Test Match Special - No Balls: The Cricket Podcast - G'day folks!

Episode Date: January 13, 2022

Our dynamic duo have made to Australia. Excitement for Alex as she commentates on her first men's Test, whilst Kate is easing into a busy schedule ahead of the start of the Ashes.

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And cross strikes in the first over. It's what England we're looking for. Partly falls down. the track comes scoring this time she connects it's either six or out it's six it's six hello and welcome back to

no balls cricket packet podcast with me Alex Hartley and you Kate Cross new year new us yes still messing up the intro obviously remember in fact

no it was my turn to introduce because you forgot our name last week go on then hello and welcome back to nobles the cricket podcast for me kate cross and you Alex hartley coming live from australia mate it's so good they introduced it twice yeah nice well played nice guys happy new year everyone this is officially our first one we've recorded in 2022 and i'm really enjoying the fact that we've just had a really down conversation and been like grumpy ass and we podcast turned it on we know this is what we're getting paid for Al true true you actually messaged me yesterday like do want to do the podcast I was like no it's work and I need a day off yeah you've been busy haven't you you landed and literally

went straight into a test match yeah and then we'll get into that yeah we will we need to talk mashes but yeah you've been well we've barely spoke to be honest it's been really hard to like and then I text you like I'm so glad you're in Australia because I went like like two weeks out of speaking to you. And I said on the air that you were probably like a lost puppy, and you text me saying, no, I've got the zoomies. So we landed and I turned TMS on to have a listen. Because I couldn't, for some reason, I couldn't get my, what's it called,

VPN working, so I couldn't watch the cricket. And then I was like, oh, listen to you. And I don't often listen to you on the radio, I must admit. And I was like, I want a shout out. And I want you to say the washes. And I'll give you four pound if you do. And then the radio cut off the second. and you started talking about it.

I was like, I've missed it. I missed it all. So you rewind it, didn't you? I didn't even know you could rewind the radio, but there you go. I learnt something. It's 2022, so you can do whatever you want. It is 2022.

Happy New Year, everyone. Happy New Year, it's late. When was the last one we recorded? We don't even know. Well, do you remember this time last year when we kept saying Happy New Year at the start of every podcast? And we were like,

when do you stop saying, Happy New Year to people? And I think it was probably three days. ago and we're still going. I've not seen anyone to say Happy New Year though because I can't wait to see you. What, you're not,

you don't say Happy New Year to people after New Year? I've not said it, I've not said it to anyone yet. Oh. I'm going to, every time I see anyone now, I'll get a Happy New Year. It could get to October. If you've not seen like Boisey since October,

you could be like, Happy New Year, mate. Should be like what? Yeah, exactly. Speaking of New Year, have you done any New Year's resolutions? Yes, yes. Talk me through it. Are you surprised?

I know you're surprised. I actually am because if I remember correctly, your last year's New Year's resolution was to not order as much takeaway. Yeah, and it didn't last very long. I think you had the world record for amount of takeaway ordered in a year. Do you remember? No, I'm not even going to go into it. Yeah, my New Year's resolution this year is to, eat more fruit and veg.

Nice. How's that going for you? Good. I had breakfast this morning. I had a smoothie bowl, so it's got all the fruit in it. I had a burger last night which had tomatoes,

onions and lettuce on it. I had some chips, which are potatoes. Actually, that spot us a bit of a debate we had in the England team the other day. Would you consider a potato

as a vegetable? No. See, I do. And Heather Knight was like, mate, it's not a veg. Like, you can't have chips as vegetables.

No, it's not a vegetable. I do not class white, but I do class sweet potatoes as a vegetable. But anything, for me, my point of view, anything that grows from the ground or from a tree is fruit of veg. Like, technically, you're right. Potatoes grow from the ground. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, technically you are right. Why are we talking about potatoes again?

