Five things I don't get about cricket

[neville cardus]

I remember that my first-ever bat was christened "Brian Lara Croft," after my favourite cricketer and my favourite computer game. Maybe I'll revive that.

 

[RossTaylorsBox]

You're aware, then, of my wee Twitter spat with her? ;-)

I have no idea who you are.

 

[neville cardus]

Pity. That would have been funny.

 

[Marius]

You're aware, then, of my wee Twitter spat with her? ;-)

Ooh, tell us more. When I was still on Twitter she ended up blocking me, ha ha.

 

[Furball]

'Pologies for the duplicate posting. The first one didn't show up initially, and the second one refuses deletion. A task for our anxious moderator?

HIt 'edit post' then there's a delete button.Hit that, click the radio button that says delete then there's a box that you put the reason for deletion. I usually put 'double post' but you can put 'Dan is an annoying ****' if you want then press delete.

 

[fredfertang]

You're aware, then, of my wee Twitter spat with her? ;-)

How do I find this?

 

[neville cardus]

Dunno. Can't find it myself. Will have another look tomorrow. I was complaining about her reticence on the question of quotas and last year's World Cup semi-final. I felt that, as a reporter, she had no business being reticent.

 

[neville cardus]

Actually, she's pretty weird on the whole question of quotas. Listen to this toe-curling interview she did with "Can't Bowl, Can't Throw" in 2015:

A 'Person of Colour' Explains Why Racial Quotas are Necessary in South African Cricket - Dennis Does Cricket

I happened to read a lot of her stuff while researching the chapters on Morne Morkel and Vernon Philander for Supreme Bowling, and found myself groaning at such regular intervals that I started taking angry notes:

