Story Englands attempts to become the best (ICC2006 Ashes Edition)

[surendar]

This is a huge win.. Failure from Gayle and Lara are the main reasons i would say.. And good to see some nice scoring from Ryan Hinds. Nice story in progress mate :cool:

 

[Sureshot]

Thanks, I've missed Harmison and his comeback has been excellent. Albeit despite the WIndies being not fit for viewing! Looking forward to the ODIs now. Get a bit of rest for some players and maybe a warm up for ODI specialist Tres...

 

[rabeta]

Great, comfortable win for England. They have this series wrapped up, and like you say, now is the chance to give some of the fringe players an outing. A very good batting performance from England in that game, with both Prior and Bell playing excellently. Also, well bowled Jones, he only performed because he was encouraged by my comments that he should be bowling more though . Keep this up SS, this is my fav story at the moment, purely down to the detail in the writing and the amount of updates. Well done.

 

[kookaburra69]

Huge win their mate,Your bowlers are going extremely well.
Keep up the awesome work mate.

 

[Sureshot]

4th Test at Port of Spain, 5 changes to the team.

Horton, Steven Davies, Batty, Plunkett and Mark Davies in. KP, Prior, Jones, Panesar and Hoggard out. They won the toss and chose to bat first.

For the first time in the series Gayle and Lawrence made a great start. Making our new ball bowlers ineffective and scoring 20 off of one Plunkett over. They put on 196 when Gayle fell to Davies for 107. Lawrence put on 38 for the 2nd with Chanderpaul, who fell to Davies aswell, for 18 runs. Davies was bowling really well, very economical at the same time aswell. Lara fell cheaply to Davies, but Lawrence was still in and he and Hinds put on 106 for the 4th wicket. When finally Lawrence fell, to the bowling of Flintoff for 153. Sarwan and Hinds put on 38 for the 5th wicket when Plunkett redeemed his earlier efforts by getting Sarwan for 22. From here on in it was the Plunkett show as he somehow took 5-85 bowling them out for 420. Batty got the wicket of Mohammed for 3. Davies 3-59 bowled well, bowling 28 overs, Plunkett bowled 21 overs yet went for 26 more runs.

The key to this batting reply was a good start. Cook and Vaughan put on 191 for the opening stand when Vaughan fell to Mohammed for 77, passing 7,000 test runs. Cook and Horton put on 53 for the 2nd, but Cook fell for a delightful 135, to Juggernauth, caught behind. Horton and Bell carried on the effort putting on 64 for the 3rd stand, ending whem Bell fell for 21 to Mohammed. With Horton (70), Flintoff (0) and Davies (4) falling all within a few overs of each other we suffered a demoralising collapse. But Colly played well, with Batty (18) and Plunkett. But they fell without contributing massively. His Durham team-mate, Harmison though did stick around and they put on 72 fo the 9th wicket (a record), seeing Colly within touching distance of his hundred, but harmy fell for an excellent 25 (34 balls). Colly did reach his hundred and was last man out for 103, passing 2,000 Test runs on the way, 478 all out. Juggernauth, 4-148 and Moahmmed 3-143 were the pick of the bowlers. HInds, jeremy and Collymore all got a wicket each.

With a slender lead I wanted an early breakthough, but their openers batted well again scoring 150 for the opening stand. ending when Harmison bowled Lawrence for 56. Gayle and Chanderpaul added 34 for the 2nd, but Batty got Chanderpaul. Gayle and Lara put on 46 for the 3rd when Gayle finally fell for 130, a very dominant innings. (scoring 65 runs in the last 2 partnerships). Plunkett got Gayle. Flintoff got Hinds for just 31 but Lara and Sarwan put on 66 for the 5th wicket, but big Fred did what he does best and took quick wickets. Getting Sarwan (55) Lara (43) Hinds (31), Baugh and also Mohammed, a 5 for! They declared on 341-8. Flintoff 5-55 easily the pick of the bowlers.

