talkFORUM Archive

Lou Grant wrote:Root has got a worrying habit of not making centuries these days.

He's had a great series, but he should have turned more of those 70s and 80s into hundreds, and then we'd have been in a much stronger position.

All England care about is the flight home next Wednesday . The cricket they served up here is as welcome as cold turkey cuts on
January 2nd.

Great knock from Dawson on debut; him and Rashid took England from 321/7 to 429/8

Oh look, another Bairstow drop. If you take away the extra runs scored by the players he's dropped from the runs he's scored, he'd be averaging about -35.

Shocking.

Good to see the talkFORUM cricket brains trust still in full flow

Will England get more than 150 in their 2nd innings. The odds are shortening by the ball.

Cook has to go as captain after this shambles and should only be selected on form, like some of the other rabble. Bayliss has to go, he's more like an insipid Englishman than an Aussie.

Another innings defeat. England don't want to be there and want to go home ASAP to get on the piss ASAP.


The useless bunch of cunts.

Thursty wrote:Good to see the talkFORUM cricket brains trust still in full flow

Are you still in Oz? Fantastic test in Brisbane.

Can't wait for the India - Oz series in the spring, in which I will genuinely put my hand up and admit I've been wrong about England's performances if Australia go out there and win some tests.

Lou Grant wrote:

Thursty wrote:Good to see the talkFORUM cricket brains trust still in full flow

Are you still in Oz? Fantastic test in Brisbane.

Can't wait for the India - Oz series in the spring, in which I will genuinely put my hand up and admit I've been wrong about England's performances if Australia go out there and win some tests.

Whatever Australia do in India, will not change the view on England's performances, which have been a disgrace, particularly from an application, technique and psychological point of view.

They should come home in disgrace, but some no doubt will go back for a second holiday in Dubai for a deserved rest.

I still long for tennisman's view on this series. I suspect he might have more perspective than you, but who knows?

Lou Grant wrote:I still long for tennisman's view on this series. I suspect he might have more perspective than you, but who knows?

Who cares what anyone elses opinion is. It sounds to me, that you are not sure of your own though, if you are looking and hoping someone elses will back yours up. It wont change mine though. England have been woeful and are in need of a massive shake up.

It wont happen though, because those who are responible are as gutless at the FA.

Zambo wrote:

Lou Grant wrote:I still long for tennisman's view on this series. I suspect he might have more perspective than you, but who knows?

Who cares what anyone elses opinion is. It sounds to me, that you are not sure of your own though, if you are looking and hoping someone elses will back yours up. It wont change mine though. England have been woeful and are in need of a massive shake up.

It wont happen though, because those who are responible are as gutless at the FA.

I think that's a huge overreaction. India's home record is phenomenal.

What is frustrating is that England came a whisker away from going into the 2nd Test 1-0 up, which would have changed the whole complexion of the series.

I think people are talking up India to take the attention off the incompetene of England. Many of the shots some played to get out they would have got out to against anyone.

I'll throw a question into the ring. What was the difference between England in this series. Being out performed doesn't cut it.

I see Bayliss is blathering on about there bieng good times ahead on the BBC, but nothing about his team being shite in India.

England should've had a proper wicket keeper - I said that from the start. When you have limited spin bowler resources it's crucial that a wicket keeper can take every catch or stumping chance a bowler creates. Whoever had captained and coached this side, they couldn't have magicked a top class spinner out of thin air.

The catching has also been poor, but again I feel that has shown up more as the series has gone on. 7 tests in 2 months is just insane. Players can't be expected to keep fresh and have the same level of intensity over such a punishing schedule, and we don't have enough depth to give large numbers of players a break mid series.

Aside from the catching and keeping, batsmen have performed reasonably well, but even class players will struggle batting in the 2nd innings against world class spinners on Indian pitches. The bowlers have by and large done their best - neither Anderson nor Broad have been fully fit and able to play a full series; we simply don't have great spinners. Again, I'd fail to see a different coach/captain combination getting significantly better results given those bowling resources.

I've never said this has been a great England performance - all I've ever said is that all the experts predicted 5-0, so it's hard to see how we can be judged as being so much worse than expected. I don't see a bunch of great players we failed to select. And I don't see a coach out there with a significantly better record than Bayliss that is begging to be given the role in his place.

Remarkable that Pakistan came within 40 runs of getting a record winning total. Good fighting effort for a side which folded with more alarming regularity than England.

Nah, current Pakistan side are good. Their collapse in the first innings was actually out of character for the current side, more like a throw back to previous incarnations.

Lou Grant wrote:Nah, current Pakistan side are good. Their collapse in the first innings was actually out of character for the current side, more like a throw back to previous incarnations.

