Cricket: General Chat

[robby b]

11 hours ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Terrible attendance for this final test match in Pakistan, which is really surprising given that it’s the first time England have toured there for a decade plus.

I know the series has been lost for the home team but there’s literally almost no one there.

Yeah, that is strange, for a start a win for them is important to bounce back, 'to get back to winning ways', to head into their next series positively. And above all they still have pride to play for. When England are 2-0 down in a three match series, going into the third and final match I really want them to end up losing the series only 2-1 rather than 3-0, there's a big difference in those two scores!

(When Villa lose I much prefer by one goal than by three!)

[KentVillan]

On 10/12/2022 at 13:01, sheepyvillian said:

This Swashbuckling style of England isn't something completely original to test cricket. The great West Indies sides were very much known for there attacking style of cricket, I mean, I lost count how many times Greenidge and Haynes surpassed England's total without losing their wickets. 

A few great test sides have had very destructive opening batsmen. Matthew Hayden also springs to mind.

But has there ever been a Test team before that bats this aggressively through the entire top and middle order?

Greenidge and Hayden were both paired with more conservative openers (Haynes and Langer) for most of their careers.

England just seem to have completely given up on the idea of the top order blocker… maybe because since Cook retired there isn’t one worth picking!

The big question is how BazBall will handle something like Australia or South Africa away. A proper bowling attack on pitches that cause a few problems. If they can win one of those series playing like this, then they really will have changed the game I think.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, KentVillan said:

big question is how BazBall will handle something like Australia or South Africa away. A proper bowling attack on pitches that cause a few problems. If they can win one of those series playing like this, then they really will have changed the game I think.

IMO the bowlers will be the key. A lot of the focus so far has been on the batting approach and the super rapid scoring rate and so on. With that comes the risk or reality of losing wickets quickly, so the counter side is England having the bowling attack to also take wickets in the type of conditions you mention. A top class spinner and quality pace - Archer, Wood, maybe Stone, obviously Anderson, Broad, Robinson...Stokes and Leach...trouble is injuries really and the amount of cricket, but you can't argue so far with the approach and results under Stokes and Baz.

[Milfner]

Harry Brook is quite good, isn't he. Special player.

[bannedfromHandV]

6 hours ago, blandy said:

IMO the bowlers will be the key. A lot of the focus so far has been on the batting approach and the super rapid scoring rate and so on. With that comes the risk or reality of losing wickets quickly, so the counter side is England having the bowling attack to also take wickets in the type of conditions you mention. A top class spinner and quality pace - Archer, Wood, maybe Stone, obviously Anderson, Broad, Robinson...Stokes and Leach...trouble is injuries really and the amount of cricket, but you can't argue so far with the approach and results under Stokes and Baz.

Bowlers will definitely be the key but having an attack minded captain will help a lot, we might leak some runs but we’ll keep knocking down the batters and this England team will feel confident chasing any kind of score potentially dependent on the wicket of course.

I think the big transition for England now will be moving away from relying on Broad and Anderson. We have a plethora of good bowlers to replace them but they all seem to have frequent injury issues (Wood, Archer, Robinson etc). We’ve managed without a ‘world class’ spinner for years now, decades in fact maybe, Swann on his day was top drawer but you wouldn’t put him near the elite spinners.

Anyway, done well again this morning to surpass the Pakistan score, a more healthy lead would have been nice but set up nicely for the second innings now, gonna be tough batting last perhaps so hopefully can knock them over for 250 or less and get the clean series sweep, which given Englands record in Pakistan previously would really be some achievement.

Edited December 18, 2022 by bannedfromHandV

[blandy]

45 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Swann on his day was top drawer but you wouldn’t put him near the elite spinners.

I would. He was an excellent spinner. 60 odd tests, 240+ wickets, loads of 5-fers, knocked over left handers for fun. Took wickets loads of times in his first over. Bit of a bell at times, but he was near the elite spinners IMO. Not a genius like Warne or Murali, but there are not many others who were better as attacking spinners, at least not in my lifetime.

Agree with the rest of your post, mind.

[sheepyvillian]

Trust me, there was nothing Conservative about Greenidge or Haynes.. The great West Indies sides rarely drew test matches. It was all out attacking cricket. 

[KentVillan]

Rehan Ahmed looks a bit special doesn’t he

[bannedfromHandV]

5 wickets for 18 year old Rehan Ahmed.

Pretty special 

[robby b]

Just woke up, yet again (typical rubbish night's sleep, boo). 8am here in Chile. Pakistan 9 wickets down without a big score, that's good to wake up to. Will Crawley make amends and get some runs in the 2nd innings? Good luck Crawley and Pope , go on lads!

