The cricket thread

scrumhalf · December 2021

Another batting shambles. But it's okay, we'll take away the positives and lessons will be learned.

Mellish · December 2021

@scrumhalf you've said exactly what I was thinking

crunchman · December 2021

Mellish said:

Well, that's about it for *this* Test. Root hit in the groin at over 100k/h. But that's what can happen. If they drop Butler, who to replace him? How much cricket has Birstow done lately? None.

Foakes is in Australia and has played a game with the England Lions team.

Mellish · December 2021

@crunchman indeed. I've mentioned Foakes here. IMO he is the best England have gloves-wise. I mentioned Birstow because IMO he wouldn't do a better job than Butler, at least not right now

crunchman · December 2021

Mellish said:

@crunchman indeed. I've mentioned Foakes here. IMO he is the best England have gloves-wise. I mentioned Birstow because IMO he wouldn't do a better job than Butler, at least not right now

Agree Bairstow wouldn't be a significant improvement. Unlike Buttler he has made significant runs at test level in the past, but bowlers have worked him out now. They just bowl at the stumps and he plays all around it and gets bowled. He's not a great keeper either.

Mellish · December 2021

The Aussie Test team isn't the all-conquering unit it once was, but do they need to be? I'd say no. As long as they keeps rolling England over cheaply, they're going to win the series.

Tannin · December 2021

It's pretty much the same Australian test side that it's been for quite a few years now, @Mellish. Different players, but the same team: i.e., an outstanding attack (look at the current match - three of the best four quicks out injured or quarantining and they are still doing the job without raising a sweat) matched with a fragile batting line up with only one or at most two players of genuine quality, a line-up which is hopeless against swing and prone to collapses any time the opposition bowling is better than half-decent.

As for the England keeper, well England keeps making the same mistake with keepers that Australia keeps making with batting/bowling all-rounders. England looks at Gilchrist and says "what we need is a top batsman who can keep wicket" when they should be admitting that Gilchrists are very rare and just looking for the very best keeper in the country. Australia, on the other hand, has an all-rounder fetish. They keep looking for a Botham or a Miller ... and selecting fair-to-middling bowlers who can't bat reliably at test level.

Mellish · December 2021

@Tannin when I was putting together the post you referred to I was thinking of Warne, McGrath, Marsh...wss a massive, massive fan

Mellish · December 2021

To me it's cricket, not the country, that matters. Sure, I'd like England to do well, but mainly I'm looking for great cricket because that's what i love

chris78 · December 2021

crunchman said:

Mellish said:

Well, that's about it for *this* Test. Root hit in the groin at over 100k/h. But that's what can happen. If they drop Butler, who to replace him? How much cricket has Birstow done lately? None.

Foakes is in Australia and has played a game with the England Lions team.

Foakes went home with the rest of the lions squad

Mellish · December 2021

Can we hang on? If I was batting, having got my eye in, I'm not sure I'd want the upcoming tea interval.

Mellish · December 2021

Well, that's answered that

Butler was offering some stubborn resistance until he hit his wicket.

crunchman · December 2021

Mellish said:

Well, that's answered that Butler was offering some stubborn resistance until he hit his wicket.

He still gave Labuschagne more than 80 runs in the first innings though with his drop. That set the tone for the whole match. We still need to get a decent keeper in the side. If Buttler bats like that then leave out Pope and play Buttler at 6, but there is no way he should be keeping wicket.

axisus · December 2021

Wow, we are so poor this tour. Embarrassingly bad.

scrumhalf · December 2021

axisus said:

Wow, we are so poor this tour. Embarrassingly bad.

At least we're consistent. Just a shame that we're consistently bloody awful.

