Lignum Vitae heavy bails cricket

Heavy Bails cricket - Lignum Vitae;

A year or so I posted about looking for more Lignum Vitae bails to replace a missng one from my set. At the time I had trouble finding them and during my research I came across articles that mentioned the fact that the bush/tree that the wood is harvested from is becoming increasingly rare. The tree/bush as I recall only occurs in the Carribean and one or two of the north eastren South American countries on the main land mass. The bush/tree is a very slow growing plant and this is a part of the reason it's so rare as it's not a commercially viable proposition for a commercial wood. The turn round from sapling to harvesting being decades and the demand for the wood being such it seems that they don't farm it as such. In fact as I recall it's so rare it's considered endangered.

But if you are after some of the bails and you can't find them try this place here. Needless to say it's probably a case of while stocks last!


Check out my other blog here - this is all about Leg-spin bowling and nothing else. Double click on the image below.

 

 

59 Days and counting...

59 more days and counting before Joe can starting being totally normal...

Friday saw another hospital visit at 5pm, so I had to leave work a little early. In the days leading up to the visit, Joe had increasingly been not fussed on having the bandage on his leg. The bandage was only there to limit the bending of his leg and stressing the 'Steri-strips' that were holding the wound together while it was healing. Over the week we noticed that despite the Steri-srips he was able to bend his leg considerably without compromising them, so the bandaging was more or less pointless. So today he walked into the hospital with no bandage.

We didn't have to way long to get seen and the old dressings were removed ready to be re-dressed. A different doctor saw us, Dr Khan and like 'Bob' he too was more concerned with the progress or rather slow progress of the damaged wound. The other 'Pin exit wound' because it stayed intact during the fall in the snow is now 95% healed. But the wound which had the stitches ripped out is a
very different story (See images)
Joe, awaiting treatment. This is the last Xray that was taken last week and if you look closely towards the top of the tibia where it fans out towards the Tibia plateau, you can see two very feint lines on the bone and these were the anomalies that caused the concern and confusion last week that led to Joe being platered up again for a week. This is the last remaining hole in Joe's leg, and this is the dressings that they've been working with. The dressing in the last week has been covered with a plaster of some sort and then the bandaging on over the top. This is the wound without any dressing and the nurse called the Dr in to have a look and like Mr Wakeman, he was also slightly concerned at how far behind it is in comparison with the wound on the other side of the Tibia. Mr Khan had said that we wouldn't be required to be seen for another 4 weeks, but having seen the wound and how open it was, a discussion was had and it was decided that because of this wounds slow progress, we'd have to come in again in 2 weeks. He also agreed with the nurse and said that the wound would also have a little bit of the seasweed packing put in the hole to help with the healing. The seaweed stuff looks like strands of white cotton wall and they lay it in the wound where the wound oozes fluids, the seaweed kind of contains the fluids and prevents it from scabbing. This means the skin grows back in a way that reduces the amount of scar tissue and the scars are far less obvious than if left to scab over.

The wound had the seaweed put inside, 3-4 steri-strips laid across it holding it in and that was it. The nurse said we'd be advised to go to the treatment clinic at Laindon and have it all renewed on Monday and see what the nurses there would say about continuing to come in and have it dressed. But we left with no plasters and no bandage.

With regards to what Joe can and can't do... He'll be back in the playground again next week, but he's got to be careful - no fighting, no over-exhuberant activities where he might fall again and just generally take it easy and build up slowly (59 days) towards normal activities. The sense I get is that the main concern is this wound and getting closed up and sealed in the short term. With regards the bone, limp, leg strength and physical activities, very little has been said with the inference that because he is young, he'll just gradually get back to normal activities and strength over the coming weeks. But, there is the clear message that for the next 4-5 weeks he cannot do sports and anything that might push him too far, the build up to the decision to resume normal sport activities has got to be gradual.

