Alarm rings for Test cricket
IS AN alarm bell clanging anywhere in world cricket? When a five-day Test (South Africa and India) ends on the second day – both sides skittled – does it not suggest that our top players have psychologically lost touch with the game in its purest and traditional form?
Okay, the Newlands pitch was lively – but not fiendishly so.
Has the limited-overs game, played with an inert white ball on plumb wickets, so taken over the game that it has more of the ethos of baseball than the time-honoured subtleties of traditional cricket?
For some of us, that alarm bell has been ringing a while. Are they listening over at Lord’s and the other citadels of cricket?
Teenage darts personality
STAR off the World Darts Championship in Old Blighty was 16-year-old Luke Littler, who got as far as the final. Known as “The Nuke”, he has this emblazoned across the back of his darts outfit.
Sky News and others describe him as a “teenage darts sensation”. Fair enough, I’m sure his age is genuine, but the amiable Littler is by no means a babyface little softy.
He has the stocky build of a Free State prop forward and he sports a beard and moustache. That’s some teenager.
Yet he does exude amiability and he hugged the other Luke – Luke Humphries – who beat him in the final. They don’t give us Humphries’ age but I’d guess it is a time-ravaged mid-thirties.
Luke (junior) has already set his sights on next year’s world darts championship. He’s been honing his skills a long time. Footage shown on TV also showed him playing darts with extraordinary skill while still a toddler.
Long way for a beer
IT WAS advertised as “the best job in the world” – beer tasting for a brewery in Northern Ireland – but the prospective employers did not anticipate 2 500 applicants from all over the world.
The offer of free beer, chips and a taxi home attracted global interest, but only a tiny proportion of the population has the genetic ability to do the job, according to the BBC.
James Huey, director of the Walled City Brewery in Derry, says it’s all about “genetics”, with only about one out of 1 000 qualifying as “super-tasters”.
“The thing is, you probably don’t know you’re a super-taster,” he said.
“Maybe if you’re out for a meal with friends and you’re picking up certain flavours and you’re saying that you can taste this and that and people are saying: ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about’.”
Jack Kyle, the head brewer, could not believe “how far people were willing to travel for a free pint of beer”.
“Two addresses stood out to me, Philadelphia in America and San Paolo in Brazil, which is mind-blowing.”
Tattoos absent
OVERHEARD in The Pub With No Name: “You’ve got no tattoos. Why’s that?”
“Well, would you put stickers on a Ferrari?”
Tailpiece
Wife: “Have you seen the dog bowl?”
Hubby: “I didn’t know he played cricket!”
Last word
We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don’t like? – Jean Cocteau