World T20 Update The Revenge

The story so far:

LONDON, 5 JUN 2009
Andrew 'Roy' Symonds has been flown back to Australia with his international cricket career again in tatters after more off-field indiscretions.

LONDON, 6 JUN 2009
Cricket Australia (CA) called an extraordinary press conference today to announce changes to the official team squad for Australia's first match of the World Twenty20 Championship against the West Indies on Saturday (AEST).

NOTTINGHAM, 7 JUN 2009
The Real Australian XI went through a light recovery session today ahead of tomorrow's ICC World T20 Group C match against Sri Lanka at Trent Bridge.

LONDON, 14 JUN 2009
The Australian challenge at the ICC World Twenty20 Championships appears all but over after consecutive shambolic performances in the opening games of the 'Super Eight' Group E round-robin against India and South Africa.

NOTTINGHAM, 19 JUN 2009
WoBNewsWire with a worrying grinding noise from the diff

Stand-in Australian captain Simon Katich has delivered a stern warning to observers questioning the legitimacy of his makeshift squad's challenge for the ICC World T20 Championship, either on or off the pitch, after yesterday's truly astonishing semi-final action at Trent Bridge. Truly astonishing even by the standards of Cirque de Soleil style implausibility set by the comical Australian tilt at this tournament to date.

Katich woke this morning not even expecting to play in the semi-final, despite his man-of-the-match 99 off 58 in the Australian side's sudden-death victory over England in their final Group E pool game at Trent Bridge on Tuesday. Katich's characteristically doughty and considerably ugly knock carried the day for the Australians, helped by a characteristically dismal batting display from the Three Lions who were dealt a significant psychological blow immediately prior to the commencement of play by the withdrawal of South African ring-in Kevin Pietersen with a badly injured Achilles. Pietersen's Achilles heel, it emerged, was discovering Shane Warne's phone number in the Favourites folder on his wife's phone.

The unconvincing nature of the victory over the English, particularly the fact that no batsman other than Katich had reached double figures chasing a target of 121, led most observers to expect significant changes to the Australian team prior to the semi-final matchup, again at Trent Bridge, against the redoubtable Kiwis led by IPL stalwarts Dan Vettori and Brendan McCullum. However on the eve of the match it was announced that Katich was to be suspended from the side for a breach of team protocol. It soon emerged that this breach was to disobey a direct order from team management, in particular vice-captain Lara Bingle, who requested that he make some sort of effort to take some pride in his appearance as he was 'letting the side down', and more importantly, 'diverging from the established standards of corporate governance determined and perpetuated by the Senior Leadership Steering Committee Management Group going forward'. This reportedly led to a physical altercation between Bingle and Katich as the Australian vice-captain attempted to forcibly bleach streaky blonde highlights into Katich's stubble. Team management refused to comment on the specific nature of the breach, saying only that Katich would not be playing on Friday. Katich was banned from talking to the media, although many reporters drew their own conclusions as to Katich's standing within the team from the fact his dismissal on 99 on Tuesday had been through being run out off a no-ball by Ponting, on at least the third or fourth attempt.

However these developments were overshadowed considerably on the morning of the semifinal when an explosion ripped through the Australian team's hotel in Nottingham, centred around the ground floor hair salon and styling studio. Given the events of Lahore, a terror attack was immediately suspected and anyone looking vaguely Islamic rounded up and hit with phone books questioned by police - leading to a fairly pissed-off Pakistan team missing their flight to London for their semifinal against South Africa - but firefighters were quick to establish the explosion was caused not by a bomb or improvised explosive device (IED), but by a set of hair straighteners (GHD) overheating through heavy use, allegedly by Nathan Bracken, and sending a shower of sparks into the Australian team's stockpile of hairspray and product, which then ignited with the force of several kilograms of plastic explosive. Amazingly, noone was killed in the blast, though the injury toll from burns, concussive trauma and explosive shrapnel was considerable. This was particularly the case among the Australian team, as at the time of the blast the entire Australian squad, with the exception of the exiled Katich, was in the salon at the time having their nails done, plaiting each others' hair and talking about boys.

With the 4pm pre-match toss less than six hours away, and the rest of the Australian team corralled in the burns unit at Nottingham City Hospital, the new Australian captain was in heated discussion with the least singed representatives of Cricket Australia as to what team selection policy was to be implemented for his first and almost definitely only match as skipper of his nation. This resulted in Katich having to be physically restrained from throttling Cricket Australia CFO (Chief Fuck-up Organiser) James Sutherland as well as assaulting at least three more members of team management, after it became clear the position of Cricket Australia was that they would prefer to forfeit the match and the tournament rather than play without their heavily publicised stars. "Where's the story?" Sutherland queried. "Where's the public interest? Where's the names people know? I mean, yeah, we MIGHT win with a bunch of nobodies dragged in from county cricket, but if it doesn't rate, does it really matter? I mean, is there a point? You're hearing me? Are we all on the same page? Same journey? Same overarching creative concept?"

