The Cricket Thread

[Alex 35588]

32 minutes ago, Dr Gloom said:

Yeah, I reckon that could be the end of the Roy experiment in Tests. 

I think he had to open if he was playing anyway. Denly hasn’t opened much and has tended to play at 3 in the longer format recently I think. That’s why I liked the idea of him at 3 and another more attritional type opening in Burns. Then Roy, in theory at least, was a more attacking opener in the Warner mould. Putting him into the middle order just seemed pointless as we’re already overloaded there. If he can’t fulfil the role he was brought in for then make the difficult decision and drop him or Bairstow or Buttler. I get the idea of picking your best players but even going back to the winter we were better with Burns, Jennings and Denly against the Windies in the last test. They didn’t get loads of runs but they at least batted time and blunted the seam attack. It’s hard to make a case for Jennings because of his record (and I’m not) but the balance was clearly better with batsmen in their proper positions. 

[Alex 35588]

I just heard Abdul Qadir has died  absolutely magical bowler and part of the Pakistan team that gave England a beating in 1987 

[Alex 35588]

That action 

 

[Dr Gloom 22164]

2 hours ago, Alex said:

I think he had to open if he was playing anyway. Denly hasn’t opened much and has tended to play at 3 in the longer format recently I think. That’s why I liked the idea of him at 3 and another more attritional type opening in Burns. Then Roy, in theory at least, was a more attacking opener in the Warner mould. Putting him into the middle order just seemed pointless as we’re already overloaded there. If he can’t fulfil the role he was brought in for then make the difficult decision and drop him or Bairstow or Buttler. I get the idea of picking your best players but even going back to the winter we were better with Burns, Jennings and Denly against the Windies in the last test. They didn’t get loads of runs but they at least batted time and blunted the seam attack. It’s hard to make a case for Jennings because of his record (and I’m not) but the balance was clearly better with batsmen in their proper positions. 

The balance is all wrong, it’s true. Way too many aggressive players. At least in Burns it looks like we might finally have found a test match opener who can leave the ball well and bat for time, annoyingly just after cook has retired. We could do with finding another opener cut from the same cloth - I’m still not convinced by Denly at all but af least he has spirit. Roy had a big chance today but the less said about his dismissal the better, particularly coming after all that hard graft by Root and Burns. He may have used his last life.

I doubt Jennings would do any better, plus he had plenty of chances and didn’t take them. The problem is who else is there? No one banging the door down in the CC. Do you throw someone like Pope into the middle of an Ashes series? 

Going to need another miracle innings from Stokes to keep the series alive.

Edited September 6, 2019 by Dr Gloom

[Gemmill 46039]

One of the few good things about this series has been Warner. Gone again for nowt. 

[Dr Gloom 22164]

Annoyingly, you have to say fair play Australia.

Smith is the difference between two poor batting sides. He’s a run machine and today provided yet another absolute master class. Feels like we got him out cheaply for just the 80 odd runs. 

But it’s not just Smith. They have better depth in their pace attack than we do without Anderson and have out-bowled us in this match. Cummins and Hazlewood are different class.

The pressure is on them to win a series here for the first time since 2001 but I don’t see us batting the day out after they knocked over our two batsman most likely to hang around. Root got an absolute snorter tbf

Edited September 7, 2019 by Dr Gloom

[Dr Gloom 22164]

Archer looked again class today when the sun was out. Didn’t fancy a windy Wednesday in Manchester. 

[Dr Gloom 22164]

4 hours ago, Gemmill said:

One of the few good things about this series has been Warner. Gone again for nowt. 

I like how he walks off the field smiling to himself every time broad gets him out like he isn’t bothered, especially when the cheating cunt is obviously seething. Marvellous 

[Alex 35588]

I don’t think Root did get a snorter. Look at where he plays the ball. Not for the first time in the series he’s made a good ball look a lot better by barely getting out of his crease to one where he should be playing forward which makes a huge difference when you’re dealing in such small margins. Any movement in the air or off the pitch is therefore exaggerated. Totally agree about Australia being the side deserving of victory though. The only test we deserved to win was the drawn one. Stokes’ incredible innings papered over the cracks. It’s a good Aussie side though, even allowing for some brittle batting 

[Alex 35588]

And don’t get me fucking started about his captaincy. Why didn’t Archer and Broad bowl straight after tea? 

[Dr Gloom 22164]

15 hours ago, Alex said:

I don’t think Root did get a snorter. Look at where he plays the ball. Not for the first time in the series he’s made a good ball look a lot better by barely getting out of his crease to one where he should be playing forward which makes a huge difference when you’re dealing in such small margins. Any movement in the air or off the pitch is therefore exaggerated. Totally agree about Australia being the side deserving of victory though. The only test we deserved to win was the drawn one. Stokes’ incredible innings papered over the cracks. It’s a good Aussie side though, even allowing for some brittle batting 

A 90mph inswinger seaming then clipping the top of off will challenge most batsmen first ball, unless your name is Steve Smith. 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/av/cricket/49623051

In Root’s defence, it takes a few balls to get the feet going but I agree about him generally batting too deep in his crease. He almost walked back on his stumps at one point today. Missed it by inches 

Edited September 8, 2019 by Dr Gloom

[PaddockLad 17661]

What time is end of play? Am following via google....

[PaddockLad 17661]

No worries then...

