Its Summer! - the Fever Cricket Thread. (Part 2)

I generally can't decide what to do when I win the toss so I find it easier when they win and they then have to make the play...and then we win anyway haha.

For any cricket admin guy really;

1 - improve NZ weather so we can make better pitches (hurry up global warming!).

2 - greatly increase the population, which will lead to more players to choose from (reverse the immigration decision, John!)

3 - make Junior cricket interesting for the kids and parents - it's unbelievably pointless at the moment

4 - improve how rep teams are selected - in my region (and I'm sure in every region and in every sport) - if you have the right surname, you're in....or if you've been involved before, you're in no matter how shark you are.....

5 - in my region there are a relatively large number of clubs for a small population base. Reduce numbers of clubs to increase the competition.....would also lead to volunteers, players, coaches, etc not being spread so thin

6 - Auckland can have a second FC team.....but would there be an 8th? (is an even number of teams really necessary? Certainly ideal, but necessary?)

7 - can some contracted players be seconded to play in the sub-continent for a season? Or in South Africa or Aussie?

8 - don't schedule club cricket on the same fudgeing day that a Black Caps match is on just down the road

9 - a halfway point between FC cricket and Test matches needs to be addressed - this used to happen with the Conferences back in the '90s. This time, commit to it

How long has MacMillan been batting coach for?

Southee has just gotten his first ever ODI 50! Great stuff from him.

Could you help the grassroots level out?

Onslow CC Fundraiser - Money for us, Wine for you. 

Looking forward to getting my hands on the Brendan McCullum book

Question for the cricket lovers out there...

How much would you pay for a 3 course dinner event, limited to 150 people and with a Q & A or talk by a current Blackcaps player, Selector and Coach a few days out from the Wellington test in March?

I've run something like this for my club - what you need to do is cost up all the component parts - the dinner, hall hireage, advertising, guest fees, etc - then assume 10% of tickets don't sell to give yourself a buffer. Then make whatever markup you feel is appropriate for your time.

Limited to 150 people is neither here nor there in terms of $ value

In the process of that stuff at the moment - what did you end up charging for tickets (ballpark)?

$50, but.......catering was by the Spit Roast Company, and our speakers were free (ex-members).

From memory, our advertising was free as well - it all just went through the "old-boy" network.

This was in 2009 as well, so let's add inflation in to that :)

$50 seems skinny now - if we did the same again, I'd be nudging it up around the $70 - $80 mark

Cool, sounds about right for us plus we'll be hoping to auction a few items and it will be a sit down 2 or 3 course meal at a waterside venue (at the moment). Cheers for the info

We planned to do a few auctions too - but the speeches ran too long, so that got fudgeed.

Another day in the office for Martin Guptill, another duck to go along with it,

Cairns hitting back at McCullum and his book. Actually, Cairns's response is pretty much spot on. If McCullum doesn't want to have his own piece of history tarnished by those events, just don't talk about them.

Yeah right because pretending it didn't happen means it never happened? What kind of book would it be if he didn't talk about two of the most significant moments of his career? His name is McCullum btw.

Good to see King Kane back in form. He's looked much more like the KW we all know in this innings. Nice to see one of our batsmen pass 100 too

Shocker. Also why is Dhoni impersonating Morpheus?

Yes, but McCullum does not want to be associated with it so why mention it. I am not suggesting to deny anything, nor is Cairns. But what he is suggesting is to not refer to it as such.

He's a bowling all-rounder now :)

Isn't he just a bowler?!

I wonder if Christopher is writing a book as well

Writing one or running one?

Well.that was a bit shark.

For the cricket players here - are you using CricHQ? And do you find it a dog, as everyone else seems too?

Not sure why it's being pushed on clubs when ResultsVault worked really well and had an intuitive feel about it

Am an admin for a club.  The live scoring is great, but other than that it is an absolute dog.  It is much improved on a few years ago, but I hate it very very much.

Yeah that's what we've found.....the live scoring is cool, but no one in our region really used it apart from rep teams. The rest of it is a pile of shark

Doesn't BMac have money in CricHQ? 

Sure does......he invested in a pile of shark.

How would CricHQ make money from their site?

Wow the Saffers are tearing through the Aussies

Australia's got a shark-tier squad at the moment. They've really declined.

Seeing the Australian cricket team get a pasting is one of life's greatest pleasures.

Looks like a wet one in ChurChur - and brass monkeys too.....no play today?

Test cricket at home.  What a sight.

Only seen bits of this but looks like we are bowling and fielding well. Good to see de Grandhomme performing on debut as well.

Raval and de Grandhomme doing so well on debut. Finally we're giving new players a chance and they fudgeing deserve it and are proving it too.

The sceptic in me says that de Grandhomme is just another half tracker that will turn into a Neesham or Anderson. Lets see how he does against SA before we start jerking off over him. Didn't Hamish Rutherford score a ton on his debut too?

Pakistan is doing well to make this one tight.  76/0 doesnt osund outrageous but for this series its a great start to an innings. 

Had meetings all afternoon but saw Pakistan 1 down with a session to go and just assumed it was going to peter out to a draw. Didn't even check the score until this morning and then saw we won. What the hell?

Test cricket happened - that's what.  There is nothing quite like it.

gutted I missed it. Stupid work