Yeah, spuds. Spuds everywhere. Have you got any New Year's resolutions? I've actually not set myself any this year. I did stick to mine last year, which I think I'm the first. first person in the history of the world to ever stick to new year's resolutions you did what was it remind everybody again all right i'll just remind everyone how brilliant i am um it was to donate something to charity every month and i did i managed to complete it quite often you'd just resort to money

though wouldn't you every month was money i had no time to donate i just donated money to stuff but it it definitely made me feel better which is what a new year's resolution's about But I also felt like I was giving something back. So... Yeah. And you actually did a real fair bit of... You actually did more than charity this year, Crossy. Like, far more than charity.

Well, I'm still mates with you, so... Yeah, and you let me live with you for what was supposed to be six weeks. And by the time we get home from Australia, it'll have been a year. It wasn't charity, because you actually did pay me rent. And then I realised when you flew to Australia, you'd gone three months without giving me rent and left the country. No, I hadn't. No, I hadn't. Yes, you had.

It was 300 pounds worth. So it was like six weeks. 21st of September was my last bit of rent. No, it wasn't. No, no, no. I was. I swear in my life because it was in November. It was in October because I checked.

I checked. I checked. My last money from you was September the 21st. Nah. Yeah. Because then I've not paid you enough then. Well, we need to not have this chat on the podcast. No, no, no.

I'm going to screenshot it because I definitely. sent you £400 when you said take 30 quid off for Guster. Right, we'll definitely have this. This is not the conversation for the podcast. But, yeah, so you... You text me being like, any danger of sending me rent? I was like, oh, oh, shit. I was like, any danger of you not leave in the country

without paying any rent? It was so drastic. It was like one time, right, the first ever time I came to Australia, the Halifax sent a letter home being like, Alex is overdue. Overdrawn. Not overdue.

I can't have my period. It's fine. Overdrawn by this amount of money. And in block capital, it's like, do not leave the country. And you're in Australia. My mum sent me a picture and was like, they've said don't leave the country. I was like, oh my God, how much do I owe them? She was like, 3P.

Oh, you're choking. Overdrawn by 3P? What did you buy? I don't know. So I sent my mum 3P and she paid it. before me. It was probably one of them neck pillows that everyone buys at the airport because they forget to take the neck pillow that they last bought at the airport. Yeah, there it is. There it is. Every time, people must own like 75 neck pillows because they just don't remember where they put it from

the last time they traveled. And do you know what? I don't even use it because they're really uncomfortable. They're terrible. They are. They're awful. They're actually better. This is life hack for you. If you put it the other way around so that it sits your chin in a position because then you can't bobblehead right i'm going to do that yeah it's a game change honestly um speaking of charity we got offered before we left a bit of a deal um with a again um the tree man was called the tree man on twitter who has offered offered to pay us 10 pound for every leaf not to pay us to pay charity of our choice 10 pound for every leaf we grow on the dead tree Yeah, but there was a bit of a problem.

Oh my God, it was so tragic. We started off with 16 leaves because we counted them. Would you like to explain to everybody how many we have now? I've not asked, I've not checked. The tree is in rehab and I've just thought, out of sight, out of mind, but it has to be less than eight. Yeah, but crossy, you chopped the head off the tree. I know, the three most thriving leaves that were on that thing.

I didn't judge the size of it. And I put it in the car to take it to rehab and they chopped off. I was devastated. Oh my God. When you sent me a video, it's like, oh no, we're going back. So we actually owe Dan money?

We owe charity money, yeah. So I gave it to my mum, and I'd rung her and I said, would you be happy enough to have the responsibility of looking after the tree while I'm away? She was like, yeah, yeah, bring it over. And I took it out of the car, and she was like, what is that?

Now for anybody that hasn't listened to our previous episodes Christine Cross actually revived one of Crossie's previous plants and Crossie was like oh my god you're a miracle worker turns out she put it in the bin and bought a new one that looked exactly the same and gave it me for my birthday as a gift yeah cheers so I did say to her I was like you can't buy a new one it's not allowed I'd need you to just please try and look after it fix it we'll keep you updated

yeah At longest intro ever, have we asked each other how you are? No, because we did this on the call beforehand and we weren't okay, so I thought we better not do. For podcast purposes, are you okay? Yeah. Yeah. No, I actually have. Now we've had this chat, I feel so much better.

