How cricket has lost its working class tradition; The game is better for having its working-class heroes

Class and cricket

A lower-order collapse

Mar 12th 2013, 19:54 by B.R.

IT USED to be said that when England needed a fast bowler, all it had to do was whistle down a Nottinghamshire coal mine. Harold Larwood (pictured), the most fearsome bowler of his generation, was destined for a life in the pits before he was spotted while playing for his village team and offered a contract by Nottinghamshire in 1923. Nuncargate, the tiny mining village in which he was born, unearthed four further England cricketers, including Bill Voce, who shared the new ball with Larwood during the 1932-33 bodyline tour of Australia.

England’s great batsmen, too, often came from humble beginnings. Jack Hobbs, one of the country’s most revered players, grew up in poverty in Cambridge. Herbert Sutcliffe’s father was a pub landlord in Yorkshire. Indeed, from Fred Trueman, the first bowler to take 300 Test wickets, whose father spent time in the coal mines, to Ian Botham and Freddie Flintoff, working-class heroes have always bestrode the game.

This is not to say that English cricket has not been subject to class division. On the contrary, it is enshrined in its history. The first recorded games, in the 17th and 18th centuries, were often between teams playing under the patronage of the landed gentry, such as the Second Duke of Richmond, who employed local farm hands in fixtures convened for toffs to bet on. Until 1962, England’s first-class cricketers were formally divided into two categories, gentlemen and players—the nobs who could afford to play cricket as amateurs, versus working-class professionals who needed to be paid. At Lord’s, the home of the game, teammates entered the field through separate gates dependent on this distinction. There was even an annual fixture between the two which was, for a while, the highlight of the domestic season (and in which the professionals usually prevailed). It was not until 1952 that a non-gentleman, Len Hutton, captained the Test side.

Class is even enshrined in the game’s aesthetic. Some shots—particularly front foot drives—are to this day considered more elegant, to be purred over by purists. This may be because they are also associated with the upper classes. In “More Tales from a Long Room”, a satire of the game, Peter Tinniswood relates the story of an aristocrat who undertakes “a missionary crusade to the dourlands of the north to preach to the working classes his fervent belief that the cover drive, the late cut and the wristy leg glance were not the sole province of the upper classes.” In contrast, brutal, clubbing back foot shots, such as pulls and cuts, were considered professionals’ shots, born of those who cared little about art and much about efficacy.

Yet if there was once a class battle in cricket, it is on the verge of being conceded. Today, fewer working-class players reach the top of the English game than probably at any time in the sport’s history. If one takes a very broad measure of class—whether a player attended a state or private school—the majority of England’s Test cricketers since the second world war could be said to have come from relatively modest backgrounds (see chart). In 1993, nine of the starting XI who played in the first Test against Australia had been to a state school. By the 2009 series, only half did (one, Monty Panesar, attended both types). In the last Test match England played, against New Zealand last week, that proportion had gone down to a third. Read more of this post

Dr Reddy’s Laboratories Founder Anji Reddy Dies; Considered as a pioneer of reverse engineering, Dr Reddy made significant contributions in making pharmaceutical products globally competitive and also affordable to the common man

March 15, 2013, 12:50 p.m. ET

Dr Reddy’s Laboratories Founder Anji Reddy Dies

By DHANYA ANN THOPPIL

BANGALORE–K. Anji Reddy, the founder and chairman of drug maker Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories Ltd., 500124.BY +0.29% died Friday in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad. Mr. Reddy was ailing for some time, the company said in a statement, but didn’t give details. Mr. Reddy founded Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories in 1984. The Hyderabad-based company, which is listed in India and on the New York Stock Exchange, is now one of India’s largest drug makers.

Founder chairman of Dr Reddy Laboratories Anji Reddy dead

Indo-Asian News Service | Updated: March 15, 2013 21:20 IST

Hyderabad: Kallam Anji Reddy, the founder chairman of Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, died today at a hospital in Hyderabad following brief illness. He was 73. He is survived by wife Samrajyam, daughter Anuradha and son K Satish Reddy, who is managing director and COO of the pharma giant. One of the most well-known faces of Indian pharma industry, Dr Reddy was suffering from lung disorder for last few months and was admitted to a private hospital 10 days ago. The technocrat-turned-entrepreneur, who started Reddy’s Laboratories with a meagre outlay of Rs. 25 lakh in early 1980s, transformed it into $1.6 billion global entity. Considered as a pioneer of reverse engineering, Dr Reddy made significant contributions in making pharmaceutical products globally competitive and also affordable to the common man. Read more of this post

Tan Sri Andrew Sheng: The wonton vs sushi story; So what is the right business model for small businesses in the age of massive social and technological change?

