Brendan

You do realise that you?re having a cricket conversation with yourself again don?t you Brendan?

Here?s the squad for Thursday: Andrew Strauss (capt), Alastair Cook, Ravi Bopara, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Matt Prior (wk), Andrew Flintoff, Stuart Broad, Graeme Swann, James Anderson, Monty Panesar, Graham Onions, Ian Bell, Steve Harmison. Apparently Freddy has a sore knee so we may be seeing: Andrew Strauss (capt), Alastair Cook, Ravi Bopara, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Matt Prior (wk), Graeme Swann, James Anderson, Graham Onions, Ian Bell, Steve Harmison. Personally I?d drop Pietersen and bring in Rob Key just to teach him a bit of a lesson.

Or vicars? I?m pretty sure its vicars.

Isn?t that Welshmen? Or Mormons?

Madam Gatecrasher I hereby appoint you official correspondent in charge of private information relating to Australian players? homes, lavatories and boudoirs* for the duration of this Ashes series as it is obviously an area in which you are knowledgeable and can speak with some authority. In other sporting news, Basically you get fifteen fellows all of whom have much of the proverbial ?brick shithouse? about them. The other side collects fifteen of similar. They then gather on a field in the middle of winter and have an eighty minute long, no holds barred, fight over a ball that is broken anyway. That from my frontal lobes folks, although which of them was considering rewriting the Wikipedia entry for Rugby Union is anyones guess. *Can men have boudoirs?

And as for this time wasting business. Today on the Guardian?s weekly science pod cast they ask the question, do we really know what time is? ?What it time? Is it the uniform, steady flow envisaged by Newton that helps us follow our daily routines? A spooky, purely subjective feeling? A dimension of Einstein's space-time? Or simply the phenomenon that stops everything from happening all at once?? Chop that on your cistern and snort it Mr Ponting.

Or it has a lisp. Anyway onto Broad. That?s what you get for fielding fresh faced youngsters without whiskers. They spend their time out on the town trying to pick up niggles instead of concentrating on the game. Admittedly I don?t know if a niggle is a broad or a type of monkey but it sounds unhygienic. But that?s kids for you these days. He?s probably going to spend his time off blowing things up on his PlayBox or stabbing people for crack.

Anyone else notice that the voice in Ponting?s head can?t spell for toffee?

English people in novelty Guinness hats.

England?s official bottle carrier, glove replacer, drinks spiller, physiotherapist fetcher and general time waster has a very impressive beard. Bilal Shafayat is his name. I?m not sure what he does exactly but he has managed to annoy Ricky Ponting so his selection was obviously tactical. Meanwhile some guy call Jonathan Agnew who apparently knows a thing or two has said this, ?England must play much better to win'. Insightful Aggers, insightful.

Thanks for your reply Santerme. My comments on the military are more my personal opinion than an argument. I realy do appreciate that it is not nor should it be the military?s role to get involved in policy. I do feel though that the armed forces of any country should be aware that they act in the name of the people of that country. This means that if they want the support/respect of the people they have to at some level or to some degree act within the boundaries that the people of the country find acceptable. If they don?t it leaves us asking where the military will draw the line in obeying orders. At bombing civilians? Genocide? We have already seen that international law can be ignored if you have the right countries backing you. Although the situation sounds extreme it could well happen and we the public may not have the time to vote people giving the orders out of office before the damage is done.

See I told you they would bat out the day. Admittedly it was looking a bit touch and go but then Collingwood and Monty used their beards to stabilise the innings and force a draw. Now there is the question of which, if any, spinner to play at Lords. Swan who doubles as a batsman but has bowled pretty averagely or Monty who has the best beard? Keeping in mind that whichever one goes may be making room for Harmison who isn?t exactly known for his batting (although I do remember him making 49 not out against Seffrika once) but has a beard or Onions who has a funny name. Or maybe they will go with and all seam attack which seems* possible. I suspect that the selectors are probably not going to pay any attention to my post at all though and just play Swan and Onions, which sounds like something the queen may have for tea. You?re allowed to eat cricketers if you?re queen. *geddit?