With only 2 sessions to get nearly 280 runs I didn't both attempting as I knew their spinners would be too tight, it was the case. Vaughan and Cook put on 48 for the 1st when Cook fell for 18 to Juggernauth. Horton made just a single as he was bowled by Mohammed. Vaughan and Bell added 25 to the 3rd wicket but Vaughan fell for 47. Bell and Colly saw us home though, putting on 78 for the 4th wicket, Bell finishing 52* and Colly 30*. Mohammed 2-44 and Juggernauth 1-35 the wicket takers.

So, a comfortable 3-0 series win, with 3 huge wins. I can't think of many downers to the series. The bowlers did well, Harmys come back was a success. and Plunkett got a five for in the last game.

 

[Left_Hander]

Plunkett and Flintoff bowled well for you. Cook and Collingwood also did a good job with the bat. You touched up the West Indies though you must be slightly dissapointed you couldn't make it 4-0 and a white wash.

 

[Brett_Lee]

Good win for that series for England. If you had that little bit of extra time or attacked that little more it would have been a 4-0 whitewash.

Nice presentation

 

[Sureshot]

The pitch conditions kept telling me seamers would be successful so I was very skeptical about attacking. Though that was probably Cook's fasted hundred yet. about 55-60 runs per 100 balls.

 

[rabeta]

Great series win for England. I would have liked to have seen England go all out for the win, especially as they had already one the series.

Some Questions:

Is Freddy still his usual self, bowling very well, but still failing with the bat? He was in this game.

Would you have expected to beat the Windies this convincingly away from home?

Who is the biggest prospect in your opinion from the players that came into this side in this game?

Well done SS, keep the great work up

 

[Sureshot]

Q1. Freddie, hasn't been outstanding but he doesn't let me down with the ball. His batting is decent, no Test hundred in quite a while iirc, but plenty of 50s and decent partnerships with Prior.

Q2. I knew I'd win the series, but I wasn't bargaining on Harmison being so good.

Q3. Plunkett or Horton. Horton has a terrific FC record and has done quite well for me, he averages nigh on 60 in FC cricket. Plunkett is improving and has a couple of test five for's this season. Still is inconsistent but is a good talent.

 

[Sureshot]

Sorry for the week long delay.

OD friendly against Guyana.

Team: Trescothick, Compton, Horton, Bell, Collingwood, Flintoff, Prior, Jones, Batty, Davies, Harmison.

We won the toss and chose to bowl on a batsmans nightmare.

Harmison started well getting a couple of early wickets, and Jones got one too. They never got going and only offered some resistance when Sarwan (53) and Chanderpaul (26) put on 43 for the 5th wicket. No bowler excelled, but everyone chipped in. Flintoff 2-17, Batty and Harmison 2-28, Jones 2-36 and Davies 1-26.

In reply it was going to be tough given the conditions. Tres and Compton put on 29 for the opening stand when Compton fell for 16 to McGarrell, he got Tres 3 balls later. Horton failed as did Colly. But Bell and Flintoff saw us home with an unbeaten 79 for the 5th wicket. Bell 63* and Flintoff 33*.

1st ODI vs West Indies.

3 changes: Vaughan, KP and Panesar in. Horton, Bell and Batty out.

We won the toss on a decent track and chose to put them in.

Gayle and Lara put on an opening stand of 51, when Gayle fell for 19 to Davies. Lara put on 29 with Chanderpaul but the dogged left hander fell to the bowling of Panesar. Lara and Sarwan batted well together, hitting 2 Colly overs for 17, they put on the biggest stand of their innings with 60 for the 3rd wicket. Broken when Harmison dismissed Lara for 54. Hinds batted fairly well finishing second highest scorer with 44. But they underperformed and despite a handy 18 runs from the last stand they only got 219. Davies was excellent with figures of 10-2-26-3. Flintoff 3-39, Harmison 2-36 also bowled well. Jones 1-47 and Panesar 1-53 were a bit expensive from their combined 18 overs.

Tres fell early in his stand with Vaughan, scoring just 15 runs in this important run chase. KP joined his captain and put on 50 runs for the 2nd wicket when Kp fell for 22 to Bravo, Jeremy having dismissed Trescothick. Vaughan was joined by the inexperience Compton, and we did some hard grafting, but they built up the partnership well with some good acceleration in the last 10-15 overs. They put on 105 for the 3rd wicket, Compton fell to Taylor for an impressive 56. Vaughan and Collingwood finished the innings with a 42 run partnership in 27 balls. Vaughan got his hundred and finished 102* Colly was 15*.