The podcast always makes us feel better, doesn't it? Yeah, we should have done it yesterday. Yeah, we really should have. Do you want to ask me? Are you okay? I was just going to talk about how I am and you didn't ask me. You're okay? Yeah, and no.

I had a really tough 10 days leading up to this flight where I didn't really see another human being and it was tough. And then jet lag, quarantine, it all got to me yesterday. And we need to safe live and be very well-behaved as a group for another six days to secure our bubble as a group. And then I think we can all relax. But it's just a bit all up in the air at the minute.

And yeah, it's tough, especially when you're jet-lagged and you're knackered and, yeah. I f***ed it yesterday. Go on. I sent you a really nice message being like, Crossie, you've been through worse, you've got this. And I was like, I'm going to send her a little voice note to cheer her up. And you were like, nice one. You're out, having dinner. And I said to Henry, I said, I can't text her ever again.

I said, I'm going to go jump in. I said, I'm going to jump in the sea. I think I'm going to get in the bin I think yeah I must have me I wanted to put you in the bin yesterday so I forwarded the message that you sent on to a few people to just get a feel to be like

am I really tired or is this not okay and they were like what is she playing at like what is she but the first message was lovely and then do you know what it was it was that if it's any consolation and I thought you were going to then be like

I'm locked into and you're like I've snuck out I'm in a bar and I was like, oh Yeah, I think what I meant is what I'd actually been in safe living while I was in Sydney and not been out, not doing anything, didn't really explain that to you. No, there was not a lot of context

in the message and I was like, right, getting... Shock. Yeah, I hardly know context. So I just didn't text you until this afternoon. Yeah. Which is probably the longest we've ever gone without texting, but I thought she needed space, I'm going to leave her alone. Yeah, yeah, yesterday was not a good day for me. It was a dark day.

But we're here now. We're moving on. We've moved on. And I think on a completely separate note, we should talk about how bloody brilliant our episode was last week. It was, wasn't it? With H. So good. And we've had amazing messages. Honestly, the feedback, and we've not even read the email, so I dread to think how many there is in there. But the Instagram and the tweets and just the power of their ability to. explain to a lot of people who didn't understand because that's been a lot of the feedback that we've got but honestly blown away like I went through the nobles email the other day at the ground when I was off air and the first one was thank you h for telling your story thank you h thank you h thank you h and there was just message after email after email so everybody like thank you so much for getting in touch like it does mean the world to us doesn't it and we've passed

every single message onto H as well so they've been able to read it but yeah just amazing and I think we were we're always proud to do this podcast but to have a conversation like that with someone that we love and trust so much to get it right because we knew they would because they're so brilliant but like

no one in the world of sport is really talking about that and hopefully it really changes things for a few people and with that I don't think we'll ever top it so this is where we end our podcast yeah this is it we're 2020 two done and dusted baby but we're retiring we should probably talk about the mashes before we finish all right okay yeah let's talk about everything that has been going on since christmas okay so i've got one question for you and it's probably going to sum up the mashers so far and i want your honest

answer i want you to not think too much go with your gut would you shave your head so that jack leach could sign your head. Yeah, easy. You would. Yeah. I've always said I've wanted to shave my head, and if it means Jack Leach, fellow left arm spinner, because sign my bonts, then yeah.

Whoa, was that? Who? Got the head signed by Jack? If that was you, please get in touch with us because I really would love to know the thinking behind it. It was one of the best things I've seen. I was actually on air at the time, and I was like, I think I've just seen something extraordinary down at the fine leg.

I didn't know whether to say it or not, because we're losing. It's been like, everyone's down in the dumps. And I was like, you know what? I've just seen somebody get their head signed by Jack Leach. What have they done with it? I mean, is it still signed? Was it a permanent marker? Did you use a Sharpie?

