Btw, I think religion has nothing to do with ethics either. I was just repeating what was said. I do remember Cronjie initially using his Christianity as a defence – saying he’d never do what he was accused of because of it. Although I was still a Christian myself at the time, that was when I began to doubt him. Ime, as soon as someone uees the religion defence, it’s a sign they’re guilty.

Not Ross Taylor. It’s irrelevant to his cricket or how he plays the game, but there’s a sex tape of him and his partner. (I don’t know if she’s still his partner.) It was all entirely consensual – they were both into filming themselves at it. I don’t remember much about it, or how it got out, because it was ages ago. So there’s a wee blot in his copybook.

NZers like being #1 of course when we can manage it. Personally I’m not too worried as long as we’re ahead of Australia!

I think you’ll win the next test too. If it’s by a big margin, that will drop Aus’s points I think.

If Australian cricket had any decency, they’d take the captain out altogether, along with some of the other senior players. After that press conference, he should have been removed completely too imo. To go back on the field was wrong. Not being named captain means virtually nothing. I bet he still participated in tactics, decision making etc.

In the test here, the English fans keep waving little bits of yellow tape. It’s hilarious! They’re loving seeing Aus exposed, and so are most of the players. Apparently there’s no respect for Aus in the cricketing community because of the way they play the game.

Yes, Hansie Cronje and Steve Smith, they were so much the gentlemen, honarouble men, we thought (I never thought of Hansie’s Christianity as a factor for or against, most South Africans are Christians, and in my experience being a Christian or not has little import on ethics anyway).
Who is next? Who is the most honourable gentleman in cricket nowadays? Quinton de Cock?, Kane Williamson? (luckily Brendon Mc Cullum has retired, I was -still am- great fan of him). Ross Taylor? Eoin Morgan? Angelo Matthews? Jason Holder? If Smith and Cronje, who not? You get the feeling.

Strangely enough NZ dropped quite a bit in the T20 rankings, they are fourth now after Pakistan, Australia and India. Right after they were No 1 after beating Pakistan. I do not have a clear view of how these rankings are calculated, ‘the calculator’s ways are impenetrable’.
They are also 4th in the test rankings, after India , South Africa and Australia, but the difference is not great. 104 v 100 points. I suppose that after SA beats OZ in the fourth test (I confident prediction), they might overtake OZ at the third place. But as sasid the calculations of these rankings are a bit obscure.
In the ODI’s they are also 4th, after India, South Africa and England.
At present they look to be consistently 4th, regardless of the teams ranked higher. And we like consistency in cricket, now don’t we? 🙂
[Note that in the last series between India and SA, the win in the tests (2-1) was not enough to take the first place from India, while the dismal SA’n loss of 5-1 was enough for SA to lose their no 1 spot]
I also note that -sadly- Sri Lanka is dropping. They have not recovered from the simultaneous retirement of their 2 top world-class batsmen (Sangakkara and Jayawardene) and the more spread loss of some of their top world-class bowlers (Vaas, Muralitharan and Malinga). I personally think that Muralitharan was even a greater spinner than Warne (and that is a reference). but I diverge….

Except he’s more confident than ever. That’s why he’s cleaning house imo. He knew he wasn’t really up to it to start with, but now he thinks he’s got the job sussed. He’s growing in confidence, which is really scary!

I remember one of the reasons many thought Hansie Cronjie couldn’t be guilty was that he was a Good Christian. He was a really nice guy, and I was shocked to discover what he’s done. It didn’t see to fit with his character at all.

I agree with what you say about the Aussies. All the senior players were confident enough in the way the others would react that they discussed cheating quite openly amongst themselves, which I think says a lot. There’s been an attitude in Aussie cricket for some time, and there needs to be a clean out. Remember the attitude of Shane Warne for example. He was an amazing bowler, but a complete a$$ho£€.

And yes, it’s extremely unlikely Brian McKechnie would have got a 6. There had already been a couple of umpiring decisions in that match that were dodgy – see the Wikipedia entry of the incident: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underarm_bowling_incident_of_1981

Even now. Australia hadn’t played NZ at 20-20 for about ten years until this year because we’re really good at it and they knew they couldn’t beat us. They played this year because they had a team good enough that they were sure they could beat us.

I mean -referring to the ‘underarm incident’- what is worse, a defeat or being painted as cowards for decades? Greg Chappel later admitted it was wrong and that he was exhausted and not fit to be captain at that moment.
Still waiting for such a statement from Mr Trump, isn’t there anu moment he has a shimmering of a realisation he is totally unfit to be POTUS?

‘Bone-spurs’ summarises it nicely.

A small detail that I find most despicable (after all, ball tampering to varying degrees is as old as cricket, although this degree is kinda very blatant), is that the ‘leading group’ of players saw fit to task the youngest player to carry out the ‘felony’. It reeks of cowardice.
I think that the whole business was instrumental in the monumental loss, by 322 runs (more than any of their innings), of Australia in this 3rd test of the 4 test series. Most of the Ozzies looked like whipped dogs in their second innings.
Smith and Warner stripped of their respective captaincy and vice-captaincy is -I fear- but the beginning of the repercussions.
I’m still kinda ‘shellshocked’, who would have thought that Steve Smith and the other ‘seniors’, all honourable men, would turn to cheaters? The collusion angle of it, so sordid.
The unexpected part of it reminds me of Hansie Cronje, the ‘gentleman cricketer’, who turned out to be a sell-out, throwing away matches for money from bookies. My Sri Lankan neighbour refused to believe it, and when it became clear it was true, she blamed the Indian bookies, saw him as a victim.
The underarm incident in 1981 (nearly 4 decades ago) was, however, not illegal at the time, although very much ‘not cricket’. How great was the chance NZ would have hit a 6 from the last ball? Deeply disgraceful indeed!