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The Week That Was

Cricket caskets and Caddick the kid

Colourful coffins, the world's oldest young cricketer, Warne the untrustworthy and a starring role for Wasim

Brydon Coverdale
Brydon Coverdale
23-Jun-2008

Your last resting place? A colourful cricket coffin © Colourful Coffins
 
A tisket, a tasket, there's cricket on your casket
Coffins have been part of cricket of years, transporting bats and gloves and the like, but this is the sort of coffin you don't want to rummage around in looking for that elusive thigh-pad. An Oxford-based company is offering cricket tragics the chance to be buried in a casket depicting their favourite sport. Mary Tomes, the managing director of Colourful Coffins, said: "For cricket fans, having a coffin showing a game on a village green is always very popular and we've done some lovely designs." Interestingly, the customers - you can pre-order the coffins, much like arranging your own funeral - can choose to have the design personalised. So fans can go their graves to the sound of mourners saying: "Oh, look at that picture. I didn't know Gerald made a hundred at Lord's."
Age is relative, but still...
Andrew Caddick a young cricketer? Twenty years ago maybe. But Caddick, 39, has had so little cricket action this season that Somerset asked MCC if he could play for their Young Cricketers team in a second XI match in Hertfordshire. Ridiculous as the idea sounded, Caddick made the trip and was looking forward to getting some overs under his belt after recovering from a shoulder injury. He wasn't allowed to play, though not because of his age, rather because he was not registered for the side. Caddick was told of this having made the 200-mile trip and, according to Somerset's chief executive, "there were a few expletives". If Caddick really wants to be viewed as a young cricketer perhaps he should go and play against Accrington, where he could find himself up against David Lloyd, 61.
Warne tied up with phone boss
Would you trust Shane Warne? Most Australians wouldn't, according to a new poll. The annual Reader's Digest trust survey asked which of 100 Australian celebrities and public figures were most trustworthy and Warne, he of the texting and drugs ban and various other indiscretions, came in at equal 95th. He was in rather unsavoury company at the bottom of the pecking order. The only people on the list that Australians trusted less than Warne were a disgraced businessman, two former AFL players who have had off-field transgressions in the past year, and a confessed terrorism supporter. Fittingly, given his love of mobile telecommunications, Warne tied for 95th place with a phone company executive.
But snooker doesn't go for five days
So, Twenty20 is taking over cricket. But who would have thought it would take over snooker as well. The Pakistan Billiards and Snooker Association is organising a five-nation tournament for next year and they're trying to draw the crowds by reducing the number of reds from 15 to six. PVK Mohan, the president of the AP Billiards and Snooker Association, said the Indian Premier League had prompted the move. "The concept had the backing of all the members because the sensational success of the T20 World Cup and the recent IPL in India could not be ignored," he said. Mohan also wants a two-hour time limit for games in future billiards tournaments. What's next - onepin bowling?
Sad, sad love
Wasim Akram is set to star in a music video by the Pakistani pop band Fuzon. The clip for the song "Soona Soona" will feature Wasim and his wife Huma, and Wasim reportedly has a new, debonair look for the video. "I love experimenting with my looks and used to do it even when I played cricket," he said. Fuzon said Wasim loved the songs on their new album and wanted to be part of it. "When we were working on the song "Soona Soona", which is a sad love song, we thought of him." Well of course, doesn't everybody think of Wasim when they hear a depressing ballad?
Headline of the week
"Champions-less Trophy - Australian players threaten Pakistan boycott"
The Sydney Morning Herald on the reigning holders possibly pulling out of the Champions Trophy

Brydon Coverdale is a staff writer at Cricinfo