Tagged with steve waugh …

Jul 19 2011
4 Comments
general balls

The MCC suggest using Steve Waugh’s eyes to stop match fixing

You can beat a polygraph, trick a jury, be immune to truth syrum and even make sure the CSI bastards don’t find a thing, but you can’t beat Steve Waugh’s eyes.

They are double barrelled weapons of truth.

When not roaming the cricket world talking about the baggy green, Steve Waugh is used by various world governments to find double agents because it is impossible to lie to them man.

Once his eyes have you locked in there is nothing you can do but tell the truth.

The MCC have thusly offered to rent out Steve Waugh, or even just his eyes, to the ICC to check when players are cheated.

Apparently Salman Butt walks around with his hands over his eyes when Waugh is around or looking at his compact mirror, much like Perseus did around Medusa.

A 30 second conversation with Steve Waugh will result in no less than 7 secrets coming out, cricket or otherwise.

His truth beacon eyes are like polygraph detecters, only not a bullshit pseudoscience, they actually work.

How he does it is by steeling his eyes up, making them tougher than a stone. Then he locks on your gaze with the sort of razor sharp eyes needed to cut Curtly Ambrose from a touch to close to off. Then he looks through your eyes, down past your brain, he finds your soul, and he mentally disintegrates your soul until it coughs up all your biggest secrets.

The Indians are still not 100% convinced with the system, they say that Steve Waugh’s eyes, while being far more efficient a system for telling match fixers than a polygraph, are still not a system that they really believe in.

That hasn’t stopped the MCC from suggesting that Steve Waugh’s eyes could solve match fixing in cricket.

It’s even rumoured to have already had an effect on cricket with Steve Waugh sat in a room with Daryl Harper and Harper admitted that he had never actually read the laws of cricket (which he called rules) and that he was generally incompetent as an umpire.

As if backing up the claims of Steve Waugh’s gaze of truth, there is a wikileaks document stating that Steve Waugh can’t be in a room with any American Peisdent, because even by accident he could find out the name of the remote control operator of the two 911 planes.

Fuck polygraphs, one quick bit of eye contact with Steve Waugh and you’ll be saying your a match fixer, admitting to licking a doberman’s ass for a dare and talking about how you like to Tarmac young boys.

There is truth, and then there is Steve Waugh truth.

I looked in Steve’s eyes today, so I need to tell you that I’ve met him last year and the year before that.

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Jul 02 2010
7 Comments
general balls

Steve Waugh has never seen ‘Dude, where’s my car?’

Yet again I was invited to the MCC’s world committee (MCCWC from now on) meeting.

Last year I had a run in with Steve Waugh that resulted in me being mentally disintegrated.

This year I had no idea what would come of the whole trip, would Rahul Dravid bitch slap me, would Shaun Pollock and I get caught up in a coversaation about the Pixies, the possibilities were endless.

If you have never been to a cricket ground the day before an international match, I recommend you do. Lord’s is a great one, because much of it is so open and there is just heaps of shit going on. I saw KP giving batting tips, Derek Pringle ushering young kids around, Grand Master Mushtaq ushering kids around and Majid Khan helping Barry Richards opening a window.

Come on, that is a good afternoon.

Then for the press conference, which seemed drier than last year, perhaps because there was no Boycott.

It started with Zimbabwe, the MCCWC want a fact finding trip there, I almost suggested John Howard be sent there, but I held my tongue. The MCCWC – led by Shaun Pollock, Barry Richards and Andy Flower by the look of it – want test cricket back in Zimbabwe. I inquired if it was wise to give test cricket to a team with no fast bowlers, but the general consensus was to give them a go.

Then it was about pink balls. The MCC and the MCCWC love pink balls. John Stephenson loves pink balls more than any man alive. Pause. Well, he does. He also talked about Kookaburras new G3 ball which is a cricket ball that stays whiter for longer because it is dyed better. Maybe Stephenson doesn’t love pink balls as much as he likes balls that will last. Either way, there was plenty of talk about balls and day night tests.

Then there was Rahul and his talk about the IPL. Twice now I’ve seen him at the MCCWC pressers, and both times his performance has assured me that he will never be a regular on panels at comic cons. He just doesn’t seem to like doing it at all, his tie was all slanted, he was slumped over his notes for most of it and answered each question with a sombre nervousness of a geeky teen talking to a milf he is desperately trying not to look at the cleavage of. He said very little about anything.

The MCCWC’s world test championship was talked about again, I wondered if the viability of the championship game would really grab people’s imagination if it was just one test and the home ground produced a road, then Barry Richards suggested a 6 day test championship. Nice.

