Tag Archives: michael hussey

Apr 02 2010
11 Comments
general balls

The Jesus XI

Happy Jesus on a stick day. A day that is all about honouring someone who died so that we can all be perverts and animals, but you can’t eat steak, in case some is made of him.

In honour of Jesus dying I’ve compiled an XI of players who died, and were then reborn, or you know, other Christian type shit. Jesus, as we all know, was a wicket keeper.

S Katich – Found himself in a cricket career cave due to some horrific test form, but then his God, Bob Simpson, helped him, and thankfully we now have Katich shuttling around the crease for days on end.

M Sinclair – Impossible as it is to enjoy the way he plays, Sinclair is the one cricketer most likely to survive Sodom and Gomorrah. When the Kiwis are having a selectorial apocalypse, it is Sinclair they turn to. He will always live with us.

I Bell – If Bell truly was the son of God, Christianity would have died out by now. Instead Bell seems ordained by some higher power, perhaps Murdoch, to play the number 3 position for England. He coveted it while he had to wait out Pestilence (Shah), War (Bopara) and Famine (Trott) but he found his way back to number three.

M Hussey – Has never left heavenly earth, but what exactly was he doing between the age of 12 and 30.

K Pietersen – An outcast with his old religion he became the father, son and holy bail of a new one. It still hasn’t been smooth sailing, but he no longer has to bowl off spin, so that is good.

K Akmal – Crucified on the pitch for one of the most heretical displays of wicket keeping ever written about. But he will be back, you can’t keep a Pakistani cricketer away for too long. Even if he comes back as a kolpak.

A Flintoff – as was written.

N Hauritz – Outbowled by M Clarke and then shunned by his country, his state, and his knew state. One day four wise men decided to pick him up from the gutter he found himself in, and bugger me if he hasn’t stayed around since then.

S Bond – Needed to go on a spiritual adventure to India so that one day he could come back to New Zealand and tell them he was available for white ball games and then continued his spiritual adventure in India.

A Mendis – The man is full of mystery, but once you work it out, it is all kind of simple and you don’t really care anymore.

A Nehra – From a world cup final to the great abyss, but thanks to Lalit K, Nehra has been brought back so that we can all pray at his long limbs and permanent angry face.

J Patel (12th) – Is so good at being 12th man I couldn’t see why he wouldn’t do it for Jesus.

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Jan 07 2010
aussies, pakistanis

the heroes of sydney

Mike Hussey:

Who I thought (and still do) should have been dropped sometime during his great drought.

But did get dropped more times than Bobby Brown.

Still, even with all that fumbling behind him, he held firm and was the man when it mattered.

Nathan Hauritz:

I once considered going back in time to break his arms as a child.

Got some lucky wickets, one that almost cost him his thumb, and got some tail enders.

His second five wicket haul on the trot. Lucky or not, that is impressive, and I salute anyone who can do that in test cricket in this day and age.

Shane Watson:

Said he shouldn’t open the batting.

He still shouldn’t be opening the batting, but only because he now gets wickets.

I’ve checked this, and 97 is only three runs short of a hundred, and 3 runs would not have made a difference to this game.

The SCG pitch:

Over the years the MCG pitch has been bagged, quite rightly, but the SCG has got awway with pitches that blind many looking for their cat could score double hundreds on it.

Pakistan might have made this a better pitch by batting on it like it was a forgotten minefield.

Hard to bat on the first day, easier on the second and third, and produces a tight result on the fourth, drop this pitch in every ground in the world.

And finally, Kamran:

Over the years I have bagged Kamran about his appearance but said he is a classy player.

This test might have moved me to the other side.

His three drops were as bad as I have seen from a test match keeper.

And the worst bit was that it looked like the pressure got to him even at the stage when there was no reason for that to be the case.

He was the true hero of Sydney, just not for his side, and he was the only one before this test i would have stood up for.

Not anymore.

It is my birthday today, so buy my book, get a t-shirt, or donate to the whisky fund.

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Nov 29 2009
aussies, windies

9 wickets

Johnson, Hilfenhaus and Siddle chipped in with 11 wickets in this test.

Knowing that fact alone, Australia should have lost.

But, and perhaps this has to do with the inept state of the opposition, Australia still won by an innings and change.

The other 9 wickets were picked up by Hauritz (5 wickets without having to do much work), Watson (3 who picked his up with filth and guile) and laughably Michael Hussey (1 charity).