Saturday March 16, 2013

The wonton vs sushi story

Think Asian by ANDREW SHENG

MY friends know that I am a noodle foodie. Everywhere I go throughout Asia, I try the noodles, from laksa in Penang, pad thai in Bangkok, beefpho in Hanoi to mohinga in Yangon; each bowl showcases the culture and flavour of the place, through the different texture, spices, and taste. Somehow, I remember a place by the quality of its noodles.

There is nothing quite like the great wonton and noodle shops in Hong Kong. They are not fancy places, but have been in the same location for ages, and have become beloved local institutions with lifetime customers. In the past few months. several historic Hong Kong noodle shops and cafes have closed from rising rents. The closure of the 42-year-old Lei Yuen Congee Noodles in Causeway Bay this January made the South China Morning Post. Hundreds of tourists and residents flocked to the shop in its last days, waiting in hour-long queues at lunch time for their last chance to eat there.

Rising rent in Hong Kong is nothing new. Hong Kong competes with Tokyo as one of the world’s most expensive real estate markets. Yet Tokyo is full of small ramen and sushi shops that have been around for decades brought to international attention recently by the film Jiro Dreams of Sushi about a dedicated Michelin star sushi shop in the Tokyo subway. Tokyo sushi shops also have to pay the high rent demanded by landlords, but perhaps their landlords realise that Japanese culture is poorer if there is no local sushi and ramen shop around. Read more of this post

Money Advice for People in Boom-or-Bust Fields; Jay Reynolds borrowed heavily to buy the company in 1980. He then struggled for nearly two decades as demand suffered until the business finally revived

March 8, 2013

Money Advice for People in Boom-or-Bust Fields

By PAUL SULLIVAN

Jay Reynolds, president and chief executive of Rod Ric Drilling in Midland, Tex., borrowed heavily to buy the company in 1980. He then struggled for nearly two decades as demand suffered until the business finally revived. 

MORE financial advisers are focusing on a single clientele, say, doctors or athletes. That would seem to make sense, since concentrating on a single group of people gives advisers greater insight into the needs of those people. And if the advisers do a good job, they will get that client’s colleagues as clients.

Advisers can, of course, organize their practices in other ways. Many focus on a dollar amount. They promise to give good advice to any client with more than $1 million, $5 million or more, regardless of where that money came from. By taking this tack, they are also eliminating the need to have more, less wealthy clients.

And some advisers organize a practice around a life event, like retirement or divorce. But what does a divorced woman with three young children and a deadbeat former husband have in common with Elaine Wynn, who received nearly $1 billion when she divorced Steve Wynn, the casino mogul?

Still, is managing money for a group of lawyers, say, any different from managing money for another high earner? A dollar is a dollar, after all. Or is it just a way for advisers to market themselves? Read more of this post

Before growing into a global fashion business with high-profile collaborations and over $112m in revenue, Acne Studios began as a boutique creative consulting firm that played by a few counterintuitive rules—ones it still stands by today.

March 14, 2013, 2:08 p.m. ET

How to Succeed in Fashion Without Trying Too Hard

Before growing into a global fashion business with high-profile collaborations, its own culture magazine and an ever-evolving product line, Acne Studios began as a boutique creative consulting firm that played by a few counterintuitive rules—ones it still stands by today.

By LYNN YAEGER

THE BRAND PLAYED ON | Mikael Schiller, left, the executive chairman of Acne Studios, and creative director Jonny Johansson, at the Acne store in Tokyo, which opened in December.

WHILE HE WAS WORKING ON Acne’s spring 2013 collection—the long, floaty parachute-fabric skirts and T-shirts emblazoned with the word “music” that are in stores now—Jonny Johansson listened to a lot of Emmylou Harris. “It was a bit surreal. She talks about women, the difference between a woman who has experience and a woman who is young and free. She was painting pictures in a sense,” he says dreamily. “I could see this woman, in a white dress.”

Johannson, the cofounder and designer of Acne Studios, is sharing this reverie in a lofty room in the company’s world headquarters, a spectacular art nouveau former bank building on an almost ridiculously picturesque cobblestone street in Stockholm’s Old Town. Vintage copies of Flair are enshrined under plexiglass near the entrance; a grand staircase still shows off its original gilded wood paneling and stained glass. The uniformly youthful staff is clad in the kind of clothing that has become the company’s hallmark: edgy and slightly twisted, managing to walk a tightrope between slightly avant-garde and eminently wearable—or, put another way, unthreateningly bohemian.