Then after a brief period of talking about boundary ropes and big bats (Courtney Walsh just wanted fast pitches to batsmen couldn’t carry heavy bats) they talked about how poorly test cricket is marketed compared to IPL and T20 cricket.

I suggested that the reason could be that T20 is a rather simple format to market and that marketing test cricket is harder because of the nuance.

Now here is my mistake, or not, no one jumped in to answer it straight away, so I continued, I then said that T20 is like ‘Dude, where’s my car’, whereas test matches are more like art films. I framed the question to Shaun Pollock, but Sam Stow, of all out cricket, was watching Steve Waugh whose face drew a complete blank. I’m sure Tony Lewis’ did as well.

After the press conference finished I went up to the front to pick up my phone and Steve Waugh had questions for me.

“Dude, Where’s my car, never seen that film, mate, what’s it like anyway?”

This time I didn’t freeze like I did a year earlier. I wasn’t going to be intimidated by him twice in a row, so I fired back.

“It’s a good one, I’d think you’d like it”.

He laughed and said.

“You guys must be young, I’ve never heard of it.”

Never heard of ‘Dude, where’s my car’, how is that possible?

So this is for Steve and all you who have never seen the film that is allegedly one of Kim Jong-Il’s favourites.

Just some quick things I forgot to mention, check out the next podcast and you can hear Steve ask about the film, Barry Richards and Majid Khan opened the window without grace or style and would you let KP coach your kids?

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Mar 19 2010
8 Comments
aussies

Clarke strives for Steve Waugh but ends up in a remake

Steve Waugh

Steve Waugh

It wasn’t made by an aussie legend.
It wasn’t in front of a ravenous home crowd.
It wasn’t the Ashes.
It wasn’t the last ball of the day with a boundary.
That is because it wasn’t Steve Waugh.

But it was a fairly emotional hundred.  In all the times I have seen Clarke make a hundred I have only been emotionally moved twice, his first one, and this one.

The other 12 have been generally good innings with plenty of silky stroke play made usually when Australia was well on top.  But I’ve never warmed to him, and every time there is a public poll about the Australian team it seems I am not alone.

This hundred was different.

The shots were all the same, the situation much the same, the bowling attack looked a bit the same, but Clarke’s story arc had changed.

This wasn’t the “cocky young well-groomed poster” boy, this was the “my life is pretty fucked up but lets get some runs” dude.

He had just spent one of the toughest weeks in his life after responding to this tweet from Bingle, “Wish you were here…” The paparazzi were all over him, even more so than when they were seemingly happy.  Even his tweets slowed down, a sure sign that any cricketer is in an emotional flux.

Finally he comes back to play in the test, and on the first day, Australia stumble to 3/115, he could gift his wicket and few would blame him.

Instead he plays a top test innings, not the greatest of all time.  Not something that Andrew Denton can talk about for years, there was no Aussie battler spirit or Gallipoli pride, just a professional cricketer getting his head sorted and setting his team up.

The hundred was brought up as Clarke drops the ball at his feet and hopes North doesn’t get run out.  It was the first ball of the last over, and he obviously wanted it bad enough to put North in a bit of danger.

Steve Waugh would have milked the moment a little more, then played a big shot, made sure there was something to end the DVD with. No one knew who to pull on the heart strings like Waugh.

Clarke’s innings was like Jason Statham in the Death Race remake, too slick and easily forgettable.  Waugh (like Carradine in Death Race 2000) knew that sometimes you need to really dirty it up, make it look tougher than it is and then get the timing right so that it will be remembered for ever.  Clarke has much to learn in making himself popular.

I was just glad that for the first time in over 5 years Michael Clarke brought out an emotion in me that wasn’t violence.

-

PS: I’d also like to apologise to Clarke for mentioning his innings in the same breath as the over polished turd that was the Death Race remake.

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Sep 30 2009
aussies, general balls

Oh, FFS, Cricinfo!

I wasn’t going to write anything this evening. I wasn’t even going to turn a computer on. I have more important things to worry about, such as:

My wife is out with a girl she has already described as ‘cute’, and I have an overactive imagination;

I’m supposed to be co-writing something with a workaholic, I’ve written jack shit for the last 5 days and I’m worried he might come for me with a sharpened pencil;

My t-shirt drawer needs rearranging, because I’m not sure if my ‘SuperFred’ shirt is still wearable or not.

But then I made the mistake of turning on ESPN Classic and watching ‘Cricinfo’s Top Ten Most Hated Australians’, and it made my blood boil.

