The T20 World Cup Daily, Day 2: Join us in a Dallas diner for pancakes, and maybe an imminent upset? West Indies, the other co-host, had a challenge on their hands in their opening game, as Papua New Guinea were resolute with the bat thanks to Sese Bau, before a host of spinners and Kiplin Doriga's fine hands behind the stumps brought an opportunit…

The T20 World Cup Daily, Day 1: What. The. Absolute. Hell. The USA pulled out one of the great cricket turnarounds tonight, after Canada dominated the first innings of their World Cup opener. Aaron Jones and Aussie Gous produced the miracle after Jeremy Gordon's over for the record books. Support the show with a Nerd Pledge at patreon.com/thefinalw…

The T20 World Cup Daily, Day 0: Welcome to America! The Final Word hits Texas ahead of the opening game tomorrow. It’s time to head down to the cricket ground at Grand Prairie and check out what has been put in place, while the temperature rolls through a low swelter and the finishing touches are applied to the stadium. Support the show with a Nerd…

It's Story Time, our walk through cricket history via your listener quiz challenges. This week, the argument has gone on long enough that it's time to finish it. Is a century plus a half century a milestone? Also this week, a reinterpreted Bannerman, a misunderstood basher, and a contender for the most freakish debut of all time. Your Nerd Pledge n…

Season 16, Episode 17: India, the UK and the USA are all heading towards national elections, in the same year that the USA, England and India will all be prominent in cricket, starting with the gathering for the T20 World Cup. For that to arrive, the IPL had to finish, after a campaign as long as any election, and this time Mitchell Starc went from…

Season 16, Episode 16: It has been quite the story. First, the revelation that France's cricket board was approving scorecards from domestic games with no evidence of ever existing. Then, blacklisting the entire national women's squad when those players asked for an investigation. The ICC says there is nothing to see here. As ever, there is a lot o…

It's Story Time, our walk through cricket history via your listener quiz challenges. This week, is this one of the most bogus games to get first-class status? Probably not in the top hundred if we're honest but it's funny anyway. Also, a great player's brief and bombastic return, another's fondest day, and the ease of resolving scheduling dilemmas …

The 1961 Ashes had it all, especially at Old Trafford. The ground where Jim Laker ran amok the previous time the Australians visited would be the scene of a staggering come-from-behind triumph under the bold leadership of Richie Benaud, spinning to win from out of the rough. Adam has Steve Cannane with him to interview Harry Ricketts, the co-author…

It's Story Time, our walk through cricket history via your listener quiz challenges. This week, how many things do you not know about Jim Laker? For us, plenty, including how close he came to turning out in the baggy green. Lara Killick asks about some rubbery figures, we head back to the early IPL, some forgotten T20 Blast, and the very beginning …

Season 16, Episode 15: Yes, we finally have our ad-free feed up and running, extra exciting in the same week as Adam claims to have watched The Greatest Round of County Cricket Ever. Wait for his documentary series on it in 10 years' time. Jofra Archer is tentatively back bowling snorters, there is civil unrest in Australian state cricket, and we f…

Season 16, Episode 14: After Australian cricket endured its worst moment in modern memory in 2018, the Sandpaper debacle, cameras were invited into the inner sanctum of the men’s dressing room for a fly-on-the-wall documentary. Five years on, they have returned for a third installment during last year’s World Test Championship and the Ashes that fo…

Season 1, Ep 1: We're finally there! Reloading lost episodes from the early Final Word, this is episode No1. London 2015, with our new Ashes podcast project not signed off in time to cover the first Test in Cardiff, we got started after the second Test at Lord's. Australia had been beaten badly in the first match, only to take the next when Mitchel…

It's Story Time, our walk through cricket history via your listener quiz challenges. Did Paul Nixon pen his own Wikipedia entry? Daniel Norcross reports, you decide. Our co-host has been busy too, getting Paul Collingwood to help tell the story of the less enjoyable half of that visit to Australia. Adam goes back to a memorable week in Galle, takes…

It's Story Time, our walk through cricket history via your listener quiz challenges. This week, a long backtrack to a much earlier episode where we tried to unravel the mystery of carrying one's bat for nought not out. Enter a multitude of Hearnes. Also, the man they called Stork, a forgotten career of coincidences, Winnie Mae's birthday, Pip Clark…

Season 16, Episode 13: With the Jimmy farewell in the air, was it the right move or wrong? Should it have happened three years earlier, or one year later? Let's get into it. Also this week, Monty does a Mal Meninga, the ECB continue towards selling up, the ICC continue selling out to the worst people in sport, the Dutch keep being sold short, Irela…

Season 1, Ep 2: Reloading lost episodes from the early Final Word, we're all the way back to our second episode ever. This came after Australia got shot out of the sky in Birmingham during the 2015 Ashes, for England to take a lead 2-1 with two matches to play. Geoff was joined by fellow writers Will Macpherson and Subash Jayaraman, with Adam absen…

It's Story Time, our walk through cricket history via your listener quiz challenges. This week, with Daniel Norcross joining Geoff Lemon, we start with a walk through the Indian hill town of Ooty, then end up deep in the origins of European fascism. Yes, it's all related to the cricket. Also, the German influence on Lord's in 1994, the worst ever h…