Wednesday, November 18, 2009
“I do wonder whether Lord’s would be so keen to keep its title if it had been founded by a man with a rather less grand handle. Sometimes fate just fits: cricket got Thomas Lord, the toilet got Thomas Crapper” – The Guardian’s sports blog on the latest cricketing storm in a teacup.
“I believe Lord’s is the best place to watch cricket in the country and I intend to keep it that way irrespective of whether another London ground emerges or not. Lord’s may be the biggest ground in the country but MCC is determined to retain its intimate, traditional character even if capacity is increased through development. We are a ground and not a stadium, and no one here wants that to change” – Keith Bradshaw, chief executive of the MCC, responds to the notion of the Olympic Stadium staging cricket.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
“My companions and I agreed that enjoyment would have been entirely inappropriate, anyway. We were here as punishment. This was the penance we had to do for winning the Ashes, for the joy we had felt when we had beaten Australia at Lord’s for the first time in 75 years, for the fun we had had at the World Twenty20 (especially as England had won a World Cup), for thinking that Ravi Bopara’s hundred against West Indies had signalled the arrival of a major new talent – in other words, for being English cricket fans at Lord’s. I hope the cricketing gods accepted our collective sacrifice” – Mike Holman writing for Cricinfo’s Different Strokes blog.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
“England’s one-day defeats at The Oval and Lord’s, grievous in their different ways, have cost them a whole position in the ICC’s one-day table: now in sixth, they may yet come to regard mid-table mediocrity as a small triumph. The good news? If England win the remaining five matches in the NatWest Series, they will overtake the Aussies. Nothing to it really” – The Guardian’s Lawrence Booth writes his last ever Spin column before leaving the paper.
“Cork seized his chance for one last hurrah on a ground where he has often excelled by going on to dismiss Matt Prior for a duck as well as Chris Nash in a bristling opening spell” – Vic Marks gives his Friends Provident Trophy match report.
“The fans had come knowing that in the years to come they would be able to tell their grandchildren that they watched Flintoff’s last Test at Lord’s. The cherry on the trifle, of course, was that their hero was providing the man-of-the-match performance in England’s first win against Australia at headquarters since 1934, and only their second since 1896″ – Oliver Brett, TMS blog.
“According to reports, MCC committee room steward Brian Levitt was ordered to get the Dubonnet as a matter of urgency, but a local off-licence told him that no one had asked for Dubonnet for 30 years.”
“The course of history is about to change” – Alec Stewart on the prospects of England’s first Ashes victory at Lords in 75 years.
“Crucially, captain Andrew Strauss had maximised the resources afforded to him by a five-man bowling attack – a rare luxury in modern Test cricket despite the abundance of flat wickets – because Andrew Flintoff was well rested when the final session began. He absolutely motored in, almost hurling his body at the batsmen as well as the ball, and though it was Graham Onions’ wicket that started the Australian rot, there was a new-found edge to the cricket that could only be explained by Flintoff’s bowling” – TMS blogger Oliver Brett dissects yesterday’s performance.
“I just think that an Ashes Test match at Lord’s is the number one Test match you can play, so to get a hundred on day one is special. In the last six months or so I felt I’ve been batting better than at any time in my career. When you’re batting like that, it’s very enjoyable and you don’t feel a lot of pressure” – England captain Andrew Strauss, 161 not out at the start of day two of the Second Test at Lords.
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