A good start then to this 7 match series.

 

[Roofrom50]

England are just too good Sureshot

 

[surendar]

It seems Windies are still dependent on Inconsistency of Gayle/Consistency of Lara. If both would have failed, Windies would have got a poor score. Anyways, hopefully Windies bounce back with Lara doing some magic

 

[rabeta]

Very good blowing by Flintoff and Davies, to restrict the Windies to a below par score. Vaughan must have played very well for his century, btw how many ODI centuries has he made for you, since he has made none in real life? Also, very well played Crompton, who is obviously a very talented player, and didn't feel the pressure as he played a very important role to guide England to an easy victory. Keep up the great work SS

 

[Sureshot]

I can assure you that there was no blowing from anyone...

2nd ODI, Unchanged. We won the toss and chose to bat first.

Unfortunately, Trescothick fell early on this pitch that looked like getting worse so I jumped at the chance to bat first, Jeremy getting the Left Hander. KP joined his skipper and they put on 40 for the 2nd wicket, when Bravo got Kp for 18 it was a big blow though. Compton - who played well in the 1st game - impressed me again as he put on 68 with Vaughan for the 3rd wicket as we put the bad start out of our head, batting wasn't easy though and Bravo got Compton for a decent 34. Vaughan was trotting along very nicely, and he passed 3,000 ODI runs. The in-form Collingwood continued his success and played a big role in a partnership worth 99 for the 4th wicket as he and Vaughan accelerated in the last overs to get us a competitive score on this bowler friendly track. Vaughan passed his 3rd century (Rabeta there's your answer) and Collingwood finished 50* from 36 balls. 223-4 from my 50 overs, Bravo 2-32 was the pick of the bowlers. Jeremy 1-45 and Hinds 1-53 did well too. With the spinner getting Vaughan for 104.

We needed a good start but we didn't get one as Gayle and Wavell Hinds put on 71 for the opening wicket, Jones got Gayle for an important 33. Lara joined Hinds and put on a good 43 partnership but Colly got Lara out caught behind by Prior. Sarwan joined Hinds and knocked Jones and Panesar around, and this was just the start of a match winning partnership of 112 unbeaten. hinds finished 111* and Sarwan 54*. 223-4. Colly 1-30 (8), Jones 1-40 (6) got the wickets, Davies 0-35 from 10 was economical but we were 20-30 runs short and lacked penetration whilst bowling.

3rd ODI, Unchanged, I lost the toss but I was put into bat.

Tres and Vaughan put on 35 for the opening stand but Vaughan fell early to Bravo. Tres and KP put on 40 to get us to 75-1 but we suffered a collapse as Tres (38), KP (21), Compton (0) and Flintoff (7) all fell to the impressive bowling of Juggernauth to leave us 101-5. We needed Collingwood and Prior our last recognised pair to get us a challengable total. They played really well with Bravo recieving some harsh treatment. They put on 106 for the 6th wicket when Prior fell for 43 to the bowling of Mohammed. Jones joined Colly - who scored an excellent 86* - and made 14* himself at a run a ball, putting on 29 for the 7th wicket. 236-6 was our total from our 50 overs. Juggernauth 4-49 was excellent, Bravo 1-64 got a wicket but was expensive and Mohammed 1-28 got the other wicket.

Gayle and W Hinds put on 32 for the opening stand when Hinds fell for 18 to Davies. Our bowling was excellent today and Davies got Lara for just 3. Gayle fell to Flintoff who got his wicket in his opening over. The 237 runs needed seemed a mile off but Sarwan played well, but others kept falling around him. he made an impressive 44 runs. But Flintoff and Panesar took some quick wickets between them to destroy their chances. They struggled to 129 all out, Flitnoff 3-20 was excellent as was Montys 3 overs 2-5. Davies 2-24 bowled his full quota and was top class. Jones 2-54 did well but went at 6 an over. harmison 1-26 cashed in on the action too.