These weren’t just tail end wickets, Hauritz cleaned up the tail in the first innings, but their wickets included the 3 top scorers for the Windies (Dowlin, Barath and Ramdin), and Bravo and Nash were also victims in the top order.

Gayle and Chanderpaul never managed to go out to this powerful threesome, but only because they never lasted that long, even though they used three referrals between them.

The Windies bowling impressed in this test, in their one chance, but their batsmen are still yet to arrive.

This test is sort of like you beating up your little brother after you’ve been beaten up by a kid your size, it feels good for a little while, but it doesn’t make you forget you got your ass kicked.

At least of the Windies little boys had some fight in him, bringing up a hundred on debut as a teenager while your team is 145 runs after following on.

Well done Adrian Barath, and great maternal work from Ramdin in dishing out the hug.

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Nov 26 2009
aussies

weakness

Phil Hughes has never gone out to a short ball off his gloves or any real variation of the ball that is his weakness at test match cricket.

Shane Watson has gone out LBW 6 out of his last 7 test innings, and has also gone out after a break 4 times during that period.

Who has the weakness?

Watson has a vastly superior looking technique than Hughes’ technique of looking like he is a glass doll being dropped from the second floor.

But Watson’s test average can’t even look up at Hughes’ average.

Watson has no test century, since coming in as opener he is yet to take a wicket in three tests, and keeps going out the same way.

Phil Hughes must be beside himself, and beside himself there must be Chris Rogers and Phil Jacques who are beside him who is… you know.

The Australian batting line up makes no sense. A middle order batsman and a number three open the batting, and an opening batsman at number four.

The one resource that Australia seems to have in reserve is opening batsmen, yet both their openers are manufactured. It just doesn’t make sense.

Hilditch may like to think of himself as some wacky experimental scientist mixing up random potions and hoping for a good outcome.

There are simple ways around this, swap Hussey for Watson, and see how that goes.

Or drop Hussey, bring back in a proper opener, move Clarke to 4 and Watson to 5. Watson doesn’t have to change the way he plays then.

Or drop Watson until there is a spot in the middle order where his bowling can actually be used, and bring in an opening batsman, there is a pile of them at the door.

What I expect Hilditch to do is bring in a second keeper in the place of North, open the batting with Mitchell Johnson, move Hussey to number 8 and wait for the magic to happen.

I just want to know what Phil Hughes thinks of all this, oh for the glory days when he was tweeting the inner workings of his mind.

Check out our newest book ‘ashes 2009: when freddie became jesus‘.

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Nov 19 2009
aussies

Can a batsman lose his nip?

Australia have dropped Stuart Clark for the Dougie Bollinger.

Bollinger bowled very well in India, and Stuart Clark is 34 and out of fashion.

This year Clark has been selected for 2 of a possible 5 test matches.

In one of those matches he was a key figure, in the other one he struggled in the dust.

At 34 you can get dropped without too many questions being asked.

His two Ashes tests were obviously a golden handshake, and Hilditch is now shuffling Clark towards the door.

On his way out Clark has to go past where Mike Hussey’s desk is.

I wonder if Clark thinks he has more “nip” left than Hussey has runs?

They obviously aren’t fighting for the same spot, but they are the same age, and I think Clark would happily stack his record over the last 18 months up against Hussey’s, even (as people keep reminding me) if Hussey did have a great one day series against India.

Clark wasn’t allowed to even be a back up and prove he had “nip” in India.

Hussey was.

That could piss Clark off.

If I was he, I may be pointing to the fact that Hussey has a tendency to make ducks and leave balls that bowl him, and that might be the equivalent of losing your “nip” for a batsman.

Both men came to test cricket late, one had lost test form for 18 months, the other had a couple of months of injuries slowing him down, but is now fit.

It pays to be a batsman.

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Nov 16 2009
general balls

hussey and cook

I was struck yesterday by the fact that captaining a cricket side is less important than wicketkeeping, so I did something for TWC.

And I thought it was about time that someone got a little ranty on cricinfo about the king probot mike hussey.

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Aug 21 2009
aussies

Michael Hussey announces his retirement

King Probot Michael Hussey has done something the selectors should have done a long time ago; he has sacked himself from cricket.

Sure he is calling it a retirement.

But we all know a good sacking when we see it.

