five

Morning everyone! Yep, test cricket is back, even earlier than ever. Whilst Sky’s wall to wall coverage continues, my viewing is usually confined to the highlights package.

five (not Channel Five or even Five or 5, but five) is now showing highlights of the test cricket. Is it me or is it the same coverage as Channel 4’s last year, minus Richie Benaud? Its good, but its hard to watch cricket without Richie.

England made a pig’s ear of a great batting display and a reasonable bowling effort by fielding like drunken giraffes. I lost count of the number of catches that were put down, enabling Sri Lanka to have 30 wickets instead of the usual 20 and so enabling them to bat on for the draw. Andrew Strauss in particular had a ‘mare, including several drops which bring to mind Boycott’s comment that “my mum could have caught that in her pinnie!”

Travel Notes

Aggravating – the announcements on London underground trains such as “This train is for Paddington.”

No its not. It’s not for (or against) anything. It’s a train. What you mean is “This train is going to…” or “This train’s destination is…” Sorry, this is the pedant in me having a rant.

Also, they have taken to announcing that there is a “good service” in operation. Let me be the judge of whether its any good or not!

TV Notes

The Apprentice – there was disaster in the Veale/Janes household when a thunderstorm caused a power cut and the final of The Apprentice failed to record. Got to see the show on the interweb instead though. In the end I’m not sure if any of this was open and honest, since there didn’t seem to be a lot of questioning before the final pick. Michelle did exactly as Sir Alan suggested, showed no imagination and struggled to run her team, yet seemed to win comfortably. On the other hand, I wouldn’t want the badger to be working for me!

Rugby Notes

The season’s over for Ebbw. Safe in mid-table mediocrity, our best result for years.

As predicted here, Craig Cleaver duly won player of the year, whilst Simon Hunt had to get in on the act somewhere and was named clubman of the year. Jack Lydiate, Ebbw and Dragon’s U21 flanker got most promising player. Roll on September for the new season. We’ve already signed an outside half, Sam Mills from relegated neighbours Pontypool.

Elsewhere, the season carries on though. Saturday sees the playoff between Maesteg (third from bottom in the Premiership) and Bonymaen (champions in Division 1) to see who goes up or stays up, if you get my drift.

There’s also the small matter of the Heineken Cup final at the Millennium Stadium. Biarritz versus Munster. Should be a cracker, with The Fields of Athenry echoing around Cardiff.