The Official Cricket Thread

[Enzedder]

Wickets again for Leach and we have Bracewell leaking runs. The BC’s selection of spin has been terrible for some time and this series highlights it again. If Bracewell is getting overs then Patel should be in the team instead.

Totally agree. They included Patel in the one game where they should have had Wagner - farking clueless selections.

[Insane_Homer]

Raining, delayed start.

[OomStruisbaai]

Wickets again for Leach and we have Bracewell leaking runs. The BC’s selection of spin has been terrible for some time and this series highlights it again. If Bracewell is getting overs then Patel should be in the team instead.

Totally agree. They included Patel in the one game where they should have had Wagner - farking clueless selections.

Hope Boucher learn from this. We need two spinners. Harmer played a lot of cricket in England.

[SaintK]

Raining, delayed start.

Quick finish mind!
Only needed a little over 60 minutes once Bairstow came in

[Thor Sedan]

Thank god this series is over. Very much a case of a team running back home with their tails between their legs - pretty awful stuff from us.

Lets not take anything away from England - Better bowling (definitely better depth) - better tactics and batting many levels above the BC's. I know that England are in home conditions so would usually be favourites - but 2021 England would have capitulated faced with the equations they were set. But this series......they blew past NZ with absolute ease.

Annoyed that the decision making in the back room can't find a use for spinners. We have them.....perhaps not as much quality....but they are there.

No one in the top 5 scored a century. No one averaged above 26.

The Williamson problem needs to be addressed. He is almost worthless to the team at the moment - not scoring runs, not making great decisions and flaky when it comes to injuries. He needs to be in the team.....but captain? Team in a bit of trouble at the moment.

Will be interested to see how England go against India - a side with depth in bowling and batting even in English conditions. I guess that will be the real picture of how England are going.

[Thor Sedan]

Raining, delayed start.

Quick finish mind!
Only needed a little over 60 minutes once Bairstow came in

I wonder how many low scores he'll be allowed to get before the calls come to drop him again?

[JM2K6]

Raining, delayed start.

Quick finish mind!
Only needed a little over 60 minutes once Bairstow came in

I wonder how many low scores he'll be allowed to get before the calls come to drop him again?

This is a different bairstow tbh. The question is whether this approach can work against other sides in other conditions, and what happens when.

But whatever happens, what he's done this series is remarkable and deserves to be recognised as such. He's always been a deeply frustrating player - and can easily come across as an angry dickhead - but this goes beyond just finding a run of form. It's up there with best of KP for defining innings.

[Gumboot]

Well that was an emphatic spanking.

Brilliant series for England, just far too good.

[Thor Sedan]

Probably the least surprising retirement announcement.

Eoin Morgan stands down after 7 and a half years - https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/eoin ... nt-1322079

Fair to say that he and a couple of others completely revamped Englands white ball fortunes - and they haven't really looked back since. As nice of a guy as he is - I will never forgive him and his team (and the umpire) for breaking my heart in 2016.

Don't imagine he will be away from the dressing room for long. I would say very much a man in demand regarding coaching.

[JM2K6]

He's surprisingly unpopular among some elements of the English media, the wankers. Anyway, incredible captain and at his best a ridiculously dominant batsman. Will go down as our best ever short-form captain. Fair fucks to him for calling it quits so close to a world cup, too.

[fishfoodie]

He's surprisingly unpopular among some elements of the English media, the wankers. Anyway, incredible captain and at his best a ridiculously dominant batsman. Will go down as our best ever short-form captain. Fair fucks to him for calling it quits so close to a world cup, too.

Can we have him back now ?



Maybe he could turn out for us in the forthcoming World Cup ?

[Thor Sedan]

England are starting to give off very real 'unbeatable at home' vibes.

[Thor Sedan]

I forgot that the schedule for all tests in England right now is -top order collapse - middle order build and plunder - tail wag. Seems to be the standard right now.

[Biffer]

Broad going for 35 in an over

[Kiwias]

Broad going for 35 in an over

Just checked on that and it was Bumrah too!!!

[Biffer]

Crawley

[Biffer]

Former Scotland cricket and football International Andy Goram has passed away age 58 after a short battle with cancer.

Terrible shame.

Always wish he'd been allowed to play cricket for Scotland while he was playing for Rangers. Would likely have played at the cricket world cup in 99.

[Thor Sedan]

And the familiar middle order domination starts on cue.

[Kiwias]

Stokes was spraying catching chances around and one finally stuck

[FalseBayFC]

Bairstow has been a very angry batsman since that one Aussie spectator fat-shamed him!

[OomStruisbaai]

India have a bit of a lead . England strike immediately

[Thor Sedan]

This ball checking nonsense from England is ridiculous. They are genuinely benefiting from it.

Got to be a rule put in place that you can only check a certain number of times in an innings.

[duke]

This ball checking nonsense from England is ridiculous. They are genuinely benefiting from it.

Got to be a rule put in place that you can only check a certain number of times in an innings.

