Honestly, this series is the same s**t, different day. We'll come to England and the ball will swing about and we'll nick everything to slip or get bowled and be all out for 60. I still maintain Head and Harris aren't up to international standard and if they're in the team in a year and a half, their techniques will be exposed in England.
There was some really good discussion between Trott, Moeen and Harmison on BT last night. As good as anything I've seen from the guys on Sky. Here's a coach, an active player and I'm pretty sure Harmi watches a lot of domestic stuff, all saying similar things. As opposed to Sky where, as good as it can be, it often feels like the only cricket some of them watch is what they commentate on.
Mo was excellent, I wonder if some of his difficulties in the England side might stem from the fact he seems fairly 'luded' (I can't be arsed thinking of the opposite word for deluded)
Moeen's problem was that the captain, coach and ECB thought of him as a genuine spin option when he's a batter that can dabble in a few overs here and there.
Moeen's problem was that the captain, coach and ECB thought of him as a genuine spin option when he's a batter that can dabble in a few overs here and there.
I think proper preparation is they key. Touring sides used to play multiple first class matches before a Test. To turn up and expect to play well away in Australia when some players have barely lifted a bat in first class cricket since September is just crazy.
We also need to ensure first class cricket is the primary focus of counties and market it much better. It's a great product but no-one is watching as counties are only interested in short format and put all their marketing in that direction.
I think proper preparation is they key. Touring sides used to play multiple first class matches before a Test. To turn up and expect to play well away in Australia when some players have barely lifted a bat in first class cricket since September is just crazy.
We also need to ensure first class cricket is the primary focus of counties and market it much better. It's a great product but no-one is watching as counties are only interested in short format and put all their marketing in that direction.
Sadly, no one wants to watch the County championship as it takes too long, the world is sadly changing into a want it now and make it quick. I have to deal with parents who feel I am solely responsible for their children's education and development; so far from the truth, a parents, sorry I digress but the world needs to take stock and slow down. Cricket is a sport that can achieve this. The team I manage at school you see changes in behaviour when they have played as they're more relaxed than stressed before (maybe this is my interpretation). Is t20 cricket that exciting? Throw the ball fast and hit the ball hard a very simple game, longer forms of the game hold so much more strategic value but little interest in the public realm.
Okay then, a serious suggestion from the players England have with them:
Rory Burns
Ben Stokes
Dawid Malan
Joe Root
Ollie Pope
Dan Lawrence
Jonny Bairstow
Craig Overton
Dom Bess
Ollie Robinson
Jimmy Anderson
Ensures that England have played every last player in their squad, ready to call up whoever's in the BBL for Hobart Gives Mark Wood a rest before the all-important fifth Test Drop Jack Leach for a game that it seems likely to actually turn End Jos Buttler's Test career Trying Something Different (TM) with Ben Stokes at the top of the order
Okay then, a serious suggestion from the players England have with them:
Rory Burns
Ben Stokes
Dawid Malan
Joe Root
Ollie Pope
Dan Lawrence
Jonny Bairstow
Craig Overton
Dom Bess
Ollie Robinson
Jimmy Anderson
Ensures that England have played every last player in their squad, ready to call up whoever's in the BBL for Hobart Gives Mark Wood a rest before the all-important fifth Test Drop Jack Leach for a game that it seems likely to actually turn End Jos Buttler's Test career Trying Something Different (TM) with Ben Stokes at the top of the order
Not every team has a Rohit Sharma and not everyone gets the backing that he got that a middle order bat gets promoted to open. Don't think that it would be a wise call to open with Stokes considering he has just comeback from a break relating to his mental health issues.
Also I am more willing to see Bairstow at 5 as a keeper batsman. Root-Bairstow-Pope-Lawrence would be my choice. Also why not give the gloves to Ollie Pope who keeps for Surrey in LOIs? Is that some KLR kind of issue?
It probably seems like the wrong place to put this, but I'm watching the New Zealand-Bangladesh Test at the moment and the home side currently have Devon Conway and Will Young at the crease. The commentators have noted that neither is an opening batter by trade, but that New Zealand brought them both into the side as openers because that was where the openings were for them to come in. When number three became available for Conway in this Test, he moved down to three and Young came in as an opener. They're suggesting that it is likely that once Ross Taylor retires, Conway and Young will be the next number three and four, and the next batter off the rank will come in as an opener - possibly Daryl Mitchell or Rachin Ravindra. This certainly seems very possible as Tom Blundell also filled in as an opener in recent times.
It's a very interesting take on how to handle a Test batting line-up. Conventional wisdom (including my own) states that a Test match opener is a very specialist role, but the New Zealand approach is rather opposite: pick the six best available batters, then sort them into a batting order as best they fit.
I was thinking about how this might apply to England, and I realised that England don't have a best six batters, openers or otherwise. Working from a vague combination of county averages, Test averages and gut feel, those six batters would probably be: Joe Root, Ben Stokes, Dawid Malan, Ollie Pope, Rory Burns, Dan Lawrence (much as it hurts to say). Then Foakes as keeper.
It probably doesn't need saying, but the same sort of approach likely doesn't work here:
Rory Burns
Ollie Pope
Dawid Malan
Joe Root
Ben Stokes
Dan Lawrence
There's a pretty obvious reason why that doesn't work. Look at the techniques of these Kiwi batters: These are New Zealand's last four makeshift openers. All of them are perfectly balanced on both front and back foot.
England don't have any batters who even look like this. Forget the stats and such like (as even at 30* I reckon Conway's on his way to a second Test double-ton); the English techniques simply aren't up to scratch. Only Joe Root even looks vaguely balanced at the crease in the way that these two, and if I were to find screengrabs of Burns, Hameed, Pope and Bairstow I think they would illustrate my point still further.
This isn't something that can be fixed overnight because it is a basic issue. If the best of England's batters have these problems, then the ones who are struggling must be in real trouble.
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Ensures that England have played every last player in their squad, ready to call up whoever's in the BBL for Hobart
