Sri Lanka in England 2011

[Auwais]

The best man to come in the team now that Collingwood is gone from the # 5 role for me would be Owais Shah, but for dumb reasons we all know he wouldn't get picked.

That ship's long sailed for me, unfortunately.


Yes, it's a terrible joke, I know.

 

[Themer]

So realistically at the time Kieswetter should have backed. But typical knee-jerk foolish English ODI selection policies prevented that from occuring.

Kieswetter was averaging less than twenty in all competitions both domestic and international at the time he was dropped. He was in awful form and deserved to be dropped. Averaged 17 against Bangladesh that summer as well.

I can bring up the stats he got against the domestic side (the very same domestic structure you ridicule extensively for its lack of quality) where he was also averaging less than 20.

 

[War]

That ship's long sailed for me, unfortunately.


Yes, it's a terrible joke, I know.

Ha ye i know. Just saying he was stupidy dropped after the 2009 Champions trophy when he was amongst the top 3 English ODI run getters during that 2007-2009 period when he had his 1st and only substantial run in the England team. Along with the overexaggerated criticism of his running ability.

He has performed all over the world since that axing, recently gaining the T20 player of the season award down in S Africa South Africa news: Jacques Kallis is South Africa's Cricketer of the Year | South Africa Cricket News | ESPN Cricinfo

Plus to think that Middlesex dispenesed of his services recently and its case of administrators of England treating Shah appalingly in recent years.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/cricket/article-2006994/Paul-Newman-Owais-Shah-loss-England-shut-out.html?ITO=1490

----------

Kieswetter was averaging less than twenty in all competitions both domestic and international at the time he was dropped. He was in awful form and deserved to be dropped. Averaged 17 against Bangladesh that summer as well.

I can bring up the stats he got against the domestic side (the very same domestic structure you ridicule extensively for its lack of quality) where he was also averaging less than 20.

My respond to angy's post was jsut me aggreing with him.

I dont intend to rehash this argument especially with you, since i know we had it before during Kieswetter's axing last summer.

He is back in the team now, so lets move on. Thanks..

 

[sifter132]

We've too many Test batsmen in the side. Cook, Trott and Bell are all good batsmen, but not 'so good' that they are musts for the ODI side. Cook has what captaincy experience? None on the showing so far. Kieswetter is the epitomy of England's poor tactics in they persist in picking a keeper to 'pinch hit' at the expense of a proper opener, it has failed pretty much since forever.

I completely disagree and I agree with one of the Sky commentators (possibly Nasser) but in my opinion your best players are the ones in your test side. That's your ultimate XI and if they are your 11 best cricketers in the country then they should be your players in all formats. The problem with revamping the squad so you end up with with almost 3 different XI's and each side has to gel as a unit. You start bringing in new faces every 3 games and the side never has any time to become cohesive as a unit. It's one of the reasons the test side has become so good, they are incredibly tight as a unit and whilst you could say it's possibly become a bit of a clique these are the people you basically have to live with. The players in that national side are basically family and in the end everyone has to get on with everyone else or life can be hell an ruin a lot of the team. It was one of the downfalls with the late Fletcher years and Moores years. The side became a clique and anyone coming into the squad was basically shut out.

I've always believed that somewhere between the 2 is the best approach. Use most of your Test side, but bring in 3-5 specialists for ODIs. It can help to bring new life to your team on long tours/summers and it can add specialist skills that the Test players may not have eg. playing an all-rounder, or picking guys to hit 6s/finish an innings, bowl at the death etc.. I also think that the bowlers are the main players that need to play both formats, not the batsmen, because your Test bowlers are your best wicket takers and picking bowlers to contain is not a good start, bowling teams should be aggressive.

So my 'formula' is: pick your 4 best Test batsmen/keepers, and your 3 best Test bowlers, then add 4 50 over specialists that fill in the skill gaps.
4 best Test batsmen/keepers: Cook, Trott, Bell, Prior.
3 best Test bowlers: Swann, Anderson, Tremlett.
Then what's left to fill the gaps with the other 4 spots? You need:
an all-rounder at #7,
a fast bowler who can bowl at the death and be hard to target,
2 batsmen: one to finish an innings at #5 or #6; and another in the top order (depending where Prior wants to bat). One of those batsmen should be able to bowl a little bit, since Trott isn't much of a bowler.

