Graduation done, England are back in both Ashes, and Matt Doherty looks as though he is on his way back to Wolves summer, what’s not to love about the last week?
First of all, hello again and welcome back to the blog, the weekly posts are back out and rolling at you again now I have more time on my hands, but it does just make you realise how much can go on in a week that’s for definite.
I’ll start off this piece though talking all about my graduation, sounds very egotistical to kick off talking about yourself but it’s a logical approach before we get into all the sporting news and talking points.
Let’s set the scene, we had to set off from Millom at 8:30am so that we could get down to Preston and park up, but also make sure we were there for when registration was open at 10:30 because we knew just how manic it was going to be.
It wouldn’t be Cumbria or the north of England if it didn’t rain all the way down, and I thought the full day was destined to be riddled with rain and showers which would’ve taken the shine off the occasion slightly.
Anyways, time to put the cap and gown on, luckily for this bit there was people on hand to do this for us because I quite honestly didn’t have a clue how I was going to manage such a task on my own.
Before anyone thinks here for a second that it’s surely just like getting changed right and putting a new set of clothes on, then you can think again.
Everything has to be in the right place and it all needs to sit correctly on you so that nothing falls off or comes out of place, which just happened naturally at times, because the gown itself is surprisingly heavy on your shoulders and can slip really easily.
To top the full outfit off it’s then time to put the cap on your head, and again, it’s got to be done properly so that it goes in the right place, and then there’s the tassel on top which queued a full discussion between me and my fellow course mates about worrying whether it has to be on a certain side, I made sure it went over to the left anyways, once someone had told me that the person had put my cap on the wrong way round.
The easiest way to describe the full ceremony itself is that you aren’t really nervous about the occasion, but when you sit around and clap everyone else who has graduated while waiting your turn, the tension and nerves begin to build up, it’s only natural.
My main worry was falling over on stage or my cap falling off, things that would basically just be outright embarrassing, although it would then mean that no-one would forget you because they would also remember you as the only person who fell over at graduation, it wasn’t what I was going for though let’s be honest.
Ceremony all done, the highlight being the music, a little bit of Don’t Stop Believin sang by the choir and just about everyone else in the room, before we walked out to Don’t Stop Me Now by Queen which also had everyone singing.
Just to side track from the full graduation conversation momentarily, it only feels right to drop onto the topic of Freddie Mercury and just how brilliant he was.
It’s different for me because I was born 10 years after Freddie died, so I never had the chance that my parents did of being around when he was alive but because he was so good people have made sure that his memory has always lived on, and that’s showcased by the fantastic music both him and Queen produced.
You can’t not like Queen though, I simply won’t have it, and if you’ve never heard of any of the music they have produced then you must’ve been living under a rock because it will always be played at some place that you’ve been to or it’ll probably just be in one of your playlists titled classics or something.
So everything done without any problems, no falling over or any of that, and now it was time for the celebrations to officially begin.
There’s no need for any details on the next bit because we all know what celebrations consist of, all I will say is that Baby Guinness is a shot that I have quite frankly become very fond of now.
Time to drift into the sport now though, we’ve all heard enough about the graduation bit so, it makes sense to talk about some cricket and the Ashes doesn’t it?
There’s a real theme occurring with every game played so far in the series for both the men and women’s teams, and that’s the fact that they are all nail biters.
I’ll start by talking about the women, and the scoring system works slightly different for them because their series is played in an entirely different way.
So they have the one test match, which because Australia won, meant that they moved into a four point lead, and then they have six limited overs matches, all of which you gain two points if you win and a point each if it ends in a draw or there’s no result.
Australia are aiming to make it their third win in a row, and after that opening test match victory, they followed up with a four wicket win in the first T20 to assert early dominance on the 2023 Ashes.
Backs against the wall stuff for Heather Knight and her England team then, staring defeat right in the eyes, but they managed to drag the Aussies into something of a staring contest, hanging on in there with a steely eyed gaze and winning the next two T20’s to bring in back to a two point deficit and leading it all to play for heading into the ODI’s.
