Outside The Line

The Sublime

I have surfed the clear waters of the Caribbean.

I have watched the sun rise above Angkor Wat.

I have taken magic mushrooms and laughed for six straight hours as I snowshoed atop frozen inland rivers, like some sort of hallucinogenic false prophet, by the Rocky Mountains in winter.

I have been deep-throated, all the way down, and had every last drop swallowed.

I have performed onstage at stand-up comedy clubs and made a roomful of paying strangers laugh at things I said.

I have looked deep into a beautiful girl's eyes and known, in my bottom of my heart, that there is no place on earth -- in history -- where I'd rather be.

And yet, I can't think of anything that makes me happier than seeing Ricky Ponting get out for 99 in a losing match.

I really can't.

Take It Easy, Punter. Why Don't You Stop Talking For A While?

Only Ricky Ponting would try to defend a shitty, selfish bit of captaincy with a shitty, idiotic bit of selection:

I had Jason Krejza bowling at one end, who ended up taking 12 wickets in the game, and Cameron White - he'd been the No. 1-picked spinner in the first three Test matches - operating from the other end for a couple of overs.

For the record, those couple of overs "the No.1-picked spinner" bowled went for 15 runs. He never bowled again.

Some Announcement Or Something

India have announced their squad for the tour of Australia starting later this month, with Virender Sehwag's recall, after almost a year away from Tests, causing some controversy. Given that a) about 86.3% of the cricket blogosphere, even on a normal day, consists of a bunch of guys arguing over who should be in the Indian batting lineup, and b) I have nothing particularly salient or insightful to say on the matter, I'll just mention something that pissed me off about Ricky Ponting's reaction to the announcement.

Ponting was asked what he thought of Sehwag's inclusion. He said:

I didn't think Sehwag would make the final touring party but he's here and he had some successes against us last time. A terrific 195 or something.

Or something? Come on, Punter. You know it was 195. You were there. You remember it well... you remember that it was in Melbourne, that it was exactly 195, that he got it on the first day, and that he got out caught in the deep trying to hit a six. Everyone knows it. So why the fuck do you have to add that dismissive "or something" to the statement? Like it was just some random lucky innings in Bangladesh that someone mentioned to you in passing a while ago. Come on, you yourself scored a 257 later that same match. You can't tell me that you barely remember that game, or Sehwag's innings -- you know, the same innings that competed with yours for Man of the Match on the most competitive Boxing Day Test in years. Surely you remember, Ricky. Surely.

(The strange thing about it? I remember that 195 vividly, and yet I had completely forgotten about the 257. I only discovered it a few moments ago when I was checking the archives to see who dismissed Sehwag that time. Has Australia been dominating for so long that I'm starting to repress memories of their success like they're Freudian childhood complexes? Has Australia fucked me -- and my psyche -- up that badly? Damn.)

Nero's Spot Might Soon Be Threatened

Is it just me, or are Australians (and Australian fans) sounding more and more arrogant by the day? True, they have always been riding the higher end of the Arrogance Spectrum throughout their era of dominance, but lately they've gone right off the charts. Ever since McGrath and Warne retired, it's like they're not even trying to hide it anymore. The thin layer of faux-humility has been erased, and we start hearing comments like this:

"Hobart is somewhere that probably will favour slow bowlers late in the game and it's somewhere where we might bat twice, so (Muralitharan) will have two cracks at us." -- Ricky Ponting

(You know, they might bat twice -- they might even be forced to last the whole five days, god forbid. Worst-case scenario, of course. If half their squad comes down with explosive diarrhea on the day of the match, and Symo stumbles onto the ground with a flask of last-night's-rocket-fuel in his hand, and Haydos' femur breaks trying to hold the weight of his gargantuan chest as he takes his guard... then, you know, they might have to bat twice. They just might.)

As if that wasn't bad enough, yesterday we got John Buchanan's ridiculous calls for a complete revamp of cricket at the international level. From what I can tell, Buchanan seems to be saying that Australia is just so damn great and produces so much pure talent that the only way for cricket to remain competitive is for every international squad to just load their lineup with surplus Aussie players. (In other words, Buchanan is telling the rest of the world, "even our rejects are better than every person in your shitty, underachieving little country." Thanks, John.)

Looking at the Arrogance Spectrum, I'd say at the moment the Aussies are somewhere between "Jay-Z after hearing his latest album made it to the top of the charts, giving him more No.1 records than any artist except for Elvis," and "Donald Trump at the best of times." If they beat Sri Lanka easily in Hobart, who knows how far they could go up. We might even have to recalibrate the scale just to handle Ponting's trophy ceremony speech.