Be Excellent To Each Other

There was no winner in our match! Other than those who enjoy comedy batting.

I call foul on Codemasters. When you set the theme to 'England' you get 'generic soundtrack 102837' as the background music. If however you set the theme to Australia you get the proper World Series Cricket theme. Boo Hiss, how dare they put in better music for the convicts? Surely the rights to Soul Limbo aren't that expensive?

Well, I've got to stumps on the first day, and my opinion of the AI has gone quite a bit downhill. The bowling AI seems to be fine, but as in BLIC07, they seem to bat as if they forgot to go to the toilet before coming out. I ended up posting what seemed a below-par 301 from 68.1 overs, only to leave them on 140/7 from 21 overs at the close of play.

Two comedy run outs (and two close things) started things off. They would scamper a quick single, only to start coming back for another just as my bowler or wicket keeper got the ball - ludicrous. Also, at one point their run rate was 7.5. Obviously some of that was the fact I was bowling a lot of tripe, but Brad Haddin came in with Australia on a perilous 52/5, only to swat Broad for 18 off one over, post a breezy 42 from 22 and square cut the ball to my point fielder thinking his job was done.

Only Simon Katich seems to be taking the game seriously, still there on 44 from 65 balls.

There does seem to be a lot of comedy run outs.
In my 3rd test (still playing) my bowling figures are swann 3/79 and anderson 1/35, with the rest being run out.

Managed to get a really good partnership between bopara (128*) and Cook (160) at lunch on day 2. But day one both me and them were out for roughly the same (just over 200).
Still havent made it past 2 days yet. Im trying to just bat this innings out and put on a massive total, and try and get the achivement for winning by 600 runs or whatever it is.

My own comedy AI failure story from the demo. Batsmen had edged it past the slips, where it stopped. One of them ran to it within a second or two , and then stood there looking at it while another fielder came from elsewhere. What should've been a tight single became 4 runs.

Or the abject camera failure story, whereby I'd hit the ball off into the field behind the batsmen, and the camera showed me the ball, taking up the entire screen. So I didn'[t know if I had time to run. Probably 2 runs in there.

They've definitely sorted out most of the camera issues from the demo.

Lunch on Day 2. I bowled out Australia for 161 in the end. Katich went for 51 and Hauritz managed a gutsy 19 from 65 balls (that's more like it!). Anderson got a five-for and I managed to get Broad's economy rate down to under 6 by bowling him at the tail-enders.

So far in reply I'm 44/2. Cook went for 3 off 29 and never looked comfortable, but I'm kicking myself about Strass's dismissal; spooned a simple c&b for Hilfenhaus when well set on 29. Bell and Pietersen out there now and I'm 184 ahead.

Im currently all out for 497 on day 2.
and australia have to get 508 for the win in their 2nd innings. games go very quickly!
They are already 12/1 off 5 overs, 3 maidens from anderson and a c&b aswell. Not a bad start.

I think it will be a different story on hard, I had quite a few catches dropped, and edges not carrying.
But as the bowling is harder to get perfect balls on hard, they'll rack up bigger totals as there are more hittable balls for them. Making it more of a challenge.

Not realistic! 2nd Test and in the second Australian innings Harmison takes a hat trick. I'm currently experimenting with the squad, is it just me or is Sidebottom much more effective than his stats suggest? The AI has real problems with him.

Won 3rd test bt 290odd runs.
Mainly set up by bopara and cooks 300+ partnership in the 2nd innings.
And anderson and flintoff getting a couple of early wickets with the new ball.
2-1 up in the series, looking like Im going to win it.

For those of you still reading (ie me), it's now tea on the second day and I'm 230/7. Not great to lose 5 wickets in one session, you might think, but I'm now 370 ahead and Ian Bell is delicately poised on 94*. I'm hoping for a lead of about 450 which should be too much for them.

Just bowled Riles out for 37.

Riles should play me, he'd probably beat me, I'm that bad.

And yet I'm still tempted to get the game.

Four overs and one ball (for me to win).