I hasten to add that this is not because it featured Cricinfo’s own Andrew Milller, who I feel sorry for because ESPN always contrive to make him seem like he just got off the special bus (I know he hasn’t, because the aforementioned cute girl is one of his friends).

It’s not even because of the presenter, who is one of those instantly dislikable people that you feel obliged to punch at least once per syllable. (I’m not naming him. I object to him having the oxygen of oxygen, let alone that of publicity).

I think the main issue stems from simply not being able to take anything in once you realise the person speaking is dislikeable. Once you’ve got problems with whoever’s offering information on a subject, it tends to slide off you as easily as a wicket through bacon grease.
Some people tend to refer to statistics and their own experience when looking at cricket as a sport. I’m sure it works for http://www.partybets.com/ users, but for me I prefer to kick back, relax, and see what others have to say as well as myself. Like I said earlier, though, it wasn’t the presenter that was the major problem.

It’s because the entire show was so fucking wrongheaded it wasn’t true. Haydos at number one? Come on! In the imaginations of one or two hacks, maybe, but most England fans couldn’t give a toss about the bible-bashing, barbeque-basting big guy. He was just one more Aussie to get rid of, a little bit obnoxious maybe, but nothing more.

Ditto Merv at number two. Only the truly brain dead saw him as anything other than a comedy villan. He was a decent bowler who had the odd good day, but ultimately was known more for his tache and ability to swear than as a cricketer.

Steve Waugh bored the pants off us, both on and off the pitch. Warne we feared, not hated – we may not have approved of his private life, but we all wanted to see him bowl. And Greg Chappell was lucky to even be in there, given that you seemed to need to have been seen on colour tv to be considered at all.

The real howler, though – the mistake that devalued the entire show – was having Border down at number 9. We hated AB in England, hated him with a passion Warne could only dream off. He was arrogant, obnoxious, a man who frequently seemed to go against the spirit of cricket. You won’t find anyone who laughed harder than I did when he was bowled by Richard Ellison on that glorious August evening in 1985. And yet he could bat you out of a game with ease, even when playing in one of the most talentless Aussie sides in history. God, he was annoying.

The show also lacked some of the other real hate figures from the past. Where was Chappelli? Bradman? Boon, even? If this was supposed to be the ten we hated, I dread to think who they think we might have liked.

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Jul 14 2009
general balls

mentally disintegrated

I now know how it feels to be an average medium pacer in the 90s.

I went head to head with Steve Waugh, and I wilted like a flower in a hurricane.

It was at the MCC’s World Cricket Committee press conference. With me was a small number of press, Rahul Dravid, Tony Lewis. John Stephenson, Geoffrey Boycott and Steve Waugh.

It was about the MCC’s idea to bring in a test championship, and generally sex up test cricket.

During the press conference my questions were well received. The first one even eliciting a “that’s a good question” from Steve, which is like saying well bowled.

My confidence was sky high. Then the press conference ended, rather abruptly.

Rahul Dravid and Geoffrey ran out of there, but Steve Waugh stayed behind, so I ran down to ask him a question.

Before I got to him I could see John Stephenson eyeballing me, and as I got down to the floor he cornered me, seems my questions about what happens next after the MCC ideas group come up with the ideas got on his nerves.  Finally I wriggled out of that.

Then I made my way to Steve Waugh. He was talking to another reporter at the time; I sat behind and steadied myself for the question I had to ask.  Just keep it sort, sweet, and try and look relaxed.

You know he can smell fear, he tastes weakness, and his hairstyle tells you he is not here for nonsense. So keep it light, quick and easy.

It was a hard question; an out of the back slower ball if you will, and I knew Steve wouldn’t want to answer it.  How many chances do you get to ask Steve Waugh a question though, I might as well ask him one that has some bite to it.

When he saw me waiting with a question he was already a little pissed, he was trapped on the wrong side of the press conference, and now realised that he was the last “name” in the room and would have to do the gauntlet on the way out.

But fuck it, I had the question ready to go, it was now or never.

“Excuse me Steve, can I ask you a question” A little nervy.
“Sure” If you have to.
“I’m not sure if you know or not, but Bilal Shafayat was jokingly called an Al Qaeda terrorist by an Australian website after the last test, and I was just….”. Very nervy, I can actually see him turn on me as the question comes out.
“No mate”.

And then he gives me the look.

You know the look.

We have all seen it countless times.

That look of complete pure contempt, he was judging me as a man, and I was failing.

