Category Archives: Cricket

Bending the rules ex post facto

July 3, 2008 – 3:37 pm

Lawyers don’t like retroactive laws, but it now seems - despite insisting on having its rules called ‘laws’ - that cricket is in no such quandary.
For those unfamiliar with one of the more controversial events in the Gentleman’s Game, in the 2006 Oval Test, Pakistan refused to take the field against England after being accused [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Law | Comments (8)

Exam hand cramp = bouncer on the forearm

July 2, 2008 – 3:26 am

I did my third exam today, and for the first time in my life experienced what I’ve only heard about before - hand cramp. Maybe it’s because Oxford exams are longer than other exams (three or three and a half hours, depending on subject). The longest written exam I’ve ever encountered in the past was [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Academia, Fark! | Comments (14)

4th Test heroics (we hope)

January 24, 2008 – 12:15 pm

Cricket tragics over to Tony the Teacher’s place for 4th Test action. Once again Spanky Roebuck has covered himself in, well, err… something best left to your imagination. (Non) Money quote:
That is to confuse joy with rage. Likewise, the umpiring was acceptable and even-handed. Only lamingtons imagine otherwise. The game is up for that lot. [...]

By skepticlawyer | Comments (38)

Monkey business no laughing matter

January 11, 2008 – 5:25 pm

This rather offensive picture comes from Josiah Clark Nott and George Robert Gliddon, Indigenous races of the earth (First published 1857). It illustrates scientific theories of racism in the 19th century, which continued into the early 20th century. Essentially, the theory is that Aryan “races” are superior in evolutionary terms to Black “races”, and that [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in History, Media, Racism, Society | Comments (6)

So, will Cricket self-destruct?

January 8, 2008 – 9:13 am

I decided to take the scenic route from Edinburgh to Oxford, which meant two days offline. During my absence, it emerged that cricket is in danger of imploding after the fall-out from Australia’s victory over India in the second test. Rather than rehash what’s already been said, I’ll point Catallaxians to this excellent but very [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Sport | Comments (190)

Front yard flags

January 26, 2007 – 12:15 pm

There’s been a bit of to-ing and fro-ing over the flag of late. The link is to a piece about Australian outfit Jet, who seem to have taken the right approach to the whole dust-up. Last week’s debate took me back to 1990, though, my first year at UQ. Logan City - where I [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in General, Popular culture | Comments (118)

Brett Lee’s alternative career

January 9, 2007 – 7:00 pm

We need to lighten up around here a bit, so I’m inviting Catallaxians to check out Brett Lee’s latest Bollywood film clip - a rather fetching (!) duet with a bhangra backing. Very entertaining all round. Can he sing? Should he give opening the attack away? Or it it truly worrying?
I should also mention that [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Music | Comments (15)

Open Ashes Thread - Fifth Test, SCG

January 1, 2007 – 10:15 pm

Well, Justin Langer is going to walk away after Sydney as well, in many ways a less surprising decision than Damien Martyn’s pin-pull after Adelaide. Langer has been hit on the head repeatedly throughout his career: a footballer put through the same ringer would have hobbled out of the game by now, likely with permanently [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Sport | Comments (15)

Open Ashes Thread - Boxing Day Test, MCG

December 25, 2006 – 6:55 pm

Australia has the Ashes safely in its keeping. Nominally, the rest of this series is a ‘dead rubber’, the sort that, historically, Australia did poorly in. But Warne and McGrath are bowing out after Sydney; Warne is on 699 test wickets; McGrath has a point to prove before his last series, the one-day World [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in General, Sport | Comments (59)

Bowled, Shane

December 21, 2006 – 3:05 pm

Shane Warne has decided to hang up his flipper at the end of this Ashes series, going out of the game on his own terms. One thing’s for certain: we’ll miss him when he’s gone.
His retirement inspired me to reprise this piece, originally published over at the Sydney Morning Herald. I’m reproducing it below the [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in General, Media | Comments (90)