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The quick bowler went more than 600 days between first-class appearances after his return to New South Wales, but made up for lost time last season

Andrew McGlashan26-Sep-2022Chris Tremain, the New South Wales pace bowler, was one of the few professional cricketers in Australia who wouldn’t have minded last season not coming to an end in late March.”I was probably the only one,” he says with a laugh.Tremain is in his second spell with New South Wales having started his career there before moving to Victoria. The return, six years later, came ahead of the 2020-21 season but he ended up not featuring in the first XI the entire summer.Last November, when he finally found a place in the Sheffield Shield team, against his former team Victoria, it had been 634 days between first-class matches. In that time, during which the world had been taken over by the pandemic, his professional outings had amounted to three BBL games for Sydney Thunder.He quickly made up for lost time, ending the Shield season with 24 wickets at 15.95 in five outings and was named New South Wales’ men’s player of the season. However, as the new campaign begins, with Tremain certain of his place in the team, he admits his immediate feeling was not one of savouring his much-awaited success.”I didn’t actually let myself enjoy it that much. I wasn’t very modest about it, either,” he tells ESPNcricinfo. “People would come up and say ‘gee, you bowled well today’ and I would say ‘f****** surprised, are you’, especially when it was blokes from New South Wales saying ‘you bowled really well’. I was like ‘yeah, I’ve been doing it against you guys for the last five years’.”Then to balance that out, I never really stood back and said I’m proud of how I’ve bounced back. Even with the awards, I spent a lot of the time saying it’s great to win an individual award, but I really want to win Shields, win trophies, because with a career getting into the 30s you are closer to the end than you are the start. You really just want be in a successful team.”Kurtis Patterson, the New South Wales captain, conceded their previous selection was proved wrong. “He was fantastic when he came in last year,” he told ESPNcricinfo. “Certainly as an organisation we can put our hand up and say we got that one wrong, leaving him out of the side for as long as we did, because he really led from game one and was rightfully our player of the year.”**Chris Tremain walks off the SCG after taking five wickets against Tasmania•Getty ImagesLooking back on his season – and more – on the sidelines, a situation exacerbated by the need for Covid bubbles and hubs that made it very difficult to find playing opportunities at short notice, Tremain reflects honestly on how it played out.”Maybe not second thoughts [about the move], think I did the right thing, but I was sort of left in limbo,” he says. “Sitting on the sidelines for those 18 months was horrid. I hated it.”I contemplated retirement quite frequently, my wife talked me out of it so many times. It was just a really challenging period. If I was injured or not bowling well then it would have been okay because I’d have had a little carrot dangling in front of my nose. But I was just fishing in the dark a little bit for that 18 months, waiting and waiting. But I knew when I got an opportunity, when I picked up the tools and went back to work, that everything would be okay.”However, to get that opportunity he needed misfortune for a team-mate. There was some 2nd XI cricket to keep him ticking over, and he captained the side, but even that created some mixed messages about whether he actually had to prove he should be recalled. A conversation with Shawn Bradstreet, the NSW assistant bowling coach, provided some clarity.

I went, this is the most dysfunctional relationship I’ve ever been in because they show you a little bit of interest, you come crawling back, then they throw you away and go with someone else. Then you get better, come crawling back again, and they discard you againChris Tremain on putting aside the Australia dream

