Sane Thoughts on Chennai

So I’ve had a bit of shut-eye and somehow that is supposed to help my judgement of the Chennai vs. Delhi match.

I guess, and I hate to say this, it seriously hasn’t been Albie’s week. In fact, the last time he orchestrated a giant run chase in the death overs like this was in January, and while he did it several times, he has lacked a certain something in the following months.

I think it was Anthony Hudson who said “Out of the entire tournament, if there was one person you wanted in that situation, it was Albie Morkel.” For once the stupid git is actually right.

But fuck, that dropped catch did nothing to help them. Or the bowling.

Come to think of it, Freddie didn’t do much to help them either. He was the most expensive bowler, picked up no wickets, left the field after a similarly low score, but yes, he did take that low catch. Doesn’t matter, because he also failed Chennai.

From the outset Albie looked nervous. He just couldn’t get any of the balls away. The Delhi bowlers did very well, but I’ve seen Albie smash spinners to bits, and he was up against Dirk Nannes there. You know, Dirk Nannes. Any other day, and Albie might have hit 16 off the over.

But he didn’t. Instead, Albie looked like a depressed little ghost out there. He didn’t even seem to want to be on the strike, didn’t go for 3 runs to get himself on strike, let the tail end face a lot of those final deliveries. And there were a shitload of run outs. When Gony came on, there was the feeling that perhaps this match could be saved. But no, he was run out.

David Warner was on crack.

And Albie just didn’t really care. AB had broken his spirit. To be fair, maybe we shouldn’t expect him to succeed in situations like this every time, but he’s done it often enough for people to genuinely expect it.

So somehow during the course of this post, I have gone from blaming him to pitying him. Great.

If Albie does well in the next match, all is forgiven.

Time to watch the advertising

If you think you've got it bad with advertising, try watching the IPL in Australia.

Same ad breaks, same times, but completely different content during the ads. You see, even the tactical time-out is purely ads, and 30 second ones at that. Then it's back to the studio to get Ryan Campbell's expert advice on cricket before we head to the game.

Sounds alright to an extent, but that's before you consider that with the ad breaks thrown in at every possible opportunity, including between overs, after wickets, etc, we are being subjected to quite a lot of advertising when we sit at home watching the IPL. (this is for everyone across the world, of course)

It's made worse by the fact that Australia's IPL broadcaster - ONE - is still a very new channel. It's barely been a month since this channel was launched, and in that time, the only sponsors or advertisers they've managed to secure are Castrol, Hungry Jacks, Advanced Hair Studios and Gatorade. If there's one or two more, tell me in the comments, but this is pretty much it.

Now, in the time that we're expected to watch ads, imagine these 4 ads being repeated, time after time. Imagine watching only these 4 ads for the duration of two matches, every day. Throw in a few ads from the channel itself and we've got a very narrow range of advertising that is expected to cover about 2 hours in total per night. It makes you actually want to watch Anthony Hudson and Ryan Campbell, or Corey Wingard.

I have most of the ads committed to memory, they haunt me in my dreams.
"At Hungry Jacks, we believe you should be able to get a meal for the same price, no matter where you live."
"I have to ask, is this true or is it just a load of spin?"
"I'd be looking like a new ball."
"You mean 'yeah, yeah'."
"Can you afford not to use it?"
"I guess this stuff works."

If you can identify the person who has said those quotes, congratulations, you must be Australian.

You mean 'yeah, yeah.'

As a side note, did anyone catch Corey Wingard repeatedly asking Campbell whether Warnie could make the Ashes team? He must have come up with a different scenarios in which the selectors have to decide whether Warnie can be on the squad, and each time Campbell responds with a no. By the end of that drawn out conversation, I was ready to kill myself.