[robby b]

Rehan Ahmed wow! The youngest ever bowler to get a five-for on their test debut! 

Pakistan's Abrar-cadabra is brilliant too, getting seven wickets on his magic debut in the last match.

Go on Crawley, 8 runs in the first over, that's more like it! I hope he and Root have a much better innings this time...

[bannedfromHandV]

Crawley and Duckett in T20 mode here, can England win the match before the end of the day?!

[robby b]

Just now, bannedfromHandV said:

Crawley and Duckett in T20 mode here, can England win the match before the end of the day?!

Incredible! 37 runs in just the first three overs. In a test match. What are we seeing?!

[blandy]

1 hour ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Crawley and Duckett in T20 mode here, can England win the match before the end of the day?!

One thing I wonder, is whether there's just a gulf opened up. I watch the Aus Windies games, then the Aus v SA over in 2 days test, and obviously following England's progress, it just seems a bit like there's a gap - Australia totally better the WI. Aus v SA it could have gone either way, with a spicy pitch and 2 excellent attacks, England mullering Pakistan. I think I'm saying that the likes of India, England, Aus and maybe SA are a bigger step ahead of the other nations than has been the case in the past. 2 tier cricket - Aus, India England, with the money are going to dominate the rest, who are essentially poor. South Africa are clinging on, due to exceptional fast bowling talent, but the batting's not there. The places with the lucrative T20 leagues are just pulling away.

[sheepyvillian]

If Ahmed is half as good as Warne, we'll have some spinner on our hands. 

[bannedfromHandV]

7 hours ago, blandy said:

One thing I wonder, is whether there's just a gulf opened up. I watch the Aus Windies games, then the Aus v SA over in 2 days test, and obviously following England's progress, it just seems a bit like there's a gap - Australia totally better the WI. Aus v SA it could have gone either way, with a spicy pitch and 2 excellent attacks, England mullering Pakistan. I think I'm saying that the likes of India, England, Aus and maybe SA are a bigger step ahead of the other nations than has been the case in the past. 2 tier cricket - Aus, India England, with the money are going to dominate the rest, who are essentially poor. South Africa are clinging on, due to exceptional fast bowling talent, but the batting's not there. The places with the lucrative T20 leagues are just pulling away.

Yeah I don’t know to be honest, good point. We know how money affects sports and for sure there’s more money and resources going into the likes of English and Indian cricket versus the Windies or Sri Lanka.

I don’t think the gulf is as wide as may appear though, let’s not forget that England only won 1 in 12+ test matches prior to Stokes and McCullum taking the reins. South Africa are up and down and I think they have some challenges with the enforced quota system they use, the Windies have fallen out of love with the sport and Sri Lanka are struggling for quality but all it takes is one superstar to emerge in any of those places and it can take off easily enough.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, bannedfromHandV said:

I don’t think the gulf is as wide as may appear though, let’s not forget that England only won 1 in 12+ test matches prior to Stokes and McCullum taking the reins.

Fair comment and good post. England concentrated on white ball stuff too much perhaps, plus also played way more tests during the pandemic and consequently suffered from bubble fatigue, before then they’d been doing ok.

I hope you’re right and the SA selection criteria is a good point.

[bannedfromHandV]

2 hours ago, blandy said:

Fair comment and good post. England concentrated on white ball stuff too much perhaps, plus also played way more tests during the pandemic and consequently suffered from bubble fatigue, before then they’d been doing ok.

I hope you’re right and the SA selection criteria is a good point.

I definitely think this is do or die for test cricket, if the gung ho and entertaining approach that England are employing takes off with the other nations and it still doesn’t bring back the crowds and the interest then it’s game over for the long form potentially.

[KentVillan]

23 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

I definitely think this is do or die for test cricket, if the gung ho and entertaining approach that England are employing takes off with the other nations and it still doesn’t bring back the crowds and the interest then it’s game over for the long form potentially.

Test cricket will endure I think, but the risk is it becomes just 3 or 4 countries taking it seriously. It’s still by far the best format of the game when you have two evenly matched sides playing on a decent wicket.

[blandy]

2 hours ago, KentVillan said:

Test cricket will endure I think, but the risk is it becomes just 3 or 4 countries taking it seriously. It’s still by far the best format of the game when you have two evenly matched sides playing on a decent wicket.

The risk you mention, it's already been exceeded. In terms of spectators in grounds, the ashes fills them. England at home generally sell out. Nowhere else really cares that much. Australia and India have big grounds, but they're mostly sparsely populated for most days of most games. Really only England loves test cricket. Everywhere else just pays lip service to it.