Ashes 2009

Jarrod Kimber, the Aussie author of the cult cricketwithballs blog, goes where other cricket chroniclers fear to tread in his 2009 series Ashes diary. From his couch, in the stands and with the occasional press pass from the Wisden Cricketer, Kimber produces a unique take on events on and off the field. When he's not rubbing shoulders with cricket's glitterati, he's either rubbing Steve Waugh up the wrong way, fraternising with the npower girls or attempting to lick Richie Benaud's trousers. Unless he's threatening to strip Ian Bell naked, oil him up and make him practice in a giant birdcage, that is. But amid the bawdy humour and ribald ranting is the penetrating insight and love of the game that by the end of the summer had journalists of a more conventional nature tapping cricketwithballs into their search engines, leading the Guardian to describe Kimber as "a 22nd-century cricket writer".