1. "When Morne Morkel found success in the final Test match against New Zealand in March, he did more than become the only South African to take the first six wickets in an innings." Good thing he did more, because he didn't do that. Vogler was the first.
2. "Entry was free at the Basin today but the ground was not very full -- an indication of what the hard-working people of Wellington were up to instead of being at the cricket." It indicates that they were away, not what they were doing, unless I'm missing something.
3. Moonda seems to have written the same piece about Morkel's "attitude/mental change" about fifteen times over, on each occasion making it out to be something new, and so contradicting what she'd written formerly.
4. "He grafted and grovelled his way to a century." Grafted and *what*?
5. "With those 'reference points,' as Graeme Smith calls them..." Doesn't everyone call them that?
6. "'My partnership with Dale is long gone. Vernon and Dale are the new guys and I've made peace with that. I am not going to wear the yellow jersey anymore,' Morkel said, referring to what a cyclist dons when he is the stage leader in a race." I get the feeling she's explaining this less to her readers than to herself.
7. "There was a time in South African cricket where the bowling spotlight was occupied entirely by Dale Steyn. It probably started when New Zealand toured South Africa in the summer of 2007 and Steyn made his big splash, first by remodelling Craig Cumming's face - thanks to a fractured cheekbone -- and then by taking 20 wickets in two Tests." Even when she does come up with a decent turn of phrase ("remodelling Craig Cumming's face"), she spoils the effect by pedantically explaining it ("thanks to a fractured cheekbone"). Again, she assumes her readers are idiots.
8. "Philander, whose performances in the last two seasons of first-class cricket made him an automatic choice for the starting XI, showed that he had a Plan B. When he tried to bounce Ricky Ponting, and was promptly dispatched, he immediately switched to a fuller length. That probably led to Smith handing Philander the new-ball and opting away from the Steyn-Morkel combination that became known as the most feared in Test cricket." Philander had the new ball already. So, according to Moonda, something Philander did *after* Smith's decision persuaded him to make the decision he'd already made.
9. "Philander is unusual because he prefers the longer version of the game." This is unusual? Don't most cricketers proclaim their love for Test Matches?
10. "Unsung Philander relishes another crack at Australia." Unsung? In 2012? By whom? The only thing Moonda likes more than a trite underdog story is a trite prove-your-critics-wrong story.
11. "When his Test career began, Philander had the lowest average of all active bowlers on the South African first-class circuit but plenty of doubters who believed he was not quick enough and did not do enough with the ball to make an impact. Nineteen Tests later, not many of them will have that opinion anymore." Who were these doubters? I can't remember one. Nor have my web searches turned up any. I suspect they're a figment of Moonda's imagination, or more likely of her need to flesh out her favourite trope.
12. "Despite his remarkable numbers, in the last year, Philander has been regarded with suspicion from Hamilton to Headingley. In New Zealand, they were too afraid of Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel to give much thought to him and in England, they called him nothing more than a county trundler. Both countries changed their minds when he took 21 and 12 wickets respectively in their backyards." Who described him as a county trundler? No evidence of this. Sounds like more bullshit to me, although I see it's been picked up by a number of other journos who ought to know better.
13. "Vernon Philander is least bothered [sic] when people still question how he manages to pick up wickets. In Australian conditions, he is likely to be deadlier and silence a few more critics.... To imagine that Philander could be more devastating than he has already been is difficult but in conditions that may assist him better than any other, it remains possible." This would have seemed a dubious judgment even at the time. (How, exactly, would Australian conditions have been more helpful to him than South African greentops and English clouds?) In retrospect it's just laughable: Philander came away from that series with four wickets at fifty and a strike-rate of 100. Witness, children, the perils of operating more as a hype merchant than as a journalist.
14. "If Morne Morkel had a bit more cheek, he could be mistaken for Bugs Bunny. He already has the trademark front teeth, the geeky smile and last year he could well have been heard asking the question, 'Er … what's up Doc?', as he searched for an answer to his bowling conundrum. Now that Morkel has solved his dilemmas, he walks with the same sassy swagger and wide-eyed excitement as the popular rabbit. All he needs is a carrot, or three, to chew on. If vegetables don't take his fancy, Morkel has a few other things to mull over, especially since re-establishing himself as a key cog in South Africa's bowling wheel." Jesus Christ.
15. "Lyon's stubbornness made Morkel crank up the pace and beat him with that, instead of the ball, for a change." This sounds clever until you pause to think about it.
16. "Otherwise they will have to hope the weather, unlike Morne Morkel, is not engaged to an Australian." Sentences like these ought to be criminalised.
17. "Not long after Peter Siddle went bananas, Morne Morkel decided to go green. Not with envy but in his diet." #$@&%*!
18. "He found the consistency he has sometimes been criticised for." Face-palm.
19. "A relative unknown to anyone outside South Africa, Kleinveldt's call-up was reported like Philander's, as a coming in from the wilderness. Like Philander though, Kleinveldt was not discovered in a cabbage patch in Cape Town fully formed as an international bowler." Like Philander, sure, but unlike whom? What the #$@&%* is the point of this observation?
20. "With Steyn batsmen are more aware of what they are going to get but that does mean it is any more comfortable."
21. "His joy that day was a cruel precursor to what was to come. Ntini is suffering in silent pain after a decade of participation came to an abrupt ended."
22. "Last year, Morkel bowled more overs than both Steyn and Vernon Philander in both, the eight Tests South Africa played and the 14 ODIs he featured in."
23. "They would also have known about his 3,000 first-class runs and that he was initially as a genuine allrounder."
24. "Now, he has also started to talk like a man who has reached that rank. 'We are the No. 1 Test team in the world and we need to show that, even in tough conditions. Someone needs to put up their hands up and do it.' Someone like the man who spoken those words."

That last one must be self-satirical.

 

[Furball]

tl;dr

 

[NUFAN]

Some of those angry notes really aren't that horrible. I suggest you have an ordinary cup of tea, take a long bath and a deep breath and remind yourself that it's only cricket we're discussing.

 

[neville cardus]

I see what you did there.

 

[NUFAN]

But seriously, I agree most of the sentences aren't terrific in the academic and literal sense and might look worse in isolation without reading the rest of the story (I know you have NC, but I haven't). But a fair few I don't have a problem with. For number 20, it must have just been a typo as surely she meant to say 'doesn't'.