We need the answers. The way Leach just dismissed the pen afterwards. I can't believe I've just done that. Jack Leach, though, it worked. He had a great game. He did. He did. Came back fighting.

Yeah, yeah, and Crossy, there is something I need to say. I made my debut on the men's ashes. On your first test match game? First test match game. I said I was going to be the good luck charm. I've never lost a test match. Very, very true. So I was going around the comms box to be like, have you lost a test match?

I haven't. Have you? I haven't. And Adam Moutreveld was like, I will send you home. I love that. Sit down and shut up. Jonathan Agnew was like honestly, I've lost hundreds Oh wow

Gosh I mean it was It felt really odd Celebrating a draw And it I celebrated like we won Yeah you messaged me And you're like

I'm buzzing And I was like What But that last ball was For me The last ball Summed it up Because everyone was like

Oh Is that Is that it What was that That was terrible That was the second Worst delivery of the game The first being

Joe Roots leggy that went down the leg side. What about Joe Leach bouncing someone and Ollie Pope taking it? Like, Ollie Pope's been behind the stumps for years. Honestly, he kept so well. He did. He did really well, didn't it? I think there's like an element with wicket-keeping of just having enthusiasm gets you a very long way.

And Ollie Pope seems to have that in abundance. When Butler's keeping, you don't hear anything from behind the stumps, you don't like hear anything. All you can hear is, come on, nut, come on, nut, keep going, nut. I always think Josh Butler's the kind of cricketer that you can't tell when he's happy but whoa you can tell when he's angry

yeah he looked really hurt in that test match and I felt so sorry for him having to bat twice well it must be a bad injury for him to A, be going home obviously but it sounds like it needs surgery so for him to bat and carry on keeping yeah

like yeah England England are plagued by injuries Honestly, I reckon Graham Thorpe could be batting four in this Hobart test And what's that keeper called that's out there as keeping coach? James Foster Is he there? He could be getting a gig.

He came in. Aga's opening the bowling. I did see as well that I've seen a lot of really good stuff about Joe Root. Like when the Barmy Army always sing Jerusalem, he claps them from first slip or if he's batting. he always gives them a thumbs up or something. He'll always get some kind of kit for any of the Barmy army

that he sees in the street or who asks photographs, things like that. And he obviously was dogs slinging for the team because they were so short on coaches this week leading into that test match. And then I saw he got out in the second innings on day five of a test match and he went straight to the nets and had a net with a pink ball.

Like, does this guy ever stop? It just shows why he's our best batter. Well, yeah. And it's funny, isn't it? Because you'd never, ever, ever see a bowler, be like, I'll just nip to the nets and bowl a couple of overs with the pink ball now. There is one more thing, though, about Joe Root. He got hitting the nuts again.

Again. And we need to get him on. We really need to get him on. We do. Because apparently he's double boxing now, you know. Is that a thing? Apparently so. Well, I must admit, because now he got hit again and he just didn't really flinch.

And I was like, oh, he's either numb or something's going on that's helping him. He's double boxing. Wow. Right, okay. I mean, it was obviously working. Yeah. Zach Crawley got hit in the Joe Roots, took it like a trooper. Yeah.

Yeah, love that, get hit in the Joe Roots. Maybe we should call this Joe Root the Cricket Podcast. Oh, Joe Root. Anyway, enough about that, enough about that. Have you got anything on your sticky note? I've just gone through it all. Oh, have you? You literally just whizz through it all with you, yeah?

Right. I have something on mine. That makes a change. Yeah. It's blown my mind a little bit actually in it, and I really want to discuss it with you. And I know full well that our listeners will also want to discuss it with us.

Okay. But when you stay in a hotel and you go out for the day and you come back and your room's been cleaned. Where do all the half-use toilet rolls go? Because they just changed them for new ones. Do they? Yeah, I haven't had a half-a-roll of toilet roll since I got here.