Physio

NHS Physio does seem to be a bit piecemeal and subject to abuse. When you go into the clinics, there's aways a chart that tells you about how many last minute (Less than 24 hours) cancelations and 'No-shows' that have happened over the previous month and it's a horrifc number - 50% or somewhere near that. So they have a policy where if you do this to them, they just cancel your program, allowing others to use the facilities. But, because of the 'Incident' we weren't able to attend our usual session and we must have fallen into the 'Crap customer' catergory and as a result, Joe's not able to get in to a Physio session for the next week. Michelle's going to ring them again and see if she can wangle something, but if not it's not a problem, it's something we've been doing for 9 months now, so we'll just do some of the usual stuff. This was also what the Dr suggested, when Michelle mentioned it to him.

In conclusion, it's all going well and my only concerns now are the potential for a life-long limp, (which the Doctors are non-commital about) and Joe's weight, but while we were at the hospital the Greek Dr (Can't spell his name) who operated on him on day one with Mr Wakeman said... "You'll be fine, just do your physio at home and slowly build up your activities and you'll lose all the weight you've put on as well". So, I was pleased to hear that.

62 Days & More Stuart Macgill

62 days and counting, another good day for Joe. He's taking it easy still, but Michelle said that he ran up to the car when she met him out of school this afternoon and when I got home his limp looked less of a limp!

More on Stuart Macgill on his website/Social media site (See below) He'd posted a link to the Guardian (He can't do nothing wrong this bloke - he even reads the Guardian)! where there was an article on the worlds most beautiful cricket grounds. I reckon that the Rec when photographed from the right place is a pretty spectacular pitch so linked in the Rec from this blog and he was in agreement, so B&PCC could potentially use that as a selling point 'The Rec as recommended by Stuart Macgill"!

If you're a wrist spinner or just interested in cricket and want to be in contact with some of the professional players (MS Dhoni is on there along with some of the other Aussies from the 2005 era) contact him via his Google + page and see if he'll let you in, at the moment its open invites all round. He's got something planned for Feb 22nd which may be something video based (Although I'm not 100% certain), but it's something he's been working on and is getting really excited about releasing. So have a look and sign up...

Stuart Macgill has got to be the most approachable professional cricket player on the web. Sign up to his Google + site and if you're a wrist spinner, the chances are he'll communicate with you.https://plus.google.com/u/0/?tab=mX#101070011342127402871/posts

63 Days

Good day for Joe, back to school today. The school kept him busy and accomodated our desire to keep him out of the playground for this week till he's been back to the clinic and had the go ahead to start normal activities.

This evening despite the bandage he was bending his leg massively - suggesting that the wounds have healed well and he's not that bothered about them. The limp is most definitely there, but I'm not overly concerned with 63 days to go. I should film the limp, so that I can plot its regression over the coming weeks. I'll have to get that done and post it up on Youtube. I've also got a feeling the bandage isn't going to last the week, as it's already slipping down during the day.

Messages from Stuart

I recently emailed Stuart Macgill asking him about his training schedule when he was younger and how it was managed and organised, from both a pro perspective and his own take on what he felt was needed. On the forums that I write on, we've often discussed what is required by way of training? It's increasingly obvious that in the professional arena, the academies, clubs and national teams are recognising that in most instances there's some recognition that a Wrist Spinners career comes to a peak at a much later stage in life than other types of bowlers. This is in part down to the fact that there is so much to potentially learn with regards the skills required, along with the strategies, but increasingly there seems to be a recognition of the fact that maturity and experience play an awful big part in the bowlers success and that a Wrist Spinner will play his bowl his best beyond his 30th birthday. In recent years I've watched Adil Rashid and Steve Smith be touted as up and coming Wrist Spinners only to see them crash and burn through exposure to the international arena potentially far too early.

We've questioned how much spin bowling would these lads have done running up to their inclusion in their national team, we've laughed at the England hopefuls that were dragged out into the middle to join Shane Warne a few years ago during the test series, they looked little more than club cricketers in comparison with Warne! If you read the biographies and books of the likes of Grimmett and Philpott, you'll read about how much time they spent as boys through to adulthood honing their skills and it was an awful lot. These days kids have so many more distractions, so can you get away with far less practice and training like with Warne? But, you then have to think that Warne was a freak of nature and is not a good example with whom to compare and judge yourself against. Whereas Stuart Macgill is a modern example of excellence with an untold story as far as I'm aware and I'm definitely eager to here about his rise to success. One of the forum posters 'Macca' who resides in the Sydney area and knows about this stuff recently posted...

macgill came from a legspin/cricket family. Taught by his father ( his dad had the grimmett books and his grandfather knew and played against grimmett) and bowled both legspin and seam until about age ten then decided to concentrate on legspin.

