Cow Corner Blog

Who is your favourite Pietersen now?

Wed Jul 09 08:46AM

6.30PM - England 309-3 (90 overs) - Bell flicks Ntini down to fine leg and that's stumps. He finishes unbeaten on 75 while Pietersen will resume on 104 after an unbroken 192-run stand.

The book goes to the_kop2003 who will need to send his address (again) to cow.corner@yahoo.co.uk . Join us at 10.30am tomorrow for more of the same but less spam.

SCORECARD | MATCH GALLERY   

6.15PM - England 294-3 (86 overs) - Three figures for Pietersen!!!! His 13th Test hundred as he stands up tall and punches Morkel through the covers. Just 124 balls and 180 minutes of batting with 13 boundaries and a six. Bell then clips the quick to the fence and this is all rather dandy for the home fans.

284 elmhurst99; 285 g_hine; 287 yvonne.beacom; 293 swads43 - close but no cigar 

6PM - England 282-3 (83 overs) - The second new ball is tossed to Morkel and Steyn only for the latter to be met by a clip through mid-wicket by Pietersen who is now on 97. He has scored three centuries in seven ODI innings against the country of his berth and is now looking to make that one in one in Test cricket.

No addition to their book shelves for the following with their runs in the day estimates: 194 arttidesco; 196 habitkwe; 223 mystic_sleet; 237 weeman27bob; 245 richardpmjones; 251 cafeclemence; 265 sikka316; 270 rossopie; 271 ben.alchin; 279 terrysmith2104; 281 rishigupta001

5.45PM - England 268-3 (80 overs) - The 150 partnership is up as KP drags a ball from a foot and half outside off from Kallis past wide mid-on.

BREAKING NEWS: Sri Lanka will allow their top players to compete in the Indian Premier League rather than tour England next year. Will you pay £40 to watch England play a B team?

5.30PM - England 253-3 (75 overs) - Bell steers Kallis past gully for two and that's his 19th Test fifty off 89 balls. He then cuts Harris away to the fence for boundary number six.

Stewie Griffin currently more popular than KP - we'll keep you posted. An hour to stumps.

5.15PM - England 238-3 (72 overs) - Pietersen dispatches a Steyn full toss through mid-wicket for another boundary. It is time for drinks and time to ponder the question: Who is your favourite Pietersen/Peterson? Kevin, Norm, Ronnie, Chris Griffin (think about that one).

5PM - England 227-3 (68 overs) - The problem with the South African bowler is similiar to the one Rik Waller faces when he sits in economy class - too much width. KP takes advantage and slaps Steyn through the covers off the backfoot. 50 from 73 balls with six boundaries plus a six. He then sweeps Harris to the fence and pulls Steyn to the pickets.

mooochas is back despite the fact his comments get deleted within ten minutes. I'm sure a McDonalds assistant manager is missing his burger flipper.

4.45PM - England 211-3 (65 overs) - KP is starting to show some of the old razzle dazzle as he takes a liking to Harris. Sweeping and driving the "slow" bowler in one over and then in the next, coming down the track and driving him through the air just past his old mucker Smith at mid-on before launching him halfway to London Zoo over long-on. 

4.30PM - England 184-3 (61 overs) - Harris into the attack for Ntini and he's around the wicket. son_of_squid - We were not suggesting that the SA team are en-masse a bunch of Tory MP's although most of them did go to public schools. Cowers is more of a Green Party supporter - they seem to be the best supporter of Bovine issues.

4.15PM - England 178-3 (58 overs) - Morkel and Ntini in tandem for the start of the evening session (not with Steve Lamacq) and Pietersen rocks back and pulls Morkel away with great power for boundary deux.

4PM -South Africa have yet to win a Test series in England since the end of their apartheid-enforced isolation despite twice coming close, and have often been labelled "chokers" (and not in an amyl nitrate soaked orange sort of way). What do you think? Is this the series they will finally come good in?

3.40PM - England 163-3 (54 overs) - That's tea. For all the pre-match chat about how much banter there would be with KP out in the middle, it's been pretty quiet. A partnership of 46 in 61 balls has taken the sting out of South Africa just a little.

3.30PM - England 160-3 (52 overs) - Bell angles Kallis down to third man for three. His wagon wheel shows jam, cream and 80% of his opening 30 runs coming through the off-side. Very attractive player in a purely cricketing sense and then KP flicks Ntini through mid-wicket for his first boundary. Order has been restored.

the_kop2003 - patience Sir, it takes a similiar number of minutes to the IQ of the phishers before their comments disappear, so about 10.