In an era when every high street from Altoona to Zanzibar is crammed with identical chain stores selling identical merchandise, Acne is perceived as different: Its legions of fans think of it as a brand with integrity, a company that makes principled aesthetic decisions and never resorts to marketing tricks, even though they have hundreds of outlets.

If the most difficult challenge in the fashion industry is to remain relevant and desirable in an ever more crowded marketplace—and the whole project of predicting what customers will want in any given season is at best an ephemeral enterprise—Acne’s ability to play the game while appearing to remain mysteriously above the fray is a deeply impressive accomplishment. The company was founded in 1996 by four guys who threw 10,000 euros into a pot and launched a multidisciplinary digital film–design–creative consulting collective in Stockholm, an enterprise that, by a combination of frankly nutty decisions and shrewd business practices, has become a highly profitable business—$112 million in revenue last year alone—encompassing men’s and women’s ready to wear, footwear, accessories and premium denim. Read more of this post

Panda tea: one of the world’s most expensive; A kilogram of the tea goes for an average of US$70,000

Panda tea: one of the world’s most expensive

Staff Reporter

2013-03-13

Mengdingshan, a mountain in southwest China’s Sichuan province, boldly claims to be the origin of the world’s tea culture. The mountain’s excellent environment has produced teas of the highest quality, sipped by the country’s emperors (and now presidents) since the Tang Dynasty. Panda tea, a kind of tea that grow on soil fertilized with panda dung, is one of the world’s most expensive tea leaves. A kilogram of the tea goes for an average of 440,000 yuan (US$70,000), reports state-run news agency Xinhua.

Children harvest tea leaves in panda costumes in Mengdingshan, Sichuan province. (Photo/CNS)

East India Company: The Original Too-Big-to-Fail Firm

East India Company: The Original Too-Big-to-Fail Firm

For an institution that has been defunct for almost 150 years, the East India Company still evokes powerful reactions across the world.

Last year, when the Indian government debated allowing foreign companies to open supermarkets there, protesters shouted: “This is the return of the East India Company!” In the U.K., the East India Company’s extraordinary rise and fall have uncanny parallels with the stock-market bubbles and government bailouts that have shaken the economy over the past decade.

And little wonder: At the heart of the company’s story are eternal questions about how to cope with the powers and perils of large multinational corporations.

Established by royal charter in 1600 with a monopoly on all trade with Asia, the East India Company had many incarnations in its almost 275-year run.

For the first half of its existence, it remained a commercial supplicant, exporting bullion to pay for Asia’s luxury goods: first spices, then textiles and tea. Along the way, it became an early model for today’s joint-stock corporation and pioneered new management techniques for long- distance supply chains.

It also created a series of lifestyle revolutions in 18th- century England. Daniel Defoe described in 1708 how the company’s calicoes, shipped from India, “crept into our houses, our closets, our bedchambers.” This calico boom prompted fierce resistance from Britain’s weavers, who felt threatened by a flood of cheap Asian imports. In 1720, the government responded with a ban on Indian calicoes, and it was behind this protectionist wall that the Industrial Revolution would take shape. Read more of this post

Enterprise Holdings Inc. managed to become the world’s largest rental-car company by sales without actually spanning the globe. The chief executive officer says he knows that has to change. “We want to control that customer experience. We want our people taking care of customers.”

Billionaire’s Son Eases Grip to Take Enterprise Global

Enterprise Holdings Inc. managed to become the world’s largest rental-car company by sales without actually spanning the globe. The chief executive officer says he knows that has to change.

Until recently, there wasn’t an Enterprise rental counter in China, Spain or France. Malaysia and Korea, a couple of the world’s fastest growing markets, remain untapped. So to meet the global needs of international corporations, Chief Executive Officer Andy Taylor, son of founder Jack Taylor, has had to do something they have been loath to try in the 56 years they’ve controlled the closely held St. Louis area company: franchising.

“Years ago, the thought of licensing was absolutely abhorrent,” Andy Taylor, 65, said in an interview. “We want to control that customer experience. We want our people taking care of customers. But we’re learning that if we’re going to be a global brand, and we need to be competitive in the future, we’ll have to do it a different way.” Read more of this post

Leonardo da Vinci’s anatomical drawings were “startling” in their accuracy, new medical scans have shown, putting him hundreds of years ahead of his peers

Leonardo da Vinci was right all along, new medical scans show

Leonardo da Vinci’s anatomical drawings were “startling” in their accuracy, new medical scans have shown, putting him hundreds of years ahead of his peers.

