On this day, 1969, Australian wicketkeeper Ray Jordon cheated during a match in Bangalore.

The incident brought out a side of Ian Chappell that is not often talked about.

A word or two about that tour of India. Australia won the Test series 3-1.
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They have only once since then, in 2004-05.

The tour was marred by multiple instances of unrest, at Bombay, Calcutta, and Bangalore.

These incidents can wait for later threads.

The Bangalore match was against South Zone.
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Australia were 2-1 up in the Test series, but South Zone were always a tough opposition.

A brief recap of the match, first.

South Zone declared on 239/9 before unleashing a spin attack to match any Test match attack of the era: Chandra, Prasanna, Venkat, and VV Kumar.
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The Australians were bowled out for 195. Lawry scored 120 of these.

South Zone set Australia a target of 200 in 170 minutes.

The Australians then collapsed against Prasanna (14-10-11-6).

Reduced to 53/8, they finished on 90/8. Lawry was obviously unbeaten.
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Play was called off four minutes before time due to stone-pelting, followed by lathi-charge.

The incident took place on the second morning.

Prasanna and Venkat were trying to rescue South Zone from 175 for 7.

Connolly was bowling to Prasanna.
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Taber had been rested.

Jordon, his replacement for the match, was standing up to the stumps.

Chappell had a full view of what happened.

The ball passed Prasanna's bat and the stumps. Then the off-stump was knocked *forward*, defying a law or two of physics.
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Prasanna, realising what had happened, initially refused to leave.

Jordon sledged Prasanna until he walked way back.

This was just a tour match, but Chappell did not forget the incident.

Australia were humiliated 0-4 in South Africa later that season.
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After being thrashed in Cape Town and Durban, Lawry considered replacing the out-of-form Taber with Jordon.

Lawry had a discussion with vice-captain Chappell, his deputy.

The response was clear:
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"You are the captain and you can pick whatever team you like, but if you are going to pick Ray Jordon in the Australian cricket team, please don't consider me for selection. I'm not available."

Jordon never played a Test. His career for Victoria got over a season later.
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An honest man, then, our Chappelli.

Here are some anecdotes on the Chappell brothers:

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More from @ovshake42

21 Dec
Cricket Australia has discussed switching broadcast rights back to Channel 9.

I was obviously excited. Then @rickeyrecricket asked me why a some of us found the news exciting.

It is difficult to explain, but there is no harm trying.
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And I have a feeling that a lot of 1980s cricket fans will agree.

Let me first explain what watching cricket on Doordarshan used to be like – when the antenna worked, anyway.

There was one channel, where everything had to be crammed in.
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They used to interrupt coverage abruptly for news, University Grants Commission programmes, live telecast of the Prime Minister inaugurating random institutes, and more.

But we still waited, because we knew that this was all we were going to get.
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Read 21 tweets
21 Dec
On this day, 2002, Ashish Nehra became part of the most James Bondesque scorecard entry in international cricket.

We remember the Hamilton Test.

The Nehra dismissal took place on the eventful day when some part of all four innings was played.
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India, 92/8 overnight, reached 99.

Then they bowled out New Zealand for 94 and themselves folded for 154.

New Zealand finished the day on 24/0. They won next day.

Tinu Yohannan bowled and batted in each innings.

The dismissal happened early in the day.
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Nehra (yet to become Nehraji) was batting on 1.

At 93/9, Shane Bond charged in to bowl at him on a pitch clearly designed to suit him.

He had already claimed 3/33 including Sehwag and Laxman.

Surely this was a mismatch?

Of course it was.
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Read 7 tweets
20 Dec
Bill O'Reilly was arguably the greatest leg-spinner until Shane Warne arrived.

He also fought a few battles with Don Bradman, both on and off the field – though neither lost professional respect for the other.

That, we know.
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Not as well-known is a 21st-century war cricket fans fought on his behalf.

There are several Bill O'Reillys, six of them reasonably famous. You can see the list here, on the disambiguation page: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_O…
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In 2005, a Wikipedia user tried to push a motion to make the political commentator the default page.

What is a default Wikipedia page?

Check this one, on Julius Caesar: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Ca…
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Read 9 tweets
20 Dec
On this day, 1997 at Cuttack (photo), Hemulal Yadav became the first batsman to be given timed out in a First-Class match.

However, Yadav is not the first anymore (yes, I know that sounds confusing).

Here is what happened.
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At 10.28 AM on the final day of the match, Ajay Barik had Vijay Bhatnagar caught by Robin Morris.

Tripura were 235/9. Yadav was the only man left to bat.

The umpires, Sankara Dendapani and KN Raghavan, decided to call drinks at this point.
+
According to Brian Levison, Yadav was deep in conversation with the team manager during the break.

The conversation must have been intriguing, for he did not bother to come out even when play resumed.

Bill Frindall wrote that he just sat there and made no effort to return.
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Read 6 tweets
20 Dec
#36AllOut reminded me of a phase in Test cricket when India lost 25 wickets for 224.

We saw it live.

Now, the runs per wicket (8.96) does not match yesterday's 4 (India lost 9 wickets).

But India actually scored 280/19 at Adelaide, so what we had witnessed was worse.
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There was no respite. India were given a relatively easy pitch for the tour match.

Then came Durban.

South Africa were bowled out for 235 on Day 1.

India did not last 40 overs. 100 all out.

South Africa now scored 259.

This time, 66 all out.
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And now, Cape Town. This time South Africa declared on 529/7. There were three hundreds.

India became 58/5 on the third morning.

That. Sinking. Feeling.

As was often the case, Tendulkar was holding the fort.

It had been a few months since he had been appointed captain.
+
Read 9 tweets
19 Dec
I suppose a lot of us are still upset, so let me share something amusing.

This concerns this book, one that I had been unaware of until I came across a report by Andrew Lang in The Times.

In a piece in 1922, EV Lucas hailed the author as the Indian Nyren.
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.@sumitganguly14 got a scan of the cover for me from an acquaintance in Lucknow.

I shall share some snippets here.

I shall share more if and when I ever get the entire book.

But first, a word or two on cricket books in India.
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Calcutta Cricket Club Scores 1844-54, the first known book of scores outside the British Isles, was published in 1854.

In 1867 a Hindi coaching book was published in Agra. It was translated in Urdu in 1868.

In 1889, a Marathi coaching book was published in Baroda.
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Read 25 tweets

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