3.15PM - England 143-3 (48 overs) - It's all going off now. Ian Bell has hit five boundaries in 15 balls and Pietersen has been hit flush on the side of the noggin by Steyn. A streaky boundary for the Sherminator down to third man off Kallis but a couple of lovely drives on the off-side. KP is shaken but not dead.

3PM - England 128-3 (45 overs) - WICKET! And another! This time Cook departs as a short Morkel delivery takes the handle of the bat, as the opener takes his eye off it, and it loops to AB de Villiers at slip.

It could and should have been four wickets in 16 balls as Kevin Pietersen sets off on a suicidal single and if Steyn had taken Ntini's throw cleanly at the non-striker's end he would have been a gonner.

mystic_sleet - 'One wicket and England will tumble just you see'. Do you know the result of the 3.20 at Wincanton?

2.45PM -  England 117-2 (43 overs) - WICKETS! A massive pig's ear by Daryl Harper as he gives Strauss out lbw for 44 even though the delivery by Morke Mornel pitches way outside leg-stump. A Wimbledon style Hawkeye review would have seen Strauss reprieved but for now it's a case of ducking for flying debris in the England dressing room.

Then Michael Vaughan goes after a mere three-ball vigil. I read a quote from Dale Steyn this morning saying the England skipper doesn't like it at 140kph + and he loses his off-stump as the SA seamer gets one to swing away late.

2.30PM -  England 106-0 (39 overs) - If Nicky Boje was an Indian chief he would have been called 'Big Teeth No Spin'. Paul Harris is his heir apparent 'Bad Highlights No Spin'. Not only he is generating no turn and has a dodgy barnet but he's also got a bad knee and it's a laboured chase as Strauss drives Ntini down the ground for his fifth boundary.

That's the England 100 and statman john (HE'S A STAT-MAN SKIBBY DIBBY DIB YON DA DA DA YON DA DA DA SKIBBY DIBBY DIB YON DA DA DA YON DA DA DA HE'S A STAT-MAN!) tells me England's record opening stand is 359 so still way to go.

2.15PM -  England 98-0 (36 overs) - Steyn conjures up five wides with a wild delivery - he is meant to be the second best bowler in the world you know. He then bowls a buffet ball to Strauss who smashes it square through the off-side.

bubba_surf - You are correct, the point of a bowler is 'to knock down wickets' or stumps as they are more commonly known. At least you did better than Mrs Cow, who often refers to them as pegs. 

2PM -  England 82-0 (33 overs) - Cook has been leaving Ntini outside off but he then overcompensates and gets flicked to the mid-wicket fence by the Essex man-toddler. Makker then lets out a scream of dismay - a bit like when you find out your missus has washed your best shirt on a 60 cycle - when Cook edges him again through the gap in the slips. He brings up his 11th Test fifty later in tthe over, off 92 balls in 140 minutes. 

jude_surf  has also been consigned to the dustbin. I can't ban these people completely just in case they have an ephinany and manage to construct a complete sentence with both verbs and adjectives.

1.45PM -  England 72-0 (29 overs) - The general chat at lunch was that SA have bowled poorly and not adapted to the unique conditions of Lord's and especially that slope. Dude, Where's Makhaya opens up after lunch and immediately takes Cook's outside edge but the ball falls well short of the slip cordon.

1.30PM - mooochas is out of here! And congrats to henrikedwardlarsson who has been fast tracked for a deleted e-mail account.

1.15PM - LUNCHTIME POLL! Do I delete every post entered by mooochas today? You decide!! I have just seen Mike Brearley in a corporate tent and he told me that moochas was sub-human scum.

1PM - England 71-0 (28 overs) - An exploratory over from the left-arm spinner Paul Harris and that's lunch. Max Mosley wouldn't have liked the morning play - no swingers. That has allowed England to make decent progress. Cowers is off for a pork pie and a Vimto cocktail. We'll get back soon-ish and give you the run down on the competition entries.

12.45PM - England 66-0 (25 overs) - A change of ends for Ntini and there is far less bounce from the Nursery End, that allows Cook to find the gap at backward point. Steyn - a skiddy bowler - is on at the Pavilion End, you can make your own jokes up about leaving his mark on the match. Then another four through backward point for Cook, but this time it is a lucky one, coming off the edge after he fails to move his feet to a full Morkel delivery.