“When you are sitting on the sidelines kicking cans because you aren’t playing, the guys who are playing, your team-mates and your mates, they know for me to get a go they had to get injured or bowl poorly,” Tremain says. “No one wants that to happen. It was a really hard balancing act. I actually spoke to a handful of boys about it. I would say, ‘it’s not that I think I’m better than you, or you can’t do this job, I just want to get to a point where I’m able to do it with you’.”There was a lot less cricket. You just had to try and get the load in at training but it was never the same. That was a little challenging, mentally I was a shot duck for a lot of the time. I was sort of getting information that you don’t need to prove anything, then from other people I was getting you need to prove you are better than these guys to get a spot, but I had no way of doing that.”[Shawn] sat me down and said, ‘mate, they’re both right. You do need to prove it, but you don’t need to do anything differently to prove it…it will prove itself’. Had we not had the conversation, I would probably have come into the first Shield game trying to prove I still had it.”In the end, it was the injury scenario that played out to open the way for Tremain when Trent Copeland and Liam Hatcher were both sidelined. After the match at the SCG had been delayed by a day when Will Sutherland tested positive for Covid, New South Wales batted first and made 233 thanks to the efforts of debutant Hayden Kerr.Then, having waited more than 600 days, Tremain had ball in hand. With his first delivery, he found the inside edge of James Seymour. Two balls later, Peter Handscomb was lbw. In his next over, Matthew Short was caught a second slip. After two overs, Tremain had 3 for 2.”When I got that opportunity I just said I’d go and do my job again, it’s worked for the last seven or eight years so it will work again. And it did. I just knew I needed a crack at it.”

I never really gave myself the time to sit back and give myself a pat on the back and say, well done

When the Shield resumed after the BBL – where Tremain did not get on the park for Thunder; he has now moved to Hobart Hurricanes – he took five wickets in a victory against Queensland at the Gabba (also making vital runs in a low-scoring encounter) and seven in a win over Tasmania at the SCG, the two games New South Wales won in their truncated season.”Even when we were playing in Shield finals [for Victoria], the best thing about it was we knew the season was coming to an end,” he says. “Win, lose or draw, you just knew the season was done. Not that we don’t enjoy doing what we do, it’s just there is always a relief when you can put your feet up and say that was an okay season, a good one or there’s stuff to work on. [But] for me, [last season] was five games, a couple of one-dayers and no Big Bash so I would happily have kept going.”**Tremain tried to find some overseas opportunities this winter but has not played enough games for Australia to qualify for the County Championship. He had planned to go to Darwin with the Melbourne Renegades’ squad for some T20, but injury put paid to that. In fact, having been largely injury-free for six years, he’s been hit by a couple of problems in the lead-up to this campaign.The first was a small stress fracture in a rib – “a strange place to get it for a fast bowler,” he says – then he damaged the cartilage in his ribs when he was leaning over a gate at home. “So the last month or so my ribs have been taking a beating, but everything is shaping up well.”Tremain is a believer in the best way to stay fit to play cricket is by playing cricket. He admits the medical staff sometimes see it differently, but everyone has reached the start of the season with him able to get into the Marsh Cup side ahead of the Sheffield Shield beginning against Western Australia on October 3.Which leads to what another successful summer could mean. Tremain is still only 31 and averages 23.58 in first-class cricket. Since his debut, only four bowlers have taken more Shield wickets. His recent Victoria team-mate Scott Boland burst onto the Test scene at the age of 32 last summer with the magical spell of 6 for 7 at the MCG. Does Tremain, who played four ODIs in 2016 as part of a second-string bowling attack that also included Boland, still harbor those dreams?A pumped up Chris Tremain celebrates•Getty Images”I haven’t allowed myself to feel that way for a long time because I feel it’s a little bit counterproductive,” he says. “I spent a lot of my 20s with that a driving force, that I really want to get that Baggy Green. I got to 26 or 27, probably when I came back from India on an A tour [in 2018] and didn’t get picked in a Test squad to the UAE when I was probably at the peak of my powers.”I went, this is the most dysfunctional relationship I’ve ever been in because they show you a little bit of interest, you come crawling back, then they throw you away and go with someone else. Then you get better, come crawling back again, and they discard you again. So I just wiped it and thought, well, look, you have my number, if you want me to do a job give me a call, if not, the only thing I care about is putting my name on trophies.”Sadly we have fallen short of that in the last couple of years but having only played first-class cricket, the feeling of winning Sheffield Shields is the best I’ve achieved so to recreate that is now goal number one. Playing for Australia, or advancing a personal career, is a byproduct of doing that.”Tremain has featured for Australia A again since 2018, against England Lions in 2019, and he does add that, as Boland shows, “there is always time.” But however that plays out, it is not at the forefront of his mind. With a career back on track, he hopes to be less hard on himself this summer.”I never really gave myself the time to sit back and give myself a pat on the back and say, well done. Fingers crossed if there’s moments this season when things go well, I can sit back, have a beer, and go that was a good shift today.”