It was the look of insinuated violence. I could break you little man, you know it, and I know it. But instead I will just stare at you until you break yourself.

It was the look hundreds of cricketers had to deal with in their career.

Reducing some to tears and making others doubt the very essence of their existence.

At that moment it didn’t matter that I am actually bigger than him, he was in charge.

I am not a man who scares easily, but I was on my heels.

The awkward silence seemed to go on for hours, as he just tore me down with his eyes.

I was sort of stuck where I was, I couldn’t get around him, and he wasn’t in a hurry to get out of my way.

I tried to look him back in the eyes, but they were fucking vicious.

Instead I stood next to him like a naughty schoolboy while he dressed me down without ever saying a fucking word.

Hours later (you weren’t there, it was hours) another reporter came in and asked him a question about the Australian bowling line up and I fucked scrammed.

I got out of the building as quick as I could, another reporter was trying to chat to me, but I didn’t want to run into him again, so I bolted on that conversation as well.

Once I was outside I felt whole again, I had survived.

No wonder that bastard was so good at stripping down cricketers, if he had told me I’d lost the world cup at that stage, I’d have fucken believed him.

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Aug 25 2008
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tugga inspires Australia to average performance

I hate the Olympics.

Hence why it hasn’t been mentioned here (by me).

But I did see a bit of the closing ceremony.

Not sure why, but it could be my love of robotic looking asian girls who play metal drums standing up.

And I was waiting for the cricket to come on.

But what did I see, Steve fucking Waugh.

Looking a little uncomfortable to be honest.

Even more than when he faced a fast short ball.

I could be wrong, but I think he was there as some sort of mentor towards the Olympians on how to handle the pressure of expectation and so forth.

Or he might have been there to teach them the art of sledging mental disintegration.

I doubt it though.

I saw no Australian sailers with bull horns abusing other sailers.

No synchronised swimmers writing notes on the bottom of the pool about how bad their technique is.

And most importantly none of the Australian boomers, the brilliantly named Australian men’s basketball team, started bowling bouncers at the Dream team.

So what did Steve Waugh do?

Inspire through his presence.

Give advice on sensible hair cuts.

Feed the Chinese Lepers.

Or get a free holiday to China.

All of which are noble pursuits.

www.cricketwithballs.com… We constantly get sodomized down the legside
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Apr 09 2008
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The End Of The World……..20/20 Style.

The commencement of the IPL 20/20 competition is the cricketing equivalent of the lunar landing.

Expectations are high all around the world, but will it be as historically significant? I doubt it. In fact, I think it will do more harm than good. In this fast food, throw away world the shiniest car in the lot isn’t always the best. Some of the plainer things are often much more intriguing or captivating.

Of the 20/20 cricket played so far, which games stick in your mind were you think, “Geez, I’m not going to forget that in a hurry!”…………..simply none of them.

No 20/20 game has made the hairs stand on the back of my neck like the day Steve Waugh metorphorically gave Trevor Hohns the two finger salute in his career saving 100 in Sydney or the day Mike Whitney held out for an over to defy the Kiwis in Melbourne, in ’87, and reclaim the Trans Tasman trophy, to name just two of 1,000′s of cricketing highlights borne from the longer form of the game.

These events made us proud to belong to the country of our origin. Twenty/20 may be entertaining, but if it causes our players to abandon their international and domestic careers at an earlier age, many of the wonderful memories cricket provide will be just that, memories.

An already diluted talent pool, diluted further will spell the end for the longer versions of the game…….it’s time to re-embrace the simple things in life.
www.cricketwithballs.com… We constantly get sodomized down the legside
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Mar 20 2008
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the easter krab

I would like to say that some of the Australian greats of yesteryear think Simon Katich should be chosen to play for Australia.

Steve Waugh was heard to mumble, Simon Katich should be playing for Australia.

But importantly he didn’t say, in cricket.

Allan Border said he can do no more.

I agree he can do know more, he is a krab, and krabs can only do so much.

Katich is an enigma, because if you had a shoe big enough you would crush him.

And you would be right to do so.

There must be something wrong with me, as all the experts see this man as someone who has restructured his game and is ready for test cricket.

I see him as the same useless mother fu©ker who crabbed his way across the crease and cost us an ashes and generally made my life miserable.

Even when he made more runs the Moses this year, I still just saw the same Krab with no talent pissing me off.

Maybe there is something wrong with me.

I doubt it, its probably Katich’s fault.

But there is an important point to the story on Katich.

Like katich, Jesus was crucified.

