Neil Pickup - ARTICLES

It’s remarkable how two miles and two weeks can spin your life around on its axis, thrusting you from one side of a situation into the other, and forcing you to question everything you think, and everything you believe in.

It occurred to me this afternoon that I’d never bothered to properly introduce myself in last week’s column. So for those of you who’ve never found yourself being triggered by my right index finger, here’s the first draft of my autobiography.

Welcome to the first of one of Cricket Web’s new regular blogs, Completing the Square, exploring the end of the game that the glare of the world’s media leaves well alone: the layers of the game hidden well beneath the latest scandal about betting, bias or bigotry. The game as played, for love not money, in the backwaters of Oxfordshire.

Anil Kumble’s maiden Test hundred was the highlight of a second day at the Oval that ended with India in complete and total control.

Zaheer Khan’s five wicket haul inspired India to the brink of a commanding victory on day four of the Second Test at Trent Bridge.

Five wickets for Andrew Hall set up a nine-wicket South African thrashing of England, and booked a place in the semi-finals.

At the age of nine, my primary school class played a game called “Adventure Island” on the BBC Micro. It’s probably best described as a very early version of the role-playing game. In several parties, we had to navigate ourselves off an uninhabited island without dying in the process. One of the ways we found […]

The fifth, and latest, version of Brian Lara Cricket rectifies some of the flaws in its predecessor, but could have been so much better

The fifth, and latest, version of Brian Lara Cricket rectifies some of the flaws in its predecessor, but could have been so much better

England stumbled to a 52-run win over Canada at the Beausejour Stadium in St Lucia to record their first victory of the World Cup