Shadab Khan was a key part of the club’s planning and has already shown why

Cameron Ponsonby29-Dec-2022A friend makes bionic limbs. Back when he was studying for his masters, he went to his supervisor with a question about a process he had been following.”Potentially a stupid question,” he put to the tutor, “but I’ve noticed everyone does this thing that way. But why can’t we do it this way?””I don’t know,” came the reply. Six months later and bionic limb friend would give a presentation to an international audience on his discovery.Sometimes it pays to ask why not. In August at this season’s BBL draft, Hobart Hurricanes set tongues wagging after they pursued a unique draft strategy that saw them tap up an under-utilised corner of cricketing talent: Pakistan.Related

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“Surprised everyone,” was one review. “An interesting tactic,” another. “Punter [Ricky Ponting] explains draft gamble,” a third.The assessments were accurate, in that Hurricanes had departed from convention, with no other team picking a single Pakistani player (Usman Qadir has since joined Sydney Thunder as a replacement) and Hurricanes choosing three. But also confusing, in that there doesn’t seem to be a reason why Hurricanes’ noteworthy strategy should be of such, well, note. This isn’t the IPL, there’s no ban on signing them here.And sign them Hurricanes did. What’s more, in Shadab Khan, Asif Ali and Faheem Ashraf, Hurricanes’ “draft gamble” saw them bring together the three most internationally experienced players of any teams’ picks, with 181 caps between them. Sydney Thunder were next closest with 144; Adelaide Strikers further off the pace with 115.In particular, Shadab was their man. At the very first planning meeting months out from the draft the view was that the team was in need of a power-hitting, spin-bowling allrounder. Cue months of conversations going round-and-around in circles as all parties aggressively agreed with each other that Shadab, yes, Shadab, was the one they wanted.

I always talked with Darren [Berry] about the basics because [in Pakistan] we don’t have coaches since childhood, we’re self-made players so he helped me with all this stuffShadab Khan

