6th ODI: Australia v England at Sydney

[War]

Well this is one WC where it was worth taking the punt. We have 2 guys that are out with long term injuries, only one batter who looks in any sort of form and then you have Dussey and Smith who are yet to prove themselves with the bat.

I dont think they are too much worries with the AUS top 7 now the Clarke is returning the selectors faith in him & his seemingly getting his mojo back. Only White is slight worry with everyone else in the top 7 clearly in good batting form, they just haven't put together that perfect batting performance yet. Which should worry other teams, since if you can chase down 334 (albeit against under-strenght ENG bowling attack) & have batted to 100% potential is great. No need to peak as a unit now, save that for the WC.

Not sure what IYO, Dussey or Smith have to do to prove themselves. Last i checked Dussey won a game in this series with that bat.

Going back to Paine. Given the indeed dicey situation AUS have with two senoir bats coming back from long term injuries, i personally would have considered this time picking another pure batsman back-up in Ferguson/Marsh right now. But as we both know the stupid ICC regulation which made teams pick their WC squads so early is more @ fault here, since in the past AUS would be picking their WC squad until after the last ODI or maybe after this current one & that problem would have been addressed in the squad selection.

 

[Roofrom50]

It's great to see that every batsman were able to make more then just a start (apart from Smith) All the top order made a contribution, and whoever's idea it was to bat Johnson at number 4 was genius. Ferguson played well and didn't look to have missed a beat, Watson and Haddin made a flying start, and we can all say what we want about Clarke, but the last 2 games, he has won the matches for his country when he needed it the most.

 

[angryangy]

But as we both know the stupid ICC regulation which made teams pick their WC squads so early is more @ fault here, since in the past AUS would be picking their WC squad until after the last ODI or maybe after this current one & that problem would have been addressed in the squad selection.

I don't know what you mean there because they had to name the squads a month out last time too. It's just that the World Cup was later. The 2003 World Cup squads were named even earlier.

 

[Haarithan]

Sorry to say this if you are an England fan but time has come for Strauss to step down as ODI skipper . England have never ever won an ODI series in emphatic fahsion against any team :

England 2-1 bangladesh
England 3-2 Australia
England 3-2 pakistan

But look at the defeats :

England 1-6 Australia
Australia 6-1 England (its sure to be 6-1)

But look what Cook did on the tour of Bangaldesh :

3 ODIs , 3 fiftys and 3 wins !!
Enough said .

And can someone please shoot Matt Prior on his legs so that he isn't a part of our WC squad ?? Seriously he is the best in tests , but the worst in ODIs .

 

[Owzat]

Sorry to say this if you are an England fan but time has come for Strauss to step down as ODI skipper . England have never ever won an ODI series in emphatic fahsion against any team :

His captaincy is poor at times, but then he is hardly dealt a handful of Aces. Why did he open with Woakes and not Finn?!?!?!? Woakes may have done well, but throwing him in at the deep end when Finn has more experience was daft.

But look what Cook did on the tour of Bangaldesh :

3 ODIs , 3 fiftys and 3 wins !!
Enough said .

England pick based on half-baked theory, like the pinch-hitter, the bits n pieces down the order and playing Collingwood as a 5th bowler as is often the case. I guessed our target would be made more gettable by being effectively a bowler light, Pietersen and Trott taking 1/72 off 10 overs and Woakes much the same. Of course the failing of England's plan is often in the number of times a frontline bowler is woeful or expensive, they have no plan B and plan A is a panto character (wishy washy)

And can someone please shoot Matt Prior on his legs so that he isn't a part of our WC squad ?? Seriously he is the best in tests , but the worst in ODIs .

Nothing wrong with Prior's SELECTION, it is the ROLE he is put into. He bats down the order in Tests, but somehow someone thinks that he can open in ODIs - I guess on the premise he scores quickly. That said what did Davies do wrong to not be retained as ODI opener? I say scrap the pinch-hitter role, just find an aggressive opener a la Trescothick, Knight etc. We don't have a Gilchrist, let's stop playing our keepers like we do

 

[formula1man]

very entertaining match.