It's always been swapped for a brand-new roll. It's a great question, actually. I have asked myself a similar question, but I've never known them to go halfway through a stay. I've always thought, like, when you turn up to a hotel, it's always brand-new toilet roll, so then where do that? they go the only thing I would think is that you'd take it home the cleaners yeah and you just

never have a fresh toilet roll at home if you were a hotel cleaner yeah and like the shampoos the body lotions like that really reminds me actually so you moved out of the flat early in late or late December early January I can't remember just before you flew towards you gave me the keys back and I've obviously moved out as well now because I'm over in Australia so I've given the keys to Georgie Boyce to kind of look after the flat make sure it's all right stay there if she needs to and I went into your bathroom to clean and just generally have a bit of a tidy up and you had three half toilet rolls in there but they were on your toilet roll stand and it yeah do you know what it's from it's from COVID so is it from the hotels

that you've been cleaning and you've brought them home. No, it's when I had COVID. I had a roll on the sofa, a roll in my bed and the toilet roll because I always had a snotty nose. Ah, I did wonder what on earth was going on there. Yeah, and I did think that I've got tissue everywhere. Yeah. I forgot to ask you about it, actually.

That did just remind me. Good question, yeah, good one. Maybe leave a note and ask them. I have one thing, and it's an LBW, but I think it needs to be mentioned now. Okay. So Julia Hartley, mother of Alex Hartley, me, said to me the other day, I'm going to clean the bathroom.

Did she refer to yourself in the third person? Yeah, weird. I've lost the plot. Okay, we've gone feral. Yeah. Said to me, I'm going to go clean the bathroom. I was like, all right, okay, I go upstairs and hear the shower running. I was like, okay, she's cleaning the bathroom.

But no, what my mum does is has a shower and bleaches the shower while she's in it. What? Yeah, so I'm like, do you not get bleach on your feet? your body she's like well it just washes off that sounds highly dangerous doesn't it so she'll like bleach the whole bathroom while she's like naked having a shower julia that that is a hazard that you don't want to be getting bleach in orifices in the nether regions in the jo roots do not want to be getting bleach in your jo roots my mom does not have jo roots no she doesn't but remember me not I don't know no you're not allowed to ask that question remember H's advice has never ask anyone what

they've got between the legs but if you've got pretty sure i came out of what's between my mother's yeah yeah i know but i'm just saying the area is the jo roots yeah but imagine if you like get yeah if she's like got it on her hands and she cleans the jo roots well surely she's not bleaching and then giving herself a scrub right we've gone too deep into this not we've not gone too deep into the joe roots but we've gone too deep into the thinking about your mum naked yeah she's cleaning the bathroom thinking about it? Maybe don't try this at home.

It's an LBW. Good disclaimer. Yeah. Shall we go on to some, not emails, but tweets this week. Who we're going upstairs? Who we're going upstairs with.

I think you should decide. I'd like to go back upstairs with Anna Harris this week because I don't know if you saw, but on Twitter she got, it's stupid, it's so Twitter. She got abuse because she put that she'd been volunteering to help

with the COVID vaccination thing that's happening back in the UK. And people were like, oh, do you want a medal? Yes, Anna should have a medal. Let's give her a medal for everything that a girl does. Yeah, exactly. So let's go upstairs with Anna. Let's give her a medal, literally. So we've had one here from Glenn.

It says on TMS, I heard Alex talk about her exercise regime. I read this yesterday, actually, and I didn't read this. the rest of the tweet and I actually thought, what was she talking about on her? Literally, what was she saying on it? And he then goes on to say, I know that all the professional cricketers undergo some exercise patterns, but are there any set up for particular disciplines like batting versus fielding versus bowling plus spin versus fast bowling? So I'd love to know what you were talking about with your exercise regime. Maybe I was saying it's, there's nothing there. I don't know. I can't remember. No, I think I was saying that we do the 2K time trial as

bowlers. Right. What on the batters do the yo-yo? Yeah, the batters have started doing the yo-yo. That's what they're going to do at Lanks. But luckily for me, with the late call up to the ashes, I actually avoided January fitness testing. Yeah, you smashed it, didn't you? I actually saw the girls, and it was the day of the yo-yo, and they were so anxious, and you'd literally flown that morning, so you did very well. Does that mean you're going to have to do it and you get back? Yeah, but I don't, I'm running here. You know, I ran today. No one saw. And there's one time. Did you even run if it's not on Instagram?