12.30PM -  England 55-0 (22 overs) - Morkel gets some movement down the slope, plus bounce, and Cook is beaten all ends up on three occasions from his seventh over.  The Essex boy gets a leading edge down to third man off the first of those deliveries to collect a streaky fourth boundary. And his fifth is just as sketchy, fencing at Kallis and finding the vacant third slip region. He's batting like Ray Charles at the moment.

sikka316 - FYI: Edward Xavier Tras has managed just six so far. South Africa will be fielding their special man Stijn Sundries in their innings.

12.15PM -  England 43-0 (18 overs) - They say Jacques Kallis is a reluctant bowler and in this case he's reluctant to pitch it up. Wide and short and Strauss cuts to the fence with some alacrity.

mooochas - init is not a word and means nothing in the context of your sentence. What university did you attend? Was it Luton?

NOON -  England 33-0 (14 overs) - As we told you yesterday 'What do Mark Boucher and Michael Jackson have in common?' They both wear gloves for no apparent reason. But not the keeper's fault as Morkel loses his radar and throws some bilge down the leg-side which goes for four byes. Cook then angles the young quick down to third man and it's time for drinks and possibly a pot noodle.

THE COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED TO ENTRIES terrytodd_accounts you are the last man.

11.45AM - England 23-0 (10 overs) - Awkkkkkk!! The first boundary of the morning as Strauss pulls Ntini through mid-wicket. It took 32 minutes - you could drive from Rochdale to Huddersfield in that time or around 600m in inner London. Then Cook slaps Morkel to the third man fence and cuts Ntini to the pickets square on the off-side. It's a runs safari, people.

mooochas - the syntax police are coming around your house very soon, hopefully they will confiscate your PC.

11.30AM - England 6-0 (7 overs) - England continue to work in binary numbers and Morne Morkel has already replaced Dale Steyn at the Nursery End. If anybody is Sky plussing this to watch after work, I suggest the plus 30 setting.

andymc09 - 330 looks very optimistic Sir. Did you mean in a month or just today? 

11.15AM - England 2-0 (4 overs) - I have seen more life in the crowd at a Leonard Cohen gig than in this track. Yesterday's monsoon seems to have taken much of the pace out of it. From the 20th ball of the innings, England finally score a run as Cook pushes Ntini through the covers for a single.

arttidesco@rocketmail.com - what are you talking about Sir. I am waiting for you to crack the old "Dude, Where's Makhaya line very soon.

11AM - The Proteas are so keen to get started they run on the pitch before the umpires. Andrew Strauss and Alastair Cook follow and we are ready for lift-off. 

10.45AM - It's all happening in the world of cricket today: Shoaib and Asif back in Pakistan squad; Sri Lanka want England tour cancelled and Hair on mentoring panel - CLICK HERE for details.

10.30AM - South Africa have won the toss and elected to...............bowl. Graeme Smith said it was a difficult decision but there may be something in the pitch this morning and the track at Lord's normally gets better as the match progresses. England named an unchanged XI yesterday while as you can see from the picture, Smith had to tell Andre Nel this morning he was the odd man out with spinner Paul Harris included.

England: MP Vaughan (Yorkshire, capt), AN Cook (Essex), AJ Strauss (Middlesex), KP Pietersen (Hampshire), IR Bell (Warwickshire), PD Collingwood (Durham), TR Ambrose (Warwickshire, wkt), RJ Sidebottom (Nottinghamshire), SC Broad (Nottinghamshire), JM Anderson (Lancashire), MS Panesar (Northamptonshire).

South Africa: GC Smith (capt), ND McKenzie, HM Amla, JH Kallis, AG Prince, AB de Villiers, MV Boucher (wkt), PL Harris, M Morkel, M Ntini, DW Steyn.

Umpires: DJ Harper (Aus) & BF Bowden (NZ); 3rd umpire: NJ Llong; Match referee: JJ Crowe (NZ).

10.15AM -  As always we are giving away a competition prize and today we have a copy of the book "23 Sweet FA's - a story of going around the world with a football table". Just tell me in the comment box below how many runs will be scored today and don't worry jude_surf is ineligible.

10AM - Morning everybody. Yesterday's deluge of rain has passed by London and we are set for a prompt 11am start as the four-match Test series between England and South Africa gets underway at Lord's.

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