Firstly I dont think Prior was being sly, the ball hit the stumps and im not sure he was aware he had knocked the bail off, very Brad Haddin like Vs NZ.

Clarke had a very good innings and has proven me wrong somewhat. i still believe it is dangerous to stick with out of form players for so long as it can lead to you losing matches if your whole team is like that. But if he can bat like that then he is more than welcome in my team.

Lastly, although the Johnson idea putting him at 4 turned out to be a great idea, I am very disappointed at who it was who made the decision. The message it is sending out is that we have no faith in Clarke, White, Hussey and Smith to do the job they are in the team to do. There are going to be many chases similar to this in India 300+ and if you need to bring Johnson up the order to achieve that then the batsman you have in your team mustn't be good enough, so why are they in the team??

 

[angryangy]

They were really only looking for quick runs, but it proved a way of manufacturing a top order partnership and conserving vital wickets. In all the successful 300+ chases, it's really only NZ who have a knack of doing it with a top order collapse. Everyone else; even Pakistan; expects to build some sort of platform. When Johnson was dismissed, they'd effectively made 200 for the loss of the first three batsmen. They had kept proper batsmen for the tricky end stage and stacked the odds in their favour.

As it was, most of the batsmen had a chance to get in, but the situation might have called for someone to step up to the crease and just smash the ball around for an over. We know Johnson can do a bit of damage when he gets his eye in, but those difficult pressure situations are better handled by proper batsmen.

Furthermore, they took pressure off each other. Johnson was sent in with a licence to do whatever and as a result, came back with a decent innings; when Clarke came in there was no pressure on him to rebuild the innings; it was screaming along. On another night, Clarke might have made 100 in a losing cause.

The key here was that they made up for the relatively early loss of the openers. If a team is 1 wicket down after 20 overs, there's probably not much reason why the captain would try to do it. However, for all those teams trying to create a pinch hitter out of one of their top 7, this is the real way to do it.

 

[War]

I don't know what you mean there because they had to name the squads a month out last time too. It's just that the World Cup was later. The 2003 World Cup squads were named even earlier.

You sure?. I'll check it later, but i seriously dont recall AUS having to name their WC squads for the 2003 & 2007 WC after just one game in the tri-nation home ODI series, as was the case this time.

 

[Sureshot]

Not too disappointed with that by England, think a few things out of our control affected it, most notably the Colly injury, he may not be a great bowler, but he'd have been more than useful in not having to bowl both Anderson and Woakes out when they were expensive, though Woakes did drag it back.

It's an improvement, but still a lot to improve on, then again, this bowling attack is half of the one that we'll have in the WC.

Finn was impressive with the ball today. I wasn't expecting it.

 

[aussie1st]

Not sure what IYO, Dussey or Smith have to do to prove themselves. Last i checked Dussey won a game in this series with that bat.

One knock does not make a summer. The whole reason Dussey was dropped was because he kept failing to go on with his starts and that is starting to happen again. Smith hasn't had the time to show what hes capable of doing.

Ignoring all that I'm one that feels every member in the squad should be used in some role outside of being a backup. If you want to pick a backup wicket keeper batsmen then use him as the reserve batsmen, there is no reason why Paine can't fill that role. Else pick Wade, he could have added a destructive opener/number 7 along with his keeping.

Going back to Paine. Given the indeed dicey situation AUS have with two senoir bats coming back from long term injuries, i personally would have considered this time picking another pure batsman back-up in Ferguson/Marsh right now. But as we both know the stupid ICC regulation which made teams pick their WC squads so early is more @ fault here, since in the past AUS would be picking their WC squad until after the last ODI or maybe after this current one & that problem would have been addressed in the squad selection.

I don't know how the ICC forcing us to name our squad early had any impact on picking another specialist batsmen or not. Both Hussey and Ponting were known to be injured before they named the squad.

 

[Biggy]

very entertaining match.

Firstly I dont think Prior was being sly, the ball hit the stumps and im not sure he was aware he had knocked the bail off, very Brad Haddin like Vs NZ.