The only problem for Hurricanes was that they had the last pick on auction day. But, if the last few months have proved anything, it’s that they were placing value where others weren’t. And Shadab went unpicked.”We could have alleviated two and a half months of planning,” head coach Jeff Vaughan said, in a sod’s law sort of a way, “but we’re really pleased to get our man.”In addition to a global superstar in Shadab, they added Asif, a powerful middle-order batter who represented Pakistan in the recent T20 World Cup. Asif’s pick was a surprise to most, but again, the best case scenario for Hurricanes.”We were very pleased to get Shadab into Asif Ali,” Vaughan said. “Another of our first two picks.”In a sport increasingly focused on marginal gains buried in laptops, Hurricanes were picking cash off the ground that everyone else was too busy to notice.This connection with Pakistan isn’t a coincidence. Vaughan spent time in the country earlier this year when he was coaching with Australia while Ricky Ponting, the head of strategy, has long been a public advocate of Pakistan’s white-ball talent. But the real link comes through assistant coach Darren Berry who spent two years coaching at Islamabad United alongside the late Dean Jones.”It was a brilliant experience with Dean Jones and Darren,” says Shadab, who worked extensively with the pair when they headed up the team.”I always talked with Darren about the basics because [in Pakistan] we don’t have coaches since childhood, we’re self-made players so he helped me with all this stuff. I spent two years in Islamabad with Darren so it’s good for me because in a new set-up, the coach is the same.”For all the money that gets handed around franchise leagues, you can’t put a price on the importance of personal relationships. And it was Ponting in particular who wished to lean on this. Cricket is a global game, but it would be naive to assume that coming from overseas will always be plain sailing. Playing alongside those you know from home can help make the transition easier. Not only are Shadab, Asif and Faheem countrymen, but they are all club-mates too, with Islamabad.”It’s brilliant,” says Shadab of being signed alongside Asif. “Because it’s not usually we play like that when we play in overseas leagues. I play a lot so my English is a bit better, but it means I can help Asif. Because [the] accent is a bit difficult for me,” he adds with a laugh. “Sometimes even I don’t understand and I can take care of him as well.”It was certainly something we discussed throughout,” Vaughan said of Hurricanes’ focus on ensuring as welcoming and friendly an environment as possible. “I mean number one was to pick the best players. But we all know when we play cricket and when we travel the world with people that we know or we’re comfortable with and we’re friends with, it makes your time and your experience a hell of a lot a lot easier.”And just seeing Shadab and Asif for the last week and a half has been great, they’re like brothers, they really are.”Asif Ali almost stole a remarkable victory at the SCG•Cricket Australia/Getty ImagesHurricanes have been rewarded on the pitch for looking after their players off it. Shadab has hit the ground running with contributions with both bat and ball, and Asif contributed with a fantastic, but ultimately doomed, innings 44 off 13 balls in their loss against the Sydney Sixers. Meanwhile, Faheem is soon to join up after unexpectedly being called to the Test squad against England.The theoretical availability of Pakistan players had been the final piece of the puzzle for Hurricanes’ strategy although these best laid plans have nonetheless been partially undermined. Shadab leaves in January for a white-ball series which was expected, but Faheem’s inclusion in the Test side was not, with Zak Crawley and Jimmy Neesham chosen as replacements respectively.”Faheem was one that we planned on probably not being in the [England] Test series,” Vaughan said. “I’m very pleased for him that he did get selected, but that was certainly part of the strategy, weighing up the best players, but also their availability. And I think most teams went down that route of not necessarily selecting the best players who can only play four or five games. Longevity was a fair bit of it as well.”Historically and currently, English players have had the strongest ties with the BBL. And in particular, second-string England players, as their availability is often all but perfect.But now with global T20 sands shifting, the BBL could see other sides following Hurricanes’ example. Of particular significance is that the two new competing T20 tournaments, the ILT20 and SA20, are all-but completely Indian owned. Of the ILT20s six teams, five are run by Indian business with the only Pakistani player signed, Azam Khan, being picked up by the sole American franchise Desert Vipers. Meanwhile, the SA20’s six teams are all owned by the same companies that operate the IPL and has seen no Pakistanis signed, although the league has stated they wish for Pakistan players to be involved in the future.A caveat here is that Pakistan’s home white-ball series against New Zealand and the West Indies means availability of their top players would have been poor, but it nonetheless plays into the creeping fear of Pakistan cricket that as the IPL spreads its wings, their players may be further marginalised and denied opportunities in global leagues.How fictional or far away that reality is doesn’t really matter today. The monster under the bed may not be real, but it still keeps people up at night. An ever more powerful IPL is unlikely to be good news if you’re a player from Pakistan. Which, in contrast, makes tournaments such as the Hundred or the BBL that are board-owned a more attractive and likely destination for Pakistan’s stars.For the BBL, Pakistan offers available, high quality players. Which begs the question, why spend your life doing way, when you could be doing it .

Duckett’s open-secret transfer from Welsh Fire epitomises behind-the-scenes dynamic

