In President Bush’s most brilliant photo op ever, he invited members of the Pakistani national cricket team to the US embassy for a private lesson in cricket. 
President Bush met Pakistani cricket captain Inzaman-ul-Haq and opening batsman Salman Butt amid tight security at the US embassy in Islamabad.
Watched by a crowd of schoolchildren, he was shown the correct way of holding a cricket bat before being led to the crease to face some bowling.
One of the balls from the Pakistani captain bounced high, striking the president on the shoulder.Mr Bush also tried his hand at bowling. [Link]
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p>No word as to whether batsman Butt was bestowed one of the President’s honorary nicknames when he was standing in the crease, but we can only hope.
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p>Those of you concerned about the President’s safety while learning cricket will be pleased to learn that they replaced cricket balls with tennis balls for the purposes of this demonstration, so while the President was hit by a ball, he was not injured.
See a fuller squence of photos here; my favorite is this one of President Bush holding the tennis ball as if it were really heavy before bowling. And yes, he maintains his trademark tight lipped grin in most of the photos.
The wicket keeper looks stoned
Ennis, Bush photos are not allowed without captions.
The wicket keeper looks stoned
he looks like he’s trying VERY hard to keep from slapping bush. such close range, such oppurtinity. ‘Will try to resist, will try everything in my power to resist – ooohhh pretty sunlight – i will not smack him!’
it almsot look like someone photoshopped bush’s head on another body. i’ve noticed this in a few pics……
The wicket keeper, if I am not mistaken, is Salman Butt. And dubya looks like a monkey in these pics. Lol. Specially in this one. Nonetheless, its nice to see him having fun.
the wickie wasnt salman butt
Ennis – that isnt a tennis ball. judging by the blood red color, it’s the real stuff – it IS heavy – and his reaction is quite natural – he seems to be weighing it on the end of his fingers to get a sense of how much more dense it is than a baseball – his remark might even be “getting beaned by this wont be any fun”. I dont know who the clean shaven dude is behind the President – but the bearded giant in the foreground is Inzamam-ul-haq, and he’s the backbone to the Pakistani team – a respected man in cricketing circles, regardless of nationality.
Seeing the President in these candid shots has been a revelation. Good for him.
Coomi Kapoor, in her weekly column on the low-down and inside info on politics in Delhi, writes:
“When informed by the Americans that President George Bush would like to participate in a very Indian pastime, the Ministry of External Affairs proposed that he watch a cricket match. Bush liked the suggestion. In fact, when asked by an Indian correspondent in Washington whether he would prefer watching a cricket match or a Bollywood movie, he came up with the pat line ‘‘I am a cricket personÂ’Â’.
But though the idea came from us, Bush watched a cricket match in Pakistan, not India. The MEA is understandably miffed at the Pakistanis appropriating its brainwave. Still the Indian Government can take heart from the fact that while he was here Bush was too busy with work to have time for relaxation. In Pakistan, on the other hand, he had more leisure time, since he had little business to transact.”
(http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=88995)
🙂
Dhaavak – in none of the photos in that sequence is a red ball visible, it’s yellow only: here, here, and here. The guy behind him seems to be a school kid, there are several in the background, all dressed similarly.
may be you need to refresh your cache or something – at least his link has a red ball – sort of masked by the yellow star on the clean shaven guy’s green blazer – http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/4775096.stm
ennis – sorry about my earlier post – i had a brain fart – … what I meant to say… Ennis – maybe you are looking at the wrong image – because the link http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/4775096.stm … at least to me shows a red ball – right under the yellow star on the clean shaven guy’s green blazer –
Poor Inzamam caught between BUTT and BUSH !
And dubya looks like a monkey in these pics.
he always does. his nose also looks like the tail end of a roast chicken. anynohho, it IS nice to se him having fun instead of his usual antics…though he seem to enoy that a lot too.
Dhaavak – fixed the link – I meant to refer to this photo.
dhaavak:
Baseball:
Cricket:
The two balls are approximately the same size. MLB plays with 5 1/4 oz. balls and most cricket balls tend to be 5 1/2 oz. Not sure about the avg. circumference of each. Yes, cricket balls are denser, but only slightly, and unlike baseball, they get softer as the game goes on because they’re not changed all the time like they are in baseball.
What makes cricket more hardcore than baseball isn’t the size of the ball, but how it’s used – no gloves.
Have we finally found something that our President may be mediocre at? He is a hero of ‘just functioning.’
cricfan: LOL Madurai: Dunno whether u can call cricket more hardcore just because the fielders dont wear gloves. One can say that the batters in baseball wear less protection than the batsmen in cricket. Despite the similarities these are just two very different games. One is not necessarily more hardcore than the other.
The headlines on the BBC news needs to be corrected. Cricket is not the national spor of Pakistan
Check here
ooo, this is fun!
I think they are similar enough that they’re quite comparable: they both involve batting, fielding, and running. There are several ways the batter can get out in each sport, and several of these overlap.
This is true; however, getting hit by the ball isn’t as much a part of baseball as it is of cricket, so padding is necessary to prevent injury. In baseball, the pitcher is punished for hitting a batter (hit-by-pitch); in cricket, the bowler is often rewarded for hitting a batter (leg before wicket). That’s pretty hardcore.
In baseball, the people who do actually get hit with the ball on a regular basis (the catcher and the ump) do wear lots of padding. And it’s not like baseball batters don’t wear any padding at all – they do wear protection while batting; unlike cricket, however, baseball players can remove their padding once they reach base safely. Cricketers have to keep running back and forth with all that padding. Oh, and then there’s the bat. Baseball players can just chuck it aside when they don’t need it anymore, whereas cricketers keep running with it.
Then there’s the field: baseball is played within the confines of a right angle. Cricket is played in a circle, so even if the ball goes behind the batter it’s still in play. Granted, there are two more fielders in cricket, but there are still 270 more degrees to cover.
In baseball, you get at least three plate appearances during a game to try and make your mark on offense. In cricket you get one chance.
Then let’s not forget the length of matches. One-day matches take about seven hours. Test matches take five days. The longest baseball game was what – 17 innings? 19 innings? Puh-leeeeease!
Yup, cricket’s SO much more hardcore.
19 · Madurai Vivekan said
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longest_professional_baseball_game