It still did mean that they would need to win all the ODI’s to win back the Ashes, a draw would see Australia keep hold of the urn of course, but they levelled things up with a narrow two wicket win in the first 50 over match, captain Knight leading from the front with an unbeaten 75 to edge her team over the line with 11 balls to spare.
Fascinating stuff to be honest, and it’s certainly interesting seeing how this format works compared to just the standard five test matches, and it makes things more exciting that’s for sure.
Test matches can usually be considered less entertaining than the shorter formats, although with ‘Baz ball’ that perspective has been changed entirely, and placing more of an emphasis on those games where there’s more of an atmosphere, and different players can excel and be suited by the style of cricket.
I’m not saying for a second that I would like to see test cricket eradicated completely, because I feel like the skills and strategies which go into these contests are those of ones that you would see in a chess match, or a boxing bout, but moving the Ashes into a format where you could have three test matches, three ODI’s and three T20’s could be something that happens in time eventually, it’s just whether they would make such a drastic change to a thing that’s 141-years-old.
Another point which has also intrigued me not just through the Ashes but for a while now is that Sophie Ecclestone is such a good spin bowler she could quite easily slot into the men’s team.
When former England international Alex Hartley made the comment after the World Cup last year, a tournament in which Australia beat England in the final but Ecclestone ended up top wicket taker with 21 in total, it was important to stress that it’s nothing that we should or usually do which is compare the women’s to the men’s game, but Hartley made the point that Ecclestone could easily play for the men.
Ecclestone is the number one ranked bowler in the game, and her ability to tie batters down and stop them scoring runs from her bowling alongside sending the stumps flying makes her a valuable asset to the side, and that point from Hartley is one that could really be considered, especially because the men didn’t have a spinner for this series with Jack Leach out injured, meaning they brought Moeen Ali back.
At just 24-years-old as well she was praised for her maturity in how she bowled in the World Cup last year, and even though I did play cricket, Hartley’s opinion is worth way more than mine, and she said in the article that no-one could turn the ball as much as Ecclestone does, and her height of 5ft 11 means she can easily bowl above the batter’s eyeline, shorter ballers have to toss the ball up way more to do this, but Hartley said it was the amount of work and effort that she put into her bowling which makes her as good as she is.
You might’ve seen the video or watched it live when she took that stunning catch in the first ODI the other day, and that’s not something you can just pull out of the hat, that comes from hours of fielding practice and hard work, and that is quite clearly so evident in her game.
Back to the point though, and I do agree with one of the tweets I saw when this full idea was mentioned, why would she ever have to play in the men’s game when she is such a role model in the women’s?
For me it would create this platform for people that the games aren’t on the same level in terms of quality and I wouldn’t want to see that happen because at the end of the day, she is playing at the highest level of cricket that you can possibly play at and doing it so well so, why change something that isn’t broken.
That brings us nicely into the men’s Ashes and ‘Baz ball’ once again, because despite trailing the series 2-0 going into the third test match, England cricket could’ve quite easily have downed tools on the new style of play and reverted back to a safer and more considered approach.
We all knew that was never going to happen though, as like I said, why change something that isn’t really broken?
As with any style it has ups and downs, but it suits this group of players, it would be like a rock and roll musician all of a sudden having to play classical music, it just wouldn’t make sense, and that’s certainly how England play the game at the minute with a bit of rock and roll.
I was really impressed with Chris Woakes and how he bowled throughout the test, especially in the second innings when he took three wickets, and then of course to hold his nerve alongside Mark Wood at the end to chase down the target and see England over the line to claw the scores back to 2-1.
At times Woakes has been overlooked, because he can bat as well and is always hugely consistent when he plays for England, and yeah you could just class him as a bowler but he’s an all-rounder in my books as he knows how to bat.
What we got through Mark Wood in this test was something that England had seemingly been lacking in the other two, and that was some lightning quick, and quite frankly scary bowling.
Every time Wood charged in, then fell over after it, he was giving his side that extra bit of aggression and ruthlessness which teams sometimes need, and with the five wickets he took in the first innings you could see he was creating fear in the Australian batters.
