Batting

Bowling

This week:

• Rockets win The Hundred… but which player has played in the most Hundred finals?
• Attendances down? We crunch the numbers!
• Has the comp been dominated by overseas stars?
• Who will play in the England v Ireland series?

The first movie in the rebooted “Hundred” franchise ended with rockets being fired into the rising sun, which probably sounded a lot more exciting in the initial pitch-meeting than it eventually looked on-screen.

SunRisers Leeds had got close to Trent Rockets when they met in the group stages, taking it to the final set chasing 139 and falling just 5 short after Annabel Sutherland hit a somewhat academic 6 (with 12 still required) off the final ball.

But SunRisers failed to bring any of that game to Lord’s for today’s final, never recovering from losing 3 wickets in the powerplay, and setting Rockets just 92 to win, which they achieved at a canter.

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Lord’s is the lowest-scoring of all the Hundred grounds, with an average 1st innings total of just 120 across the seasons, compared with Edgbaston at the other end of the scale, where a typical score is 134. But it’s hard to blame the pitch for today’s performance, given that Rockets chased down the target at a rate which would have seen them rack-up a massive 170 had they maintained it across 100 balls.

Bryony Smith’s role at the top of the order for SunRisers is obviously very much the same role she plays at Surrey, to go hard or go home – but this season in The Hundred has mostly been the latter, and Kim Garth clearly had her number – Smith had no clue what to do with a delivery speared in to her ankles, and gave up an easy catch to Nat Sciver-Brunt on the ring.

Lauren-Winfield Hill’s first delivery was a wide but that was as good as it got for her, as a “rocket” of a ball from Garth had her heading back to the pavilion for a golden (though perhaps that should be goldenish due to the wide?) duck. As she walked through the gate that leads up to the Long Room, Winfield-Hill took just a moment to look around her, in a manner which hinted that perhaps she might know something we don’t. I’m sure she will finish the season for Yorkshire, but perhaps she realises time is finally catching up with her in her 36th year?

Having therefore not got off to the accelerated start they’d have hoped for, it was all on Phoebe Litchfield and Annabel Sutherland to make the running for SunRisers. They have both had good Hundreds, with Sutherland being named Player of the Tournament after finishing as the leading run-scorer, with Litchfield just behind her in second place. But Litchfield, like Maia Bouchier, does seem particularly vulnerable to the odd brain-fade; and she was caught at short fine trying to ramp a ball from Charley Phillips that was never in a month of Sundays going to be travelling fast enough to play that shot.

And in many ways, that was… as our American friends (most of them still are our friends… I think!) say… “the ball game”. Sutherland obviously felt she needed to play a more conservative “anchor” innings and try to see it through; but with Deepti chewing up balls at the other end on her way to a pedestrian 12 off 16, it was leading them down a road there would be no coming back from.

Dani Gibson did eventually realise that risks needed to be taken, and took advantage of a run of leg-side deliveries to find the boundary 3 times in a row; but then went looking for the same shot again off a delivery on a very different line, and again was caught on the ring. The rest of the wickets fell like dominos, and 9 balls went unused as SunRisers were bowled out for 91.

It was another in a long list of under-par first innings scores in this comp, and they’ve generally been followed by the team batting second proceeding to drearily game-manage their way to the target in a fashion that calls to mind “that” Batman film – you know the one, starring George Clooney!

So we should at least be thankful that Trent Rockets responded by going out and playing positively. Sophia Dunkley led the way with a cracking 41, though it is a pity she didn’t finish the job – a mere 15 more would have put her at the top of the run tree ahead of Sutherland and Litchfield.

Nonetheless the start Dunks and Beth Mooney had given Rockets ensured that the result was so little in doubt that they spent the entire innings on 99% win probability, which the loss of those couple of wickets towards the end didn’t dent in the least.

It was, as Sutherland admitted afterwards, a win that Rockets deserved – they dominated the table and had the numbers to back that up, particularly with the bat. Dunkley was the standout, but beneath her it was very much a team effort with NSB, Sophie Luff, Beth Mooney and Ash Gardner all chipping in; whilst with the ball, Sam Bates (who, remarkably, has the same number of Australia caps that I do – ie. none!) finished as the joint leading wicket-taker, backed up by Ash Gardner, Kim Garth and Charley Phillips – the latter mixing it with the international stars in her first season in this (or any other) franchise competition.

