The Official Cricket Thread

[OomStruisbaai]

Stokes again. Cricket freak

[OomStruisbaai]

England will take this. Awesome crowd.

[SaintK]

Oooooof a chance of a c&b for Root there
Going like a rocket mind!!!

[Biffer]

What a catch by Root!

Take the new ball now?

[JM2K6]

Into the final hour. Going to need all of it.

[Sandstorm]

England have dropped a LOT of catches this Test match.

[JM2K6]

Into the final hour. Going to need all of it.

Ah. Maybe not, Aussies getting a lot of runs now. Big drop by Stokes, tough catch though!

[Sandstorm]

Last 3 overs. 24 runs with old ball when new is available. Why England?????

[SaintK]

Last 3 overs. 24 runs with old ball when new is available. Why England?????

Yep!!!!

[Biffer]

Catches win matches. England have wasted too many chances. Take them and the declaration was genius.

[fishfoodie]

The Ashes really has everything you need for an Event.

A long history, two competitive sides, & fanatical supporters

[Insane_Homer]

Cricket winning!

Stokes needs to give himself an over here

[JM2K6]

Bairstow missed five on his own. Stokes with two working legs would've taken his ones. Root had the toughest ones.

Superb match, great cricket. Well played Australia. Huge performances by Lyon, Cummins, and Khawaja.

England just look a bit patchwork - trying to make a half fit captain work, an overweight mediocre keeper work, a t20 spinner work - and the lack of pace in the bowling attack with Stokes' injury probably cost us plenty, too.

But ultimately, Leach's injury and Bairstow's keeping incompetence have cost England this game.

[Biffer]

The Ashes really has everything you need for an Event.

A long history, two competitive sides, & fanatical supporters

And yet there’s still the occasional spiv prick who thinks you’d improve it by combining the tests with some ODIs and t20s.

[Insane_Homer]

4 more games like that please!

[Biffer]

Fantastic knock from Cummins. What a match, if England hadn’t declared first innings, that last day would have been flat and processional to a draw.

[Deepsouth]

The Ashes really has everything you need for an Event.

A long history, two competitive sides, & fanatical supporters

England haven't been competive in Australia for some time and as for fanatical fans try moronic or boorish....

[JM2K6]

Lmao, welcome back Bazza

[Deepsouth]

Lmao, welcome back Bazza

You disagree with my statement?

[JM2K6]

Lmao, welcome back Bazza

You disagree with my statement?

Agreed on the Australia bit, our fans hold up pretty well against the bogans and the Indians. SA and NZ are a decent enough bunch.

[Deepsouth]

Lmao, welcome back Bazza

You disagree with my statement?

Agreed on the Australia bit, our fans hold up pretty well against the bogans and the Indians. SA and NZ are a decent enough bunch.

You must be delusional if you think 5 days of repetitive moronic and belittling songs is indicative of any claim to decency.

[Slick]

Awesome Test cricket

Strange comment about the supporters.

Edit: is DeepSouth an Aussie?

[Deepsouth]

Awesome Test cricket

Strange comment about the supporters.

Edit: is DeepSouth an Aussie?

I take it you are a soccer fan. Would be difficult for you to understand in that case......

[Wyndham Upalot]

Cheer up DS, you won, didn't you?

[JM2K6]

You disagree with my statement?

Agreed on the Australia bit, our fans hold up pretty well against the bogans and the Indians. SA and NZ are a decent enough bunch.

You must be delusional if you think 5 days of repetitive moronic and belittling songs is indicative of any claim to decency.

Never been to Lord's, I assume. Couldn't manage the dress code? The only difference between the Aussies and the English is that we know better songs.

You must be thrilled with this result. Dreaming of Australia's first series win in England in 22 years?

[JM2K6]

Awesome Test cricket

Strange comment about the supporters.

Edit: is DeepSouth an Aussie?

Remember Bazzamacca?

[Slick]

Awesome Test cricket

Strange comment about the supporters.

Edit: is DeepSouth an Aussie?

Remember Bazzamacca?

I do, but he’s reminding me of someone else, can’t put my finger on it

[Slick]

Agreed on the Australia bit, our fans hold up pretty well against the bogans and the Indians. SA and NZ are a decent enough bunch.

You must be delusional if you think 5 days of repetitive moronic and belittling songs is indicative of any claim to decency.

Never been to Lord's, I assume. Couldn't manage the dress code? The only difference between the Aussies and the English is that we know better songs.

You must be thrilled with this result. Dreaming of Australia's first series win in England in 22 years?

