Australia v South Africa 1st Twenty20.

[lemonbella]

Herschelle 7

Oh....Herschelle. It will be okay, he'll get loads of runs in the other matches, and he was all perky and leapy in the field. Also, he's spent the last month hiking early in the mornings and being a Good Boy, so he's probably used to being in bed by this time.

Graeme 37

Kallis doesn’t get any points. If they're going to insist on using him to replace Graeme, I'm just going to give Graeme points for what I *imagine* he's doing instead of batting.

For this match he was sat on a sofa with his duvet, yelling at the TV. His Mum made him a sandwich and told him to keep the noise down. He left several messages on Botha's phone, and one to remind the umpires about the memo he sent instructing them to give Herschelle three goes at the wicket because they obviously forgot about that.

deVilliers 6

I can’t mark him low because that was an embarrassing way to get out. And apparently he had to be carried by the Large Morkel.

Duminy 10

Duminy continued to be fantastically excellent. It's hard because he's not a dork in any way and dorkiness is usually a pre-requisite for me being attached to someone. Coolness and pierced ears are totally new territory.

What I really like about Duminy is that nothing I do affects him. I can watch, I can not watch, I can sort of watch or I can go to the gym and watch on video later. He just bats. Other players are all temperamental and demand that I stay sitting cross legged on the sofa or only check the score every seventeen minutes or something.

Van Jaarsveld 5

He gets 5 for being called Van Jaarsveld, rather than for his actual batting. He's new, so I'll give him some more chances. I'm not panicking. Graeme told me not to.*

Older Morkel 8

I'm quite fond of the older Morkel, so we'll over look the getting out when he and Duminy were just starting to take the game away. He did some fantastic fielding and not once did the commentators feel compelled to compare him to a gangly animal. Also, there's several points in there because I secretly suspect that he's spent all of his childhood telling Morne that the reason he's so tall is because he's adopted: that's what older siblings do.

Boucher 7

Needed to be more Boucheresque. He gets points for offering to do the chatting to commentators thing, but was distracted. Geraint doesn’t get distracted. Geraint can chat on the microphone and make faces and gestures to his team mates at the same time.

Most of those points are because, when asked what their tactics were against the Horrible Little Australian, he replied: "Well, to get him out basically."

He got an extra two because indian_skimmer said he should

Trotsky 1

That's Johan Botha for those of you who aren’t indian_skimmer. There was some suspiciously authoritarian pointing and an arm around Herschelle. The captaincy is Graeme's, Johan, don’t get any ideas.

He gets that 1 point for the increasingly convoluted ways the commentators found to say "Botha"

Steyn 7

Pulled it back well at the end, and was all grown up and senior bowler-ish. Usually it's him who gets the reassuring pats but this time he gave a little encouraging chat with his arm around Lopsy's shoulder. Also, I suspect he refused to bowl at that horrible little Australian who did all the batting. That's his prerogative now he's a senior bowler.

Ntini 5

Not exactly his match, but it's all that horrible little Australian's fault, not Makhaya's.

Lopsy 8

It's nice that they've managed to find a number 11 batsman to replace Makhaya now that he's a senior batsman. It wouldn’t be the south African tail without someone falling over their feet. Those eight points are for having the best nickname *ever* and for looking suitably thrilled when he got his first wicket. I have high hopes for him.


* when I say that Graeme told me not to panic, he didn’t actually tell me personally. I do not hear Graeme's voice in my head telling me things. He told the world generally not to panic and to expect things to go a bit wonky for a while. I am remaining calm. I trust Graeme.


ETA: two more points for Boucher because indian_skimmer said he deserved them

Comments

[indian-skimmer.livejournal.com]

Boucher! Boucher deserves more than five! He was all funny and giggled a lot and was cheery at Australians, and at one point there was Boucher tongue that was going to be on my highlights post until I realised I only had two highlights and one of them was Herschelle's name repeated several times with occasional asterisks.

It's not his fault he's not as naturally shouty as Geraint.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

I didn't see Boucher tongue. I feel sad about that.

[make-a-move.livejournal.com]

I saw AB getting hit on SSN. He should have been able to hit Shaun Tait back, it's only fair.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

He should! That should clearly be the rule. Graeme could have whacked Mitchell Johnson round the head with his bat.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

JP is the coolest cricketer in the world.

[indian-skimmer.livejournal.com]

It was good. It was while he was having to talk and keep wicket at the same time near the very end and he had what looked a lit like Graeme's bored press-conference tongue but was probably run-calculating tongue unless he was just bored at being heckled by Australian commentators.

[indian-skimmer.livejournal.com]

He could have told someone strong to whack Mitchell Johnson around the head with his bat. He could have damaged his elbow more if he'd done it himself.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

That's true. Maybe he could have kicked him.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

Well, if AOC do the list he'll end up being #12 with Alastair Cook at #1. AOC can't write lists for toffee.

[indian-skimmer.livejournal.com]

It's because they don't have any *good* writers. Sensible male writers would recognise JP's coolness too. Neil Manthorpe recognises JP's coolness.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

Boucher has trouble calculating runs. He always forgets one and sometimes one is important

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

Neil Manthorpe's list would be a Good List.

[fringedweller.livejournal.com]

Can I just say that I have no idea what anything you say means, because I am lacking in cricket knowledge, but I always read your posts because they are funny. Also because you give people marks out of ten, which I find myself compelled to do as well.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

I shall try and mention the space mice from now on, to help you understand.

[fringedweller.livejournal.com]

You don't have to, because that would just confuse the people that actually know what you're talking about.

[thatrachie.livejournal.com]

i cannot see how the inclusion of space mice could be anything other than a good thing.

[kale-hunni.livejournal.com]

For the first time in my life I saw Jacques run to save the ball from reaching the boundary, I'm not a huge Jacques fan myself that's pretty special. I don't think I've ever seen him run that fast. Ever.

Also seeing batting AB get hurt was not cool at all. That's just unfair he clearly should have been allowed to keep on batting.

Also I was at the match and M. Morkel should get points even though he wasn't playing firstly because whenever Albie did well on the field he gave him extra special claps and the Melbourne weather was way to cold for him! At one stage he had about three jumpers on.

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

There really is nothing that can't be improved by the inclusion of space mice

[lemonbella.livejournal.com]

Having to wear extra jumpers because nowhere is as warm as africa earns anyone extra points...