 

 

[Dr Gloom 22164]

Agonising day. We got so close but we were always hanging on.

Aussies deserved to retain the Ashes. They’ve outplayed us for large chunks of the series. Good to see us fight till the very end today and not roll over. Shame we haven’t seen more of that type of application more often. But the sandpaper boys have one of the best pace attacks around and the best batsman in the world by a mile. 

We have some match winners but need a new coach, a new strategy, possibly a new captain and a lot of work on the test match batting mindset, which we only showed in glimpses.  

Shame Jimmy didn’t feature. He could have made a difference. Archer and Burns the two positive for the future, good to see Broad showing he’s still got it at this level. I’d like to see those three bowl with Woakes in the winter tours of SA. They’re our best four seamers. Then Stokes could be more of a batting all rounder and occasional impact bowler, particularly if he does end up with the captaincy.

 

Edited September 8, 2019 by Dr Gloom

[Dr Gloom 22164]

I can’t decide whether winning the World Cup was worth losing the ashes at home. I think it probably was. Still gutted to lose to the Aussies at home after all this time. The new coach has to find a way to balance the one day mindset that has been so successful for our 50 over side, but which so many of our players carry into test matches with them, with a renewed focus on getting back to building proper test match innings. We don’t pass 400 runs in an innings anywhere near enough anymore.

Edited September 8, 2019 by Dr Gloom

[RobinRobin 11584]

On 9/7/2019 at 21:36, Gemmill said:

One of the few good things about this series has been Warner. Gone again for nowt. 

So Roy was playing the Warner role 

[RobinRobin 11584]

On 9/5/2019 at 22:05, Dr Gloom said:

How has leach contrived to bowl a fucking no ball when he takes smith's wicket ffs. what are the odds of a spinner doing that?

Pretty unforgivable, but so was everyone else dropping their shoulders as a result.

[Alex 35588]

Best team won 

[Alex 35588]

11 hours ago, Dr Gloom said:

I can’t decide whether winning the World Cup was worth losing the ashes at home. I think it probably was. Still gutted to lose to the Aussies at home after all this time. The new coach has to find a way to balance the one day mindset that has been so successful for our 50 over side, but which so many of our players carry into test matches with them, with a renewed focus on getting back to building proper test match innings. We don’t pass 400 runs in an innings anywhere near enough anymore.

We batted for quite a long time in this match. A big factor in the series is how parsimonious (as Jeremy Coney would say) the Aussie quicks have been. It was a definite tactic and one of the reasons Starc  couldn’t get in the side earlier. If you look at the type of batsman we have you’d expect us to have scored something closer to 400 in the first innings but throughout the series scoring at more than 3 an over has been difficult. I also thought the attitude in the second innings from Roy and Bairstow was good. It was their technical issues that let them down. Also can anyone tell me what the fuck the ECB was doing letting the likes of Bancroft and Labuschagne play in the county championship? 

I agree more focus should be on the test side. The one day side getting priority with World Cup being here has been justified with our winning it but what most England fans care most about is test and, in particular, The Ashes. T20 is where the money is though and where’s the incentive for producing proper test batsmen? Also, the world’s best players used to play in the CC. Not any more though so the standard isn’t there and players struggle to step up 

[Dr Gloom 22164]

whoever the new coach is has to try to develop a proper strategy for test match cricket, the aim being to regain the ashes next winter, reinstalling a 5 day game batting mindset - there were glimpses of it at old trafford from the players you mentioned, from buttler too - then picking players capable of causing them problems down under. i'd see if dizzy gillespie fancies it. his coaching record is good, he knows the CC and how to win on australian pitches. 
 

[Alex 35588]

Same team for the final test. 😂

Edited September 9, 2019 by Alex

[David Kelly 1260]

There's not many batsmen showing it at test level at the moment, whether that's down to conditions, bowler or (my personal belief) the focus on white ball cricket around the world meaning batsmen aren't used to playing the way they need to.  As Stokes said, the flip side of that is we're able to see innings like he produced at Heddlingley.  Mind the way it's going we aren't going to be able to see the first part of that innings from many players.

I definitely think we should be splitting the red and white ball coaching duties.  I don't blame the ECB for focusing on white ball these past few years because winning the world cup was massive for us, but it does feel somewhat overdone when you look at how are test team are performing now.  And what happens now?  Do we switch it back around and lose our standing as the top odi team or fail to prepare for the T20 world cup?  Surely having someone focusing on the white ball game solely would be the better option.  Obviously they need to be looking at the make up of the county championship season too but with the hundred starting next year I don't imagine there's going to be any immediate changes with the program.

[Dr Gloom 22164]

yeah, a specialist test match coach could be the way to go

[RobinRobin 11584]

The bottom line is that the best batsmen (and bowlers) in the world can and do play all forms of the game.  The absolute best players (Kohli, Smith, Williamson), though, can and do play the conditions and occasion, not just the same game each time.

We need to coach resilience and perspective, not just "see it - hit it", especially early in an innings or when the match needs to be drawn.  

[Dr Gloom 22164]

Yeah, that approach worked for winning the World Cup but it has to change if we want to do well in tests. We split the captaincy in tests and one dayers - I don’t see why the same can’t apply to coaches. They’re such different games now - the best one day coaches, like Bayliss, aren’t necessarily the guys you want devising batting strategy when the chips are down in a test match