It’s not just England though is it? The Kiwis were asking for ball checks at the same frequency- the problem is with the ball manufacturer

[JM2K6]

This ball checking nonsense from England is ridiculous. They are genuinely benefiting from it.

Got to be a rule put in place that you can only check a certain number of times in an innings.

I honestly believed the same as you but it turns out that a) everyone is doing it - not just England and opponents, but first class sides - because b) it's a terrible batch of balls this year that are falling apart very very fast. So it's a shit situation that they're making the best of.

[Paddington Bear]

Cricket balls have been massively affected by supply chain issues and covid, and by all accounts it is still a very labour intensive industry. Not a huge shock quality is suffering

[Paddington Bear]

Need to rattle through the last three ASAP

[Mahoney]

India get the ball changed on 20.5 - are the "old" balls they swap them with from last year, and hence a quite different batch?

[Insane_Homer]

Run rate has dipped from 5.0 to 4.8 - India back in this

[Insane_Homer]

getting the ball changed worked, 109/3 (although the changed ball probably had little to do with the run out )

[Paddington Bear]

Can't afford moments like that...

[JM2K6]

India get the ball changed on 20.5 - are the "old" balls they swap them with from last year, and hence a quite different batch?

Pretty sure they have to be from the same batch

[OomStruisbaai]

England do it again. Another tick box waiting for the wise Nipper coming up.

[Thor Sedan]

This ball checking nonsense from England is ridiculous. They are genuinely benefiting from it.

Got to be a rule put in place that you can only check a certain number of times in an innings.

I honestly believed the same as you but it turns out that a) everyone is doing it - not just England and opponents, but first class sides - because b) it's a terrible batch of balls this year that are falling apart very very fast. So it's a shit situation that they're making the best of.

Yes....apparently so. I was unaware of the number of challenges that other nations were checking the ball. Thought it was a pernickety Broad/Anderson thing. But no.....rubbish balls it is.

But on another note - fecking he'll English cricket fans must be loving this new look England batting. They're only going to pull off another massive chase. Seriously - if you want to defend against this side you need to have a 400+ score.

Crazy batting skills at the moment.

[Mahoney]

I think most of us are wondering when it's all going to go horribly wrong.

[T]his rash fierce blaze of riot cannot last,
For violent fires soon burn out themselves;
Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short;
He tires betimes that spurs too fast betimes;

[Mahoney]

Bloody amazing while it lasts though. It must feel astonishing to be Bairstow at the moment. Just dismissing everything that's thrown at you.

[JM2K6]

Yeah, it's quite, quite mad.

[Paddington Bear]

Long way to go today of course, but it's fascinating what a difference mindset makes. For all the talk of reinventing test batting, Root has barely played a shot in anger and is ticking along rapidly in the fourth innings. Crowds are clearly loving it and venues are making some effort to connect with what is a very long suffering fanbase. Remarkable turnaround.

[Mahoney]

I'm certainly very much in favour of being positive from 30 overs on - so often England would grind on at 2, 2.5 an over through the old ball, then collapse in a heap when the new ball came with only 200 on the board*. Big fan of looking to score heavily against the old ball and get a proper score up before it gets really hard again.

I'm not quite so convinced that the full Morgan approach will work long term in test cricket.

[Biffer]

This ball checking nonsense from England is ridiculous. They are genuinely benefiting from it.

Got to be a rule put in place that you can only check a certain number of times in an innings.

I honestly believed the same as you but it turns out that a) everyone is doing it - not just England and opponents, but first class sides - because b) it's a terrible batch of balls this year that are falling apart very very fast. So it's a shit situation that they're making the best of.

Yes....apparently so. I was unaware of the number of challenges that other nations were checking the ball. Thought it was a pernickety Broad/Anderson thing. But no.....rubbish balls it is.

But on another note - fecking he'll English cricket fans must be loving this new look England batting. They're only going to pull off another massive chase. Seriously - if you want to defend against this side you need to have a 400+ score.

Crazy batting skills at the moment.

This is a big question for me - are England redefining Test Match cricket? I was initially thinking it’d work against that New Zealand attack but against a better, more mixed attack it’ll be different. We’ll see how the rest of the summer goes, but if they carry on like this then the other nations will have to adapt, and that might completely revitalise test cricket. If this approach dominates then a side who has decent openers as well as the middle order England have could put on 700+ regularly in first innings. Tickets would most definitely sell.

[Paddington Bear]

I'm certainly very much in favour of being positive from 30 overs on - so often England would grind on at 2, 2.5 an over through the old ball, then collapse in a heap when the new ball came with only 200 on the board*. Big fan of looking to score heavily against the old ball and get a proper score up before it gets really hard again.

I'm not quite so convinced that the full Morgan approach will work long term in test cricket.

In many ways is this so different to the great Aussie side of the late 90s/early 2000s in terms of philosophy? 'Spinners are there to get you from 50 to 100' etc, just adapted to people who play white ball cricket at a level above what it was. Tend to agree otherwise, we haven't seen the end of 'proper' batting and application, particularly against the new ball, but as you say there's nothing proper about grind and collapse.