England In India - October 2011/12

[Owzat]

Bell seizing the game for England now.

Can see the headlines now "Bell ends hopes for India"

Strauss was in too poor form, but he did a job of seeing off the new ball (faced 52 balls)

England surely must look to this pair to put them in charge, a partnership of 52 already but they must try and treble that. The bulk of the innings so far is Bell's 72no, that's effectively their lead.

Pietersen is an important part, he needs to not throw his wicket away and get himself a fifty or hundred, we can't leave it to Morgan, Trott (if/when he bats), Prior and the tail. We may be 114/2 which is healthy at the moment, but lose one or both of this pair and it's 114/4 or thereabouts with a lead of 47 so effectively 47/4 - even 47/2 isn't a very strong position. They need to shut the actual total out of their minds and focus on the lead, look forward no more than 10-20 runs at a time and keep their wickets intact (as much as they can control that) There are near 50 overs before the new ball, England need to think in terms of having only 4-6 wickets down when that is due with a likely further 140 runs or so on the board.

All in all the task is big, England can't start believing they are on course for anything other than defeat until we're in a much healthier position, 247/3 or 4 say

 

[teamindia]

the irony

Twitter

 

[WubbaLubbaDubDub]

the irony

Twitter

He just joined a day before

 

[AngryPixel]

A small tweet from Vaughn resulted in a giant catfight in commentary box.

 

[Ollie_H]

He just joined a day before

His first tweet with the time stamp '17 days ago' would say otherwise.

 

[SaiSrini]

Yesterday's post tea session will come back to haunt India. I dont get a nice feeling about this.

 

[deepuparayil]

Bell is playing flawlessly and at a very good strike rate. Runs are coming easily for England and we need a magic spell from one of our bowlers ASAP.

 

[Owzat]

I always associate Yawn with the word 'big tweet'

 

[WubbaLubbaDubDub]

Englands Session tbh. Well play Bell. Hope we are able to take 2 to 3 quick wickets with Bell and Kevins tummy full

 

[SaiSrini]

Accusing Laxman of putting vaseline on his bat? Even if it was true, I would not blame Laxman at all. If technology can be cheated like that, I will blame the technology, not the batsman.

 

[Haarithan]

God awesome session for England. They produce their best part of cricket when they play like this - positive intent, flawless stroke making at nearly 4 an over. Bell you beauty - easily the classiest England batsman to watch out these days, so technically sound and perfect! Pietersen has supported him well enough to put this game back in the balance. And for once, Ollie's prediction turns out to be right.

 

[Themer]

Accusing Laxman of putting vaseline on his bat?

I don't know what this fight is all about on the Indian coverage but Vaughan's tweet is obviously a joke. If they are fighting over that its fudging hilarious.

 

[Biggy]

Love it when Bell plays like this.

 

[Themer]

If technology can be cheated like that, I will blame the technology

Funny how its the only piece of technology that India agree with cause they know how to cheat it...

 

[Owzat]

Let's not get ahead of ourselves, the lead is only 63 and that's for two down with Trott injured and Swann too so we don't know how much batting they can do.

We need another session on top, at least. Add another 100 runs and no more than two wickets and we can start thinking about winning, although there isn't much point in thinking about drawing as there is little chance of the match ending in a draw with 18 wickets left and eight sessions left.

Bell and Pietersen need to keep it up, at least double their 73 run partnership and 63 in front then becomes 136 and if that doesn't put this current lead into perspective then nothing will.