4 to win with a boundary from the last ball of the game. The venal capitalists’ last gasp triumph will come as a bitter blow to the Brothers. But this is a long war and there will be countless other battles.

Mr Steerpike is still a boy at heart: I feel giddy with anticipation on the first morning of an Ashes series. England versus Australia. 5 Test matches. A golden summer in the offing. There’s nothing like this rivalry in sport, at least to those for whom it matters. And perhaps it matters most to those who’ve played for the Ashes. I bumped into Ted Dexter a few days ago. The former England captain is 78, but he had lost none of the dash, sparkle and elegance that made old mother Steerpike swoon for him in his ‘60s heyday. Dexter towered above me, ramrod straight at 6’2 (or thereabouts), as he

Marcus Trescothick. Nick Compton. Alviro Petersen. James Hildreth. Craig Kieswetter. Jos Buttler. When all troops are fit and available Somerset enjoy a batting line-up one might compare favourably to this summer’s visiting New Zealanders. Today they were dismissed by Sussex for 76. At Horsham. Granted, Compton and Kieswetter were absent but, even so, this was a dismal showing.  Somerset, damn it, won the toss and chose (rightly!) to bat. At the time of typing Sussex are 241/7. The best that may be said of it is that this year the Wurzels are not teasing their supporters. A season that began with hopes that – at last! – the Cider Men

Does this advert ring a bell? It showed a handsome young man hitting a cricket ball far into the distance. It appeared on the Tube last spring. The tagline read: ‘How far can you hit it, Rory?’ The advert said that the young man was Rory Hamilton-Brown, captain of Surrey County Cricket Club. It urged commuters to watch his team play. It suggested glamour and clamour; neither of which is associated with stolid county cricket. Something was afoot. Hamilton-Brown had been appointed three years earlier, aged 22, to rejuvenate Surrey, a once great club wandering in the wilderness. He was the youngest captain in the country, and one of the

Summer, or rather the hint or promise of it, only arrives with the publication of Wisden. The cricketers’ almanack – the venerable almanack – celebrates its 150th anniversary this season. It has been quite an innings. John Wisden (pictured above) created an institution that, happily, shows no sign of flagging. This year’s almanack clocks in at a chunky 1584 pages and is a fine edition that pays proper tribute to the Yellow Brick’s past. This second edition stewarded by Lawrence Booth confirms the impression fostered last season that his editorship is a considerable upgrade upon his predecessor’s. His prejudices are sound. Quite correctly, Booth is a conservative but not a

Slight treachery from Boris, who has written a glowing piece on the occasion of the New Statesman’s centenary. While most people will focus on his dissection of the evils of left-wingery and explanations for hatred of Margaret Thatcher, something else caught Steerpike’s eye: ‘My paranoia about the New Statesman and its terrific pieces went on for some months, until we finally met for physical combat, in the form of a cricket match. It was a torrid afternoon and I was full of nerves. Bernard Levin had come to watch, for heaven’s sake, and the New Statesman’s captain, Christian Wolmar, displayed what I am forced to call gamesmanship. At last we prevailed,

Today, February 28th 2013, is the 80th anniversary of the conclusion to one of the finest – and certainly the most controversial – test series ever played. Eighty years ago today, Wally Hammond and Bob Wyatt put on 125 for the third wicket as England strolled to an eight wicket win at Sydney. This capped a remarkable winter for the tourists and sealed a crushing 4-1 series victory. It remains one of English cricket’s greatest foreign triumphs. Rarely before and rarely since has pure theory been so completely matched to the needs of applied cricket. No wonder Douglas Robert Jardine is still remembered as arguably the finest captain to ever