Gotta love Siddle, on these flat pitches he always rises to the occasion. He deserves a 5 fer here and it would be much better than the one he got in the previous Test. North has done a good job so far, will be interesting how he goes in the 2nd innings.
5th Test: England vs Australia at the Brit Oval
- Thread starter evertonfan
- Start date
I'm going to put my credibility on the line here and pitch for an England victory.
Reason: This is not a typical Oval wicket. For the ball to be going through the top and turning sharply on day 1 tells me this is a result pitch.
Johnson has been successful; so will Flintoff and Harmison if they pitch it just short of a length. Swann will tie batsman up and bowl unplayable wicket balls
Aus all out for 214.
Reason: This is not a typical Oval wicket. For the ball to be going through the top and turning sharply on day 1 tells me this is a result pitch.
Johnson has been successful; so will Flintoff and Harmison if they pitch it just short of a length. Swann will tie batsman up and bowl unplayable wicket balls
Aus all out for 214.
StinkyBoHoon
National Board President
- Joined
- Mar 5, 2009
- Location
- Glasgow, Scotland
certainly not the end is nigh yet.
barmy, you going to see scotland get slaughtered by australia next week? I am, for some reason.
barmy, you going to see scotland get slaughtered by australia next week? I am, for some reason.
MasterBlaster76
ICC Chairman
I agree. It will be a low scoring match, so England's 300+ will prove to be a good score. Of course, we should've batted them right out of the game, but 300+ on this is a good score.
Certainly the day belonged to Aus, if Aus manages to pick those two wickets around 320-330,then would be satisfied with their bowling performance,S Clark was wicket less but he bowled well...Eager for second day's play of this final test match...
Looking at the way North bowled here, I think Australia will really miss Hauricane. He got some good turn and bounce and going into the 3rd or 4th day I think a specialist spinner is a must here so Clark as a medium pacer will have no role to play with the ball and that's when England will have to take advantage of it by not giving away wickets to Siddle and Johnson but I think once Australia get past or anywhere near England's 1st innings total which is likely to happen with their solid batting line up, it will be very difficult for England to win the match.
I just get a feeling Harmison will play a key role, if he picks up wickets like Siddle then England will have a better chance.
I just get a feeling Harmison will play a key role, if he picks up wickets like Siddle then England will have a better chance.
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Australia are a bit fortunate to have 8 I think as particularly in the first session they bowled a lot of bad balls. They certainly wouldn't have been happy about their bowling, but they would be happy with the result.
After his first over I said to my brother, 'this is a Siddle pitch'. Just like the Headingly pitch was great for Stuart Clark. Siddle can just rip in, move the ball in, with the occasional short stuff and it should work pretty well.
But by crickey Hilditch/Ponting, where's Hauritz???? The dude's done a solid, if not excellent job in his 3 Tests, and the pitch is a dust heap. Really needed him here. Lee would also have been helpful on this pitch with the extra pace and reverse swing. Clark and Hilfenhaus haven't looked too dangerous at all. It would have been harsh for Hilfy to be replaced by Lee after a good series, I'm just saying that Lee probably would have done better. But I still would have picked Hilfy for the continuity factor, you can't have too many changes or confidence drops.
That's the only thing I'm worried about here, Swann towelling the Aussies up with ripping turn. The two obvious tosses to win have both gone to England - Cardiff and here. Hopefully the Aussies bat like they did at Cardiff, probably the best I've ever seen them bat as a team. It was awesome, disciplined and demoralising batting.
Therbs
PCPL Season 2: Best Bowler (Division 2)
That's the point innit? I think some English fans are hoping for a biting, turning pitch to develop. Day Two won't see that happen and that's when the Australian bats need to be rock solid and dominate. Should be a cracker of a Test match again. Batting in the 4th dig will be dodgy.
Under normal circumstances I would agree, but England have "kept faith" with certain players who are VERY lucky to still be in the side, and the aussies have few/no passengers in their side. They also tend not to throw their wickets away and bowl much better than us.
I said on 606 that I thought 370+ would be a total England need to aim at, they could fall well short but then the pitch might be more helpful to the bowlers than England's 'best' position of 176/2 might suggest. It does depend on how well England bowl and the aussies bat, with only one change in the bowling attack, the unlucky Onions (best average of all England bowlers in the series) dropped, it is hard to imagine they will suddenly get it right.
Strauss - led the way again, just ONE more run and he'd be averaging 50 in the series. Take away his HS of 161 and he'd still be averaging 34 which would be same as Bell and better than Collingwood, Cook and Bopara.