Rockets had never made the final before this year, but assuming that teams will be able to retain most of their players for the next couple of seasons, following roughly the model of the IPL/WPL, they look like they will be the team to beat next season, and into the Hundred-Verse.

MI London kept alive their extremely slim qualification chances with a narrow win against London Spirit at Lord’s.

MI and Spirit are now in a very similar pickle, requiring a very specific sequence of results to make it through to the knockouts. Unless Phoenix beat SunRisers tomorrow they are both out; and if that happened they’d still need SunRisers v Fire to be rained-off (or a tie), not to mention a massive turnaround in their Net Run Rate in their last two group games.

And after the way both sides batted today, that doesn’t feel likely – despite the hottest, driest summer this country has ever known, I’d still rate the chances of SunRisers v Fire getting rained off as somewhat higher!

You’d be hard-pressed to describe it as a “good” game, but in front of another very decent crowd at Lord’s – over 15,000 turned up in time for the women’s game – at least it was an exciting one, going down to the final ball; though arguably it was the penultimate ball that was key. With Spirit needing 5 off 2, and the keeper standing back after MI had been subject to a fielding penalty, Deandra Dottin could easily have run a single that would have left Katie George needing to get a 4 off the final delivery. But Dottin chose to stand her ground, meaning she effectively had to hit it for 6; and with no short boundary today (unlike the game here last weekend) that was a bridge too far – she was run out looking for a second, meaning 17 wickets fell across the 200 balls… and largely not from brilliant bowling.

Put in to bat, MI were 23-5 at one stage, after Charlie Dean had taken 3 wickets in balls – the Spirit captain, who was the pick of the bowling across both teams today, finding enough spin to account for Hollie Armitage, Nic Carey and Alice Monaghan. At this point, everyone in the press box was typing “Lowest score in the Women’s Hundred” into Google; but after a summer which has almost (but not quite) rivalled Laura Wolvaardt’s for disappointment, Melie Kerr finally came to the party, hitting 69 off 41 balls to give MI the big finish they needed to make a game of it.

With wickets falling around her, Kerr waited until the last 10 balls to hit the “Launch” button, hitting 3 6s off Charlie Dean in the penultimate set. It was risky – she was almost caught off the first of those – but it was what needed to be done; and given how close the game turned out to be, it was the difference between staying alive in the competition and going out.

Although I’m not unaware of my reputation for a degree of cynicism, believe it or not I came to Lord’s today hoping to write about a good game of cricket. But with just 5 of the 20 players who batted today making double-figures (and one of them was Dottin, who made 11 and ended up making a terrible decision which all-but guaranteed Spirit lost the game) it’s hard to find the positives.

These players are being paid more than ever before, and most of them have been full-time pros for five years now, and yet…

Most of them can hit a ball, but their decision-making is shocking. The international superstars have had a long summer, and were almost certainly peaked for the World Cup in terms of their fitness; but that’s a minority – most of these are domestic pros, but they are playing like schoolboys (sic!) with an almost male level of self-delusion about their own (in)abilities to ramp their 7th ball back over the keeper, or clear the ring with a dinky chip. I’m not naming names here, because it is everyone; but if you were watching, you know who I’m talking about.

We can only hope that this is a low point; and that the semifinal and final give us something to celebrate and cheer – a bit of the magic Davina Perrin gave us in that semi at The Oval last summer. Because right now, Spirit might have been Kerr’sed; but this The Hundred… in its “reboot” season… feels cursed.

As Shakespeare might have put it: “nothing in this match became it like the leaving it”.

Except in this instance, the leaving it was rubbish.

With 20 balls left, Brave needed 14 runs from 20 balls with 7 wickets in hand; and it was still just about possible to believe that Spirit could turn it around. Just 5 (legal) balls later and the ask had become 2 from 15, almost entirely due to some utterly inept bowling from Deandra Dottin. Of the 11 runs that came off her final set, just one came off the bat, with 4 byes and 6 wides going down in the scorebook.

But it somehow then took Brave another 8 balls to get over the line, losing two wickets in the process. Sophie Molineux was kept in check for three dots by Charlie Dean, before having a huge mow, missing it completely, and scrambling through for a single. One needed. So what does Maia Bouchier do, with one needed from 11 balls? Well… she was on 46 so obviously she also had a huge mow trying to get her 50, missed it completely and was ignominiously stumped.

