India in England/Ireland/Scotland

[Adarsh]

Yeah. If 5 is average, a few of those were below average. It's a bit surprising that none of them are under 5.

Anderson was poor - 3. Leaked runs, and got a wicket he really shouldn't have.
Bell - 3. Got a good catch to get rid of Dravid. That's all he did though.
Sreesanth - 3. Good in some spells, but awful otherwise.
Karthik deserved more than Tendulkar; so did Ganguly.

 

[Chimp132]

does anyone know what tremletts fastest ball of the test series has been, i thought he could bowl around 88 - 90mph ?

 

[cricket_lover]

RP singh deserves an 8. he was expensive because he was unlucky in the first innings, too many through the slip cordon. He picked up wickets and thats good.

Sreesanth doesn't deserve a rating..he's a no entity right now .

Dhoni wasn't impressive either but he was undone by a good bowler.

Michael Vaughan has taken the Indians a bit lightly. Prior to the series..i remember him saying "we have to raise the bar just a little bit (than the WI) to win the series".

India raised their bar..just a little bit, to go 1-0 into the third test.

 

[SaiSrini]

McGrath didn't have a great start, but he was persisted with and look at the results.
MP showed great promise and so far he hasn't done that bad. His attitude/body language are the problems not his skill.

Same goes with VRV. RP Singh has shown great promise in the first two tests (and he's a good fielder as well). Pathan should be in sometime so I think our pace bowling dept. looks good. Concern is the spinners who have not been looked into. Bhajji will probably be the only one (and though peopl e have doubts abuot him...he'll definitely be in after kumble retries).

If Munaf improves his fitness and his fielding, he is a must-have. That line and length bowling by him is impeccable. Sreesanth, Munaf and Zaheer would make a lethal combination with Sreesanth's pace, Zaheer' swing and Munaf's line and length aided with pace.

Anyways, good win for India. Should tremendously boost our confidence. I would say that after the World Cup debacle, we are truly back on the track and going in good flow. May be the dark days of the Cha***** era is behind us (I hate naming him!).

The team looks united. Some players not talking in the media about controversial players (e.g. Ganguly) has gone (Sachin spoke about Ganguly and his contribution in this test match in a post match interview yesterday), the team looks hungry for success and are playing more positively than before. All we hope is that this victory is not a one off thing. We need to avoid the previous mistakes of getting too confident and ending up losing the series.

For now, lets celebrate the victory as fans. We deserve to see this for backing our team even through the bad times.

 

[angryangy]

Sreesanth doesn't deserve a rating..he's a no entity right now .

I think taking one wicket and bowing 30+ overs for less than 90 runs is worth around 4 or 5. You can do a lot worse as a bowler. You guys keep paying him out, but if he was Shaun Pollock anyone would see it as a dry spell and still rate him highly.

Indeed, his ridiculous antics (among other events in the match) have brought much needed character to cricket. Sure, you can look at it as bad or unnecessary behaviour, but I had a good laugh.

 

[Hooper]

I cannot beleive how good Zaheer Khan has become.

I was watching the highlights on youtube.com and he was swinging it both ways ang going nuts!

 

[irottev]

Just following up from my comment a while ago about Pietersons excessive celebration after his hundred. Take a look at how much better that Vaughan hundred was, and then look at how he celebrated it.

Zaheer was excellent indeed.

 

[aditya123]

I've got the tweasers ready and waiting!

I'd pick Sidebottom over Anderson. If not for when Sidebottom isn't taking wickets he's still keeping the pressure on, something we need at the Oval.



As well as India have played they have to be consistent over a period of time and on more than just one tour to get rid of that tag, for all we know they could crumble to an innings defeat at The Oval.

I said that we are no more poor travellers based on the fact that we have won more away tests that any other team (barring Australia ) since 2000 and not just based on this test.

I agree with that. Personally, I'd rate the Sirils and Safricans better as overseas travelers, but I think that India are closing that gap pretty fast, and we are getting more competitive.

I don`t think that the Saffers are better travellers than India either.
They have a brittle batting lineup and depend too heavily on Kallis.
They tend to collapse against good seam bowling.

Sri Lanka have only started winning overseas tests in the past couple of years whereas India have been winning overseas tests consistently since 2002.

 

[gary0808]

I don't think this loss was due to England underrating India at all. I know it sounds like an excuse but we have had to replace our whole seam attack with three relatively new players to Test Cricket. Any team would struggle without the likes of Hoggard, Flintoff and Harmison and India have capitalised wonderfully in winn ing the Second Test.

I still believe after Trent Bridge that we can still salvage something from this series and get a draw. The key is to get a big score on the board in the 1st Innings to set the foundations for the rest of the test match.
BRING ON THE OVAL!!!

 

[evertonfan]

Just following up from my comment a while ago about Pietersons excessive celebration after his hundred. Take a look at how much better that Vaughan hundred was, and then look at how he celebrated it.

In fairness though, Vaughan's hundred was made at a time where England were still under the kosh and heading for defeat. He couldn't have exactly celebrate wildly as he had a lot of work left to do.

It was nice to see Vaughan get a hundred though. We have finally got him back in the squad and he's proving all his doubters wrong. I hope we win at the Oval for his sake, as he's never lost a home Test series yet.

 

[Animator!]

Shame that none of the large amount of Aussie's on here that said Vaughan was a poor player during the WC haven't come here and admitted they were wrong yet.

 

[aditya123]

I don't think this loss was due to England underrating India at all. I know it sounds like an excuse but we have had to replace our whole seam attack with three relatively new players to Test Cricket. Any team would struggle without the likes of Hoggard, Flintoff and Harmison and India have capitalised wonderfully in winn ing the Second Test.

But you still had your entire batting lineup but the English batting failed to cross 300 thrice against a not so highly rated seam attack.
I believe that it is your batting which cost you the game.
Had England put up a big score, as they did most of the times against the West Indies, India`s batsmen would have had far more pressure on them and thus would`nt have been able to post 481.

Coming to the issue of injuries, although Harmisson is a superb bowler, Tremlett in the 2 games has bowled way better than Harmisson has in recent times.

 

[gary0808]

But you still had your entire batting lineup but the English batting failed to cross 300 thrice against a not so highly rated seam attack.
I believe that it is your batting which cost you the game.
Had England put up a big score, as they did most of the times against the West Indies, India`s batsmen would have had far more pressure on them and thus would`nt have been able to post 481.

Coming to the issue of injuries, although Harmisson is a superb bowler, Tremlett in the 2 games has bowled way better than Harmisson has in recent times.

I do agree if we put a bigger total on the board the result may have been different but I very much doubt India would have put 480-500 on the board in their first innings if Hoggard, Flintoff and indeed Harmison were playing. We all know Harmison in recent times hasn't been at his best at all but there is no doubt in my mind that he is still a quality bowler and we have missed him during this series no matter how well Tremlett has performed.

 

[Mr Anderson]

* Tremlett has impressed me, he has the physical attributes, good action, decent pace and aggression. I mean when I first saw him against the Aussies in an ODI, I was thinking to myself, what a waste of your height. I mean he was bowling 120-135km and not even troubling Gilly or Haydos. He's done very well.

 

[baburao]

It would be good if India-England series will be called as "JellyBean Series".