While watching the 2020 game yesterday I heard a phrase I have heard so often that it amazes me people still say it.
“You don’t see Yuvraj misfield much”.
Yuvraj has some good skills as a fielder.
He is also lazy, a little dozey, and on a bad day as fumbly as can be.
The sort of guy that will take the special catch and drop the dolly.
It isn’t Yuvraj’s fault, he is who he is.
But why do we have to hear it?
We know it isn’t true by the fact that it seems to be said at least twice every game he plays in.
Yuvraj isn’t the only one.
Brad Haddin missed two balls in last test match that the batsmen had left. You can’t get much easier than that.
The commentators expressed their surprise. Both times.
But when was the last match you saw that Haddin didn’t drop a regulation take or two.
It can’t always be the Lord’s slope.
And how often when he does so has he been called a poor keeper, or called for his shoddy keeping? Like say Matt Prior has been.
Some players just get the run in the box. Reality seems to run a distant second to how they are promoted.
Just once I want to hear, “Fuck me, Yuvraj, for a bloke with fielding skills you sure do fuck up alot”, or “Brad has fumbled again, I feel like I have said that 12 fucken times this test.”
A boy can dream.
He’s fat now… somehow the good fielder tag has been with him since he started. He also does ads for nutritional supplements (which Indians take as a Viagra proxy), like he needs anymore of those….
Some Phrases to add:
Brilliant century by Tendulkar.
Match saving knock by the wall of Indian cricket.
Took the game away from the opposition, attacked from the very first ball – Sehwag!!
Another day in office for Australia as they wrap things up with another win.
Lee returns home due to injury, out for 6 months.
Afridi celebrates his 18th bday.
Akhtar facing legal action from the PCB.
Nzl 24/4.
West Indies dominated cricket in the 70′s.
South Africa lose in the finals of yet another tournament.
ECB name new captain.
.-= Mock Wah´s last blog ..B.B.O.T.D. – The Bald & the Beautiful =-.
General fielding of Indian team is so fucked up, that it make sense for the commentators to put Yuvraj on a higher pedestal. But of course, that doesn’t make it correct. He used to be good,but then again he has to work on it , which he is not very inclined, I guess.
The Prior thing has been a truism about every English keeper who isn’t an out and out specialist (ex. Knott, and even then his batting is more rehabilitated with hindsight than at the time). There is still a certain English sniffyness about batsmen who keep.
I would rather hear all of those hackneyed phrases than listen to the bloody silly banging on about the run rate and what the batting side need to score, and the speculation about who is going to have to do what. I can’t think of a single commentator who doesn’t get verbal diarrhoea during 2020 games. Perhaps they all ought to smoke some skunk an hour before the game.
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jrod, amen to that. This is the first time I am hearing this comment on Yuvraj from someone who is not me :-)
I have been telling anyone who would care to listen for years that Yuvraj is overrated as a fielder, and he drops dollies, he fumbles, misfields and yet, has a reputation as a good fielder.
My blood boils when these jokers of selectors keep Laxman out for bad fielding. As though the ones in the team are great fielders. We once had Laxman out of a WC because of his fielding – guess who we took in his place? Dinesh Mongia, ha ha!
As you say, the cliched commentating on the fielding of the likes of Yuvraj is even more annoying.
Another of those – when Harbhajan has his usual fast-darts day Ravi Shastri and Senile Gavaskar go “Bhajji seems to be having a off day today”. Trouble is he has those off-days 70-80% of the time. Ravi and Senile are two of the most annoying commentators ever.
Yesterday, the ball Sehwag got out Ravi went “great shot, and he is caught in the deep” :-)
without a morsel of shame in between.
There was this other occasion when the batsman hit straight to the fielder – Ravi went “Good shot!”. So far so good, afterall a shot can be good without fetching runs, too. Watch what happens next. The fielder misfields, and it goes for 4. Our man now upgrades it to “Very good shot”! So, a shot is good or not depends on the fielder, not the batsman.
All you have to do is listen to vocabulary challenged L sivaramakrishnan commentary.
He repeats senetence so often , you think you are playing same tape again and again. I never seen one original comment from him any time.
Yuvraj has been a poor fielder for a few years now. I think Ravi Shastri is the one who keeps saying “you dont see that often from Yuvraj” and now of course L.. Sivaramakrishnan has joined in because he cant think of any new lines on his own.
First time here. Great site. Very funny. Read your Sehwagology post. and the 10 sons etc…You may want to replace “reek” to “wreak”.