But in terms of exercise patterns for batting, fielding and bowling, yeah, wicketkeepers are particularly different as well. Obviously, they've got to have a lot of leg strength, haven't they? But we've been doing loads of work fielding-wise on lower leg strength and being able to be like dynamic. Yeah, being dynamic and strong enough to be able to get in to low fielding positions, but also then be able to get out of them to throw. So we've done loads of work on that. And fast bowlers, it's just literally anything that keeps your core strong, your back strong, your side strong. Obviously, we saw Ben Strokes had a little injury with his side as well in that last test.

But that's probably the biggest difference. I would say that fastballers have that real rigid core that they've got to work hard on. Yeah, you've got a six-pack, whereas I very much don't. I don't think that's to do with cricket, Al. Got one from Nikki. It says, who are your best friends in cricket? It feels sad that Alex has now moved out. and will you actually miss living together?

I'm a toaster out, a knife washer. Go well in the Ashes Cross Eat, bring them home. Alex, look forward to more great commentary. Well, who are my best friends in cricket? Kate Cross? I'm as sad I've moved out. No, but it was really nice living with you.

Yeah. Good way of summing up that as well, I think. I think we've done well to survive it. Yeah. Survives a strong word. It was not. It was great living with you. We had so much fun.

I wish we hadn't had. had any COVID limitations while we were living together. Like that would have been nice to have actually experienced going out more and being able to do more bits without the worry of cricket and COVID. But I've never lived on my own. So I think it's going to be quite strange. I'm excited for you. But you did, you said something to me like I was laid on the sofa.

And you're like, I think I'm going to really struggle when I get back from Loughborough and the house be empty. I like coming back to somebody to talk to and somebody in the house. And I was like, I can still be here. Yeah. I think as well, though, when you're like, live with someone. And I think this is where our relationship changed a little bit through that period. But you don't do as much because when I see you, it was in the living room when I came

back from Loughborough and we'd catch up. Whereas if you don't live with me, we probably arranged to go out for dinner that night and have a catch up. Not Loughborough night because I'm always knackered when I come back from Loughbber. But you know what I mean? Like you. You arranged to do stuff and I think we probably didn't do as much because of the fact that we were living together. We do text and ring each other and stuff more now I moved out two weeks ago which is really weird But again when you're living together you know what you're up to Like I knew I knew you were going to training

I knew you're doing whatever So you don't need to text and be like This is happening or But we do now we're good for our friendship Now we don't live together Not that it was bad for our relationship That we live together Yeah

No I think yeah yeah yeah no I get you And I'm more excited for you That you're going to actually get to move into your flat that we've been talking about for 18 months on this podcast now. Honestly, honestly. I thought it'd be done before I flew to Australia, and it's not, and it's doing mine nothing. Anyway, a question here.

When do we get introduced to the amazing Danny Wyatt on the podcast? Ah, what a timely question. That is, what a timely question. She's not on this episode. No, she's not. We don't have a guest this week, if you've not noticed. But we're going to ask her to come on and do our ashes preview. Yes, I forgot to ask her today, so I will put that on my today.

do list tomorrow that's fine i'm sure she's been asking to come on for ages what was the biggest tip this is from derrick by the way or something that has helped you the most to where you are today and conversely what's the worst piece of advice you've been given in life or cricket because in cricket it's stay tall it's to get to where you are today um there's no nugget of advice that's ever stuck in my mind to make me the person i am now i've always been a bit of a rat bag great word nice I like that no you know what

think before you speak I've got better at doing that but also still don't do it which makes me who I am yeah that's fair the advice you get so much at this level or at any level really and we give it out all the time

is enjoy what you do yeah but it's it's not good advice because how do you do that how do you just enjoy being under so much pressure all the time mostly from yourself spending 10 days in your house isolated. Yeah, it's a strange bit of advice,

but it really sticks with me because I know I'm a better cricketer and a better person when I'm enjoying myself, when I'm having some fun, and it's just so hard to get. You almost have to have a really bad moment in your life or career

to be able to enjoy it because you realise it's not the be all and end all. It's just the game. Worst bit of advice you've ever been given? I mean, if it was, really bad you wouldn't remember it, would you? Yeah, yeah, so I don't actually know. Maybe that is the worst bit, enjoy yourself.

