I have no *idea* what this means.

[jeriendhal]

From a BBC news report on the sport of Cricket:

"The biggest surprise of the Ashes so far has been the consistent failure of Australia's top seven batsmen to produce big scores.

They have only managed one century between them in four games, but there is perhaps some light at the end of the tunnel with the news that Simon Jones is injured and out of the vital Oval decider.

Until now, everything has gone smoothly for England.

The pacemen have bowled short, sharp and often destructive spells. Spinner Ashley Giles has bowled with attacking fields and often with the pressure already on the Aussies."

At least with baseball we just run around in circles instead of trying to confuse everybody.

Comments

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

I can offer a few definitions (subject to correction, of course). In cricket, a batsman (approx. = "batter") remains at bat as long as he isn't put out. (It's more complicated than that, IIRC; there is one other base, which may be occupied, and the batsman and the runner may swap roles repeatedly.) A "century" occurs when he (and his hypothetical partner?) score a hundred runs without being put out. The verb "bowl" is approximately equivalent to our "pitch", except that the bowler may do so from various points and with various run-ups. For the rest, you're on your own...

[kd5mdk.livejournal.com]

A cricket pitch has two stumps, located some distance (40 feet?) apart, forming a long narrow rectangle. That's the bowling and batting surface. The rest of the field is an oval centered on that. A batsman for the batting team stands at each stump, and takes his turn batting. The balls are bowled in groups of 6, called overs. A bowled ball is thrown overarm with a perfectly straight arm (theoretically, which means it's in the rules). When the batsman hits the ball, he and his teammate at the other stump run and exchange places, and, if the ball is hit well enough, continue doing so until the fielding team is in a position to throw them out (by knocking a stump over with the ball).

There are basically two kinds of players, batsmen and bowlers. Batsmen are chosen for their fielding and batting ability. Everyone fields when not bowling, when the other team is batting. Bowlers also field, but because like National League pitchers who have to bat, they're generally not so good at it, having been selected for their bowling ability. Teams have 11 players, so generally you have 4 bowlers who are weak batsmen, maybe 2 more who are decent at both, and the rest are primarily batsmen and may never bowl (I think). Thus, when the report says Australia's top 7 aren't scoring, they're the sluggers who are expected to carry the team on their back, and if the rest of the players get 20 points each, that's great, but nobody expects anything of them.

A century is 100 runs scored by that batsman. A partnership century is 100 runs scored by the two batsmen who are up at the same time.

There are two main types of bowler: Fast bowler, which is just what it sounds like, effectively fastballs all the time, and spin bowlers, who are like curveball pitchers. It's not exact, because a bowled ball must strike the ground in front of the batsman, but that's the general idea.

[glenbarnett.livejournal.com]

This is no more confusing than someone who doesn't know baseball reading an article about a baseball series. You don't know the game or its jargon is all; each sport has its own arcane rules and jargon that makes it difficult for outsiders. Cricket is in fact no more complex than baseball.

Translated:
"The Australian players whose job is to make runs have not"
"One of the English bowlers (like a pitcher) can't play the fifth match, which will decide the series"
"The English bowlers have attempted to get batsmen out (or even directly aim at their body), rather than prevent scoring. It has been highly effective."

www.dangermouse.net/cricket has a good explanation of cricket for those familiar with baseball

[glenbarnett.livejournal.com]

In support of the assertion that cricket is no more complex than baseball, it's just a matter of following the game and knowing the jargon:
http://www.sjgames.com/pyramid/login/discussion/article.html?g=sjgames.chatter.sports&a=3562&t=dfpqc9%24i74%241
(A baseball post by Scott Haring)

Now I know baseball well enough to watch the odd game now and again (I watch the odd bit of MLB, but when the Olympics are on I watch it more avidly) and I mostly understand what's going on. I've even played a little in high school. But I have no idea what some of that post of Scott's was about, and a cricket fan with substantially less familiarity with baseball (say, your average Indian fan) would be unlikely to follow more than a couple of words of it.