After Katich had finished choking the chief executive of Cricket Australia to within an inch of asphyxiation, he shrugged his shoulders, borrowed Mrs Pietersen's phone and called Warnie. He and the remaining members of the outlaw 'Real Australian XI' squad were in hiding at an undisclosed location amongst sympathetic civilians, i.e. sinking piss in the Walkabout in Shepherds Bush. They commandeered a passing tour bus, inconveniencing a coachload of fat pastel-clad American tourists headed for Stonehenge, and took off up the M1 with Gilly at the wheel, stopping only for a couple of 'roadie' slabs at a drive-thru off-licence.

The ICC, who were expected to block the Australian team's use of alternative players, despite them having already taken part in the tournament, released a puzzling statement at approximately 2pm stating that they were delighted with the proposed return of the previously suspended, banned, fatwah'd and pursued-by-Interpol Real Australian XI players, and wished them the very best of luck in the remainder of the tournament. Some conjecture in the press room attributed the change of heart to the fact the ICC's paymasters no longer had a horse in the race, the Indian side having played like busted arses and failed to get out of their group to the dismay of their entire nation, apart from John the Bookie. More controversial scuttlebutt surrounded the potential possession by Real Australian team management of a series of compromising photos of ICC chairman Aamir Tukashin in a darkened basement being degraded and whipped by a series of prostitutes dressed as prison-camp slave girls. However this was discredited on the basis that no international sporting body could possibly have a leader so astonishingly dodgy as to end up in such an embarrassing position, nor could any credible international sporting body maintain such a person in their position once their perversions had brought them and their sport into disrepute and public humiliation.

The final potential hurdle to the Real Australian XI's remarkable return was cleared by team sponsor Fosters Australia, formerly Carlton and United Breweries, who announced their intent to continue their sponsorship of the team despite the lack of photogenicity, dearth of pan-demographic appeal and excess of flat-out old-'n'-crustyness exhibited by the majority of the squad. Some consideration was given to rebranding the team with an appropriately old-school retro brewery brand from within the CUB umbrella, but when it was pointed out to marketing managers that this could result in the team being called the Reschs Real Australian XI, a line was carefully drawn through the proposal.

New Zealand: J Ryder, B McCullum, M Guptill, R Taylor, S Styris, J Oram, N McCullum, D Vettori, I Butler, J Franklin, I O'Brien

Australia: A Gilchrist, M Hayden, S Katich, S Law, M Waugh, D Lehmann, A Symonds, S Warne, M Kasprowicz, J Gillespie, G McGrath

New Zealand won the toss and batted, with a brisk start from Jesse Ryder who pummelled an ironically charitable McGrath for consecutive sixes over deep cover in his first over, clearly signalling his intentions, i.e. intending to avoid having to run as he'd had a couple of pies for lunch and really couldn't be arsed. Ryder and Brendon McCullum took full toll of the poorly prepared and possibly still half-cut Australian bowling attack, racing to 98/0 from the first ten overs. However shortly afterwards McCullum was out attempting to invent an reverse overhead ramp shot off Warne, ending up performing a forward roll into his stumps with his bat up his arse. This precipitated a mini-collapse - Ryder was run out chasing the bloke with the hot dogs, Martin Guptill was adjudged too dull for international cricket and Pig Styris wasn't actually out but played like he was for much of the innings. Ross Taylor made a feisty and bottom-hand-heavy 26 off 12 before being controversially given out LBW despite, or possibly as a result of, umpire Arshat Ralf being momentarily blinded in Warne's follow-through by the eye-watering effect of Warne dropping his guts after a week on the run surviving on baked beans, VB and Winnie Blues. Much the same as always really. Indeed Warne himself was quite lucky NOT to follow-through at the time.

New Zealand finished their 20 overs on a slightly disappointing 167/4 with Jacob Oram on 18 and Styris on Nutraslim. This was revised by the random number generator that is the Duckworth-Lewis system to 217/2 off 15.2 overs after London weather did what it does best, and shat itself like a toilet-shy preschooler. IPL top scorers Gilchrist and Hayden set about competing to see who could break the most windows in the Trent Bridge members pavilion. Hayden was eventually caught on the boundary by six-foot-seven Jacob Oram, having made 37 off 20 and created several hundred pounds worth of business for the local glazier. Stand-in skipper Katich joined new half-centurion Gilchrist in the middle and set about dismantling the timid NZ attack in a manner reminiscent of a cranky woodchopping champion with an amphetamine habit and a grudge to settle. The pair put on a quickfire century partnership, ended when Gilchrist, on 102, nicked Ian Butler behind to Otago teammate McCullum, and walked. This made the perpetually cranky Katich even crankier, as he only walked when his car was out of petrol. His mood was not improved by first-ball ducks to Stuart Law, who couldn't figure out which side of his Mongoose bat he wanted to use and ended up using neither to a straightening ball from Butler, and Mark Waugh, whose laissez-faire approach to digging out a swinging yorker from the irrepressable Ryder would have impressed few, other than possibly the aforementioned John the Bookie. Coach Boof Lehmann dropped himself down the order in favour of Symonds, in order to maintain the left hand-right hand combination in the dying overs. Despite the earlier fireworks from the left handers, Australia still needed 31 from the remaining twelve deliveries. Symonds deposited his first ball from O'Brien into the members' carpark, followed by a gobful into the dirt next to the bowler's footmarks. He appeared to be sledging himself in order to extract better performance. O'Brien's line was better for the remainder of the over; a series of scrambled twos and mishit singles led to Australia still needing 16 off the final over from Ian Butler.