Aggressive, but calculated bowling, and that alongside some mature batting from Harry Brook has put England right back in this now, and the next test could not be any bigger.
Speaking of big things we’re moving ever closer to the start of the Women’s World Cup in football, and whether or not we as a country can end our World Cup misery.
The tournament is being held between Australia and New Zealand and gets underway next Thursday, with England’s opening match against Haiti on the Saturday morning.
Obviously you feel that England have a really good chance to capitalise on that brilliant European Championship victory last summer, but it’s such a shame that quite a few key players that played such a huge part in that success are going to be missing.
Captain Leah Williamson and Euro 2022 Golden Boot winner Beth Mead have both done their ACL’s, an injury that has been on a significant rise in the women’s game, while Fran Kirby has undergone knee surgery and won’t be back fit in time.
On the ACL subject though, I didn’t realise until someone on the course was doing a piece on it this year just how more likely they are to occur in the women’s game.
Female footballers are up to six times more likely to suffer an ACL injury, but there isn’t enough research to say why exactly that is.
Scientists believe that some elements of the menstrual cycle could have an impact, due to the fact it can make joints looser, and therefore make them less stable and easier to cause injury to.
Another claim is to do with how boots are designed, and that because women’s feet are different to men’s they can end up being put in places which aren’t comfortable and can cause more of an injury.
More research will now be done to try and get to the bottom of all this, with monitoring the menstrual cycle of players one of the methods put forward, but it really is a shame that it is such a prominent issue which doesn’t have an immediate solution to it all.
Despite the injuries I do really believe England have a strong chance to bring it home, but as it always is with this country and sport, it’s the hope that kills you isn’t it?
One thing I do hope will happen though is that Matt Doherty can finalise his move back to Wolves soon so that we can start throwing the homecoming party for him.
The ‘Doc’ was a key player at wing-back under Nuno in that Championship winning season and also in the Premier League, in fact, his full-time at the club was just a huge success, but after 10 years at Wolves he decided he wanted a new challenge in 2020, and joined Tottenham to link up with Nuno.
Nuno however didn’t stay long, and over three years he only managed 44 appearances for Spurs, and spent last season on loan at Atletico Madrid where he struggled to make any impact on the team, making only two appearances for them.
To bring him back on a free transfer would be great, and despite one or two people seemingly holding the move to Tottenham against him, I think it’s smart business.
That sums up this full transfer window though at Wolves, smart, because we’ve obviously had to raise funds to sort out the financial fair play rules, but the money we have got can be reinvested in other areas, and like I’ve said previously, there’s that big part of me that’s really excited for the new season to get going.
There’s so much going on in the football world though at the moment, some news that isn’t as cheerful as Doherty’s homecoming party, and that’s to do with Southend and Morecambe.
Morecambe this week had to cancel a pre-season game against Workington because they didn’t have enough players, while Southend have now been given 42 days to sell the club or face the winding up order.
The problem at Southend isn’t a new one though, it’s almost like a reoccurring nightmare, as owner Ron Martin has been trying to sell the National League club since March, but to no avail.
With a £275,000 still unpaid, and the club unable to sign new players because of the debt owed, topped off by the fact that the water was turned off at the club’s training ground this week, things do look pretty bleak unless something gets sorted.
I don’t know enough about the full situation to pass comment, but I do know a certain someone from my course that is a hugely passionate Southend fan and can’t see the situation has anything other than just a massive disgrace.
They have faced multiple winding-up petitions, with four happening in 2019, and you just really feel for the fans because just how does this keep happening in football.
You’ve seen the same happen to Bury, and even to Wigan, and at the heart of it all you have these loyal fans who have followed the club through absolutely everything, but they never thought it would ever get this low.
In Morecambe’s case it just appears to be a really strange situation to be honest, because from a fans point of view your worried that if you can’t fulfil a pre-season fixture just a month before you kick start your League Two campaign then how much needs to be sorted still?
Anyways, I think that’s it for this blog piece again, we’ve covered a lot there haven’t we? I’m off for a busy weekend reffing, catch you all in the next one.
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