I have been reporting on county and international cricket for 大象传媒 Radio
since 2002 and it was a privilege to graduate to the Test Match Special
box for my first England ball-by-ball commentary at the Twenty20 World
Championships in South Africa 2007.
I made my television debut earlier that Summer, commentating on the ODI
between Scotland and India alongside Jonathan Agnew for 大象传媒 Scotland.
Having always been a keen sportswoman, sport was firmly in my mind as I
trained as a broadcast journalist at Falmouth College of Arts. It
followed three years at the University of Nottingham where I gained a BA
in Geography - probably the only discipline that would allow me to
write a dissertation on cricket. I produced 10,000 words on "The Impact
of Television on the Cultural Geography of English Cricket" and several
years later I find myself working alongside many of those who agreed to
be interviewed for that study.
My first job as a qualified journalist was with the sports team at 大象传媒
Radio Leicester. I also worked for Radio Northampton and the Asian
Network before becoming a regular county cricket reporter for Five Live,
travelling up and down the country to cover matches.
Away from cricket I have been lucky enough to cover Wimbledon, the
Commonwealth Games and two World Snooker Championships.
Reporting for the 大象传媒 is a position I look upon with great respect and I
am fortunate to be involved so deeply in a sport that still holds the
Spirit of the Game and respect for one's opponent in such high regard.
For my love of the sport I thank my cricket-mad father and older
brother, who between them taught me how to get my head over the ball in
the forward defensive stroke.... and that nothing matters more than
beating the Aussies, particularly when your mother is Australian.
Welcome to Ask Bearders, where statistician answers your questions on all things cricket.
Below are Bill's responses to some of your questions posed at the end of his last column and if you have a question for Bill, leave it at the end of this blog entry, including your name and nationality, and he might answer it in his next piece.
Bill isn鈥檛 able to answer all of your questions, however. 大象传媒 Sport staff will choose a selection of them and send them to Bearders for him to answer.
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鈥淭he attitude meter isn鈥檛 quite right鈥 said Aggers, tapping a dial in the cockpit of a .
鈥淭he what?鈥 I quizzed, peering over his shoulder from the seat behind. 鈥淚t鈥檚 ok鈥 he quipped. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not an important instrument.鈥
With that, our flight supervisor climbed on board, Aggers completed the final checks (getting a second opinion on the attitude meter) and I strapped myself into a springy beige seat that reminded me of the upholstery in my dad鈥檚 that he drove in the early 1980s.
This was my first experience of flying with Aggers. I knew he had taken Arlo White up in a small plane in Guyana during the Caribbean World Cup, and Ian Chappell survived a flight around Table Mountain less than a week ago in Cape Town, so I was utterly confident that we would both return safely to commentate on the World T20 semi-final the following night!
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It was clear the first was going to be a little bit different as I enjoyed a pre-match beer at a bar around a mile from The Wanderers.
Without any prompting I was offered a staggering 200 crisp American dollars for a ticket which had cost me just 100 rand a few weeks previously.
In other words, 拢100 for a ticket that had a face value of a little over seven quid - but when India and Pakistan are squaring off in any cricket match, let alone the inaugural World Twenty20 final, then all financial logic seems to go out of the window.
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Just think, has been slogging his guts out in the name of Indian cricket since he was a 16-year-old back in 1989, when he made his Test debut against Pakistan in Karachi.
In that time he鈥檚 played 140 Test matches, and 395 ODI鈥檚 and scored over 26,000 international runs. So how many ICC tournament winner's medals does he have to show for all that sterling effort? Absolutely none.
Compare that to . He鈥檚 played one match in the light blue uniform of India, bowled one over and scored a quick fire 15, and tonight, he鈥檚 clutching a winner's medal. That鈥檚 sport for you at the top level I suppose.
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Have you heard the one about the cricket tournament that began in March but is still going on?
Yes, for some of us, the 50-over World Cup seemed interminable, and when we finished our marathon stint in we wondered what the future held for that type of cricket.
At the time, I suggested a serious bucking up of ideas was needed to wade off the threat of a bright new kid on the block.
Well, having witnessed the World Twenty20 extravaganza in South Africa, albeit via television, I have to say the dangers for 50-over cricket are clear and present.
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It鈥檚 been quite a week here in Durban. It didn鈥檛 start in the best possible way when Jonathan Agnew, Alison Mitchell and I arrived at our hotel - the Balmoral - to be told our rooms had been given to someone else. We quickly dubbed it the 鈥淏ad morale鈥 hotel!
We were told to wait around whilst they 鈥渢ried to sort something out鈥 for us. The receptionist then returned looking very excited and informed us that she had managed to find us two rooms between us.
She presumed that would be fine as she thought we were a 鈥渇amily鈥. Aggers's mood wasn鈥檛 improved when I suggested they probably assumed he was myself and Alison鈥檚 dad!
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Every so often you have to take off your England sunhat, sit back and enjoy a once-in-lifetime 'I was there" moment.
The thing with anything as extraordinary as in Wednesday's Twenty20 match against India is that is impossible to see that moment approaching and even harder to digest as it is taking place.
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It is the announcement we have been expecting: in order to go home and strengthen his troublesome ankle, which is inflamed and causing him discomfort.
Questions about his fitness have dominated the post-match press conferences throughout the World Twenty20 and it has been clear for any observer to see that he has been in pain whilst bowling just 4 overs per match (whenever Collingwood has counted correctly).
Flintoff has bowled economically during the tournament but he has not been showing the aggression we are used to seeing from the talismanic all-rounder. England cannot carry a half-fit Flintoff, despite his insatiable desire to play, and for the sake of his long term future he has accepted he needs to go back to the drawing board and work out how he can bowl pain-free.
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My hair was in tangles and I could still feel the odd grain of sand crunching between my teeth when I got back from a walk along the seafront. It鈥檚 mighty windy out here!
The beachfront reminds me of Santa Monica in California, which I visited for the first time earlier this year, but the scene in Durban is more colourful and as we headed off for England鈥檚 Super 8s match against New Zealand, several women were already busily setting up their market stalls in the watery early sunlight.
Not long after, the promenade was full of African wares and bright clothing for sale: red and green sarongs, wooden giraffes, miniature drums and much much more. Many items were spread carefully across the pavement in a mosaic of an outdoor shopping mall.
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Welcome to Ask Bearders, where statistician answers your questions on all things cricket.
Below are Bill's responses to some of your questions posed at the end of his last column and if you have a question for Bill, leave it at the end of this blog entry, including your name and nationality, and he might answer it in his next piece.
Bill isn鈥檛 able to answer all of your questions, however. 大象传媒 Sport staff will choose a selection of them and send them to Bearders for him to answer.
Read the rest of this entry
To be absolutely honest it has not been a great few days to be an Englishman in South Africa.
Friday night was not a time to be watching in any of the bars around Cape Town and was not the most pleasant of experiences.
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Is the world ready for a Twenty20 world cup?
The local crowd certainly was at the Wanderers for the opening game of the ICC World Twenty20 between hosts South Africa and the West Indies.
The cacophony of noise was unlike anything I have ever heard at a cricket ground, save for an India v Pakistan ODI. The noise at those matches is largely generated by the crowd alone, however at Jo鈥檅urg we had a DJ booming out dance anthems at a volume that made you think you could be on a night out at the . There were even podium dancers to go with it, albeit quite unnecessarily, as the cricket was entertainment enough.
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| 14:06 UK time, Saturday, 29 September 2007