Butler opened the over with two marginal non-wide calls which served as dot balls. The third ended up in the river Trent, Symonds beginning to tire of the negative line being employed by the NZ medium-pacer. A scrambled bye and a contemptuous Katich flick for four left Australia needing five from the last ball to win. As that was probably going to be fairly tricky to arrange, Katich decided to go for six and not worry about the excess run left over. Butler again went wide and full, but overpitched. The low full toss soared over wide cover... straight towards the overhead grasp of six-foot-seven Jacob Oram, parked on the boundary rope. He took a long look at the ball, took a glance in his peripheral vision... and decided to duck.

As a commandeered busload of badly singed, maniacal Australian cricketers, determined to prevent their Not Fuckin' Pretty Enough replacements completing the match in their stead and stealing their glory (and more significantly their endorsement portfolios), careened sideways through the service gates, clipped the heavy roller next to the grounds maintenance shed and barrel-rolled along the access path from the shed to the boundary fence, as paying patrons threw themselves out of the way. In its final dying spasms the twisted wreckage of the bus crashed through the boundary fence and came to rest on the grass beyond the boundary rope. Next to the match ball. Umpire Rodney Rudi Koertzen signalled six, the Australians were declared winners, the NZ media declared the whole event as another Underarm Incident, and the Greater Nottingham Police declared the cause of the accident being 'Trying to drive a ten tonne Mitsubishi Fuso bus like it's the fucking Aston Martin your hubby bought you'.

In the post-match press conference Katich, looking like he'd had about enough of today thanks very much, gave short shrift to any suggestions - mostly from the bleating contingent of sheep-shagger types - of winning by dubious means. And he likewise dismissed suggestions of bad blood between his team and the contracted Cricket Australia squad, pointing out they wouldn't have helped pull them out of the wreckage had that been the case. They were welcome, he said, once recovered from injury, to compete for selection for any side he led. Just as soon as they put their form ahead of their hairstyles, their technique ahead of their celebrity photospreads, and their will to win ahead of their will to get balls deep in riches 'n' bitches. He outlined his own selection policy: "No headbands. No piercings. No bangles, earrings, scrunchies or highlights, and no, repeat NO fucking fauxhawks." Katich did flag a potential exemption for Warnie, "'cos he's Warnie," but the core values of the side would be the same as the core values of Katich's NSW side - a bunch of fairly ugly and generally badly dressed men who were fucking good at winning games of cricket. End of Mission Statement.

Regardless of the result of the T20 final, new Cricket Australia chief executive Doug Walters has confirmed Katich will stay on as skipper for the coming Ashes tour. Walters added that considering we'd already managed to beat the Pommy bastards with our poofter hairgel XI, he reckoned we were a fair chance. And then politely directed our reporter to go and get his bloody round in already.

WoBNewsWire World T20 Updates: Postscript

LONDON, 20 JUN 2009
The undefeated South Africans, scared shitless by the prospect of having to take on Shane Warne and the core of the '99 World Cup squad that still haunts their nightmares, somehow contrived to lose their semi-final against Pakistan at the Kennington Oval last evening, despite annihilating the same opposition in the initial group stage by an innings and 57 runs. Pakistan will have to do without talismanic all-rounder and big-hootered beardy Shihad Afridi, who has been controversially suspended for the final by the ICC after a series of official warnings by on-field and match umpires for running on the pitch, overappealing, and most egregiously, constantly chanting 'MY MIND'S SEDATE MY MIND'S SEDATE MY MIND'S SEDATE MY MIND'S SEDATE' in his approach to the bowling crease. Afridi is said to be inconsolable, telling team sources 'My whole world's come undone... could you comfort me?'

LONDON, 22 JUN 2009
Yesterday's ICC World T20 Final between Australia and Pakistan, the most keenly anticipated game of international T20 cricket since the last one, was washed out without a ball being bowled, English weather being the complete fucking slut that it is. The match was decided by a game of rock-scissors-paper, won by a poker-faced Shane Warne who went rock to Younis Khan's scissors.

Asked if this seemed to be a massive anti-climax, Warne replied, "Not compared to the one I gave KP's missus, hey. Want a beer?"

The Doctor is OUT.