So he was an early starter. He always had an outstanding strike rate from junior through to test level.

Read more: http://spin-bowling.boards.net/index.cgi?board=discussions&action=display&thread=14&page=3#ixzz2JJPuYcHp

I've had a look around to see if I can find more on Stuart and have come up with this article about him, but it doesn't focus on his cricket a great deal and goes over the same old terriotry that you always hear about. But, there's a little more in there about his background.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/sport/cricket/stuart-macgill-the-odd-man-out/2009/07/12/1247337015898.html

His reply is good news for anyone that is interested in Wrist Spin and its future, the Wrist Spin community mourned the recent loss of Terry Jenner, (Shane Warnes mentor) and on the forums we all discussed whether there was anyone that would step forward and take on the role that Jenner performed. Jenner, was a massive amabassador for Wrist Spinning, not only involved in the development of the art in Australia, but travelling all round the cricketing nations of the world passing on the skills to pro's and kids alike, including us here in the UK. I was poised to attend one of his sessions here in Essex when he was struck down by the heart attack that eventually led to his death. Stuart has just recently taken up a role working officially with young spinners in Australia and he's mentioned a promising young bloke called Joe Carroll who he found via Youtube. He's got Joe into the Australian academy, so we'll have to watch out for him in the future and see how he gets on.

Stuarts been busy with a new website that he's working on and I've just linked in with it and I'm waiting for him to verify my membership, I'll check to see if he wants more people getting involved and joining up (Which I'm sure he will) and I'll post the link here and on the forums I write on. He's a busy bloke as I'm sure everyone can appreciate and probably innundated with emails and questions, I'm just always gob-smacked when he writes back to me and how much detail he goes into and deeply appreciative of it, I said to a bloke at work today who shoots film and teaches Video & TV "It would be like Martin Scorcese or Steven Spielberg emailing you"! Despite his schedule, Stuart's  promised to answer my questions on training and when he does, I'll post up what he says.

64 Days to go & Pre-season prep

Joe

Yesterday was a good day, by the end of the day Joe had ditched the crutch and was walking around just supoprting himself using the walls and tables. He gets up and down the stairs okay on his own using the rail, so things are going well. This morning a giant psychological leap forward happened that he wasn't even aware of, which is the best way for it to happen, so I didn't even mention it. Prior to the accident if you're keeping up with this in previous entries, you'll remember he was of the opinion that the removal of the pins had rendered his leg now weak and that was the reason that he was limping. The bash on the knee has now meant that he's pre-occupied with that and the negative thought regarding the strength/weakness of the actual tibia have faded. I'm hoping that once the wounds have sealed and the bandage has come off, without having thought about the tibia for more than a couple of weeks, he'll just get on with it and that should be a big leap forward.

The images are from this morning. Top one is the pin removal scar that wasn't damaged in the fall, the middle images is the leg as it is once bandaged, this is there primarily to prevent him from bending his leg and straining the other wound and opening it up. The bottom image is the one that was damaged in the fall.






Ben

I've just been out in the garage and digging around in the wardrobes and drawers getting together his cricket gear ready for the first net session of the year. It should have been last week, but that was cancelled because of the same snow that Joe had his accident in. While I was outside getting the stuff together Ben came out and bowled a few balls and  hit a few off some chuck downs I did with him and is really enthusiastic about the prospect of having a bowl at least. He's probably grown a few more inches since last season and is certainly stronger than he was last year and he's now at the stage in life where he's more competitive and is showing more of an intrinsic desire to do well and win, without at the same time getting wound up (I hope) when it doesn't come together. If he keeps that frame of mind intact during the season he'll do okay I reckon, but I'm really looking forward to seeing how he does, because I know he's feeling excited about seeing how fast he can bowl this year!

I'm hoping this year he can do a little better with the bat or at least view it in a more positive light, as I think the competition amongst the bowling attack in the U15's is going to be very strong and he needs to improve another aspect of his game.