Yeah, because I've gone off the rails a few times. Just enjoy yourself. Just enjoy yourself. No, I don't think there's, I don't think, I've obviously been given bad advice, but it doesn't stick with you because you don't listen. Yeah. Actually, some bad bit of advice I got once was from a bowling coach in 2015 who tried to change my bowling action.

and if anyone like actually looks at my bowling action in detail I don't use my front arm like a lot of fast bowlers do like it always remains straight and a lot of fast bowlers like pull it in to their side I don't do that so they tried to get me to pull it in and it oh my god it threw my timing out so much and I played a test match with this new action it was honestly horrendous like the worst I've ever bowled in international cricket so like technically that was the worst bit of advice I got given because it just didn't work for me. Yeah, I mean, technically, when a coach tells you to change something and you lose your England contract, you know, it's not great, is it? Exactly. Not good. No, not good. What's the story behind Alex's late call up to TMS?

What do you both think about the prioritising slash balancing red ball cricket versus whiteball cricket? The story was I flew out to Australia just early for the women's ashes, just in case I needed to quarantine in Sydney for two weeks. it turns out I didn't so the BBC said well you might as well work nice I mean it's great job for you isn't it great opportunity oh my god honestly because it's been amazing like amazing and you've only been there four minutes I've worked on a men's test match like I've only been commentating a couple of years it's crazy yeah so good so like as well it's so good for the women's game as well because not not until recently was

the people on there who knew enough about the women's game to help promote it and now whenever I listen, even I was watching the Big Bash last night and they were immediately talking about the women's ashes. Yeah. And the fact that that's coming up and it's just, it makes people more aware that women play cricket as well,

which I think's great. What do you both think about prioritising balancing red ball cricket versus white ball cricket? I think that's a really interesting debate at the minute actually and obviously something that the ECB, in particular Ashley Giles, has come out and spoken about. But I'm just really glad that I am not in a position

to be making those kind of decisions because as it stands, did you just like one of my posts on Instagram? Yeah, I went on the archive to get, if you put any questions for the podcast and I noticed that I hadn't liked your picture on the no balls. It's just said no balls like my post. Also, what about when I liked my own post by accident

and I'm doing it off the no balls account? So you're obviously guaranteed a like because we've got the no balls account, so we always like each of those photos. And I went on yours, I was like, Oh, mate, you've liked your own picture pile. You need to sort that out. Anyway, back to serious cricket chat.

I'm just really glad that I'm not in a position to have to make those decisions because as it stands, the schedule is so manic, but I genuinely don't know how it's going to get fixed. You can't not play cricket. You can't not play whiteball cricket in the height of summer. You're going to have players missing out. Like, I don't want to be Ashley Giles.

That's what I mean. And I do, I think, I genuinely think, like, the time of year that they're playing red ball cricket has been a big deciding factor in maybe why the test match team hasn't done as well as they should have done over the last couple of years. Or is the Duke's ball doing too much? And when you get over here, it's not doing as much. It should be easier to play over here then.

Yeah, but they're used to maybe leaving balls that are going to miss the stumps and they end up hearing the stumps. Ben Stokes, can we talk about that? Got bold. and the pail didn't come off. What? There's so much crazy stuff that has happened in this mashes.

It's so mad, isn't it? It is mad. Also, we should probably touch on the fact that our washes has been brought forward. Oh yeah, forgot about that. Really should talk about that. So our first game is soon.

