thefinalword

Stevo for England!

Season 10, Ep 5: Is he the first live-streaming superstar? The cricket world turned to a dodgy video feed from a gale-struck Canterbury as Darren Stevens produced one of the more audacious innings in the first-class game. Fifteen sixes later, he nearly reached a double ton while his batting partner made 1 run. It was just the latest in a series of scarcely believable episodes in an unusual cricketing life, having turned into a bowler at 35 years of age and still playing at 45...

Jesus, it's sandpaper again

Season 10, Ep 4: Horror movies teach us that if you don't annihilate the monster, it always comes back. Australia's ball-tampering story was never buried properly the first time around. This week we speak to Peter Lalor about the news side of the story that won't go away. Also, various squads, the county round, and a breezy chat with Australia's nearly-there cult hero Michael Neser.

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The Final Word with David Lloyd

Look at this lovely chap. Go on, have a look. There he is. What a good egg. 

For Season 10, Ep 3, we settled in for what we expected would be a decently long conversation, and hit stop on the tape an hour and a half later. The magic of Bumble, a man who really has done it all in cricket across nearly six decades. Player, coach, umpire, commentator, but still known most of all for always being ready with a laugh and a story, a kind word and a genial smile. 

The Final Word with Eleanor Oldroyd

Holy smoke, it's May already. That happened fast. Adam is flat out doing the Middlesex cricket commentary stream. It also ended up on Sky Cricket once the IPL went under. Geoff is working on a few projects in Melbourne. A few days ago, this episode went up.

Season 10, Ep 2: The IPL has been cancelled, Sri Lanka won a Test series, and there was a bonkers county round. But honestly all we really want to do this week is hang out and chat with Elly Oldroyd. She's done every...

India's deepening disaster, with Karunya Keshav

Season 10, Ep 1: This week Karunya wrote fiercely about the deafness of the Indian Premier League to the suffering outside its gates. She joins the show to explain the humanitarian disaster that has overtaken India during the biggest covid wave the world has seen.

We thoroughly recommend her article, which is here.

This starts a new season of The ...

A week of live audiences and live crosses

That's Glenn Maxwell up the top, who has made good on calling through to us from the heart of the IPL for three weeks running. Good follow-through from him. They've just moved from Chennai to Mumbai and are very aware of the harsh realities outside the bubble. You can watch that video, or find the audio version here.

Our studio audience special...

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The Final Word in front of a live studio audience

A reminder that you can join an (online) audience for the weekly Final Word show on Tuesday April 20. Neil Manthorp will also be joining us to give an update on dramatic recent political developments in South African cricket. 

The medium will be a video call on Zoom, and we'll be opening the call to you at 6:50pm Australian eastern time, or 4:50pm Perth time, or 2:20pm Indian time, or 9:50am UK time. The recording will start shortly afterwards, at the top of the hour. You should be...

The Final Word reviews Wisden 2021

Season 9, Ep 29: It's that time again: new Wisden Almanack time. In what has become a tradition – three years makes a tradition, right? – we sat down with Almanack editor Lawrence Booth to go through the pages of The Good Book and get his explanation of all that lies therein. The Wisden Five Cricketers, the essays, the editor's notes, and more. A fascinating year in retrospect, with all of the uncertainty and improvisation that was so unlovely to live through, but will ma...

Glenn Maxwell, India correspondent – plus TFW live

It happened. With the IPL is a biosecure fortress, Maxi has agreed to be our contact on the inside. First up is the escape from quarantine, and the chaos of pre-tournament week, where capitalism matters more than cricket. The video is above, the audio pod is here. 

Our next live broadcast

This won't be a live show as such, like previous times with a...

What we're doing with the Patreon page

Oh hey. You look nice. Good to see you. Really should have posted this episode last week, but then Easter happened and we actually turned off the computers for a few days. Hope you found it in the podcast feed. Or on the video, up top.

What are we doing?

Since we're trying to catch Jimmy Anderson by reaching 614 patrons and beyond, here's an update on what those numbers mean. Now that Story Time has become a permanent second show and the research is more involved, we're both spe...

Earl Eddings, William Wallace, Harsha Bhogle

Hello world. Up the top of the post you might recognise Harsha. If you're a long-time listener (first-time caller), you will have heard this interview from our Christmas 2018 show. But you won't have seen it, because we did take a video in case we ever had a use for it. Now we have a video channel, so up it goes. A few more videos from interviews past will go up soon.

Speaking of, that TFW YouTube channel went past 1 million views today. One moment...

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The Final Word goes to Brazil

Season 9, Ep 25: You may not associate Brazil with cricket. You may not know that 14 women recently won the country's first central contracts. But the game has been afoot in Brazil for some time, using innovative ways to help cricket take root rather than being transplanted from overseas, and in the process helping young Brazilians from disadvantaged places. It's one hell of a tale, ...