Me

I've not been to adult nets yet and if I do it'll have to be a low level starting point and look to build up over the coming two months. I've started to do some basic fitness and strength training, but very piecemeal at this point and I've got issues with my foot still and my calf muscles. I've been to the Quack with regards to the foot and that may be resolved quite easily with an in-step pad in my trainers. What that would do is distribute the weight more equally across the foot and take some of the pressure off the front of the foot (pads) where the pain is occuring.

U15's

Before we'd gone off to nets, I'd gone through a list of who might be in the U15's and was looking at it thinking - strewth, there's a lot of blokes there chasing after just a few games! Then once we got to nets I had another look around at who was where and had a chat with some of the parents and realised that there was even more than I imagined. It sounds as though there are potentially 20 blokes that are going to be hoping (With some justification) that they're going to get a game every week! But then at the end of the session talking to the coaches, there's another competition been added to their calender and this is an Under 16's comp that'll be played on Sunday afternoons which is a 40 over format.

So, from what I've gleaned so far, it sounds as though...

Thursday - T20 area cup matches between local clubs (U15's)
Saturday - 4th XI league competition (Adults)
Sunday - 40 over U16's
Weekday evening - School cricket training.
Weekday evening - school cricket matches (15-20 over format)
Weekday evening - U15's training.

All that alongside the need to keep on top of school work and attend Karate classes, it sounds like a busy week for the likes of Kieran and Ben!

But it does sound like there's loads of scope for cricket, it'll be interesting to see if Ben will want to play Saturday 4th XI's with me and whether he'll get selected for the U16's team.

U13's

There wasn't any U13's that I noticed other than Harry and Frank Farrington, Joe would have been there if his leg was back in action, but talking to the coaches, it sounds as though there's a bit of a shortage of U13's this season and the team will have to be bolstered by U11 players. We'll have to watch how that goes this season.

Adult nets

Are on Sunday PM 2-4pm at Fitzwymarc school, this'll be a fiver. So if I go I'll have to leave early to get to Ben's session.

65 Days

March 1st is 65 days away and I'm hoping that Joe will be running around like a normal kid by then, playing basket ball, back to his Karate sessions, playing cricket, football and riding his bike. Yesterday with the pulling around of the pin exit holes and the whole sensation of not having the plaster on he was a bit flaky. Now he's had 12 hours sleep and inevitably mobilised his knee joint while he was asleep, he's woken up seeing that the knee has been bent and has started the day with some renewed optimism. He came downstairs without the aid of his crutch and has since been walking around albeit with a massive limp without the crutch. In his own words "I think I'm almost back to the stage where I was before going into hospital". I reckon by the end of the weekend, he may be getting there, but there's a little more work to do as yet.

Last night I got Joe laying down on his back and tried to get him doing a few leg raises on his back, they didn't go so well (No strength in the thighs or a perception). On his side was a different matter and he got through 5 or 6 easily and I was happy that he just did a few.

I'm going to try and get him to stand feet apart today and catch a training ball either side of him so it puts a little weigh though the bad leg as he shifts his weight emphasis from one side to the other. All relatively gentle stuff at these stage so as not to disturb the steri strips.

Good news for Joe

I'm just back from the Fracture Clinic with the confirmation as to whether Joe has broken his leg again. Initially the Fracture clinic were unaware of the new situation and Joe had to go and have another Xray. This time they did the whole of his lower leg to include both the new and the old injury.

We were taken off  a room just outside Mr Wakeman's (Joe's surgeon) and left to wait for a while. We sat fingers crossed awaiting the outcome. Mr Wakeman came in. Michelle asked...
 "Has he broken his leg again"?
"No, not as far as I can see", and then he went on to explain what may have caused the confusion.