 

[neville cardus]

Yeah, I read so much of her stuff, and encountered so many of these errors, that by the end I was almost consciously seeking them out. It's not that she's a bad writer (although she is); it's that she doesn't even try.

 

[neville cardus]

On reflection, that's unfair. But when she does try, she tries too hard. That Bugs Bunny thing just curls the toes.

 

[SteveNZ]

I've shared a media box or two with her, she is as awful as her writing suggests she'd be. Very little idea about the game at that stage. Dunno if she is still with Telford Vice (she was when SA toured NZ in 2012) but it seemed like he had a lot of say into what she wrote as well.

 

[neville cardus]

It's a shame, really, because she caters to stereotypes that the likes of Allison Mitchell and Ebony Rainford-Brent have done great work in overturning. South Africa's Natalie Germanos knows her stuff, too.

I think Moonda's writing is informed more by her politics than by her love or understanding of cricket. Apparently she thinks Ntini was dropped because he was black, whereas most of us suspect that he overstayed his welcome for precisely the same reason. (Whether you support this is neither here nor there.) She also gets terribly offended, and throws around all manner of mean-spirited accusations, when you point out the obvious: that merit-based and quota-based selections are mutually exclusive. See that podcast I shared earlier.

 

[NUFAN]

I remember that my first-ever bat was christened "Brian Lara Croft," after my favourite cricketer and my favourite computer game. Maybe I'll revive that.

Colin Croft and Brian Lara Cricket are excellent choices.

 

[Marius]

It's a shame, really, because she caters to stereotypes that the likes of Allison Mitchell and Ebony Rainford-Brent have done great work in overturning. South Africa's Natalie Germanos knows her stuff, too.

I think Moonda's writing is informed more by her politics than by her love or understanding of cricket. Apparently she thinks Ntini was dropped because he was black, whereas most of us suspect that he overstayed his welcome for precisely the same reason. (Whether you support this is neither here nor there.) She also gets terribly offended, and throws around all manner of mean-spirited accusations, when you point out the obvious: that merit-based and quota-based selections are mutually exclusive. See that podcast I shared earlier.

Antoinette Muller is another who has done quite a lot for women in sports journalism I think.

Re: Firdose, her writing comes off as that of an earnest second-year journalism student. It's ok but nothing amazing.

I also don't think she even likes cricket that much. I certainly don't think she really has a feel for the history or traditions of the game. I also think she holds the ordinary fans of the game in contempt, she thinks we're idiots.

My cousin worked with her and said she's not the nicest person in the world either.

It boggles my mind that she's the SA correspondent for Cricinfo. Even the guys who cover Zimbabwe when she doesn't - Brickhill and Holme - are much better writers.

 

[neville cardus]

Where are you based, Marius? If in Gauteng, we should shoot the breeze at the Wanderers or Centurion some time.

 

[CapeTown Guy]

Antoinette Muller is another who has done quite a lot for women in sports journalism I think.

Re: Firdose, her writing comes off as that of an earnest second-year journalism student. It's ok but nothing amazing.

I also don't think she even likes cricket that much. I certainly don't think she really has a feel for the history or traditions of the game. I also think she holds the ordinary fans of the game in contempt, she thinks we're idiots.

My cousin worked with her and said she's not the nicest person in the world either.

It boggles my mind that she's the SA correspondent for Cricinfo. Even the guys who cover Zimbabwe when she doesn't - Brickhill and Holme - are much better writers.

Ha! She is still with Telford, in fact they are married! Little known fact, she was engaged to Mohammad Asif once upon a time.

I work in the online media industry and before Firdose was famous, she did various articles free of charge for the company I worked for at the time (pre 2011) while she was trying to establish herself.

She used to be a scorer for cricinfo and that's how she got the 'in' as their correspondent.

Liam Brickhill and Tristan Holme in particular are very good, used to share an office with them too!