The Final Word with Mark Butcher

Season 9, Ep 24: At least one England cricketer came back from India with reputation enhanced: Mark Butcher, who was noticed for an excellent couple of Tests behind the microphone. His life before commentary included 71 Test matches, with a series of dramatic highs and drastic falls. Beyond cricket, he's a musician, a considered thinker, and someone who believes in the moral obligation to speak up for others. On The Final Word this week, a long conversation with Mark about li...

Somebody please beat the Breakers

Season 9, Ep 23: NSW win the 50-over comp every bloody year, but just for a moment the Breakers are fifth. Enjoy the novelty. This week we go back and forth over the Tasman for a range of formats, with some Shield corkers and some T20 madness, some men's games and some women's, some England and New Zealand and India and Australia, as well a detour to Abu Dhabi for Afghanistan and Zimbabwe and their future on free to air. What else? Javed Miandad’s I ❤️ NY hat, Keith Mil...

First ball, no worries. Plus the Bannerman Quotient.

You may have heard on a recent show about a particular shot over cover played by a particular person very unlikely to do so. By chance the square leg umpire Michael Olle decided to film Geoff's first ball at the crease, presumably anticipating something funny. So if you'd like to share in it, this moment from a career No.11 is captured forever.

Here too is page one of the Bannerman Quotient, assembled by Jeremy Bourke. The full 3-page PDF calculates the BQ for team scores all the way up...

Farewell to the Dan O'Connell Cricket Club

It's the fourth and final TFW post for February.

Season 9, Ep 22: A busy cricket week, even aside from the final match in the Yarra Pub Cricket Association for the storied DOCCC (est. 2007). The Dan is no more, but won three Premierships, set the standard for uniforms in the comp, and had a good last day out. (The final-over 2015 flag moment is pictured above.) We also look at ...

Pitch politics, the Final Word way

Firstly, if you'd like to see what happens when Sydney rain threatens Adam's laptop and hair (choose your order of priority) you'll have to see what happens at the end of this TFW Daily video. Quite the entertainment. 

Cam Fink has extended his skills from shooting to animating for this part of our project, given that Melbourne's lockdown separated us all for the second India-England Test. The audio versions of this show are in the normal podcast feed as well.

With that Test ...

Caught Collins, bowled Brereton

Season 9, Ep 20: Featuring Damien Fleming, Dermott Brereton, and Adam White in guest spots, this week's episode comes direct from the Media XI cricket match against the MCC. In the spirit of our accidental Aussie Rules tangents, the match also featured Nick Riewoldt, Brendon Goddard and Daniel Harford. On the show: the West Indies miracle starring Kyle Mayers, the increasing fallout from Australia cancelling on South Africa, medals for Beth Mooney and Steve Smith, domestic cr...

Australia bails on South Africa

Ok, we should have posted this here a few days ago but... here is last week's episode! Also at the top is one of our Final Word Daily videos, if you haven't found the YouTube channel yet. We borrowed our favourite pub, the Commercial Club in Fitzroy, thanks to Paddy the publican who always tolerates our nonsense, and Cam Fink once more did a lovely artistic job...

The January 26 problem

Season 9, Ep 18: "How you wanna raise a flag with a rifle / To make us want to celebrate anything but survival?" So goes the A.B. Originals song January 26. This year Cricket Australia stopped using the term 'Australia Day' to promote matches, recognising that it's a day of mourning for a lot of Indigenous people. Predictably this small gesture was criticised by political antagonists. On the date in question, Munanjahli writer Dr Chelsea Watego joins us to ta...

The Final Word with Marcus Stoinis

Season 9, Ep 17: Sometimes an interview comes along that knocks our socks off. We all think that we know Marcus Stoinis: the big smile, the big sixes, the cheekiness, the time in the gym. We expected to talk to Marcus about his career, but instead the conversation went somewhere else: cricket as the backdrop to the rest of his life, the years of trying to take care of his family while nursing and losing his father. We often don't know how a conversation will turn out, and tha...

Steve Smith's scuff and nonsense

Season 9, Ep 16: One of the more pointless furores of our time must be about Steve Smith scraping his foot on the pitch in the Sydney Test. On this week's show we go into the detail of that one which has been mostly overlooked. We also look at Tim Paine's apology for losing his cool, racism from the SCG stands, and England's upcoming Test series in Sri Lanka. Plus some Nerd Pledge and a very unexpected Super Performer of the Week.

Your Nerd Pledge numbe...

Stuart MacGill, new videos, and Story Time is back

Belated on some of this, but it's a been a hectic Test match week, and we have a million things to share. All made possible by you wonderful lot on Ye Olde Patreone. Thank you.

First up, the most recent weekly show. If you weren't there for our Stuart MacGill interview late last year, the edited and tuned up podcast version is out. It was too good not to share, and the perfect week for it was right before the SCG Test. What a classic that was, too.

That was Season 9, Ep 15...