He took us into the room and brought up the Xray on the computer monitor, on the screen was a massively blown up image of the tibia, right at the top where the meniscus connects.
On the Xray, you could clearly see the whole of the plateau edge and it was clear of any damage, cracks or otherwise...
"Now if I zoom out so that you can see more of the Tibia"... Mr Wakeman zoomed out so that most of the top end of the Tibia was visible, he pointed at the screen, "You see this mark here"... We looked and there on the bone, in a length-wise configuration, just below the plateau, was a line. "This line is a result of the bone beginning to grow around the pins and is the mark that's been left by the removal of the pins. I can only guess, the surgeon on Sunday has seen this and has been unsure about what it was, hence the confusion. There's nothing else there, as you can see that indicates any damage". He continued... "The swelling and the pain was probably down the fact that the fall ripped open the wound and the stitching. The wound inside is far worse than the wound on the surface. When the pins were removed, we had to insert equipment into that little hole and then dig around in the tissue to find and grip the end of the pins and then wiggle the pins out of their increasingly secure position where they were starting to become embedded into the bone. The surface wounds will heal far sooner than the internal wounds and the bash has obvious not only dislodged the surface wounds, but has probably done the same to any healing that had started to happen internally".

Man was we relieved! They removed the plaster and re-dressed the wounds and it was obvious that he was far more concerned with the fact that the stitch hadn't been replaced. The wounds were cleaned up again and 'Steris strips' put on to close up the wounds. With no weight bearing on that leg over the last week, Joe's lost the confidence and possibly the muscle bulk, to take his weight or lift the leg, so from a physio perspective he's probably gone backwards a couple of weeks. He's now got a bandage around the knee to restrict the bending and this is primarily in order to keep the 'Steri-strips' from coming free. With regards weight bearing and general use of the leg, he's got to take it easy and he's been given the go-ahead to go back to school, but if it snows or the ice returns, we may have to re-think that. If the weather is fine he can go back, but he's not allowed out in the playground and he can't do any PE. We've got another appointment at the same time next week to monitor how things are going, but this is no longer with regards to the bones, this is all about the healing of the wounds externally in the first instance. Once they're closed up, I would imagine they'll then reinstate the physio regime and Joe will be back on track. I'm hoping that come the end of March, Joe will be running around, playing cricket, football, basket-ball and doing Karate again. But in the short term he's literally got to find his feet again.

Disaster - Joe

Yesterday Joe was out in the snow and slipped on the ice and landed on his knee (Bad leg). He landed in the region where the stitches are and the leg swelled up really quickly. We took him straight to hospital and 6 hours later and God knows how many assessments and an Xray later we had a couple of surgeons come in and vaguely suggest that he's probably damaged his Tibia at the top, on the edge of the plateau. Having had dodgy knees I had some sense that this was pretty serious. They then offered the option of either having a cast or not, I opted for a cast as a precaution. Because we're scheduled to see the Surgeon on Friday, it was decided that we'd wait till then before having a proper diagnosis and they kind of seemed reluctant to tread on the toes of someone that was already working with the leg. The advice when we left was to keep the weight off the leg for at least 24 hours.

Since coming home I've looked up what it may be and the prognosis doesn't look good especially in view of the fact that in six weeks time Joe would have been free to start doing sport again and getting back to normal. If it is fractured and its on the edge of the Tibia plateau it's a really serious break albeit small. It seems because it's broken behind the cruciate ligament and at a point where all the bodies weight goes through and does so in a dynamic way, this break is (1). Difficult to operate on. (2). In a really important load bearing part of the body. This means that if it is diagnosed as being broken, form what I've seen on the internet, Joe will be back in a full length cast for  some time and not able to put any weight through his leg for up to 3-4 months. I'd imagine that the situation will then exacerbate the situation with the existing Tib/Fib break and prolong his recovery from both for at least the whole of the summer.

I'm just praying that the xray was showing up something that is a result of the recent operation and that there isn't any break or if there is a break is a crack type fracture with no bone having come away from the tibia. If there is, it looks as though it'll be another op and more pins. I am devastated, I was so looking forward to a summer of cricket and surfing with Joe and Ben and it looks like there's a chance that's all runined.

Additionally this causes problems with school as well and all the things indoors with regards sleeping  arrangements. Other issues will be that because Joe's leg is in plaster he can't massage his scars either and he's also got a ecszema type condition on his leg which he has to apply cream to, that's now covered by the plaster too.

All this is speculation of course, Michelle has called the surgeon today to see if our appointment can be brought forward, so as soon as I know anything more I'll update.

