Average.

Who knows what's in Ricky Ponting's head at the moment. Probably something which sounds like that really terrible album Radiohead made after OK Computer, playing over and over again. 

Then, through all the white noise and static and steely screech of alienation comes something else: the sound of Harbhajan Singh.

'Ponting is a very average captain and an average player too. I can get Ponting out any time. Even when I come post a six-month lay off. He got a hundred in Bangalore but I don't think that's enough. He needs to come back and score some more before he can claim to be a complete batsman. He needs to go and learn to bat against spin bowling.'

Somehow the word 'average' really does its work here.

Still Krejzy. Or, The Madness Of King Ricky

How do you follow

43.5 1 215 8 ?

If you're Jason Krejza, with: 

31 3 143 4

For match figures of (look away now if you are of sensitive disposition):

74.5 4 358 12

It gets better. Up until tea on Day 4, Krejza had bowled almost 40% of Australia's total overs from a run-up of about four paces. Yet they were so far behind the rate, Ponting (and the team management) decided that, rather than risk Ponting's banning from their next Test (against that terrifying New Zealand side in Brisbane, where Australia have not lost this century) they would cede a realistic chance to force a face-saving win in India, a place their forebears spent careers trying to conquer. 

It's heartbreaking to report that the Australian press have not taken it well. In The Australian, Malcolm Conn wrote: "In what must surely be Ricky Ponting's worst day as national captain, he may have cost Australia the Border-Gavaskar Trophy by attempting to to save himself from suspension." In the Sydney Morning Herald, Peter Roebuck called it "one of the most baffling displays of captaincy seen in the long and proud history of Australian cricket".

Better get a few tomorrow then, Punter.

One last note on Jason Krezja: Tim Nielsen said he didn't play in the first three Tests "because he wasn't ready".

Tim old mate, no-one could be ready for that...

Oh, and he was on a hat-trick. Again. He only got Laxman and Ganguly this time. 

Locked in the arms of a Krejzy life

Cricket: the game of desperate and beautiful anomalies.

43.5 1 215 8

The dream debut is the dreariest of sporting cliches. But Jason's Krejza's first bowl in Test cricket - all eight or so hours of it - was gloriously, illogically, undeniably dreamlike. To recap:

His first three overs went for 32.

His first Test wicket was Dravid, his second was Sehwag.

His were the most expensive debut bowling figures in 1,892 Test matches. 

He speared the tail in a spell of 5-19.

He became the eighth man in Tests to take eight wickets on debut (more dreaminess: Lance Klusener is one of the others...).

He dismissed three of the big four, plus Sehwag and Dhoni, and had Tendulkar dropped - twice.

He went at 4.9 runs per over.

At one point he was on a hat trick.

He took 0-199 in his only warm-up match, meaning his two bowls in India so far have gone for over 400.

It was his first-ever five-fer in first class cricket.

Presumably he woke up after that lot covered in sweat and thinking he'd gone to a wedding in his pyjamas.

Now, does anyone actually know if he can bowl or not? Anyone?

Instant Sharma

1429 runs were scored  in the Delhi Test last week, 1428 of them by batsmen other than Ishant Sharma. Ishant's tremendous appearance as nightwatchman at the end of day three was run over by other, more newsworthy stories, but the five minutes and two balls he survived were a comedy classic. He made Jimmy Adams look like King Viv circa 1976. In this age of instant worldwide video analysis, Ishant has just lined up at least a decade's worth of short stuff for himself. Chin chin!