Australia tour of England June-August 2012

[sifter132]

You could put forward your case without the "yawn" comment, I don't agree with a lot of what War says but we don't have to resort to such approaches in debating something. And nobody said the rankings were bad because "there is no clear standout team", the underlying mechanics are rubbish, they are meaningless anyway and hinder any progress that might be made towards having a proper Test championship

And ironic much you start off with "yawn" yet charge in and defend it, and also rankings feature heavily in your own yawn-worthy rankings which are equally rubbish and meaningless I do wonder if you've read some of the comments questioning the interest in that, kettle-pot-black.......................

Yeah fair points, but I defend my right to use 'yawn' when I see something mentioned that I've argued against before, yet people still aren't convinced by my super awesome, air-tight arguments

And speaking of yawn...maybe this series?? I see Swann has been ruled out for the last 2 games. Although I think if this series was a bit more important/close, I doubt he'd be out eg. if the 2 games were World Cup semi + final he'd be there in the XI I'd wager. Oh well, gives a new fella a chance (Tredwell I think), and Swann probably wouldn't have got too much out of facing the same Aussie batsmen again anyway.

 

[midgetwars]

Swann out means Warner fires?

 

[angryangy]

dear god he and wade are the only left handers, aren't they? this is most unbecoming.

 

[War]

Beating the lankans is not really a big deal anymore, no Muralitharan. England won there in 07/08, doesn't mean they were any good at the time.

Ye ENG won their without Murali in 07/08 - but that sub-continent win clearly didn't help them in their preparation for the 2011 World Cup. I always say that series win as just a blimp for the Sri Lankan's on home turf.

When AUS went to SRI last year, they had to deal with Mendis in top-form - given the form England were in in ODI's at the time, i'm not sure what chance they would have had then of succeeding.

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I'm really torn on this. Part of me totally agrees with that, they are 3 pretty pedestrian players all playing next to each other. At least Clarke and Bailey can get going after they've been in there a while, but you are risking a lot of 15 off 30-type innings. And if all 3 of them miss out, then you've squandered a lot of balls for nothing. I think longterm Clarke needs to be #3, he plays too many dot balls to be in the middle because it seems like he tries too hard to thread tiny gaps and run 2s or hit 4s. That's better when the field's up.

Anyway...the converse argument of course is that Australia's batting has just plain sucked recently. Seems like it's always at least 4 down by the 35 over mark and another one during the powerplay...I'd kill for someone who can make a big score.

Just looking at some figures...Australia's batted first 17 times in the last 12 months, and only 6 times have they passed 252. So essentially, only 6 above average innings. In all those 6 above average innings the 4th wicket wasn't lost until at least the 36th over. And conversely in all bar one of the 252 or lower scores, the 4th wicket has gone down before over #35 (the one was the tie vs WI in St Vincent-slow, low pitch). So getting guys who can occupy the crease at the start, like England are doing I guess with Cook and Trott, is theoretically a good idea. Ricky Ponting must be shaking his fist at the TV anyway, still in the Test side but deemed not good enough for the crappy ODI batting lineup??

Then again the batting isn't the only issue...for 3 of 6 of those 'good' scores, Australia haven't been able to defend it...

The cure is to:

- Get a form White and S Marsh back into the set-up
- Potentially moving Watson to # 3 - given his recent complaints - England v Australia, 2nd ODI, The Oval: Balancing act far from elementary for Shane Watson | Cricket Features | England v Australia | ESPN Cricinfo

 

[Sureshot]

Tomorrow is going to be rained off again, in case any of you were thinking of making plans!

Wellies time!

 

[angryangy]

even Dublin got a game

 

[isrararrafi]

Is there a thread somewhere here on South Africa vs England upcoming series? I know this thread is for a different series but since England is part of it I figured I should ask here. I might be missing the thread but a high profile series where the no 1 ranking is on stake, I assumed there will be people already talking about it somewhere here. But couldn't find anything.

 

[sifter132]

Tomorrow is going to be rained off again, in case any of you were thinking of making plans!

Wellies time!

Apparently not! Might even start on time

Team news:

Samit Patel has been named in England's XI so James Tredwell is on the bench. Patel replaces Swann and James Anderson is in for Jade Dernbach.

No Mitchell Johnson and Xavier Doherty for Australia today, Ben Hilfenhaus and James Pattinson are playing.

Good to see Patto and Hilf getting a run. Would like to see Steve Smith get another go at it as well. Guys like Hussey could be rotated out - he's seen English conditions a million times. That's all I'm interested in now, making sure everyone gets a good taste of the English conditions. A couple of wins would be nice, but not holding my breath

 

[Owzat]

aussies getting washed away by the players not the weather. Wonder how many ducks we'll see today!

Shame when you get games that can be effectively decided at the toss

 

[midgetwars]

Least we got the 100.

 

[aussie1st]

Looks like a one sides Ashes series coming up. Our best batsmen in this match isn't even in the Test side.

 

[alexczarn]

Looks like a one sides Ashes series coming up. Our best batsmen in this match isn't even in the Test side.

There's still a year till the Ashes...

 

[aussie1st]

Hard to see much changing in a year given not much has changed since the last Ashes in England.

 

[angryangy]

well i figure if the ashes is still a test series, then five or six different players might come into the side

 

[midgetwars]

Is there even a bowling coach right now? Pattinson seems to be a pretty bad ODI bowler. 9