The day I took on an England fast bowler

Exclusive! Watch me face a ball from England fast bowler Glynis Hullah, as I reported in 1976 on the England Women's (or Ladies' as we used to say in those days) cricket team's preparations to face the Australians https://www.macearchive.org/films/atv-today-16021976-england-ladies-cricket-team-practising-edgbaston

Mass poisonings - Africa and India

Alcohol can kill, especially it it’s laced with crocodile bile, or other lethal additives. In Mozambique, 69 people, including apparently a toddler, have died after drinking home-made beer, ironically, at a funeral.

Health officials believe contamination with crocodile bile made the drink lethal. The woman who brewed it and a number of her relatives are dead, and another 39 people are being treated in hospital.

Meanwhile in India, at least 29 people have died in Uttar Pradesh after drinking toxic liquor at a cricket match, and 100 more are in hospital. Some have lost their sight. Doctors say the drink may have been adulterated with cheap, but dangerous, methyl alcohol. The owner of the shop that sold it has been arrested.

Poisonings of this kind are depressingly common in India. Nearly 170 people died in 2011 in West Bengal, 107 in Gujarat in 2009, and 30 in Uttar Pradesh in the same year.

Forest fires (3) + it's only money (3) + cricket, lovely cricket

The authorities in Australia are now saying that at least 173 people have been killed in its worst ever forest fires, but the toll seems certain to rise as the emergency services search the more remote areas. Many of those who died were trying to escape the blaze in their cars, but they were outrun by the flames which were whipped along at terrifying speed by powerful winds.

Police report some of the fires were started deliberately – crimes that amount, says Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, to “mass murder”. The revelation comes as a new report from the Australian Institute of Criminology says that every year more than half of the country’s 20,000 forest fires are the result of arson.

Bunch of bankers. Even though they have brought the economy close to destruction by their incompetence and greed they still want to pay themselves huge bonuses. The Royal Bank of Scotland, bailed out by £20 billion of our money wants to hand over £1 billion of it to its staff. Whose achievement was what exactly? To run the bank so incompetently, it is now broke.

Still bankers must be quaking in their boots. Labour has got tough! It’s going to, er, set up an inquiry into bankers’ pay. And this is the really scary bit – the inquiry will be chaired by – wait for it – a banker! Nor is there going to be any hanging about – if all goes well, Sir David Walker will be reporting his findings....by the end of the year. How many billions of our money will have gone down the bonus drain by then?

Not sure how much Labour was planning to spend on Sir David’s inquiry, but I’m prepared to do the job for a fiver, and I can report right now. No bonus of any description should be paid to any person working in any bank bailed out by the taxpayer until all the money has been repaid.

Cricket, lovely cricket. If you’re still smarting from England’s dismissal for 51 at the hands of the West Indies, see my blog of January 28th.

End of a civil war + cricket "disaster"

Some observers believe that the civil war between the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tigers is nearing an end after a series of successes for government troops over the last few weeks, including the taking of Kilinochchi - the Tigers’ political and administrative centre. The Red Cross is warning that the fighting is causing a humanitarian crisis with over a quarter of a million civilians fleeing their homes. Altogether about 70,000 have been killed in the conflict over the last three decades.

On this day.....in 1887 – a sporting disaster. England were bowled out for 45 by Australia in Sydney – their lowest ever test score. George Lohmann, coming in at 9, was top scorer with 17. It proved an important contribution. Australia made 119 in their first innings. Then England replied with 184, leaving Australia needing just 111 to win, but they were dismissed for 97. Astonishingly, England had won by 13 runs. Lohmann took three wickets in each innings.