He has said:

“I have struggled for a long time and I think this is the right time to go. I owe the guys better than what I am able to give them. I love playing cricket for Australia, but all good things must come to an end. My family has always been very important to me and it will be great to spend more time with them. Batting never came as easy to me as it did to others, but I am proud of what I achieved.”

Hussey leaves the game with a batting average of over 50, the final statistical anomaly we will ever get from him.

I have never been a huge fan, but he did make one of the best hundreds I have ever seen when Graeme Smith gave him boundary riders at the G and he and McGrath just batted as they pleased.

There are few people who love him or hate him, and this is what has always annoyed me about him. But when he was good he was better than you, and anyone you know.

When My grandkids say to me, “Grandpa Jrod, how good was Michael Hussey?” I will say something like this: He was a frenetic over achieving earnest bastard who proved the existence of the matrix for about 18 tests, and for the rest he was a nervous wreck with a legacy position that should have been dropped long before he retired. Now go get me an iBeer.

I think it is good test cricket has players like him, so that when the real class comes along we can see the difference.

But how many people strangled out their talent as well as M Hussey?

I respect him, even if he wasn’t my bag of skittles.

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Aug 06 2009
ashes, aussies

Michael Clarke Debunked

Yesterday’s face saving innings (from an Australian, if not a personal perspective) has had a few people wondering if Clarke is one of the best batsmen in the world today.

Hmmmmm.

Yesterday’s ton was his 12th in 81 innings, a strike rate of one every 6.75 innings.

In the current series, that puts him behind Ponting (exactly 1:6), but ahead of both Katich and Mr Cricket. But it also puts him behind Strauss (1:6.61) and Pietersen (1:6.06). Which, for my money, makes him no better than 5th in the world and probably not even in the top ten.Unfortunately for Australia, he’s currently their only batsman in any kind of consistent form and yet he’s still rubbish against the moving ball. If one thing emphasises Australia’s struggles in this series, it is that.

(Katich and Hussey, incidentally, have very similar records. One lost his place and fought and fought til he won it back; the other seems undroppable no matter how bad his form. Makes you wonder who deserves that Mr Cricket title more, doesn’t it?)

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Aug 03 2009
ashes, aussies

Michael Hussey’s numbers

3186 test match runs.

First 20 tests – 2120.

Second 20 tests – 1066.

Average in first 20 – 84.

Average in second 20 – 30.

Hundreds in first 20 – 8.

Hundreds in second 20 – 1.

Number of back up middle order batsman Australia has in their squad – 0.

Times I have mentioned Hussey’s shit form – 1086.

Number of times Australia has seriously thought about dropping him – <0.

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Aug 03 2009
ashes, aussies, poms

Gonna Be A Big Day

OK, so today might just be the day that decides the Ashes. It’s a bit unlikely with two matches still to go, but an England win would make it very hard for Australia to retain the urn, an Australian win pretty hard for England to win it back.

The whole boring ‘team’ thing aside, though, there are some fascinating individuals for whom today could be a Very Big Day indeed.

Shane Watson - I’m bored of writing about him now, but an early dismissal this morning and he’s going to have to do some good work with the ball to avoid the experiment of opening with him coming to an end after one Test. He’s scored runs, but he’s looked like an ODI opener trying to play the same way in the longer game. And his pie-chucking yesterday doesn’t inspire confidence as a bowler, either. Needs both runs and wickets today.

Michael Hussey – Almost had the same brainstorm yesterday evening that he had in the first innings. Must know that he is one more lapse of concentration away from losing his place.

Mitchell Johnson – Brett’s fit again. Need I say more?

Nathan Hauritz – Assuming the Aussies have to bowl again, can he turn it like Swanny was yesterday, or will he again look like a nervously excited schoolboy who’s been inexplicably invited to play with the grownups?

Stuart Broad – One good bowling spell does not make a summer. His 50 yesterday could not have been more timely, but he needs wickets and lots of them today, because his bowling so far in this series has been as short of Test class as my writing is of Gideon Haigh’s.

Graeme Swann - On a pitch turning square, he should by rights run through Australia. Of the 8 remaining wickets, 3 are left handers, one a debutant and one Ben Hospitalpass. Time for him to show that he’s as good as he thinks he is.

And yes, I could’ve mentioned Bell, Cook, Bopara and even Collingwood, but when England bat it is going to be a run chase and some of the England side are actually quite good at that sort of thing. In a slogathon, I don’t think you can judge anyone’s suitability as a Test batsman.

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