tom_avfc

1 minute ago, Xela said:

Braindead bazball tactics

I kind of get it when Bairstow is trying to play attacking shots. It’s his game and it’s worked on a number of occasions. Woakes coming out and swinging at his first ball when Brook is almost at 50 is complete madness. Just stay in and see how close Brook can get you. 

12 minutes ago, bobzy said:

Think it's more the pacey outfield to be honest.  It's rewarding slogging with runs, even if the risks are there.

It is partly this but not a single batsman has been able to play a normal test match innings here and score runs. I think the pitch is making sticking around a long time pretty difficult so cashing in while you can has been essential.

The only way to score runs seems to be to do it quickly. Marsh, Stokes, Wood and Crawley scoring at good rates. Difficult pitch to bat time on by the look of it.

Just now, imavillan said:

what a garbage decision giving Davies out...close to the gloves no spike on ultra edge yet still given out....shocking

and as for the two commentators, well, talk about biased

awful

You could see it hit the glove and they’ve just confirmed that ultra edge isn’t working. I can understand the fans in the ground being angry about it as they’re probably unaware but not sure how anybody watching that on tv can question that decision.

3 minutes ago, theunderstudy said:

If he can't play this high up WHY are we playing him this high up??? It's costing us a wicket. We know one of Laurel or Hardy will give away their wicket within the first 10 overs so we need someone with a bit more nous to play there not a number 5 batsman who thrives playing a worn ball

Laurel and Hardy? Duckett has an average of 48 and made 98 and 83 in the previous test match.

Completely agree that Brook shouldn’t be at 3. Probably should have moved Root up a place but he doesn’t seem to want to bat at 3. We’re hardly blessed with options if you’re after that sort of batsman though.

1 minute ago, theunderstudy said:

Think Brook can't handle these pitches. I wouldn't take him to Australia next Ashes if he's still batting like this 

He hardly played a shot and that’s not his game. Never looked comfortable. He’s had a great start to his career lower down the order. I wouldn’t be dropping him due to struggling to play the new ball that’s swinging everywhere against the best bowling attack in cricket.

As soon as he gets back down the order I don’t doubt that he’ll get back into the form he showed early on given time.

Tricky pitch to score runs on, particularly against this Australia attack. Mitch Marsh might have shown the way forwards for England here. Take your chance and get a bit of luck seems to be the way to go.

Scratching around for a bit seems like there’s always going to be a ball with your name on it and you’ll not score many.

In reality this kind of pitch is exactly what Australia want and they’re better than us at exploiting it and taking their chances.

12 hours ago, KentVillan said:

Yeah the point is the foot movement from Bairstow is to indicate to the fielders he’s inside his crease and not considering a run. He’s (wrongly) assuming they get the message and just lob the ball back, and carry on.

The idea of a stumping is you’re catching out a player who has left his crease to obtain some kind of advantage to hit the ball, or lost balance trying to hit the ball.

Dumb from Bairstow in the situation… it was of course out, and the umpires had no option. But can completely understand the rage, and think Cummins could have withdrawn the appeal.

Hopefully it will motivate England in the next test, where I think Australia will miss Lyon. Stokes seems to be fired up now.

I’m not sure it is dumb from Bairstow. I reckon there’s be hundreds of examples from that one test match of the ball carrying through to the keeper and then the batsman pretty quickly wandering down the wicket for a chat and a prod at the ground. It happens in every match. Notice how ridiculous it looked when Broad was exaggerating holding his bat in at the end of the over. That’s because it’s never normally necessary to do that.

It becomes a pretty petty game if the wicket keepers decide they’re just going to throw down the stumps every ball on the off chance that a batsman has moved slightly to soon between balls. If he’s stealing yards looking for a run then it’s fair game and a bit stupid from Bairstow. As it is Bairstow isn’t trying to seek any advantage and it’s a ridiculous wicket to claim and celebrate in the way that Australia did.

Just now, bobzy said:

What's the point, though?  We needed 70 runs to win without any recognised batter, and everyone will just be facing horrible short balls to a very deep-set field.

