That’s sad.

I’ve never understood why, it’s obvious that February is the month to kill yourself.

Personally, I’d prefer you didn’t kill yourself, as that would be one less reader.

So here is a photo of Graeme Smith celebrating winning a tournament to make you fell better.

Thanks to Dale Steyn for taking this picture and giving us this joy.

It wasn’t sordid, there was no sexiness, he was just an old dude who was once important to a few people, who is now no longer with us.

I’m not going to talk about how great Basil was, because I don’t know. Like what happened with Roebuck, those who do know will line up to tell us because other than boxing no other sport has the writers and love of nostalgia to properly handle an obituary.

Basil seemed pretty good, and an average of 40 with bat and ball at Test level is pretty handy when you consider he might have been 43 when he played.

In fact, it’s the whole bullshitting about his age to beat the system that I love the best about him. Like Satchel Paige before him and 2 out of 3 Pakistanis after him, he used his age to fuck with people.

Basil played in that golden cricket time, when cricket was cricket. Players walked, had beers with each other, were amateur, sledging was barely heard of and the gentleman that played the game loved a touch of racism in cricket.

It was Basil’s career that showed the hypocrisy from both sides. And he did all while being a top player regardless of his age.

When people talk about the glory days of cricket, that pure beautiful time, Basil pops into my head, a man who was born to play Test Cricket, yet who at one time or another was not allowed to play in two different countries.

Cricket has always been just a little bit fucked up, which is part of its charm.

But it also helps to have men like Basil who will do whatever they have to do to play cricket at the top level.

Cricket is better just because Mr D’Oliveira played it.

What is the fucken point of us playing in this tournament.  What is ever our point as a cricket team in general.  Every fucken time we just fold up like a plastic chair at even a hint of referred pressure.  You can say we’ve been unlucky, you can say we’ve been cocky, you you can also say that our very existence is proof that humans are lucky to have thumbs because otherwise we’d all be crawling around in the mud grunting at each other.  I can understand losing to a better team.  I can even understand having the opposition just out play us on the other day. But we don’t need a fucken other team, we just need ourselves.  New Zealand could have put out a whole team of cardboard cut outs and just waited for us to fuck up.  I feel bad for New Zealand, because they might have been good enough on the day to beat us regardless, but it’s almost impossible to give them any real credit when we went we lost this game by simply turning up knowing it was a knock out match.  Before today I would have liked to believe that the reason we had lost in the past might have stemmed from a belief that we couldn’t get to the top of world cricket.  But we fucken did, we beat Australia at home, well before they really turned to shit, and even after some hiccups we were the number one ranked test side for a time.  India are the number one test side in the world, and they can’t beat us in a test series.  We should be cocky swinging motherfuckers who believe that nothing can stop us.  We have the world’s best pace bowler and the world’s best wrist spinner, we have a statistical colossal all rounder, as good a batsman in world cricket opening up and our number four has the ability to do every but turn water into wine.  Still we fuck up.  Still we find a way to make ourselves the world’s laughing stock for the 6th cunting cock of a time. It’s fucking bullshit.  It’s a fucking disgrace.  And it’s all so fucking inevitable.  Our cricket board’s twitter account was trying to make light of the c word.  Fuck the C word. Don’t give me this C is for Champions bullshit.  C is for fucking choke because everytime we end up in this fucking tournament we choke.  We fucking choke. That is what we do. CHOke choke choke choke shocke chokec chokelks  chokelmkwe  CHOKE CHOKE CHOKEKKE.  That is what C is for, that is what we did, and frankly fuck off to anyone who says next time that we aren’t chokers. We aren’t chokers in four years time when we win this tournament, until then we fucken are. Actually, fuck this tournament as well, it can choke on my fucken rage. Fuck this tournament, fuck the ICC, let’s just pull out.  We don’t need this shit, we’re a proud people who has changed out nation more in the last few years than some countries have in hundreds of years.  So fuck the ICC, fuck the world cup, and fuck our attempts at ever winning this.  The world is a fucked up place and I hope that tomorrow the whole place gets smashed by an astroid and everyone on this planet s fucks off and dies.

Dedicated to Ant Sims.

It’s not impossible to mention the world cup without slipping in South Africa’s past; it’s just not that fun.  Without South Africa failing it wouldn’t feel like such a special tournament.  Everyone needs the Washington Generals. Their torment is part of the mystique; no one proves that World Cups are hard to win more than South Africa.

Every thing South Africa does is looked at through their comical history.  It doesn’t mean they can’t win the world cup; it also doesn’t make it easier.  If South Africa wins this tournament, their painful past will just make it sweeter.

