Alastair Cook

crispybug2
crispybug2 Posts: 2,915
edited September 2018 in The cake stop
The England captain has spent over 800 minutes at the crease for 250 runs in the first test against Pakistan, whether or not if you like cricket that is an astounding feat of concentration and application!

The most amazing fact from his performance is that Cook has spent every minute of the test on the pitch....... Well done Cooky!!

Comments

  • chris_bass
    chris_bass Posts: 4,913
    this is exactly why I don't like cricket, how can scoring a run once every 192 seconds be good?

    And how can you play a game for 5 days and chances are no one will win.

    And if you do really well at the start there probably won't be time for you to win.

    And 90% of one team sit on a balcony for days on end.

    and they stop for tea during the game!

    and the players often sign autographs whilst the game is going on!

    I could go on!

    The game makes no sense to me!
    www.conjunctivitis.com - a site for sore eyes
  • crispybug2
    crispybug2 Posts: 2,915
    And he's out!!

    261 runs, amazing achievement.

    Chris Bass, I won't try and convert you to cricket, I've always believed that you either enjoy the game or not, but imagine standing outside in 40° temperatures and performing to the very best of your ability for hours on end!
  • CiB
    CiB Posts: 6,098
    And he's out!!

    261 runs, amazing achievement.

    Chris Bass, I won't try and convert you to cricket, I've always believed that you either enjoy the game or not, but imagine standing outside in 40° temperatures and performing to the very best of your ability for hours on end!
    Shame. Have to say I always like his letters, from America.
  • this is exactly why I don't like cricket, how can scoring a run once every 192 seconds be good?

    And how can you play a game for 5 days and chances are no one will win.

    And if you do really well at the start there probably won't be time for you to win.

    And 90% of one team sit on a balcony for days on end.

    and they stop for tea during the game!

    and the players often sign autographs whilst the game is going on!

    I could go on!

    The game makes no sense to me!
    Does cycle racing ?
  • crispybug2
    crispybug2 Posts: 2,915
    Now that's how you bring down the curtain on an absolutely stellar test career!!

    147 in your final innings, bookending your career with a fifty and a hundred to mirror your first test innings

    Well done Chef! Quite probably the greatest batsman England has ever produced.
  • cooldad
    cooldad Posts: 32,599
    I think they should replace the ball with a small hand grenade. Would speed up the game no end, and stop the chucker rubbing his balls.
    I don't do smileys.

    There is no secret ingredient - Kung Fu Panda

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  • rjsterry
    rjsterry Posts: 27,488
    CiB wrote:
    And he's out!!

    261 runs, amazing achievement.

    Chris Bass, I won't try and convert you to cricket, I've always believed that you either enjoy the game or not, but imagine standing outside in 40° temperatures and performing to the very best of your ability for hours on end!
    Shame. Have to say I always like his letters, from America.

    There's not many that would get that. A shame. Goodness knows what he would make of the US at the moment.
    1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
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  • cooldad
    cooldad Posts: 32,599
    rjsterry wrote:
    CiB wrote:
    And he's out!!

    261 runs, amazing achievement.

    Chris Bass, I won't try and convert you to cricket, I've always believed that you either enjoy the game or not, but imagine standing outside in 40° temperatures and performing to the very best of your ability for hours on end!
    Shame. Have to say I always like his letters, from America.

    There's not many that would get that. A shame. Goodness knows what he would make of the US at the moment.

    Just some older (non cricket fans) I actually thought that's who the thread would be about.
    I don't do smileys.

    There is no secret ingredient - Kung Fu Panda

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    Parktools
  • I wonder how big a sporting celebrity Cook is outside of the cricket world. 25 years ago the likes of Gatting, Gower and Gooch would have been recognised even by non cricket fans and Botham was front and back page news. Maybe just the changing nature of the world, when we had no internet and a handful of TV channels if you were on TV you were on everybody's TV and everybody's newspaper.
    [Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]
  • I wonder how big a sporting celebrity Cook is outside of the cricket world. 25 years ago the likes of Gatting, Gower and Gooch would have been recognised even by non cricket fans and Botham was front and back page news. Maybe just the changing nature of the world, when we had no internet and a handful of TV channels if you were on TV you were on everybody's TV and everybody's newspaper.

    Go back a bit over 35 years and there were three TV channels, one of them showed test cricket live. Also the era when Steve Davis could become a huge star, remember.
  • they were also personalities in their own right - Gower, Gatting, Botham, that bloke where they asked him for his brain so they could make an idiot, etc.

