Jasprit Bumrah vs Four Spinners, Bangladesh vs Ireland, Papal Seal, Ash Filtration | Cleaner of the day

2 minute read
There is a lot of focus on Test cricket about to happen, but elsewhere in the world Test cricket is actually already happening (or has recently ended).

India vs South Africa

In Kolkata, quite a big match: the reigning Test world champions against the sport’s biggest nation at one of its biggest grounds: Eden Gardens.

South African captain Temba Bavuma won the toss, quizzed an Indian team with no fewer than four spinners and understandably opted to bat. His openers set up a half-century partnership after which Jasprit Bumrah won 5-27.

Is there a clearer measure of Lord Megachief of Gold’s supreme brilliance than taking five for spit on a field of four spinners? Such a stupid cricketer. Crazier then Camelot.

Bangladesh vs Ireland

It is always newsworthy when Ireland gets to play a test match. Unfortunately, they both found wickets and runs difficult to come by in Sylhet. They lost by an innings.

“Bangladesh were simply better than us in every aspect of the match,” said captain Andrew Balbirnie.

He thinks they need to play as much as possible in these kinds of unfamiliar conditions – which is good news because the second Test starts on Wednesday.

Papal seal

Ollie Pope was probably England’s number three anyway. Despite Marcus Trescothick’s bizarre evasion, this was then all but confirmed by his selection in the ‘England’ team for this strange warm-up match. Jacob Bethell scoring 2 for the Lions all but sealed it.

So why did Pope – a man who already has a track record of throwing away his run count early in a series – then needlessly throw away a hundred runs that he could have put in at another time? You damn fool, Ollie! You are no longer due!

Ash filtration

We were very kindly invited onto the Cricket Unfiltered podcast earlier this week to talk about our book. Of course we talked about many other things too. Not wild different things, admittedly. The only thing we talked about pretty much was the Ashes, and our book is about the Ashes after all. It was different Ashes stuff though. Future axis.

If you would like to listen to the episode, you can find the episode at Spotify, Apple podcasts and no doubt many other places.

Where can The 50 Most Ridiculous Ashes Moments be bought again?

Here’s your daily stock update.

• Bookstore.org – available, says it usually ships within three weeks, seems to be faster
• Amazon – 15 copies in stock and more will probably follow
• TGJONES/WHSMITH – out of stock
• Great books – out of stock
• Blackwells – in stock, “usually shipped within 2-3 weeks”
• Beehive – out of stock