Their big problem was obvious against England, the middle order was weak.  Yet, with their top four all being cautious batsmen, they have the potential to cover over the cracks with careful batting.

While other teams can’t afford to bat in a one paced way and give up potential runs, South Africa have the best attack in the world cup.  Their weakest bowler is Robin Petersen, and he doesn’t even have to be their fifth bowler.  They could play Steyn, Morkel, Tsotsobe, Tahir, Kallis as the 5^th bowler and Duminy as the 6^th bowler, if they play slightly within themelves and don’t lose wickets.

With this line up they should be able to control the game and play decisive conservative balanced cautious pragmatic cricket, also known as the South African Way.

What South Africa must do

Keep Amla in his magical form.

How you can beat South Africa

Morne Morkel is mentally fragile, Imran Tahir can go for runs, Kallis doesn’t seem to like to bowl as much these days, Tsotsobe is hittable, Botha is easier to manoeuvre without a doosra and Robin Petersen is a bowler you can work over.  Sure, I’ve just said above that their the best bowling attack in the tournament, but they’re really only fighting for that honour with Sri Lanka, so it doesn’t mean that much.

The attack is varied and talented, but take Dale Steyn out of it, and it has issues.  The problem is taking him out of the attack without losing any wickets to him is not easy.  If you don’t give him wickets, you can afford to go along at four an over against him.  Against India, he took five wickets, you just can’t allow that.  Without Tahir, and they may not play him, Steyn has to take wickets.  Especially if they are batting slower to protect the middle order.

In 07, Australia let Kallis bat because he couldn’t score quick enough to hurt them. Now that system would play into their hands as their attack is better, and thanks to T20, Kallis has a fifth gear.  To beat them you have to get out their top four.  I know what you’re thinking, “Jrod, what a revolutionary game plan you’ve come up with, the first four wickets, genius”.  The thing is, I don’t think their middle order has what it takes to post or chase a total if early wickets go down.  They are capable of chipping in, like they did against India, but at the moment they don’t look like being part of anything substantial. You have to get through to them, so unless you want to off them in a comedy Springfield Isotopes way, I’d suggest wickets.

The most important thing is to never give up against them, distant and recent history show that you’re always a chance, no matter how over the game looks.  However I’d suggest spending more time on working out how to beat Amla and Steyn, and less on working out who will pull a Donald.

What not to do against South Africa

Don’t mention the C word when facing Steyn.

Have you Chuck Fleetwood-Smithed yet?

The world has gone through a brutal legspin drought.  There’s Cremer, Smith, Rashid, Chawla, Mishra and Danish who all front up at times, but none of them are really taking the world by storm, or even by much more than drizzle.

As a man who fetishes legspin like nothing else, it’s been a lean era.

If it were not for the warm, fuzzy and then utterly violent Bryce McGain story and Imran Tahir I’d have left this world a few years back.

When I asked for world sides or who my favourite spinner was Tahir was who I picked.

It was more than the alice band, highlights, brilliant celebrating and journeyman status, Tahir can bowl.

And it isn’t some pseudo legspin straight breaks that you can only go out to through trying to hit them repeatedly out the ground, it’s proper out the back of the hand lepsin dark arts.

There’s wrong’uns, half trackers, flippers, full tosses and that awesome Pakistani legspin energy through the crease that makes them look like Cocained Disney characters.

What’s not to like?

That his first game for a world wide audience ended in four wickets doesn’t justify my love for him, I probably would have felt the same if he couldn’t land the ball and was only given three ropey overs

The man is a proper legspinner, and whether he lives or dies in this world cup, I’m just glad to see one around.

To me he feels like cricket.

Although, like most, I did gag when he kissed his badge, which is now the ultimate sporting auto-fellatio.

Tahir should stick to wrist action, it’s what he’s best at.

On women:

“I’ve always respected women.  When I’m in an orgy, I am constantly asking a woman if she is feeling ok, whether there is anything I can do to make her feel more comfortable.  I’ve gone as far as paying for their taxi on the way home.  You see, it doesn’t take much to treat a woman right after she’s let you cum in her ass and let her friend felch it out. Just a bit of respect. ”

On match fixing:

“To be honest, I’ve forgotten all the details.”

On the South African clique:

“One day I was pissed out of my mind, so I thought it would be cool to ask Graeme and Mark if I could join the leadership group.  They said I had to go through an initiation.  I thought it’d be fun, like paddles and shit.  It started with me holding these two metal things E-somethings, and then they all yelled at me, pointing out all the mistakes I’d made, like not buying a copy of AB’s album, it took forever.  The next part was me being locked in a room while they treated me like a dog.  It was ok, until Jacque put a collar on me.  That was weird.  But then they asked me to watch Battlefield Earth, that film is seriously shit, so I decided to just forget about it”.

