February 2008 Archives

Warwickshire legend Tiger Smith has emerged as hot favourite to land the accolade of 'Most Prestigious Ernest in the History of the World'.
Tiger - Ernest James Smith - was a giant of a wicket-keeper and batsman for the Bears for 26 years, a linchpin of the 1911 championship triumph and an integral member of the coaching staff at Edgbaston for decades after his playing days.
Highgate-born Smith's credentials are beyond reproach, although he faces stiff competition for the title. Among others being well-backed are Ernie Bishop (Emily's husband, tragically gunned down in his prime), Ernie Hunt (Coventry City striker and architect of that brilliant free-kick routine with Willie Carr) and Ernie (the fastest milkman in the west).

Nick James has become the latest victim of Ashley Giles' destructive streak of form with the bowling machine in the Edgbaston nets.
Ian Westwood is still in recovery from a broken thumb sustained from a lifting delivery from the machine, fed by the director of cricket, in the nets at the indoor centre. Now James has copped a painful one too. Again Giles was the perpetrator of the heinous act, this time a ball of full length which struck James on the big toe. Severe bruising will sideline the all-rounder for four weeks.
As it stands, though, all the first-team squad should be fit for the start of the season. Boyd Rankin today advanced his recovery from a stress-fracture with some gentle walk-throughs in the nets and should be firing on all cylinders, if not more, by April.

Darren Maddy has long-reminded me of Porthos, ace swordsman and member of the Three Musketeers. The roguish charm, the debonair wit, the flashing blade.
But never more so than yesterday when the "The Man in the Iron Mask" was on telly and Porthos was played by Maddy's near-identical twin Gerard Depardieu. And most of all in the scene where Depardieu was assailed from above from by a deposit from a seagull.
It was a carbon copy of Hove last August when, chewing over the Bears' draw with Sussex, Maddy copped one right on the Warwickshire badge of his sweater. Life imitating art.

BREAKING BEARS NEWS. Following the resounding success of the football Premiership's plans to play a round of matches abroad, the ECB have wasted no time following suit. Warwickshire's championship match against Derbyshire from May 7 to 10 will now be played in Kabul.
Subject , of course, to approval from English cricketing's governing body, Sky.

Ode to Ian Bell

O Belly, Belly.
Your off-drive is a dream.
You have scored Test centuries in Faisalabad, Chester-le-Street and Leeds.
And who can forget your 135 against Lungley and Dumelow at Derby in 2001?
Belly.
Giant amongst pigmies.
And let's not forget yout nifty spell of medium-pace against Middlesex at Lord's in 2004.
Four for four.
Devastating.
Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Don Bradman.
O Ian Ronald Bell.
You have scored runs all over the universe.
But Belly,
Will you ever do what Tavare did in 1981?
Score a Test ton in Delhi.

A poem.

"Oh what will the 2008 season bring for the Bears?"

The cricket season has loomed into distant view.
After the shambles of 2007, how will the Warwickshire fare in 2008?
Intriguing.
Bears supporters, it's time to prepare.
Put on your smocks. Take up your sticks.
Adopt the position.
It's time to perform the bean-setting dance
In the name of Manolito from the High Chaparal.
At Northampton and Southend. At Leicester and Southgate.
And of course at Edgbaston, while queuing for your car-park ticket.