Dunno who your all-rounder would be (Bresnan by default at the moment), Shahzad or Sidebottom for your other pace bowler, Morgan for your finisher, and Bopara for your batsman top 5 batter who bowls a bit. If Prior wants to bat at #6, then Ravi opens. KP and Broad not considered to keep the 2 sides a bit more separated. Morgan gets a pass because he's only new in the Test side. Leaves you with: Cook, Prior/Bopara, Trott, Bell, Morgan, Bopara/Prior, Bresnan, Swann, Shahzad/Sidebottom, Anderson, Tremlett.

 

[Haarithan]

Err.. Sidebottom's retired from intl. cricket and Shahzad's been woeful in the county circuit. And England are pretty aware of Prior's ODI abilities as well - he was arguably their worst player ever since the CB series, so he should be nowhere near the ODI setup. And the days England pick Bopara are the days I feel they are taking a step backward in the game. Problem with England is that they don't have a batting AR at #7 other than Samit. How good is Tim Phillips? From what I've seen, he's been a pretty useful AR for Essex.

My favorable XI:

Cook
Kieswetter
Pietersen
Trott
Hildreth
Morgan
Patel/Woakes (5)
Bresnan (2)
Swann (4)
Anderson (1)
Dernbach/Briggs (3)

Edit: Tim Phillips | Cricket Players and Officials | ESPN Cricinfo

Darn, he's just another one of those bowling AR's. :/

 

[Owzat]

I've always believed that somewhere between the 2 is the best approach. Use most of your Test side, but bring in 3-5 specialists for ODIs. It can help to bring new life to your team on long tours/summers and it can add specialist skills that the Test players may not have eg. playing an all-rounder, or picking guys to hit 6s/finish an innings, bowl at the death etc.. I also think that the bowlers are the main players that need to play both formats, not the batsmen, because your Test bowlers are your best wicket takers and picking bowlers to contain is not a good start, bowling teams should be aggressive.

I agree with some of that, the problem is your best wicket takers in Tests might not be the best ODI bowlers. The better ODI bowlers are able to mix it up better, slip in the slower ball etc. I agree re taking wickets, just not sure the two formats are so easily interchangeable. You talk about "the death", I'm not sure our Test bowlers are the best "death" bowlers

You don't know who will be batting at the death either, you might reasonably expect it to be someone from 5-8 but you don't know. If you overload 5-8 with sloggers then you may well find you have your specialist bowlers batting at the death because the rest have got themselves our.

So my 'formula' is: pick your 4 best Test batsmen/keepers, and your 3 best Test bowlers, then add 4 50 over specialists that fill in the skill gaps.
4 best Test batsmen/keepers: Cook, Trott, Bell, Prior.
3 best Test bowlers: Swann, Anderson, Tremlett.
Then what's left to fill the gaps with the other 4 spots? You need:
an all-rounder at #7,
a fast bowler who can bowl at the death and be hard to target,
2 batsmen: one to finish an innings at #5 or #6; and another in the top order (depending where Prior wants to bat). One of those batsmen should be able to bowl a little bit, since Trott isn't much of a bowler.

I agree, you pick your side in order and pick the rest according to what the sides needs for balance. If I were going to go with Trott then I'd open with him, not ideal but he scores runs consistently. The coach just needs to have a word in his shell like and get him honed in more on TEAM play ie acceleration. He's averaging 53.68 in ODIs, something it would be hard to leave out, but he's scoring just under 80 SR so needs to do a bit more for the side there. Cook seems to have upped his game in terms of pacing it, but I do wonder about Bell and would leave him out. In theory you should leave your keeper until last and then pick him on what the side lacks, England probably pick the keeper on opening potential and for me that's wrong

1. Cook
2. Trott
3. Morgan
4. Pietersen
5.
6.
7.
8. Broad
9. Bresnan
10. Swann
11.

Just to point out, I wouldn't necessarily pick those players, it is a working example of HOW I'd pick the side rather than WHO.

I've put them roughly in the order where you'd want them, but ideally I'd have all three of Broad, Bresnan and Swann at nine. Already you can see with just seven players pencilled in that the batting down the order is ok but not that strong and as capable of being knocked over cheaply as scoring 30+. The top order has no bowling to mention so you'd want a batsman who could bowl. At this stage you might even swap say Trott for Bopara and maybe shuffle the order.

You'd put the number 11 in first, then work out the order they'd bowl to see what you need for bowling

1.
2. Bresnan
3. Broad
4.
5. Swann
6.
7.