On drugs:

“I’ve tried buzz, scag, woop, pla, e, weed, 7, acid, purple drank, shrooms, s, charlie, ploppa, angel, sunshine, pebbles, kicker and zoom.  Not all at once.  That is an important lesson for all kids out there.”

On Jacques Kallis:

“I once saw him eat a live dog. He didn’t even shave it.“

On Hansie:

“I think he was the biggest influence on my life.  Without him, I don’t know where I’d be.  He was just the perfect specimen of manliness, sort of like Steve McQueen, but cooler.  He wore the best leather jackets too.  People may not like him, but you can’t deny what a great man he was for South African cricket.  Sometimes when Graeme is yelling at us, I close my eyes and dream of Hansie.  I always feel better afterwards.”

On Paul Harris:

“Who?”

So I watched AB’s song to see this sporting musical symmetry that AB hinted at with “show them who you are”.

I’m not going to take you through the whole video, it speaks for it self. Yes it is in Afrikaans, but if you can’t get the song’s message with the subtle video only, they’ve failed in their efforts to be as didactic as possible.

What I want to talk about is not the uplifting message of the song, nor do I want to talk about the effect of when Ampie Du Preez morphs out of AB, even the passing the digital fire scene can be ignored and I’ll even overlook Francoise Du Plessis cameo.

No, what I want to talk about happens at the 34 second mark of the video, and it may be the creepiest thing to ever happen in a soft cock uplifting pseudo chrisitan cricket music video ever.

AB puts a stethoscope on the kid’s neck, the end of the Stethoscope goes straight down the pants* of AB de Villiers.

you're going to grow up nice

what do you hear?

His genitals must be magical though, as that kid grows up to be a doctor.

There is almost nothing missing from this music video; gender stereotyping, creepy interplay with children, Francois Du Plessis, Christian imagery, suicide, soft rock angst, hope, American footballs, slow motion running, rocking out in a mist, wow, it really does have everything.

When people ask is there nothing AB de Villiers can do, we now know the answer is no.

*The stethoscope actually goes into his pocket, but considering the often creep nature of this video, they should have used another pocket.

Thanks to the kind folks at SA cricket blog for showing us this gem.

I’ve been there too.  It is shit, and once the darkness comes around it can be a hard thing to look past.  It gets in your mind and makes you think that there is only one way out, a simple clean solution that will end all the shit.

It does pass.

Obviously, I’ve never been involved in a public love scandal, or for that matter, a private one, so I’ll never know what it is like to be taken through the public ringer.  That said, everything passes.  The good and the bad.

This I have lived through, so if this news of your attempted suicide is for real, you need to think again.

Mistakes are to learn from, not to run from.  I’ve made a lot of them, but you get through it, and things are ok.  Not always great, but life isn’t a hallmark card, shit happens.

Cricket doesn’t need another player dead from his own hand.

And your soon to be born child will definitely need you.

Where you put your penis matters little to me as long as you stop short of the underage or animals.  That is for you and your family.  Your penis, as impressive as it may be, is no concern of mine.

I didn’t like your cricket because I assumed you were fidelity minded.

I liked it because you tried really hard.  You showed more effort than an entire generation of South Africans before you.  Every ball was a battle, every moment was important, and yet you still enjoyed yourself.  A crazy fucked up clown who could bowl for hours on end on the worst of days.  I, and more than a few others, loved it.

People like me equate cricket and life far too much, so I don’t see how someone who could bowl so many tough spells into the wind on flat tracks with a cheeky grin could then give up outside of cricket.  How can you be tough in front of millions, and fragile when on your own?

That is, ofcourse, complete bullshit.  Being tough on a cricket field has nothing to do with real life.  It is a shame though, because if you could reach any of that strength you showed on a cricket field I doubt you’d be where you are now.

Like you, I do know what it is like to run out of options, to feel like everything you have done is one big mistake, like you are cursed into stupid actions, to feel like there is only one solution, and that no matter how bad suicide is, that it will somehow erase everything before it.  That moment where hope of life ever getting better just doesn’t seem possible.

I’ve had moments where I’ve considered it, planned it, been seconds from doing it, but I’ve always stopped.

Not because I think suicide is wrong, or the easy option, or the selfish one, or even because my family would have been upset, but because suicide is just shit.

Sure, I get it for paedophiles, murderers, and poets trying to get famous.

For regular people, with regular problems (getting caught with your dick in the cookie jar is a pretty normal problem), suicide is a massive overreaction.

And a waste of time.

Sure your cricket career is almost over, and your marriage might never be saved, that is all shit, life doesn’t stop though, even if you stop your own.