Lance Armstrong - Disgusting human being

Up to a certain point in my life I always had bikes and now I go into Decathlon and look at the racing bikes and think I'd like one of them again. When I bought Joe and Ben BMX's and other Mickey Mouse bikes, I had one eye on the racers thinking, we should be buying them those instead of these. In 1975 one day on the marshes near our school, I found a rusty racing bike dumped in the long grass behind a row of houses. I picked it up and was surprised at how light and big it was, looking at it I could see that it was different to any bike I'd ever seen, it was a racing bike, that was obvious, but it had a massive Chainset, but no deraileur. On closer inspection I noticed that the rearblock was single speed but tiny, this I realised was a bike built for speed. The back brake seemed to have been dismantled and removed completely leaving only the front brake. I pulled it out of the long grass and onto the pathway and tried to put the chain back on, but even this was weird as the chainset seemed to be seized one way, I got it on though realising that the wheel turned just one way. As I wheeled the bike along towards the road to give it a go, I noticed that the chainset turned as I went along instead of free-wheeling, and  I recalled from some vague reference point in my life that this bike was a fixed wheel bike, probably used for track racing.

Once on the road I managed to get on it and cycled on the flat tyres a little to see how it felt and it seemed there was promise. The rims were straight, it was a bit rusty and one or two spokes were missing. The seat was a stupidly thin one with the name 'Brooks' on the back of it. Over the coming months I cleaned it up replaced some of the spokes and the brake rubbers and started to develop calf and thigh muscles like never before. The bike took 3-400 yards to get up to somewhere near top speed because of the gear combo, but man was this a fast bike! Over the coming years I cycled everywhere with it. When I left school in 1976 I got on my bike and cycled to my Nans house in Hastings, averaging 20 mph. Drivers that I used to work with in Tilbury docks claimed to have clocked me cycling at 45mph!

I had the bike for a few years and bought a 10 gear racing bike in 1977 and I can't recall what happened to the 'Fixy', It probably was stolen, but I've not no recollection of that happening. But what I do recall was how much I loved cycling and how I could go faster than anyone else that I knew. I repeated the Hastings trip several years later with a group of mates, going via Camber sands and returning via Ashford, all in one day. As much as I could I tried to get them to cycle in a Peleton using the same stream-lining tactics I'd seen in the Tour De France, they humored me, doing it a little, but knew that there was no way that they'd be able to keep up with me.

In the 1980's & 90's I would watch the Tour De France in awe of their stamina and strength, especially the mountain specialists and I still think of these long distance races as being one of the greatest sporting events ever. I've never got that obsessed with it, but was always aware of it and noted the names Laurent Fignon, Greg Lemond, Miguel Indurain,  Luc Leblanc,  Jan Ullrich,  Bjarne Riis, & Claudio Chiappucci. and more. The riegn of Indurain and his total dominance kind of put me off it a bit and Armstrong similarly, what was the point of watching if it was already a foregone conclusion and then there was the drugs aspect of it. Fortunately I was never that hooked on it, but I could have so easily been as I do love cycling and I'd loved to have been in a cycling club and it's still something I consider every now and then.

I didn't see the Oprah Winfrey interview and wouldn't want to watch it to give the bloke viewing figures and my time. His actions haven't impacted on my life at all other than turning me off of watching the race, but leading up the race I read a short piece by Rebecca Cooke who had just retired and started to get some sense of how much of an absolute scumbag this bloke is. A couple of days ago I saw Rebecca Cooke interviewed on the BBC on their breakfast program and I wanted her to resort to swearing in order to demonstrate how disgusted she was. But being British she'd never resort to such a thing.

Tonight trolling around the BBC website I found this and read the comments at the end by the followers of the sport and I ended up in tears reading what the people were saying. Looking further again I found this piece where Cooke speaks about it and again I sat there in tears...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/wales/21085639

Cooke makes the point elsewhere, that kids that take this sport up make massive sacrifices, as do their families to pursue their dreams to be like Armstrong. Those same people off the back of their committment and training make their way up the ladder of success, only to get so far because they don't take drugs. All their committment, which inlcudes a financial investment comes to little or nothing or renders them debt ridden for the rest of their lives chasing their dreams. Their dreams and successes are thwarted by the likes of Armstrong who reap the financial rewards. Armstrong by the looks of it is a very wealthy man off the back of cheating.

Lance Armstrong is scum.