Riles, you suck.

You fancy a game now?

Playing Riles again.

Ask him again in 5 minutes, he'll be ready for you then

Also, a big to Dave's last post.

4th test.

Won toss, decided to put australia into bad.
They started well. By lunch it was 148/1 with Hughes close to a century.
After lunch Ive swung it about and within 10 overs it's now 217/5. Not very economical, but Im getting them out.
They seem to play a lot more conservative when they bat first. It took forever to get the first wicket, but now Im getting edges and nicks to gully.

Second game... doing fine until he took five wickets in an over. The first one was annoying. Run out despite having made my ground with about ten seconds to spare. My guy didn't even bother to dive he was so safe, and the computer gave it out. Boo!

65 all out. Drat. Could be 1-1 here.

PLEASE DELETE ME

That said, after two overs he's 1-4...

Scoring it the Australian way round?

I just bowled Riles out for 3.

3.

2 were extras.

hahaahaa

I got australia out for 279.

Oh dear. Riles is really, really shit.

I'm at stumps at the end of day 3 of the first Test. I'm now 395/9. Bell got his century (ended up 110 off 147 balls). Swanny scored 68 (87), and now Jimmy is swinging the bat and has 65* from 64. I'm currently leading by 535, so hopefully should have enough.

I want to know how many Ben Hilfenhaus scored!!!

Also, DAVE Hussey?

You've made it to the end of day 3?

Most of my tests are over by stumps on day 2

Riley has been defeated in Drunken T20 #3.

Roughly 110 - 70.

Hurrah.

BEDTIME!

Whoops, I meant end of day 2. I reckon it'll be all over by tea time on day 3, though. I've set Australia 550-odd to win.

I need to stop playing this when drunk.

The third game was better. Still lost mind.

Were you drunk when I hit Swanny for 43?

If it wasn't for that over of madness, we'd have had a tight game.

Much as, if you ignore the two england innings in the fourth test, our batting held up really well.

No real cricket in this thread!!!

Much as in the two England innings...

You've done it again!!!

That's what I said when Collingwood got a pair.

I love reading about Cricket. Practically every post sounds like it's been made up on the spot, with the same terminology never being repeated by anyone else.

I just popped out at lunch and made a swoop on this, as it was only 25 notes in Asda (I think this was mentioned somewhere previously in this here thread, so I was on the lookout for it).

Anyway, right looking forward to playing it, though I don't imagine I'll be much cop. I'm going to approach it in the way a 'newbie' might play a Fifa game, i.e. you don't need to learn all the fancy button combos to play a basic and successful game of football.

All thee needs is t'play wi' a straight bat, not across the line. You'll not give away your wikkit like that, I'll te'thee for nowt.

That should see me right then!

Or equally, play the Legends Coaching bit. It's actually quite useful.

Right up until the last batting one. I'm not sure what it tries to achieve other than bore me into failing it.

The batting ones are the only ones I've done. It seemed pretty easy, but then again I've not been bowled out for 3.

You should definitely try the spin bowling coaching session. I bet Warney will be saying 'g'day, try not to concede 43 runs from a single over, mate'.

The bowling ones are shite. The first one is bowl 6 balls at 100 mph - for shits and giggles I did it with my eyes closed.

Are there lovely tasty Achievements to be gained from doing the coaching wotsits? If so that would make it an even bigger incentive for me.

15 in total, if memory serves.

Good-o, and that's better than nothing. I'll be doing this tonight then, and should hopefully be better at the game as a whole.

Just beat myp by 11 runs in a 10 over game.

Despite lag, it was a lot closer than I was hoping at one point

Yeah, I was something stupid like 11-5 at one point. Good fun and quite tense for the last couple of overs!

I had a load of fun with this last night, and was playing until about 1am or so. And I was only doing the coaching. Found it helpful, but I probably won't remember much of it in the middle of a real match, still it's good to know and learn it.

Love it when Warne goes, "No no no, that's not where Beefy told you to hit it, now try again".