Jesus because he was too handsome and white to be from the middle east, and katich because he couldn’t make any runs.

Then they were forgotten about.

People got on with their lives, and then one day some smart @ss checks behind a stone and Jesus was resurrected, IE, his body was missing.

It’s similar for katich, most of us thought we had killed the fu©ker and then someone one checks the scores for New South Wales, and suddenly his career was resurrected, IE, his previous sh1t form was forgotten.

So all I ask of you is this good Friday is to eat a steak, and eat a krab, let’s keep our long weekend resurrection free.

www.cricketwithballs.com… We constantly get sodomized down the legside
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Mar 04 2008
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how i sees em 2

Steve Waugh – he is one of those army sergeants no one wants around unless something goes wrong. The generals don’t like him, and the young privates feel weird drinking around him.

Ricky Ponting – bats like he is Paul Newman. Walks around like a self aware 19 year old.

Saurav Ganguly – bats like a stuck up private school kid who has had caviar in his play pen. When its easy, he’s good, when its hard he’s on the golf course.

Rahul Dravid – fights at the crease like a human fighting off the giant insect alien hordes coming to destroy earth.

Inzamam Ul Haq – bats as if time is not a construct.

Mohammad Yousuf – bats like a tight ass. You get the feeling every run is a vital cog in his self esteem.

Brian Lara – plays the game like he is the most talented kid in the park.

www.cricketwithballs.com… We constantly get sodomized down the legside
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Jan 07 2008
general balls

Every Aussie Is An asshole (especially me)

…
We are.

We’re not fu©king @ssholes, mind you, but we are @ssholes.

Australia has one culture, winning, be it Grammys, Oscars or World Cups, we do it at an amazingly high level.

If we aren’t the best sporting nation on earth, we are pretty damn close.

There aren’t many sports we don’t have world class performers in.

Hell we even win winter Olympic medals.

Sport is not our religion, winning is.

And we are ruthless about it.

Friendships are lost.

Injuries are ignored.

Rules are bent.

The Opposition is intimidated.

Anything we can do to beat you.

It was the way I was brought up.

On the field we believe alls fair in love and war, sure we have moments where we are nice, even in sports, but we still want to win.

Afterwards have a beer with the guy you called a flaming @ss muncher, just trying to fire you up chance, want a cold one?

Now they are dobbing in cricketers, are they serious?

Either play like the @ssholes we were born to be, or straighten up and fly right, don’t put your feet on either side of the fence and ride it.

When the Australians first started trying to soften up their image I thought it was a joke.

A scientologist doesn’t covert to Judaism.

Why would they bother, it’s about winning, not being liked.

Lots of people like Sri Lanka and New Zealand, how does that work out for them.

Three or so years have passed and Australia’s new nice guy tag still doesn’t fit correctly.

How could it.

Ponting is a street fighter. The working class boy who loves a scrap, and would smack you over the head with a chair to defeat you.

Hayden is a Christian soldier. Like Dubya Bush before him, he is an evangelical fighter who doesn’t let knowledge or common sense affect his anger.

Roy is a black man from new texas (queensland), imagine the ©rap he has had to deal with his whole life. If that hasn’t made him harder than a teenager in a nudie club, I don’t know what would.

Hogg is 6 tests into a career, has no real talent, and is sledging guys with over 5000 test runs. Imagine what he did to the dogs on his old postmans route.

Before them were men like Justin Langer, who I personally saw threaten at least 3 Victorians with violence.

Steve Waugh, a man who believed in scarring the opposition for life and whose face broke Jason Gillespies leg.

And Allan Border, the man who told Dean Jones he was soft, as he threw up in India whilst making a double hundred.

No I wasn’t one of the guys Langer threatened, I’m not that silly.

In Aussie rules football I barrack for Collingwood, everyone hates Collingwood. That’s the way it should be. I couldn’t stand it if I barracked for a side that provoked no reaction.

I don’t know why this team decided to be liked, but I can only imagine it had something to do with making fat cash off sponsors.

Personally I think they make enough cash from cricket, they should concentrate on winning cricket matches.

If they really want to do something for their image, they can always do what Steve Waugh did, feed the starving limbless children.

Didn’t matter that Steve would have strangled an Indian to win a test on the pitch, because he did nice tings off the pitch.

India would love to be 2 zip right now, Bangladesh would love to win 2 tests.

Australia aren’t ever going to be completely nice, cause it aint in is.

So let’s drop the act gents, if nice guys finished first, we would have tried it already.

www.cricketwithballs.com… We constantly get sodomized down the legside
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