Cook - another innings without a contribution of note, take away his 95 and his next HS is 32 and he'd be averaging only a run or two more than Bopara
Bell - battled away to make another fifty, twice as many as Cook in the series in two less Tests and yet Bell is always the one criticised.
Collingwood - has a clear (technique) problem batting that he hasn't resolved, he's ok when he hits the ball but too often LBW when he doesn't as a consequence of said problem. Scored three fifties in the series, the hero of Cardiff but 24 is his HS of the last three Tests.
Trott - looked every part a Test player, was he unlucky to be run out or is that merely a bad habit from too much county and one day cricket? Shame because he could have made a big-gish fifty and steered England into a more comfortable position.
Prior - a relative disappointment this innings, but averaging near 37 against the aussies for a keeper is only what we'd expect from Stewart, or possibly one of Russell or Jones in good nick
Flintoff - not concinving, didn't seem to want to play the situation or himself in and was out to the waft - a typical English shot and yet "lessons were learned" according to our captain. Was Flintoff excused class? Do the lessons learned get forgotten?
Broad - decent knock so far, has at least made runs when it matters this Test and hopefully can score another 30+ to give England a good total to bowl at.
Swann - too brief a cameo as I was hoping he and Broad could put on a hundred like has happened before with the likes of Gough, DeFreitas and Sid Lawrence.
On the bowling front we have to hope Swann can be a match-winner, he's bowled six times and taken 0/131, 0/4, 4/87, 1/4, 1/119 & 0/64 - hardly what you'd want from your 1st choice spinner. Broad is sadly much the same, half his series wickets coming in the 4th Test and the rest costing 69 apiece. Harmison was brought in and some thought he'd do well, 2/98 is hardly the return of the king. Onions by comparison had done nothing wrong and is dependable, Harmison is more of a gamble. Anderson has had an up and down series, 4/55 & 0/86 at Lords, 5/80 and 1/47 at Edgbaston but 2/110 and 0/89 at Cardiff in the 1st Test and 4th Test respectively. Flintoff is hailed as our great match-winner, but 5wis are pretty rare from him and this series his 5wi sits pretty in the middle of four ordinary to poor returns : 1/128, 1/27, 5/92, 0/58 & 0/35. As with Broad, Harmison and Swann, his average doesn't lie (48.57 for the series)
Even if this pitch is somewhat less of a batting paradise than many thought it would be, the onus is still on the bowlers to bowl well which is something England often fail or forget to do. In theory we should have the upper hand with a spinner and some variety in our bowling, the problem is our variety in the bowling department tends to be line, length and result. A few extra runs scored today could make a world of difference, but it is how we bowl in our first full session of bowling that will shape the Test.
As I recall the Oval Test of 2005 we scored 373, the aussies were set to pass that when England fought back and managed a slight 1st innings lead before we fought our way to safety. If we'd bowled as well to start with as we did to finish the aussies off, then we might even have forced a win. The highest score of that Test was only 373
Oval 2005 - England vs Australia
England 1st Inns 373
Strauss 129, Flintoff 72 (England were 131/4). Warne 6/122
Australia 1st Inns 367
Langer 105, Hayden 138 (Australia were 264/1). Hoggard 4/97, Flintoff 5/78
England 2nd Inns 335
Pietersen 158, Giles 59 (England were 126/5). Warne 6/124
Australia 2nd Inns 4/0
Interesting that Warne took 12 wickets in the match, Giles took nil albeit he only bowled once. It is also interesting that in all three completed innings it was an innings of two halves, either recovering in England's case or collapsing in the aussies'
angryangy
ICC Chairman
- Joined
- Oct 1, 2004
Some of this feels all too familiar. I looked at the impressions from after the first day at Cardiff to see why.
It does feel a little like a more resulty pitch than Cardiff, but England have definitely played it up. We can see that turn and bounce, even the odd cutter, will be things to watch for, but for me, the interesting question is how England go about using a ball which does not swing much. I guess that's why Onions is out, but considering that all Peter Siddle has done for his wickets is bowl fast and full, I think Onions could have done that job probably better than anyone England picked.
I deliberately anonymised the quotes because the point isn't to poke fun at people. It's just interesting how you can spot a trend on one day and make a logical prediction, only to see it taper off or be overwhelmed entirely by other factors.
It does feel a little like a more resulty pitch than Cardiff, but England have definitely played it up. We can see that turn and bounce, even the odd cutter, will be things to watch for, but for me, the interesting question is how England go about using a ball which does not swing much. I guess that's why Onions is out, but considering that all Peter Siddle has done for his wickets is bowl fast and full, I think Onions could have done that job probably better than anyone England picked.
P
pcfan123
Guest
Jimmy looks half as dangerous if the ball is not swinging. Oz is going to have a field day
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