Sweet Jesus, Mary and Joseph! Seventy six for five in reply to reply to a million for six declared. I?m still backing them to bat out the day. But then I?ve always been a bit delusional.

This from the Gurdian OBO: 'Facial fluff update, from Keith Flett "The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that for the first time in cricket history, going back to the days of WG Grace, Australia have out bearded England and thereby gained a decisive advantage in the first Ashes Test. Traditionally Australia have maintained an ultra clean shaven appearance and refused to dabble in the mysterious arts of facial hair, air currents and ball movement. In the last Ashes series Freddie Flintoff's beard played a key role and he subsequently went on to take the Beard of the Year title. On the fourth days play at Cardiff however it was clear that Hilfenhaus the fully bearded Aussie bowler new far better how to exploit the overcast and humid conditions than Flintoff did. BLF organiser Keith Flett said, 'Frankly the outbearding of England by Australia is the most charitable explanation for the team's current predicament. Any other view would be considerably more downbeard and downbeat'."' I think they're onto something there.

Well they are one of Yorkshire's most popular kick ball teams aren't they?

Perhaps we should start a petition?

I find your ideas intriguing. Do you have a pamphlet or perhaps a news letter I can subscribe to?

I don?t think I?m alone in thinking that blowing half of Afghanistan to hell is not going to make my family and I safe from terrorist attacks. In fact it?s going to make us more vulnerable. People don?t go blowing themselves up on tubes for fun but if you send soldiers halfway across the world to kill their people, interfere in their politics and threaten their way of life they suddenly find the motivation. Or at least radical groups are given the justification they need to attract followers. The blood of innocent British people is already on the hands of this government and now they expect us to buy this kind of shit. They are criminal and nothing more. And shame on the military too for their whole, ?ours is not to question why.? attitude. If they so eagerly require (or is it demand I can never tell) the unquestioning support of the public they need to reciprocate by using their power and influence to at least try to act in the best interest of the land and not just at the behest of the scum in charge.

Santerme Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > At least tell me they are crap at Morris Dancing, > the whole fabric of rural life depends on it!!! Is it possible to actually be good at Morris Dancing?

A late 90's strat isn't really a vintage or rare guitar. A good way to get a feel of what they're worth at the moment is to look on ebay and see what similar are going for. My initial instinct was around ?250 like Keef.

Peckhamgatecrasher Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I'm beginning to wonder what all the fuss about > two spinners was all about. It's like I said earlier, we know England's spinners are better than Autralia's spinners but the question is, are they better than Australia's batsmen?

There?s plenty of unsubstantiated rubbish posted on here from all sides of all arguments. In fact I would say, unless you are very selective, 90% of everything you hear or read is unsubstantiated rubbish regardless of what type of ideology it supports.* Censorship is just bigotry in a different hat in my opinion. *There is obviously a distinct possibility that this is unsubstantiated rubbish.

And here's some propper punk rock for people who can't remember the war.

Lurkers seem to be popular at the moment.

Actually (well according to wikipedia anyway) ?According to British Naval records the term "Pommie" came about from the red "pom-pon" on the top of the hats of British sailors who were involved in the transfer of prisoners to the Colonies.[citation needed] It was used as a derogatory term, but has since become a generalised term for British people. The term pommy or pom is commonly used by speakers of Australian English, New Zealand English, South African English and Afrikaans.? And further more, ?A false etymology (or "backronym") common in both Australia and New Zealand is that 'Pom' originated as an acronym for "prisoner of (his/her) majesty" or "prisoner of mother England". Although many of the first British settlers in Australia were convicts sentenced to transportation to Australia, there is no evidence for this.? Anyway regardless of my choice of pejorative terms for my anglo saxon cousins they better get a few wickets here and quick. Come on Freddy, pacey pacey.