Matt Roller22-Mar-2023Ben Duckett has spoken to enough people about the Hundred that he is confident he knows which team will sign him in Thursday evening’s draft, and for how much money.But as he stands in the Long Room of the Trent Bridge pavilion at Nottinghamshire’s media day, he finds himself in an unusual position. “It feels really weird doing this interview,” he says, smiling. “Because I can’t say who it is – but that team is somewhere I’d love to go and play.””That team” is Birmingham Phoenix, not that Duckett is at liberty to confirm as much. Phoenix have the third pick in the draft and have already signed their full quota of three overseas players; it is an open secret that they will use it to add Duckett to a top order that already includes Will Smeed, Moeen Ali and Liam Livingstone – unless Southern Brave or Welsh Fire spring a surprise.Fire, his team in the first two seasons of the Hundred, could theoretically bring him back if they want to, by using their Right-to-Match (RTM) card. But Duckett has made it clear to Michael Hussey, their new coach, that he would rather move on after Fire’s winless 2022 season: “He said he wanted me, but I said that I’d made my decision now and I want to go somewhere else, wished him all the best and said, ‘please don’t Right-to-Match me’.”Ideally, Duckett would have liked to sign for Trent Rockets, but after winning the title last year they are last in the draft pick order, and will likely bring back Tom Kohler-Cadmore instead. “I’ve spoken to teams going into the draft so I’m quietly confident,” Duckett says. “But I know that it is a draft and we’ll see what happens. Fingers crossed I end up where I’m hoping to be.”Duckett’s situation encapsulates the bizarre world of the Hundred draft: it is an event which has passed largely unnoticed by the majority of English cricket fans since the tournament’s glitzy launch at Sky Sports’ studios three-and-a-half years ago, but one which can significantly alter the trajectory of players’ seasons – and even their careers.ECB/The HundredIt is a world inhabited by agents, coaches and general managers, who are engaged in a “constant stream of communication” every spring, according to Craig Flindall, Birmingham Phoenix’s general manager. “Even at this late stage, I’ve had emails, WhatsApps, phone calls from people trying to get their players right in the mix.”The Professional Cricketers’ Association estimated that around 300 domestic players have agents, the majority of whom are in regular communication with those running Hundred teams. The extent of agents’ influence depends on who you ask, but teams are generally more interested in updates on injury and availability than lists of statistics or footage.There are 30 contracts available in the men’s draft on Thursday, of which 10 will go to overseas players. A handful of domestic players are certain to attract interest, and some have verbal guarantees from teams: Tom Abell, for example, has for several weeks been pencilled in as Hussey’s captain at Fire.But others will watch the draft with a sense of anxiety, particularly those who have missed out before. The potential fall-back of a deal nearer the time – either as one of two ‘wildcard’ selections after the Vitality Blast, or as a replacement – is no substitute for the security of a contract four months before the Hundred’s opening fixture.Some counties will be playing pre-season games on Thursday, and might be in the field when the men’s draft starts at 5pm. “I might be out in the field, so I might have to get someone to give me a wave if I’ve been picked up,” says Olly Stone. “I’m not 100% sure at the moment but hopefully, a selection somewhere will come.”Stone was released by Phoenix after missing the Hundred through injury. “They didn’t want to retain me, or they’d already used their retentions, so I’m back in the draft,” he says. He has had contracts with Phoenix and Northern Superchargers, but is yet to feature in the competition: “I’m guessing I’ll have a new team this year. It could be third time lucky, as they say.”With only one English head coach in the men’s competition – James Foster at Superchargers – most coaches rely heavily on their general managers, assistant coaches and analysts for advice ahead of the draft. Some Hundred teams draw heavily on players from their affiliated counties, often due to shared support staff; others ignore them altogether.Decisions at the draft often seem baffling – and sometimes, they are. But in general, they can be explained by the fact that teams are not starting from a blank canvas, but working back from what they expect their best XI to be, and using their draft picks to fill in gaps left after confirming their retentions in February.Moeen Ali signs autographs after Birmingham Phoenix’s victory over Trent Rockets•PA Images via Getty ImagesThat means that wicketkeeper-batters, for example, will be in high demand on Thursday, since there are several spots to fill: Tom Banton has scored 179 runs in 14 innings in the Hundred, but will probably be drafted for at least £75,000. By contrast, most teams have already identified their main spin options so some consistent T20 performers may not win deals at all.Trent Woodhill, the competition’s high-performance consultant, is tasked with ensuring that as many leading male overseas players as possible register their names for the draft. And despite a series of late pull-outs – led by Mitchell Starc and Anrich Nortje – there are more than 350 names competing for 10 spots on Thursday.But availability is a constant headache. “It’s very, very difficult to know what is going on with the international schedule,” Flindall says. “We’ve got the Future Tours Programme until 2027, but things tend to move about a bit. It’s not as much in the interests of overseas boards to make players available, compared to ECB where it’s in their interests that the competition is a success.”This year, straight after the Ashes, are all the Australian players going to be available? There’s a Pakistan series against Afghanistan at the end of August that may or may not impact things. You’ve got the CPL and the US league going on. There’s a few moving parts – you have to really factor in availability for your overseas players.”The result is that every year, high-profile overseas players have gone unsold; this year, several teams have opted to retain players who are only on the fringes of international teams in the hope that they are more likely to be released to appear in the competition. More and more teams are looking to prioritise availability, and signing domestic players with their early picks.”There will be overseas players taken at £60,000 who are better players than domestic players taken at £125,000 – just look at last year,” says Freddie Wilde, an analyst and strategic consultant for Oval Invincibles. “Availability is a massive challenge in a lot of leagues – even the IPL – and the Hundred is no different. There are fewer rival leagues – the CPL starts towards the back-end – but there are often bilateral series that crop up.The studio set-up for the inaugural Hundred draft in 2019•Getty Images”Sometimes you will draft an inferior player because he’s fully available; or you might go the other way, and say ‘we’d rather have a better player for five games than a worse player for eight games’. Different teams will go about it in different ways, and there’s no right or wrong answer.”Invincibles have consistently loaded up on domestic players early in the draft, holding back two overseas selections for later on. “We’ve always had Sunil Narine at £125,000,” Wilde adds, “but we’ve always liked to wait for our other overseas picks. We’ve got multiple plans or scenarios that we might adopt, and which one we go for is largely dependent on who is taken before our first turn.”Some overseas players also enter the draft with a high reserve price, knowing they are unlikely to be picked. Last year, Tabraiz Shamsi went unsold at the top reserve price of £125,000 but signed a pro rata deal with Rockets as a replacement when Rashid Khan was unavailable; Adam Zampa has registered for the draft with the top reserve price this year, in anticipation of a similar replacement deal elsewhere.Related