Lesson learned, right? Oh no! After the change of ends, Molineux was back on strike and decided she needed to try to go aerial over mid on, didn’t get quite enough on it and was (admittedly brilliantly) caught by Dottin. With one run still required, Naomi Dattani just needed to get a bat on it, but she couldn’t even do that from her first delivery, resulting in a huge LBW appeal (and boos from the crowd when it wasn’t given) followed by a review that wasn’t too far off; before Brave finally got through for the win with 7 balls remaining.

It was a dispiriting end to a pretty dispiriting game. The crowd through the gate for the women’s match was a group-stage record of 17,537. We have often been told that The Hundred is for new fans who don’t know much about cricket – we can only hope that was the case today, because if they knew anything about the game, they’d be asking for their money back.

Batting first, Spirit scraped past 100 thanks to a late assault from Nadine de Klerk, who suddenly woke up having been meandering along on 12 off 18 balls at one stage. She took advantage of the much shorter boundary on the Mound Stand side to wallop two 6s off Sarah Glenn and another off Tilly Corteen-Coleman, and though she eventually perished trying the same thing again, at least she ended up with a respectable(ish) 38 off 28.

Dottin, batting with de Klerk, managed 5 off 10, before becoming Molineux’s 3rd victim, though I’m not sure she should be writing home about that either – all 3 were batter error. As for Dottin, she is lucky she isn’t playing for MSG – they dropped Grace Scrivens for “only” making 9 off 11 in a similar situation!

Chasing a low total, Brave would have figured that if they could see off Marizanne Kapp, things ought to have been pretty straightforward. That was obviously Lizelle Lee’s plan, but she is such a one dimensional player that she doesn’t have anything in her locker except the big shots, and she was soon walking back, having fended off a catch back to Kapp in a hapless attempt to defend.

Laura Wolvaardt played a nice shot down the ground; but looked very scratchy again for the other 17 balls she faced, scoring only 13; and while Bouchier (46) and Molineux (23) did put the runs on the board that were needed, they should both be taking a long hard look in the mirror tonight for the way they got out and nearly made a horrible mess of things at the end.

I just hope all those paying customers get a decent men’s game to make up for this. Because this was rubbish.

London is blue tonight, after the Blue Team blew an 82% chance of victory with 10 balls remaining, allowing the Blue Team to claw back a final-ball tie in the “Blue Derby” at the iconic Blue Stadium.

The Blue team, coached by Jon and Trevor Blue (AKA the Blues Brothers), needed just 12 off the final 10 balls, with Nadine de Blue and Deandra Blue at the crease and plenty of batting still to come. But neither batter was able to find the boundary in a tight penultimate 5 bowled by Nicola Blue, leaving Hayley Blue to defend 9 off the final 5. Deandra Blue pummeled the first of those 5 balls inch-perfectly through the ring for 4; but a single off the next ball put the pressure on Nadine de Blue who tried to hit big but could only find the hands of Melie Blue on the boundary at Blue Albion Corner.

Blue Team captain Charlie Blue scrambled a single off the next delivery, leaving Deandra Blue to face the final ball with 3 needed. Blue was the first woman ever to hit a T20 international hundred, back in 2010 – an innings that included 7 4s and 9 6s – but she couldn’t find the boundary she needed today, with the batters (just… by millimeters!) scraping safely home for a second run that saw the match finish in a tie.

A total of 150 looked a long way off for the Blue Team going into the final phase on 95-3, batting first on a pitch that looked somewhat better than that used on Blast Finals Day, but was still not a typical Blue Stadium Belter. Having scored 32/31/32 in the first three quarters, they needed to add significantly more at the death. Melie Blue had been going along at a Strike Rate of 135, but lifted this to 183 in the final phase, whilst Chinelle Blue smashed 33 off just 12 balls to give the Blue Team the lift they needed to get to 151.

In reply, Grace Blue was well caught by Hollie Blue off the first ball of the innings, but that brought Marie Blue to the crease who swept and slog-swept her way to 49 as the Blue bowlers continued to feed her only shot! At the other end, England wicketkeeper Amy Blue struggled early-doors – at one stage, with Marie on 44 off 26 and Amy on 9 off 14, if I’d told you one was an England player with over 250 caps, whilst the other was a county stalwart with none, you’d have believed me… just not about who was who!