And humour. That’s the other big difference

[JM2K6]

You must be delusional if you think 5 days of repetitive moronic and belittling songs is indicative of any claim to decency.

Never been to Lord's, I assume. Couldn't manage the dress code? The only difference between the Aussies and the English is that we know better songs.

You must be thrilled with this result. Dreaming of Australia's first series win in England in 22 years?

And humour. That’s the other big difference

In all honesty the Aussie traveling fans are a great bunch.

The home fans, on the other hand... Dim witted, ignorant, illiterate, borderline racist, hugely one eyed, and whiny as fuck. And that's just the journalists.

[Biffer]

To be fair, I wouldn’t want to go to an England away test match with hour after hour of ‘barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army,….’

[JM2K6]

To be fair, I wouldn’t want to go to an England away test match with hour after hour of ‘barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army,….’

Yup, they're a pain. Great support for the team, but that's it

[Enzedder]

England have dropped a LOT of catches this Test match.

And that, rather than the declaration, is what needs to be underlined.

[Grandpa]

Must better understanding of test cricket over here. On PR there are a lot of English and Aussie fans who seem to see Bazball as some kind of upstart virus that needs to be put in it's place.. or abandoned...

[Gumboot]

England have dropped a LOT of catches this Test match.

And that, rather than the declaration, is what needs to be underlined.

Yep, it's an adage for a reason: catches win matches.

Grandpa,
I like these early declarations. Fortune favours the brave. (woops, there's another one)

[Slick]

To be fair, I wouldn’t want to go to an England away test match with hour after hour of ‘barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army, barmy army,….’

They do usually put them in a corner in their own

[Grandpa]

England have dropped a LOT of catches this Test match.

And that, rather than the declaration, is what needs to be underlined.

Yep, it's an adage for a reason: catches win matches.

Grandpa,
I like these early declarations. Fortune favours the brave. (woops, there's another one)

I used to love watching McCullum bat and love watching how England play under him. Never a dull moment.

[Biffer]

Cricket World Cup qualifier has started, not that you’d notice.

Scotland take two Ireland wickets in the first over.

[Biffer]

And another, Ireland 17-3 in the 5th over

[Gumboot]

And that, rather than the declaration, is what needs to be underlined.

Yep, it's an adage for a reason: catches win matches.

Grandpa,
I like these early declarations. Fortune favours the brave. (woops, there's another one)

I used to love watching McCullum bat and love watching how England play under him. Never a dull moment.

Yep, he's always been about the importance of enjoying what you're doing.

[Paddington Bear]

Ended up going up to Edgbaston yesterday. Five of us from my club got single tickets and made an effort to try and find a spot together, turns out all you needed to do to get a wristband for the Hollies is say the magic words ‘can I have a wristband for the Hollies please’.

Let’s leave aside the declaration which whilst I don’t like it I’ll concede nearly worked. England have blown a test that was there to win and are on the back foot as a result.

Not picking Foakes backfired spectacularly as Bairstow blew chance after chance.
Picking Ali backfired as he bowled a huge amount of crap. We all know he can bowl good balls (and did) but Leach’s role in the side is to get through overs, tie batsmen up and maintain pressure. Root did that yesterday, Ali gifted them runs with long hops and full tosses, not helped by a field that left open boundary options.

There’s a lot to be said for the innovative fields, but with a game on the line and a new ball (also take the new ball as soon as it’s on offer), pitch it up and stick some slips in, and give Jimmy the ball.

Very, very frustrating but well batted Pat Cummins, a serious captain’s innings.

Aussie fans are for the most part just dull, sitting in matching shirts and hats in big groups in near silence for five days. The same was true of their rugby fans at the 2015 semi I went to, maybe that’s just the sporting culture there. Aussie fans in the Hollies, predominantly overseas players from local clubs as far as I could tell, were much better value.

Onto Lords but given our record there you have to say 2-0 seems more likely than not.

As an aside and given this is a rugby forum, I ought to compare and contrast watching my country in the two sports. Yesterday’s ticket was £25 (is there any premiership rugby I could watch for that?), whilst people were getting pissed just about everyone was focussed on the action and there was pretty limited movement in the stands during play, we didn’t drink a lot but the couple of times I went to the bar I think I missed a cumulative 7 balls of cricket because they ran the bars properly and efficiently, and the crowd actually got stuck into, really stuck into, supporting England. I felt Edgbaston cared we’d made the effort to come and support. The contrast to Twickenham speaks for itself.

All in all deeply frustrated, emotionally drained, but quite genuinely a privilege to have been there all the same. Test cricket when it has real meaning is sport at its absolute finest.