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Phoenix, meanwhile, managed to retain Shadab Khan for 2023 despite the fact that his replacement deal last summer was so short-lived, it was never even circulated to other teams. “We got retentions rights on him,” Flindall explains, “so it was an obvious pick for us.”It is a situation that epitomises the bizarre world of drafts in short-form cricket, particularly in a tournament that has predominantly been viewed through the lens of a sportstainment event rather than a cricket league with competitive integrity. Scrutiny and transparency surrounding player recruitment have both been negligible.Players are relieved that the draft is back on live TV this year, having been staged behind closed doors over the last two years with picks subsequently drip-fed out via press release. But for those making the picks, being back on the clock – albeit remotely, rather than in the Sky studio – might induce some nervous flashbacks.”In 2019, when we picked Kane Williamson, I couldn’t find him on the software system,” Flindall recalls. “It was probably only for 10 seconds, but it felt like about 40 – and you only had 100 to make each pick. I was in this mad panic, live on Sky: ‘S***, I can’t find Kane, what am I going to do?'” The ECB will hope that things run more smoothly on Thursday.

On Tuesday, Stoinis muscled LSG to an elusive home win with a takedown of Mumbai’s fast bowlers

Deivarayan Muthu17-May-20232:52

Moody explains how Stoinis outsmarted Mumbai Indians

The Ekana Stadium didn’t roll out the black-soil turner for the final league game in Lucknow this IPL, but the red-soil one was just as difficult for all batters – except Marcus Stoinis.He was the only one to strike at over 170 on that track, his expertly-paced unbeaten 89 off 47 balls being the difference on Tuesday. Like most other batters on the day, Stoinis had started slowly, scoring 35 off his first 29 balls, but cranked up to top gear to smash 54 off his last 18.This was Stoinis’ best IPL score. This is already Stoinis’ best IPL season in terms of both runs (368) and strike rate (151.44). Before this game, a large chunk of Stoinis’ runs had come away from Lucknow on better batting tracks. Lucknow Super Giants might have been tempted to bump him up to the top, where he has been successful for Melbourne Stars in the BBL, once they decided to bench Kyle Mayers for their last home fixture. Instead, LSG promoted Deepak Hooda to open with Quinton de Kock and backed Stoinis’ muscle in the middle order.ESPNcricinfo LtdStoinis channelled all of that power in the 18th over, bowled by Chris Jordan. He went 6, 4, 4, 6, 4. The first ball was a 144kph length ball on the stumps that disappeared beyond the bigger long-on boundary. It brought up Stoinis’ half-century and had LSG’s mentor Gautam Gambhir on his feet, applauding the landmark. Jordan then took pace off the ball, but Stoinis still picked away him for fours on either side of the wicket. Then Jordan marginally missed the yorker and bowled a low full toss. It was still a hard-to-hit delivery, but Stoinis extended his arms and launched another six over the long-on fence. Jordan was left scratching his head in utter disbelief.Related

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But this sequence wasn’t particularly special because Stoinis always dominates Jordan in T20 cricket. Overall, Stoinis has taken Jordan for 151 runs off just 61 balls at a strike rate of almost 250 without being dismissed in T20s. However, the one-handed sixes off both Jason Behrendorff and Akash Madhwal in the 19th and 20th overs were truly remarkable.Both Behrendorff and Stoinis play for Western Australia in domestic cricket. The left-armer knows that Stoinis relishes pace on the ball, so he denied him pace and pushed a dipping yorker away from his swinging range. Stoinis got beaten by the change-up, and his bottom hand flew off the bat on impact, but he still manufactured enough power and elevation with one hand to clear long-off. Madhwal then just missed his middle-stump yorker on the final ball of the innings, but Stoinis created swinging room and enough power with just one hand again to clear long-off.2:31

Bishop: The way Stoinis paced his innings was superb

The yorker is arguably the bowler’s best delivery in T20 cricket, but Stoinis’ swing is so powerful that he can hit sixes off that length with just one hand on a used pitch. Kieron Pollard, who used to do this often on the field, was helplessly watching all the carnage unfold from Mumbai’s dugout.Tom Moody, the former Australia allrounder and an analyst at ESPNcricinfo, tried to make sense of Stoinis’ one-handed bombs.”It’s been done with the pace of the delivery, so therefore he gives his bottom hand away, but still the velocity of the swing coming down through the arc and he just extends the swing through with the top hand in control of the striking of the ball,” Moody said on ESPNcricinfo’s T20 Time:Out. “It takes strength, it takes balance and control because you still have to have your head in a strong position. If you throw your head back from that position, the ball is going nowhere. It’s a case of he’s been done [in] there, but he just extends that top hand through the ball to make sure he gets maximum contact.”That ability to hold his shape and use his reach has also helped him get on top of spinners this IPL. It was on display against Mumbai Indians again, with punchy sixes off Hrithik Shokeen and Piyush Chawla soon after the powerplay. With LSG currently third, this skill could also prove useful in spin-friendly Chennai for the playoffs. Throw in the pace dominance, and Stoinis has proved to be a man for all surfaces this season.

Valkerie Baynes and Firdose Moonda discuss Australia’s victory in the Women’s Ashes Test at Trent Bridge

ESPNcricinfo staff27-Jun-2023Australia took a 4-0 lead in the points-based women’s Ashes by winning a hard-fought Test at Trent Bridge. Afterwards, Valkerie Baynes and Firdose Moonda got together for Ladies who Switch to discuss a record-breaking performance from Ashleigh Gardner, the bravery of Alyssa Healy and what it all means for England’s chances of regaining the Ashes.