With Marizanne Blue looking in good touch after Marie Blue had played one slog-sweep too many and was caught on the rope, you’d have put your money on the Blue Team to cruise to the win; but they stuttered in the face of some half-decent death bowling and ultimately buckled under the pressure, leaving… honestly… one side looking rather bluer than the other.

PS: Now do you see why the BBL has always strictly enforced the requirement for all 8 teams to wear the same different and distinctive colours all these years? (Although… let’s see what happens when the IPL take over Renegades next year!)

This week:

• Terrible batting in The Hundred… why?
• New team names & new players – does it matter?
• Women’s Ashes schedule announced
• Em Arlott heads to Yorkshire – but should there be a transfer window?

Our new Prime Minister Andy Burnham was apparently a bit of a cricketer in his youth – a recent Instagram post shows him as a teenager in some very 70s-looking “Devon cream” cricket whites. Prior to becoming PM, Burnham enjoyed considerable popularity as Mayor of Manchester, and his governing philosophy has therefore been dubbed “Manchesterism”. What “Manchesterism” actually means is really quite tricky to pin down; but it can in part be defined as the antithesis to what might be called “Londonism” – an end to direct rule from the centre and more power to local and regional authorities. London is over: Manchester is the new black!

So if Mr Burnham was keeping half an eye on The Cricket this afternoon, he might have allowed himself a satisfied smile as Manchester’s freshly rebranded Super Giants squished the London Spirit with a whopping 41 balls to open their account in this year’s Hundred at Lord’s.

The result, it has to be said, owed less to MSG being good than to London Spirit being really really bad. A Jon Lewis team having a batting disaster, you say? 2025 called – they want their England coach back!

Indeed, as the wickets rained-down at the Home of Cricket, London Spirit General Manager Heather Knight and Head Coach Jon Lewis sat at the back of the dugout sharing a joke, perhaps reminiscing about the old times – Bondi… Coogee… losing by an innings at The ‘G’ – thems were the days!

To be fair to London Spirit, the first ball went pretty well – a loosener from Grace Ballinger was driven down the ground by Grace Harris for 4, to whoops from the large Spirit social media team who had set up camp in the Media Centre. But that was about as good as it got. Harris holed out 4 balls later, and Marie Kelly should have been following her back to the pavillion shortly afterwards but was dropped by Richa Ghosh behind the stumps. (It wasn’t the easiest chance for the Indian wicket-keeper, but having got a good glove on it you’d expect her to have held on.)

After scoring a brace of 50s here in the Test against India, normal Amy Jones service was resumed with a golden duck as Richa reprieved herself the following ball. And then Spirit’s problems really started!

Ryana MacDonald-Gay was the main beneficiary, taking 4-17 as Spirit collapsed in a heap to 80 all out. If it hadn’t been for Marizanne Kapp taking Maitlan Brown to the cleaners, hitting two 6s and a 4 off one set towards the end of the powerplay, it would have looked a lot worse too. Probably not quite down there with the time Birmingham Phoenix were bowled out for 54 by the Northern Superchargers… but not far off.

Defending just 80, London Spirit’s bowlers were on a slow train to nowhere. Marizanne Kapp took two wickets in two balls to get rid of Smriti Mandhana and… someone else! (Ok… ok… it was Grace Scrivens [BINGO].) But she was bowled out within 30 balls, having sent down two double-sets; and although Hannah Rainey was finding a bit of swing under the first clouds we’ve seen in London for about two months, Meg Lanning and Paige Scholfield were happy to just knock it around. Rainey did eventually pick up Lanning for a maiden Hundred wicket; but Richa was soon out there doing Richa things (ie. hitting 6s), and not to be outdone, Scholfield joined her at the end, walloping Josie Groves into the Mound Stand to finish the job.

If I’m being honest, I’m yet to be convinced that Manchesterism is the answer to all our problems. And… we have many – including a widening gap between rich and poor, and our public assets being sold off to overseas billionaires! (Remind you of anything?) Similarly, the jury’s still out on whether Manchester Super Giants are the answer to anyone’s cricketing problems; but this is such a short competition that momentum is everything, and as they top the table tonight on NRR, they are the ones with the ball.