Clearly the number six or seven is going to have to be able to bat some. You'd want someone like Bopara, Collingwood or Patel for the sixth bowler, but the number four bowler needs to be quite good. Herein lies the problem with England, that seventh batsman/fourth bowler is a player like Flintoff I don't believe we have. Stacking the top order with batsmen who really don't bowl isn't a solution, although it is to England

Maybe England have no choice but to muddle through with a Colingwood, Bopara or Patel. Problem is the rest of their bowlers can't afford to have 'days off' as often as they do - like three conceding at 7rpo last match. We then found the batting too light and the 7-11 scored 21 runs between them and the side slumped from 201/5 to 240 all out. I know we conceded 30+ runs too many, but there was nothing down the order and as bowlers there was not a lot either - Bresnan 1/70 & 2, Broad 0/70 & 1 and Dernbach 0/63 & 5. That's 1/203 at 7.25rpo and a whopping eight runs.

While I may not have 'the answer', I do know that batting bowlers well above their batting ability in the order and including five batsmen of whom one or two bowl very bit-part is not 'the answer' - or even a very good guess. At the moment it is 'the long tail' vs 'batsmen muddling through 10 overs' and both are a good way to lose a game, one by collapsing from five wickets down and the other by losing wicket taking ability and conceding extra runs.

Collingwood is arguably one of the better solutions, that or pluck a medium to quick all-rounder from the counties. Shame Neil Carter is a bit too old, assuming he does qualify. He could have done a job.

I would promote Stokes, make sure he knows he is picked ahead of the next World Cup and that he isn't expected to make an immediate impact (to take pressure off him) Now is the time to start reshaping the side, England just seem to be stuck in the idea a couple of changes here and there and with a bit of 'luck' everything will fall in place. Same players, same results Not rocket science.

Leaves you with: Cook, Prior/Bopara, Trott, Bell, Morgan, Bopara/Prior, Bresnan, Swann, Shahzad/Sidebottom, Anderson, Tremlett.

When in form Broad is one of our best ODI players, I won't argue against that. Your side has too long a tail and the bowling is ordinary, Anderson has bowled three godawful spells in his last 13 ODIs, two of 1/91 and one of 0/72 - and two further of 0/54 which aren't quite so bad. Woakes might have a future but we already have several 'can bat' s in the side but none who you'd bat higher than 8-9

 

[Paki007]

is there really Difficult to bat? What England are doing

 

[Owzat]

"England must learn fast" - Morgan

- Cook chooses to bat or bowl on the basis of who knows what? Probably chose to bat because bowling was a mistake last time
- England pick the same players despite Broad, Bresnan and Dernbach conceding heavily and not scoring any runs
- Trott scores 1 off 8 balls
- Kieswetter opens and scores 3


I could fill in a few more blanks in anticipation, I'm guessing 'the bottom line' will be England lose tamely again.

 

[Haarithan]

While KP gets out to right arm leg spin bowling (analogous to left arm off spin bowling) again. Is this ever going to end?!

And I'm reiterating my desire to never pick Trott for ODIs even if he's the most consistent player in the limited overs setup. Old school cricketers only deserve to play test cricket. Also add Bell to that club.

 

[Ollie_H]

And I'm reiterating my desire to never pick Trott for ODIs even if he's the most consistent player in the limited overs setup. Old school cricketers only deserve to play test cricket.

 

[Haarithan]

Rather save that for the team, that's the least I can say. You do realize Trott isn't the exact fit for a #3 batsman to bat during the PP overs, a period where England get pwned by almost every other team? Belter of a wicket - 32 runs in the first PP at home turf, just wow!

 

[Ollie_H]

Yeah because Trotty averages 51 and the 2nd highest average side is kp with 40. But no you're right, let's drop him.

 

[Gaurav_7]

You don't want Trott in ODIs? Wow, shows what T20 has done really. Happy Dravid played his ODI cricket (most of it) when T20 wasn't there. He did pretty well too and I expect Trott to actually do the same if not better. Seriously, I feel for some people.

 

[Haarithan]

Its just that I don't want him to bat at #3, KP suits best there. Maybe at #4 or #5, but definitely not at #3.

But the fact is India came to resurgence in ODIs after axing Dravid. What I want is a team to make full use of the first 2 PPs.

 

[Gaurav_7]

But the fact is India came to resurgence in ODIs after axing Dravid.

No, definitely not. It wasn't just Dravid. It was a transformation back then, new players stepped up.

I actually heard Nasser Hussain today. I liked what he said. Trott should come in if Cook gets out while KP should come in if Kieswetter gets out.