He saw a ball that was there to hook and thought “why not?” If it had sailed into the stands nobody would be calling it the wrong choice.

With 70 to get he had to back himself to score runs if the ball was there to hit.

3 minutes ago, lapal_fan said:

Pope's was a great ball.

Duckett **** up at 98, the general first innings and then Root getting out alongside Crawley cheaply is what lost this test.

Our bowling hasn't been great either.

Yeah the bowling has been more of an issue all series. If you put a team in to bat you can’t really afford for them to score 400+.

Just now, sidcow said:

Yes, Broad has surely shown the support batsmen how to play this? 

It’s a bit different playing support to Ben Stokes than it is to Stuart Broad. Robinson has shown he can score a few when throwing the bat at it so can’t really fault him for having a go. Good catch by smith to be fair.

19 minutes ago, stewiek2 said:

Yep. Lead of 400 and Aussies will declare and fancy going at us.

It’s going to take them the rest of the day to get 400 ahead at this rate. Takes some time out of the game that England need to bat I guess. Not sure I’d fancy us to bat out a day for a draw though given how we dealt with the short ball in the first innings.

11 minutes ago, PaulC said:

Bit two paced this wicket. Brute of a delivery from Tongue to Head

Yeah tricky to know what to do when a few are keeping low and a few kicking up.

Australia being a bit more patient than England were but not sure it’s working any better really.

“Play the short ball like Australia” they said. Maybe we should have gone straight to the same tactic that worked against us.

Just now, theunderstudy said:

Because England can bat aggressively and proactively and push the score along at 5 or 6 an over without the crap that we've seen since the Lyon injury. 

Once again, this is literally the only way the Aussies can get England out on this pitch. Did you think Cameron Green's dismissal yesterday was brave attempt to play it or a **** brainless swipe with his team set?

Duckett scored 98 runs playing in an aggressive way. Harry Brook has come out and played the short ball in exactly the same manner that the players who got out did so it’s clearly our plan to counter it by being that aggressive. 

Yes they could rein it in a bit but if that leads to them batting twice as long for the same amount of runs before getting out then it doesn’t really help. This is how England are going to play because under this leadership that’s how they think they’ll win matches.

They’re training to play like this, they’re confident playing like this and at the moment they’re scoring a lot of runs and winning more than they lose playing like this.

We put ourselves in a strong position to win the first test but fell just short. I’m not sure there’s any need for a massive overhaul of how we bat on the back of almost 700 runs scored in the first test and 270-4 here. 

22 minutes ago, theunderstudy said:

Another brainless, brainless dismissal. 

 

 

Just as well noted cerebral batting wonders Bairstow and Stokes are yet to come. **** me. Australia will have a 100 run lead at this rate. I can't believe the total lack of accountability and leadership in this side 

Bairstow who scored over 1,000 runs at an average of over 66 in 2022 and currently has 98 runs from the first test in this series.

This is up there with the most reactionary topics on here. We score a few runs and everything is fine then we lose a wicket or 2 and everyone is crap (even those who haven’t even come out to bat yet). 

This test match is very much in the balance and we’ll risk a loss going for the win. They’ve openly said that’s how they’re going to play so it’s hardly a surprise we haven’t suddenly reverted to a slow test match style of batting on a day that looks pretty good for batting. 

1 minute ago, lapal_fan said:

I hate that pint sized imbecile.

The only good thing 98 does is keep his stupid name off the honours board.

Dipshit

It was a pretty good 98 to be fair. The hook shot has got him a lot of runs but he always risked that dismissal. Good innings for a guy who apparently can only play spin and he’s set us up well.

9 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

True , but for those 19 innings  that you refer to Bairstow notably wasn’t  keeping wicket for most / all of them , which  suggests he’s better as a specialist batsman ?

so the argument around selecting Bairstow  should possibly be is he better than Brooks or Pope ?

do we get more runs out of Bairstow and play a specialist wicket keeper who won’t put down easy chances or do we bat deeper but allow the opposition more chances … the selectors have gone with the first option , hopefully they are right 

 

 

Yeah I guess batting deeper allows the batsmen to play with a bit more freedom and attacking intent too. You can afford for Duckett, Pope, Brook and Stokes not to make 50 in the first innings here because Crawley, Root and Bairstow all did. If you start removing batsmen then we may lose some of the “Bazball” intent.