    Apart from street fighting man, and Pietersen, none of the recent crop seem to stand out for good or bad.
    Postby team47b » Sun Jun 28, 2015 11:53 am

    De Sisti wrote:
    This is one of the silliest threads I've come across. :lol:

    Recognition at last Matthew, well done!, a justified honour :D
    smithy21 wrote:

    He's right you know.
  • I wonder how big a sporting celebrity Cook is outside of the cricket world. 25 years ago the likes of Gatting, Gower and Gooch would have been recognised even by non cricket fans and Botham was front and back page news. Maybe just the changing nature of the world, when we had no internet and a handful of TV channels if you were on TV you were on everybody's TV and everybody's newspaper.

    Go back a bit over 35 years and there were three TV channels, one of them showed test cricket live. Also the era when Steve Davis could become a huge star, remember.


    Yes that was part of the point I was making, is it inevitable that we don't share these cultural phenomena in the way we used to.

    Probably an interesting discussion to be had how this impacts on more important things than how famous our sports stars are beyond their own sport. Does it affect political view with people insulated from alternative opinion by following only those who share their outlook on social media and consuming their news from sources with a particular slant, does it impact on social racial and religious integration etc?
    [Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]
  • TheBigBean
    TheBigBean Posts: 20,513
    I don't think that is true. Millions still watch various sporting events e.g. world cup, olympics etc. Sporting stars are still created, but different sports become more or less popular with time. For example, Wiggins is fairly famous which would not have been expected in the 80s.

    Cricket chose to be on paid TV and therefore has fewer viewers. That said, no doubt when another series such as the 2005 Ashes comes along more stars will be created.
  • 2005 series was on Channel 4. People could watch that live who had no interest in buying a sports channel. Won't be the case next time it happens.

    I get my awareness of how well known someone is from Pointless. People don't really know anything about cricket these days.
  • Tashman
    Tashman Posts: 3,398
    It's such a shame. My 11 year old loves to play the game, but as I refuse to pay the Sky master to view, he has no idea what top class cricket looks like.
    I remember test matches being the background hum to summer holidays at a similar age then going over to the field and playing out the memorable moments or trying to bowl as fast as I possibly could (not very, which is why I became a spin bowler :) )
  • timothyw
    timothyw Posts: 2,482
    I only got into cricket after it stopped being on the telly, unusually enough.

    I don't particularly care to watch, prefer to just listen to test match special.
  • TheBigBean
    TheBigBean Posts: 20,513
    2005 series was on Channel 4. People could watch that live who had no interest in buying a sports channel. Won't be the case next time it happens.

    I get my awareness of how well known someone is from Pointless. People don't really know anything about cricket these days.

    I was disagreeing with the wider point about stars from different sports. Snooker is still on free TV, but isn't as popular. My view of that is that the game has not evolved in the way that it did in the past, so it is dominated by older, more experienced players which basically makes it less interesting. There is nothing the governing bodies can do about that. It is simply the evolution of sport.

    I think tennis has become boring too.

    Cricket traded viewers for short term cash in 2005. It was something that was pointed out at the time, and something that is being questioned at the moment. I'm not convinced that it is about changing times though.
  • haydenm
    haydenm Posts: 2,997
    2005 series was on Channel 4. People could watch that live who had no interest in buying a sports channel. Won't be the case next time it happens.

    I agree, dreadful for the sport in the long term. It's been discussed in the news for the last few years, fewer kids watching and taking up the sport, declining viewing figures in general. The problem is that spurs them on to bugger about with shorter game formats and things rather than address the real issue. I haven't watched a game since 2005 when I was 14, a shorter game still isn't going to make me pay for a sports channel to watch it...
  • Tashman
    Tashman Posts: 3,398
    Also TV viewing in general has changed beyond recognition. My 9 year old often just watches YouTube content or TV via catch up services. The concept of watching "live" TV is alien to her. With the proliferation of channels on Freeview and not just pay platforms there are a great deal of ways of not watching it unless you specifically want to. The casual viewer is unlikely to ever trip over the cricket now
  • cooldad
    cooldad Posts: 32,599
    I hate ads so it's Netflix, Amazon, or record from Freeview and FF the ads.

    But I wouldn't watch cricket anyway.
    I don't do smileys.

    There is no secret ingredient - Kung Fu Panda

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  • Really did wish I was at the Oval yesterday, it was like a day long cricket party apparently. To think some people said Cook should have stepped aside for this game once he'd decided to retire, nonsense in my view. As Michael Vaughan said, if one England player deserves to go out on his own terms it is Alistair Cook. The stat that really struck me wasn't about his runs and his hundreds but the fact he had played 150 odd tests in row I think, opening the batting for 12 years. He will be missed.

    My only gripe is that I'm guessing contractually the BBC is only allowed thirty second clips for wickets etc and so Cook's ovation for his hundred that lasted nearly two minutes wasn't available in full.