Clarke had a very good innings and has proven me wrong somewhat. i still believe it is dangerous to stick with out of form players for so long as it can lead to you losing matches if your whole team is like that. But if he can bat like that then he is more than welcome in my team.

Lastly, although the Johnson idea putting him at 4 turned out to be a great idea, I am very disappointed at who it was who made the decision. The message it is sending out is that we have no faith in Clarke, White, Hussey and Smith to do the job they are in the team to do. There are going to be many chases similar to this in India 300+ and if you need to bring Johnson up the order to achieve that then the batsman you have in your team mustn't be good enough, so why are they in the team??

I don't think Johnson was sent in to hit at a run a ball, they probably expected a bit more hitting out of him. Just turned out that he hung around a bit and formed a partnership with Ferguson.

 

[sifter132]

Mitch was actually really fantastic. Clarke will get all the headlines, and he did play really well, but the Johnson/Ferguson partnership was the one that really threw Strauss and the slow bowlers off. It was just a bit of old fashioned intimidation. Yardy ended up keeping Mitch pretty quiet, but you could tell he and Strauss were thinking all the time about the big shot, and it let Johnson/Ferguson rotate the strike easily. And Mitch showed he could push those singles really well, I was very impressed. I think they'll try definitely that Mitch up the order again, just to put different thoughts into the opposing captain's mind.

The other thing I didn't think of at the time, but Clarke mentioned today, was the left hander factor. Mitch is Australia's only leftie at present so it made sense to get him in there.


And poor Prior, I'm sure he assumed the bail on the ground had been dislodged before he'd gone for the stumping, but it made him look like an idiot.

 

[aussie1st]

Johnson was better than a run a ball for most of his innings too, it was only when he got close to the 50 where he slowed down. Can't seen any harm in promoting him again, he probably can produce an even more destructive knock.

Ferguson showed his class, only hit 3 boundaries in his 46 whereas White had a 6 and a few 4s just to get a run a ball 20.

Oh and here is the reason why Doherty didn't play http://www.foxsports.com.au/cricket...-spinner-unknown/story-e6frf3gl-1225998989787

 

[CremerCurrans]

Thats not good I'd say O'Keefe is next in line.

 

[War]

One knock does not make a summer. The whole reason Dussey was dropped was because he kept failing to go on with his starts and that is starting to happen again. Smith hasn't had the time to show what hes capable of doing.

It had more do with the fact as we have discussed before that he was rotated up & down the order & wasn't given a set role like in this current series.

I really cant see how you can find much if any fault in anything Dussey has done this series. Ok only one innings he did the work. But except for Watson he has been the 2nd best batsman in a series where non of the top 7 have played to potential. So he can only getter better from here going into the WC.

Ignoring all that I'm one that feels every member in the squad should be used in some role outside of being a backup. If you want to pick a backup wicket keeper batsmen then use him as the reserve batsmen, there is no reason why Paine can't fill that role. Else pick Wade, he could have added a destructive opener/number 7 along with his keeping.

As i said. The selectors are settled on the idea that want the keeper opening with Watson. So if Haddin where to get injured they want to keep that formation, instead of picking another pure opener like Marsh/Warner in the squad or asking Clarke to open.

I don't know how the ICC forcing us to name our squad early had any impact on picking another specialist batsmen or not. Both Hussey and Ponting were known to be injured before they named the squad.

Ponting injury was already seen as long-term yes. But Hussey played in the first ODI which was Jan 16th when the selectors probably already had their 15-man squad decided, then he got injured & at that moment nobody was sure how long he would be out for.

So on the wednesday (Jan 18) when they announced the squad, they had to pick him really given the deadline had reached.

Thats why i saw if things where different as was the case in past world-cups. AUS probably wouldn't have had to name their WC squads either after the end of this ODI series or probably after the 5th ODI - instead of situation where after the 1st ODI you had to name the 15th. Thus with the all the injury woes, currently they could have considered picking another back-up batsmen instead of Paine (although id still pick Paine personally).