Yes I know. The point I was making was that the side of old folded frequently but over the last couple of years under new management and a unified team spirit has shown great resilience and self confidence to top the test rankings last summer.

Two more wickets gone. Just two more required by India from about ten overs. Moeen again has a head's gone moment.

Just avoiding the innings defeat would have done. The tossers couldn't even manage that .
It is obvious their minds were on the Christmas dinner table , hitting the booze and slobbing out in front of the telly.
Bet they'll still expect to be paid for that pitiful display though.

Just makes that shit that Bayliss came out with yesterday harder to swallow.

This must be another sort of record with a side batting first scoring in excess of 450 going on to lose the match by an innings

Is anyone really surprised by the series outcome though? Shock horror, England struggle in high temperatures in the UAE and South Asia on dead wickets with shit spinners of their own against strong batting sides and adept spinners.

Next Summer, England will run through the teams from the subcontinent or whoever else on green wickets in single figure temperatures in wet conditions which favour swam and swing. That's the nature of cricket these days which favour the home team.

well, i was backing england getting a draw at tea. Good work to lose it from there.

A disappointed Rahul Dravid saying he really thought england would be able to put up a fight this series. Think he overestimated them a bit.

Even when you expect them to lose, at least you hope they will show some determination and fight and not go down with less than a wimper. Embarrassing and shameful.

kancutlawns wrote:This must be another sort of record with a side batting first scoring in excess of 450 going on to lose the match by an innings

Is anyone really surprised by the series outcome though? Shock horror, England struggle in high temperatures in the UAE and South Asia on dead wickets with shit spinners of their own against strong batting sides and adept spinners.

Next Summer, England will run through the teams from the subcontinent or whoever else on green wickets in single figure temperatures in wet conditions which favour swam and swing. That's the nature of cricket these days which favour the home team.

First time its happened with over 450 in the first. Its happened 6 times with over 400 and 4 of them have been england. Its also of the 6 times over 400 have been scored this one is the biggest winning margin. england are record breakers.

Id agree on cheap test match wins at home on green swingers against the subcontinent, except this summer Pakistan were the superior team even with home team advantage. Shows where england currently are.

Thanks for asking Lou, although I'm not sure I can add anything that hasn't already been said.

It does seem as if home advantage, a factor very much in evidence, especially in the sub-continent, even since I was a kid in the 60's when I started to get into cricket still predominates.

Those were the days where there were many top class spinners (especially off spinners) who could bowl all day; who did you select - Titmus, Illingworth Allen, Mortimore followed by Pocock, Emburey etc ? Or maybe the left armers like Gifford, Sainsbury, then Edmonds etc? Every county had one, or two, sometimes 3.

Don Shepherd bowling his slow medium off spinners took over 2,000 first-class wickets, bowled thousands of overs straddling the 50's and 70's and never played a single Test.

Through the 60's wickets got covered and as a result, gradually, through the 70's and into the 80's with covered flat tracks and 3 one-day competitions in full flow with a gradual rise also in ODI's, seam took an even greater grip on the national bowling culture.

Like lots of our industry, as the mills, factories, shipyards and mines shut down, so did the skills that went with them. It's almost the same with spin bowling and spin bowlers.

Although 4 day cricket was supposed to help address this issue, it doesn't seem that it has.

It's possible an easy conclusion to make but as Boycott once said, rather aptly, I reckon; 'Flat tracks, big bats and short boundaries' have been part of a the gradual increase in a 'slam, bam, thank you mam' approach to batting where 'maxiumums' are hit like 4's used to be.

In our English conditions, if the seam and swing haven't got you, then keep going and swing the bat.

With T20 images of bowlers being hit for up to 10 an over, how many kids these days want to be bowlers, let alone spinners? How many are being coached to be one?

How many are on county staffs?

It would be interesting to find out.

On the batting, having been brought up on Boycott and Barrington and Edrich, I was imbued with the concept of crease occupation. Whilst a bit too young for the 50's, I am now aware of Cowdrey and May batting all day against Ramadin and Valentine and denying them victory (at Edgbaston) and of course, Trevor Bailey and Willie Watson denying the Aussies one year by just staying in.

These days, the batsmen don't seem to have the mindset to do this (T20 mindset???).

But having said all of the above, didn't England beat India on their own patch not that long ago?

How did that come about and why didn't we carry on doing the things we did then?

PS Excuse the shameless plug but there's a lovely cartoon of Kenny Barrington in this blog post on my site (first image in) where his bat is 3 yards wide and he's been at the crease so long, he's got cobwebs all over him.

The caption uses the words, 'Doggedness and patience'. Are these the qualities England batsmen lack today?;

http://www.goalsandwickets.co.uk/cricke ... et-season/