Its impossible to say even in hindsight whether it’s the right decision. If Foakes comes in at 176-5 and we don’t get the 100 run partnership that Bairstow was there for we could have been all out for around the 250- 275mark. There’s too many variables to really know whether it’s for the best but I think the way we’re looking to play favours batting as deep as we can.

2 minutes ago, Rodders said:

I'd open with Bairstow. He'll be hit and miss too up there, but his hits will be more destructive and effective. Appreciate he is great in the middle order, but he just can't keep well enough.

 

good last half hour recovery from England here

Bairstow has won us far more matches with his aggressive lower middle order batting than he’s lost us with his keeping under Stokes and McCullum. He’s been guaranteed runs down there as his average will show.

Just now, PaulC said:

He's no pace. Maybe a mistake not picking Wood. I don't think it was expected for Moeen to bowl over 30 innings first innings.  With all the dry weather I think it was pretty obvious spinners would play a key part. In hindsight we needed two spinners this test 

I’m not sure that Wood offers much on a pitch like this. The pace is negated by the pitch and he just ends up bowling himself into the ground. There’ll be far better pitches for Wood later on in the series.

Two spinners would have been nice but the fact that we’ve had to recall Moeen Ali 2 years since his last test shows the state of English spin bowlers. Im not sure that Dawson, Parkinson etc. have much of an impact on this game.

1 minute ago, Milfner said:

So the 'keeper is dropping everything, and our spinner now has no skin left on his finger. Good stuff!

Ollie Robinson just looks so impotent, not seen him even test a batsman yet.

It’s a dreadful pitch to bowl pace on. Cummins went wicketless at over 4 an over. Hazelwood went at 4 an over for his 2 wickets. Boland went at over 6 an over.

Australia batting sensibly aren’t going to offer many chances on this.

An actual frontline spinner would have been useful for England but we don’t really produce those at the moment.

12 minutes ago, andym said:

That seems to be the argument for playing him, the runs he gets batting.

But that is irrelevant if he is costing more runs than he makes with his keeping errors.

Also assumes a better keeper than him i.e. Foakes, who would take those chances,  wouldnt make runs with the bat, which i dont think is true.

Bairstow had an average of 66 from 19 innings last year and scored 78 in the first innings here. Given that foakes averages 32 I don’t think it’s wild to assume Bairstow would score far more runs over a 5 test series.

It then becomes a question as to which batsman you drop to bring in Foakes and I don’t think there’s an obvious choice there either really. You’d have said Crawley before this game but he batted nicely. Duckett was in great form going into this series but looked poor first innings. If you drop an opener I don’t think there’s an obvious choice to move up to open either. 

I don’t expect them to bring Foakes in. Bairstow took a great catch to get rid of Labuschagne and generally has been a serviceable wicket keeper albeit not top class like Foakes. I think Bazball values the fast runs that the likes of Crawley, Duckett and Bairstow can make more than the couple of missed opportunities. 

Just now, Genie said:

I didn’t think Stones was anything special. Just looked on Fotmob and 6 City starters had a higher rating. 

It’s Pep’s new thing so everyone raves about it. He’s ok there and it’s a good move by Pep. Not sure it works in the long term and they’d certainly want an upgrade on stones if that’s a role they want to keep going forwards. 

1 hour ago, robby b said:

Update: Ireland are good at hitting England for six! Actually, if they had a few top bowlers then they could have won this match given that they scored nearly 200 in their 1st innings and are now over 200 in their 2nd.

Getting bowled out for 172 on a pitch that England then scored 524-4 at better than a run a ball suggests that their batting isn’t particularly great.

If anything the fact that the Irish 7th wicket partnership is now at over 100 shows how easy it is to score on this pitch.