Its Summer! - the Fever Cricket Thread. (Part 1)

However, the finest example of this trend is New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori, who refuses to bat higher than eight in the face of overwhelming evidence that maybe, just maybe, it might be a good idea if he did. Vettori has three Test hundreds and an average of 42.64 batting at eight. Clearly New Zealand are using their top seven to take the shine off the ball and for nothing more than that.

Perhaps that isn't such a bad tactic. Opening batsmen are there to endure the difficult conditions early on. New Zealand have just taken this a step further by selecting a series of specialist night-watchmen to endure the difficult conditions later on, even later on and a bit later on still - at which point Vettori emerges to showcase the heave and the nurdle. He is perhaps the finest number eight in the history of a country littered with them - albeit number eights in a completely different sport.

Makes as much sense as test cricket in November in Dunedin

Do you agree with MCC that Test cricket could be dying?
It didn't look like it was dying this summer with the Ashes, did it? They are playing too much Twenty20 right now. We have just had a Twenty20 World Cup and within a year we're going to have another in the Caribbean. It is greed, greed, greed. That is what will kill the game, the greed of the authorities. Twenty20 has its place but not on the international stage. It is a domestic and franchise sport. I don't want to see the best players in the world standing there and slogging. Twenty20 is bastardising the game.

Just, please, please, please don't play like c**ts.

Just, please, please, please don't play like c**ts.