England in Australia

[aussie1st]

I see Watson is making some 2nd innings runs against SA, wonder if he has a runner?

I think long term, Watson will be the perfect replacement for Warne in a way. Say our replacement for Warne is a guy like Dan Cullen. He wouldn't be able to hold up an end like Warne did and wouldn't have the same impact on the opposition. Therefore, we would probably need to play an extra bowler - a bit like England currently does. So having a batting allrounder that can bowl 10 maybe 15 overs a day will be much more important in future than it is at present for Australia. If a batting allrounder who bowls spin is needed Cameron the White could be the guy in future - especially if his batting continues to develop. I haven't been real impressed with his bowling but hopefully that can improve in time as well to a point where he could bowl 10 decent overs a day in a Test.

So currently, it seems pretty pointless picking a guy cause he is an allrounder (Symonds) when he's only going to need to bowl a couple of overs per innings - all he does is make our middle order brittle with his lack of application. Pick a batter, and let Warney play out his career.

Trouble is I'm convinced the selectors are looking for a right handed batter (how else would Voges have risen to the top of the pecking order?) - and all the top prospects are lefties like Jaques, Rogers, North, Cosgrove, Katich. Hodge is the obvious right handed candidate, but no one was impressed with the way he kept getting out caught behind the wicket in his most recent Test innings, reaching for the cover drive. Maybe the selectors are gonna keep looking past him, as the injury that apparently kept him out of the selectors minds this time was not that serious. He could have played this Test.

Yep Watson had a runner.
I agree with the need for an all rounder after Warne and McGrath retire as we could be in the field for much longer than we are now and having another bowler that can take wickets would be handy.

 

[aussie_ben91]

I could see this coming. They've still got 400 to chase but I still don't agree with the declaration.

 

[mattfb]

Warne 2 LBW shouts, given not out, the second one was out.

 

[aussie_ben91]

Hit him outside the line without offering a shot. It's not out but umpires usually give that out, maybe Warne's consistant shouting cost him?

 

[irottev]

How can anyone not agree with the Declaration? England would have to break a record by about 200 runs to win. Things look bad, but they're barely 1/4th of the way there.

 

[aussie_ben91]

How can anyone not agree with the Declaration? England would have to break a record by about 200 runs to win. Things look bad, but they're barely 1/4th of the way there.

The pitch is only getting better for batting and you've given England a small chance of winning. This could make the careers of acouple of young English batsman. If we had've batted a little bit more on today we would've reached a lead of 700 and given England no chance of winning it and we saw what happened to England the last time they had to bat and realistically couldn't win it.

 

[mattfb]

irottev is right, the declartion was good, czu we scored 430 in the day already and besides we picked up a wicket at the end of the day.

And as i type.... GOOOONE!!!! WHOOOOOOOP! what a catch!! great bowling by Warne, but i guess he had to catch it... or his head was off his body!

The pitch is only getting better for batting and you've given England a small chance of winning. This could make the careers of acouple of young English batsman. If we had've batted a little bit more on today we would've reached a lead of 700 and given England no chance of winning it and we saw what happened to England the last time they had to bat and realistically couldn't win it.

Would we have had enough time to bowl them out, we would have declared early today adn tehy might have been 0 out at the moment you never know.

 

[aussie1st]

The pitch is only getting better for batting and you've given England a small chance of winning. This could make the careers of acouple of young English batsman. If we had've batted a little bit more on today we would've reached a lead of 700 and given England no chance of winning it and we saw what happened to England the last time they had to bat and realistically couldn't win it.

I agree if the English know they have no possible hope of a win then more likely than not they will go defense and play like they did in Adelaide. But always that flip side where if we had drawn like last year Ponting would cop criticism anyway.

 

[aussie_ben91]

Would we have had enough time to bowl them out, we would have declared early today adn tehy might have been 0 out at the moment you never know.

We would've had a day and half to bowl them out anyway?

550 is capable of getting in the space of 2 days. England are playing for the win now. They'd be playing differently if there was 700 on the board to chase.

 

[mattfb]

Dont sweat, we'll probably wrap it up today, if we can get another wicket within the half hour, thats the match cuz dont forget...... we have 6 hours tommorw

We would've had a day and half to bowl them out anyway?

550 is capable of getting in the space of 2 days. England are playing for the win now. They'd be playing differently if there was 700 on the board to chase.

Do you think poms can get another 450 with 8 wickets left?

 

[aussie1st]

Not just one wicket we still need to get KP before I feel safe. KP and Collingwood have shown they can play Warne very well and the pacemen don't really scare them.

 

[aussie_ben91]

Do you think poms can get another 450 with 8 wickets left?

Well, who knows? There is a range of possibilities of what could happen. They need 380 odd to win, not 450. Cook's in, Collingwood can hang around and Pietersen & Flintoff to come.

I think if we get Pietersen out early then we're safe.

 

[mattfb]

1 more wicket, they will need bout 400 + with 7 in hand, and we will have about 10 hours nearly, Collingwood and KP can bat a 100 run patnership but we will still be in control, and we might gett Collingwood early, we dropped him at the start of his innings in the 1st, and he just nicked Warne and nearly fell to Hayden

Well, who knows?

Flintoff knows they cant

 

[aussie_ben91]

Sure, if we get another quick wicket now then we're hugely in control but we've still got to get it first.

 

[irottev]

Once you get Jones in they will drop like bunnies. If Australia can't bowl England out for 550 in the fourth innings with Warne, McGrath and Lee they deserve to lose.

Theres no need to panic guys.