Mellish · December 2021

We can talk about bowlers and who's best behind the sticks, but it's England's batting that's the biggest issue. I mean, if you can't put a good score on the board, it doesn't matter which bowlers you pick

Tannin · December 2021

Putting a good score on the board against the Australian quicks, on Australian wickets is not something any ordinary batting side can do. (Never mind facing Lyon on the last day.) The current England bats would be plenty good enough to beat Australia ... if only the side had two or three first-class bowlers - a Bob Willis and a 10-year-younger Jimmy A, let's say, matched with a decent spinner. Smith aside, the Australian bats are very fragile. Well, Warner needs respect, but they collapse regularly. They are all pajama-game specialists and none have really come to terms with the long game.

Stuckfast · December 2021

Yes I'm sure we'll see another classic English selection move whereby the batsmen have failed so we'll drop some bowlers.

Didn't realised the Lions had gone home. That's a shame cos there's no-one in the main Test squad who looks likely to improve on Buttler, Pope etc.

crunchman · December 2021

Stuckfast said:

Yes I'm sure we'll see another classic English selection move whereby the batsmen have failed so we'll drop some bowlers.

Didn't realised the Lions had gone home. That's a shame cos there's no-one in the main Test squad who looks likely to improve on Buttler, Pope etc.

We need to drop some bowlers to get a balanced bowling attack. We need Wood back in, and we need a spinner.

That doesn't mean the batting is not a problem, but these batsmen are probably the least bad we have at the moment. I can't think of anyone better who is not in the squad - unless they can talk Cook out of retirement. He's not what he was, but he would be an improvement on Burns.

UnclePsychosis · December 2021

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/59728349

If only Joe was in a position of responsibility and was able to communicate with the bowlers during the game to influence what they were doing - it could all be so very different.

Wheels definitely coming off his Captaincy.

Stuckfast · December 2021

I think the problem is that the selectors backed themselves into a corner with selections over the summer, so they were faced with either taking proven mediocrities or completely untried players to Australia, and they chose the former.

Hard to know how the untried players might have gone but Liam Livingstone would have been an interesting selection and a useful second spinner. Alex Davies is an aggressive opener who would take the game to the Aussies. Tom Haines had a hell of a season albeit in Div 2. They should definitely have taken Matt Parkinson and Saqib Mahmood. And I have no idea why Ben Foakes wasn't picked given that he IS an established Test player.

scrumhalf · December 2021

Apparently Silverwood has said that he would have picked the same two teams again.

There's not really much to add, is there?

I watched the Sky post-match review with Athers, Naz, Key and Ward (it's on YouTube). Well worth watching or listening to.

Stuckfast · December 2021

So what do we think of the team for Boxing Day then? It's certainly a fresh arrangement of deckchairs and may offer a little iceberg resistance if we are lucky.

Personally I would rather they brought back Lawrence than Bairstow, though.

Mellish · December 2021

@Stuckfast I think the writing is on the wall mate and it's how big a defeat it'll be. The selectors had four years to get it right. I hope we win a Test, at least come away with *something*. And Merry Christmas, hope it's a good one

scrumhalf · December 2021

To be fair to the selector(s) they had banked on Archer and Stone being fit.

He/they probably also banked on our bowlers not bowling too short.

However, whilst the former might take time to sort out, the latter should have been fixed pretty bloody quickly.

Mellish · December 2021

What gets me is that they can do better. They've proved it with defiance in the second Test. That's what is so frustrating about it, when you know they can do better but they keep on failing.

crunchman · December 2021

Watching the preamble. I think we can answer the question of who ate all the pies - Harmison.

Mellish · December 2021

Well, I think "Oh dear" sums up England. Unless there's a dramatic change, we're looking at a whitewash

crunchman · December 2021

It's the same failings. Why did they bring back Crawley when he's still bringing the bat down from the direction of thrid man? He needs to be told to go back to county cricket and fix his technique to play straight. He shouldn't even have been on this tour.

Stuckfast · December 2021

Trouble is there's no county cricket to go back to... except the matches played in April where it makes no difference what angle your bat comes down because the ball's hooping in circles.

I wonder if the ECB are going to have the humility to acknowledge that this is ultimately down to their marginalising of four-day cricket in the summer?

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