Yeah, and you've not got much prep time. We don't. However, I was going to say we knew about it. We didn't know about it at all. We found out three days before we flew that this was going to happen. We knew it probably would happen, but we found out for definite. So we're now starting with the T20s, which I think is the most sensible way of doing it,

because in terms of workloads for bowlers to bring the test match forward would have been a bit unrealistic. So it's going to be interesting, but we obviously know that Australia are in the same boat as well. Are they, though, because they're in the middle of the season. They're playing cricket. They are, but they've also had a lot of disruption with COVID. I saw the WNCL was cancelled and postpone and stuff. So I think everyone's a bit probably undercut. I mean it's easy to say that now.

I literally don't have a clue, I'm guessing. But what I did say to the girls was everyone was kind of panicking about the fact that we get there and we land and we've got nine days and we will men have closer to 15, 16 days prep before our first game. And I was like, if we were in Loughborough for nine days before a tour, we'd be like that is too long. It just feels so short because it's been shortened. Yeah.

I mean, it's not a long time, crossy. it's not and I think we are genuinely are going to lose some prep but what can we do we're just going to have to go out there and play our best cricket I'm glad the T20s are first because anything can happen in T20s yeah like it takes one person to get a score for you to then win the game in a T20 or one person to get a couple of wickets which can happen when you're underprepared so I'm glad the T20s are first otherwise I genuinely would have been worried for the ashes yeah and as well we're obviously going straight to the World Cup afterwards so

having the one day is last feels like good prep for the World Cup up as well regardless of what the ashes results are at that stage so yeah that's true so even if even if you've lost the ashes you probably haven't but you just got right world cup prep yeah you can probably switch your attention quite quickly yeah I can't believe we didn't really talk about that it was quite a big big part of what's going on at the minute just save it for the last two or three minutes you know why not when everyone's turned off Alex what are you going to spend your four pound on great great question um I actually have already spent it yeah what did bye. I hired an electric scooter today to whizz around Hobart.

Scrut, scurt. Nice. Skirt, skirt, skirting around. I was skirting around. I have any good time, seeing some sites. So I've spent my four pounds. So I've, oh, I'm happy with that. I'll take that. Nice. It did make me laugh a lot when I got the notification. I came across sent you four pounds. I'm a clown. I'm a girl of my word. What can I say? You are. You are. So I know we mentioned it, but I'm going to pester Danny Wyatt to come on and do some washes prep with us because we're not far away from the washes starting nine days god i am excited excited for you excited to have wyatt on she's been pestering us for ages so now it's our turn to pester her she hasn't said yes either

so if she's not on next week that's why because we're not actually asked yet and we've got somebody else yeah you've got loads of people to pick from we'll definitely have a guess next week yeah we do um yeah we going back to like the washes prep and stuff and it's obviously not ideal but I just think there's something about awashes that gets you past all that kind of stuff and the excitement, the adrenaline, the being in Australia. Hopefully the sun comes out, by the way,

because it absolutely bucketed it down for our training session today. Like, I was a drowned rat. Because you aren't a rat, you're not a pig. I am a rat. Yeah, you'd be a little drowned piggy and I was an actual drowned rat. Oh, I did see you ringing out your T-shirt.

Made me laugh. Yeah, not a good day. Yeah, I'm going to tee up Agnew. for before he flies home so that we've got him we've got some guests coming up we'll try and get an Aussie shall we we're desperate to get Joe Root we are desperate Rudy come on come on Joe

this is our plea we're pleying in public guys please send your emails to no balls podcast at BBC.com.combeau UK No balls podcast at BBC.combec.combe It's so good they said it twice really slow that was random

that was Happy New Year, hope you're all well. Keep keeping on. See you next week. And a happy new year. And Merry Christmas, everyone. Hope you had a lovely Christmas. Merry Christmas.

Why didn't we say Merry Christmas? Bye. And cross strikes in the first over. It's what England we're looking for. Hartley Falls. Down the track comes scoring this time she connects. It's either six or out. It's six.

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