You might find you have skill in acting (Gunter was one hell of a performance), you might write a book or host a radio show that brings people pleasure, hell, you might just become a property developer who donates money to charity or enjoy watching Julia Roberts’ films.  Anything is possible.

Had I quit life I would never have started cwb, got a wife, seen Donnie Darko, or experienced Sehwag make a 99* not out in Dambulla.

I can only speak for myself, Andre, but I think you can do better than suicide.

Johan Botha got a leading edge into his face.

This leading edge had enough force on it to wedge itself between three hard places, the grill, the lid of the helmet and the Robotic Kevin Bacon face of Johan Botha.

Just the ball getting wedged in the grill is a great scene, but for him then to take off the helmet, with ball still wedged, and reveal his now bloody face, that is just awesomeness wrapped in just more awesomeness.

This was the proof I didn’t want, that Johan Botha is human.

Blood on the face of a batsmen is about my favourite place for blood to be.

And this was oozing out of his eye at a decent rate.

Usually the best part would be the blood on the pitch, but Botha took it to new extremes.  The dude got blood on the ball.

I’m sure it has happened before, but generally that would be on a red ball, one day cricket finally made sense to me when that ball just had a dollop of red stuff on it.

Botha retired hurt, and the ball was replaced.

The story doesn’t end though as Botha’s face was kept together with sticky tape and chewing gum and he was sent back out.

But here is where the script writers fucked up, the ball didn’t come back.

If I was Botha I would have walked back out and demanded that the bloody ball be re-introduced.

Even if it was just for one ball.

Imagine the story, dude gets smacked in the face, loses blood on the ball, comes back without any bandages only a few overs left and the fast bowler is using the ball that is soaked in his blood.

That is my kind of cricket.

They were very loud, but showed real aptitude, but were kicked out of the library after being caught urinating on the technique books.

Australia – Finally selected a T20 team and got a test player to captain it. Took the gamble on 3 front line bowlers and it worked until their batsmen bottled it in the final.

Bullied their way around the schoolyard, and everyone sucked up to them. Next time they should stay focused until the end of the day.

Bangladesh – Tried hard at times but never had the firepower to scare Australia or Pakistan.

Truancy is a problem, if Tamim isn’t around the rest of the boys lose confidence. Perhaps they were promoted too quickly and could do well if they were to repeat this grade a few times.

England – Was the best performed and coached side in the entire tournament, Wright at six was a gamble, but their middle order stuck around and they deserved to win.

Polite, courteous, well mannered and simply a delight to teach. About time too, before this they were a disorganized bore that should have been spanked daily.

India – Arrived with a hangover, played like they were in a coma, picked the wrong side and then performed like their entire family had been killed by drunk drivers.

Spank them, send them to bed without their dinner, cut all extra curricular activities and make sure you give them a curfew.

Ireland – Showed yet again that they are a plucky yet largely untalented bunch. Bowling display against England was a masterclass in bowling slow seam.

Since Eoin has moved classes the Irish boys have looked slightly stupid, it might be time for remedial studies, again.

New Zealand – At times it felt like they were in the tournament, but that they also weren’t. They beat 2 of the Semi finalists, but not in the semi finals.

A very eager student who would do extra work than required, it was just that their best work was only just a pass.

Pakistan – Were shocking, brilliant and wonderfully insane, just like Pakistan should be. Need a captain, not an excitable poodle.

Were truant at the start of the semester, then came in late doing lots of work to try catch up. They almost passed but it wouldn’t be fair to students who turned up all the time, like M Hussey.

South Africa – had one of the bowlers of the tournament in Charl Langeveldt, and almost no one else. Picked the wrong team, stayed with the wrong teamand then failed to actually chase Pakistan’s total.

These boys are clearly too old for schooling, and didn’t look interested either. Perhaps getting them into the workforce would benefit them.

Sri Lanka – Surfed the wave of Mahela all the way to the finals, but outside of him and some isolated performances they were pretty ordinary.

Had one mature age student who was of no use, a cool student who didn’t seem interested and some experimental student who produced very little. Very disappointed in them.

West Indies – Teams who host these tournaments are usually useless, the West Indies proved that rule.

The entire class sit around waiting for Chris Gayle to do the work, and he can’t always be bothered. Andre Fletcher needs private tuition or home schooling.

Zimbabwe – Had a great array of spinners and almost entirely nothing else. Played good honest cricket, but are missing several components.

They seemed to be driven by fear of being spanked by their parents, but are generally a very poor academic group. I don’t want to alarm anyone, but Ray Price is surely too old to be at school, and I think I saw him beat up the Lunch Lady.