The bones, muscles and tendons of the hand c.1510-11 and 3D image of a dissected hand Photo: Royal Collection Trust / © Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2013 /© Mark Mobley, West Midlands Surgical Training Centre

By Hannah Furness

10:23AM GMT 12 Mar 2013

He has long been praised as one of the finest artists of the Renaissance, working far ahead of his time and producing some of the world’s most recognisable works.

But Leonardo da Vinci has finally received the credit he deserves for his “startling” medical accuracy hundreds of years in advance of his peers, as scientists match his anatomical drawings with modern day MRI scans.

The project, which will be unveiled at the Edinburgh International Festival in August, compares the work directly for the very first time, unveiling the minute details recorded by the artist.

In a series of 30 pictures, the Royal Collection Trust will show da Vinci’s distinctive anatomical drawings alongside a newly-taken MRI or CT scan.

The comparison is intended to show just how accurate da Vinci was, despite his limited technology and lack of contemporary medical knowledge. Read more of this post

Sir Luke Johnson: A founder with a sense of value is able to build a more resilient corporate culture

March 12, 2013 4:11 pm

An eye on costs sets the tone for success

By Luke Johnson

A founder with a sense of value is able to build a more resilient corporate culture

One of the most outstanding entrepreneurs I have ever worked with has one particular trait that I think is the secret of his success. It is not his ability to sell, motivate staff, innovate or think strategically. It is a rather more mundane tendency – but in this climate, an incredibly important one: his sense of thrift.

Frugality has never really been in fashion, but now more than ever it is needed. A founder with a profound sense of value is able to build a more resilient corporate culture. Ingvar Kamprad has become one of the wealthiest men ever born by making Ikea the largest and cheapest retailer of furniture in history. It sells home furnishings at prices no rival can match because it is managed with a spirit of thrift. Mr Kamprad practices what he preaches. He always flies economy-class, drives a 15-year-old Volvo, and says: “I am a bit tight with money, a sort of Swedish Scotsman. But so what? If I start to acquire luxurious things then this will only incite others to follow suit.”

One food entrepreneur who recently failed to get it right is John Schnatter, founder of the Papa John’s Pizza chain. He has complained in public about the burden of implementing US President Barack Obama’s healthcare law for staff, and suggested franchisees would cut employee hours or increase prices. Meanwhile, he has company stock worth more than $300m and an extravagant mansion in Kentucky, and yet has always promoted himself as an everyday guy in advertisements. Over recent months he has taken heavy criticism from bloggers to comedians, and thecompany’s reputation has suffered . Now he has hired a powerful PR man to try to rebuild his – and the company’s – image.

The characteristic that I admire in a business builder is not meanness but prudence and cost-consciousness. Such entrepreneurs tend to have a healthy sense of realism: they know just how hard it is for most companies to make sustainable profits. Of course, every business needs much more than a neurotic focus on the expense of everything – there must also be quality, and service, and all the other features possessed by market leaders. Read more of this post

Universities Pile on Faculty Perks as Student Costs Grow and students are struggling to pay off $1 trillion in education loans in a weak job market

Universities Pile on Faculty Perks as Student Costs Grow

By John Hechinger and Michael McDonald – Mar 12, 2013

The University of Chicago paid James Madara $2.5 million in severance when he stepped down in 2009 as medical dean and hospital chief. Madara, who remained on the faculty, later joined the American Medical Association.

Congress is taking a look at such payments following disclosures that Jacob Lew, the new U.S. Treasury secretary, received a $685,000 bonus when he left New York University and had $1.5 million in housing loans from the school.

Harvard and Stanford universities also offer real-estate loans with sweet terms, records show. While the amounts are small relative to university budgets, the perks insulate faculty and administrators from the costs upsetting many middle-class families, said Jonathan Robe, a research fellow at the Center for College Affordability and Productivity in Washington.

“It certainly gives the public a clear example of how out of touch some universities are,” Robe said. “Parents will think, ‘Here I am scraping by, raiding my retirement plan to pay for college. Why are they making me do this just to enrich these executives?’”

Congress and President Barack Obama have been pushing colleges to control tuition and other costs, which can exceed $60,000 a year at a private school. In a weak job market, students are struggling to pay off $1 trillion in education loans. Read more of this post

Bowl in the locker of a nursing home

How we face ‘getting old before getting rich’ 

People’s Daily Online）  07:57, March 13, 2013

Bowl in the locker of a nursing home in Taiyuan, Shanxi