Cheers.
Jai
Jai, nice pickup. But try not to correct every spelling error on this site, it will break your mind.
Damn…someone beat me to the part about Harbhajan. Yuvraj has been pathetic for a while. What’s more, he’s grown real fat and his minions Nohit and Suresh have followed suit – They have 6 chins between them.
Senile Sunny and Shite Shastri are the masters of cliches. Every time the scoring rate decreases Shite thinks the pitch has slowed down and the ball isn’t coming on to the bat. Ten overs later the batsmen are tearing into the bowlers and the pitch has flattened out into a batting track. And to think cricinfo sees Shite as India’s answer to Ian Chappell.
when sehwag bats the whole world thinks pitch is flat and when dravid bats pitch become mine field.
It almost like pitch is alive and doing all kind of things for all these experts.
Another irritating comment is that is BOTTOM HAND Shot. wtf. Is batsman batting with foot ?.
Is there anything special about BOTTOM HAND shot?. So what ?.
I hate all indian commentators. They suck.
I like dean jones but jrod do not like him. ha.
Yes, Yuvraj used to be a good fielder, but is now no more than mediocre. Raina is now our best fielder by some distance.
Not defending Shastri and Gavaskar at all, but they speak in cliches because they have limited English-speaking skills (they know at least 2 other languages, probably 3, but they have limited speaking ability in those too, i’m guessing ), and lack the creativity of Kapil to create their own language. Kapil, for instance, has the ablility to express his thoughts on-the-fly, but he lacks formal training in English. So that keeps him out of commentating (thankfully!).
The overwhelming use of cliches by all commentators is also because of the control exercised by the producers – nothing that could be perceived as controversial can be mentioned – and there are just so many ways you can describe what is happening, considering everyone is seeing it anyway.
Sensible article by Bhogle:
http://www.cricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/438826.html
Jogesh, The first point you make would make sense if every other commentator didn’t do the same thing. The second one hasn’t stopped Jeremy Coney or even Navjot Sidhu.
i disagree with bhogle. South africa is real number 1 barely though based on value of the win not accumulation of points.
“Big Benn ” if I hear this “pun” again I’ll fucking punch Fujitsu Taylor right in the kisser
Shane Watson Envy, Without thinking the other day I started writing it, and i felt a chill go up my spine and quickly deleted it.
Ever so true. This is the first article I have read on this site and could not agree more.
Skills. To be executed. A Haydos favourite, it seems from what I’ve read over at KC. OK, I understand that they are talking about more than one ‘skill’ but it’s like the singular and plural have become interchangable.
As for Mr Shastri, I agree completely. It’s like he’s reading from the book of Uhstrayan cliches, and it’s not really a good idea to base your English on the language of Oz commentators.
Perhaps u will like Ranjit Fernando. He can never repeat, not even himself.. there is a twist in every comment…. NO CLICHES HERE.
.-= Mock Wah´s last blog ..B.B.O.T.D. – THE LESSER KNOWNS =-.
And to top it all off, they have to yell these cliches out at the top of their voices as well!
To be fair, its not just the Indian commentators who are afflicted with this ill. Majority of the Channel 9 commentary team are susceptible to this as well. Yes I am looking at you Messrs. Healy, Slater, Nicholas and co.
During the coverage of the Adelaide test, at one point, Bill Lawry was trying to argue with Ritchie that it wasn’t legal for the Indian and Paki fielders of the 70’s, 80’s to return the ball from the outfield on the bounce to scuff up the ball (to bring spin or reverse swing into play). Ritchie in his mellifluous tone was trying to argue otherwise, but had to contend with Bill getting excited and louder by the minute and had to give up.
I think only L siva commentary i switch off volume. I do not like people repeat same sentence over and over again. Other people are bad , only L siva repeats “BOTTOM hand into play”
This sentence is beyond me. So what bottom hand into play…so?
Most indian commentators repeat what aussie commentators said before or learned the sentence. These people can’t make their own cricket sentence.
He probably repeated every unique sentence he said atleast 20-100 times in a day . The thing is he can’t speak anything else in between to make us forget what he said before..
he should be worst ever commentator in the history of the game , next probably rameez raja.
siva has two go to phrases. for bowling: “what a delivery?!” for batting: “that’s a maximum.” somebody please shoot that fcuker.
the token sri lankan commentard actually said, “hawk says that’s hitting the stumps.” may be he thought hawk was the first name and eye was the last name!