10. Pietersen’s Perth palaver

Kevin Pietersen – c Harris b Lyon – 45
Australia v England, Third Test, Perth, 2013

You don’t take on the Fremantle Doctor, blowing hard into your face at the fag-end of a nasty day, when you’re trying to save a Test match to keep your team alive in the series, and half of your own dressing room have already abandoned you, and the Australians have posted a man back for the shot, and the spinner tosses it up there as if to say “Go on, punk, make my day”, and the libated patrons of Perth are ready to roll, and you’ve already written half of your book in your head and it’s not making great reading… You just don’t, do you? Unless you’re Kev, of course. Then you do.

4. Gower Shower

David Gower – c Hughes b McDermott – 11
Australia v England, Fourth Test, Adelaide, 1991

The ball itself is a dirty pie, far outside the eyeline, leg-side and swinging wider, the final ball before lunch. Lesser men would let it slide by, or tickle it behind square for a couple. Not our hero. Gower unwraps his perfect hands, times it sweetly, and lobs it straight to the man three-quarters back to the boundary, just posted for that specific shot. At the other end, his captain, Gooch. By this point on the tour, neither man is especially disposed to the other. “If looks could kill, Gooch would be on a serious charge,” wrote the Guardian’s Mike Selvey. “But you would not blame him.”

3. Double bouncer!

AB de Villiers – c&b Ashraful – 46
Bangladesh v South Africa, First Test, Mirpur, 2008

Mohammad Ashraful’s leggies were such filth that AB, on 46, climbed into what appeared to be another long hop, only to find the nasty little grenade bouncing a second time right by his feet. The attempted hoick was skewed up in the air and the bashful bowler took the catch. Umpire Steve Bucknor was right to uphold the out decision, just as MCC were right to subsequently adjust the law to make any ball that bounces twice an automatic no-ball.

2. Up in smoke

Adam Hollioake – b Warne – 0
England v Australia, Sixth Test, The Oval, 1997

Of all the gazillions of options, no single moment so vividly captured the gulf between England’s haunted lambs and Shane Keith Warne as the sight of poor, frozen Adam Hollioake, in his third Test innings, at his home ground, shouldering arms to a full, straight non-turning leggie that crashes into his middle pole halfway up. This was the Nineties right here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osM_uMsl6U8

1. Bad Angel

Shannon Gabriel – b Yasir Shah – 4
West Indies v Pakistan, Third Test, Roseau, 2017

The big kahuna. Eludes all comprehension. Last ball of the penultimate over, there’s a Test series to save, and your partner’s batted all day for 101*. He’ll take the last over, job done. One ball to see out. One ball. Dead pitch, tired leggie, one ball. It’s a loopy thing, outside off stump. Shannon sees it, sees it all the way, opens the shoulders, lifts up his bat: ‘ave it. The perfection of Fazeer Mohammed’s commentary is in direct opposition to the terrifying brainlessness of the shot, which, now executed, has seen the ball trickle off the whirling toe of his offending bat and onto his stumps. “WHY DID HE DO THAT?!” cried Fazeer. We’re still no nearer to finding our answer.

First published in July 2017