England summer thread - 2018

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

First topic message reminder :

First test squad is announced next week, and the rumour is Nick Gubbins will be selected to open, and this would be the prospective team...

Cook
Gubbins
Root
Malan
Stokes
Bairstow
Livingstone
Woakes/Wood
Broad
Leach
Anderson

With James Vince as 12th man

What do we reckon?

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

Actually don't really enjoy it when the "contest " between bat and ball is so distorted.

Quite agree, the balance has shifted, since the last World Cup or perhaps a little before, ever more towards the batsman to the point where it is no longer a fair fight.

The powers that be, probably after next year's World Cup, will need to bring in regulations to benefit the fielding side.

I mean we did just see 214 playing 214-7 less than a week ago...England are batting very well today and Aussies are bowling some awful nonsense - can’t remember seeing a Yorker all day!

[LondonTiger]

294-1 after 33 overs.

When England made 444-3 against Pakistan at Trent Bridge two years ago they were 238-1 at the same time.

[dummy_half]

Drinks at 33 overs

England on 294-1.

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

Now the Aussies are coming round the wicket and bowling half trackers on leg stump - predictably getting pumped. Awful tactics

[LondonTiger]

Commentary line of the season so far:

"A brief plan of Baldrick proportions" says Agnew about Stanlake's two balls round the wicket.

[LondonTiger]

Finally a bowler gets a wicket - hope Buttler comes in now.

[JDizzle]

Buttler falls cheaply, which is a shame! Could have gotten ridiculous. England might now struggle to reach 450 from here...

[LondonTiger]

Buttler falls cheaply, which is a shame! Could have gotten ridiculous. England might now struggle to reach 450 from here...

Well the way Morgan is now going, fastest 50 for England. 436-3 with 5 overs left. Last 5 overs went for 80!!!

[Duty281]

444 easily beaten.

52 off 26 for 500.

[Gooseberry]

Finely balanced game

[JDizzle]

Morgan gone... 41 off 15 for 500! Unlikely, but they are 459-5!

[Duty281]

481/6. England were reeled in towards the end!

Tim Paine will not be the most popular man in the Australian dressing room.

[JDizzle]

Root 4 off 6! Drop him!

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

Root 4 off 6! Drop him!

Disgraceful. Root and Bayliss out

[Duty281]

It's funny how a team scores 27 off the first three overs, but are still behind the required rate.

[It Must Be Love]

What a waste of time these flat pitches are, what's the point?

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

England seem to be bowling alright on it...

[It Must Be Love]

England seem to be bowling alright on it...

Australia batting line up is not so great without 2 best players, and chasing a ridiculous score will put pressure on to go for silly shots which have cost them wickets so far.
I remember when 300 was a great score, now that's 350, and who knows what will happen as the bats get thicker and the pitch gets flatter. Nothing for the bowler to work with, most wickets these days are just because batsman make an error (for limited overs).

[Gooseberry]

Was Morgan just taking the pee by bowling Root first change ?

[Gooseberry]

As for the pitch. . It's better than the Scotland venue and it's village cricket boundaries. Maybe not the most challenging of conditions but Australia won the toss and had the option of testing England's relative weak spot and being the ones to set that scoreboard pressure.
There's been far flatter pitches and worse armtaacks with much lower tovals made.
England regulalry score 350 plus now in all manner of games ....their batting really is that good and that fearless.
Bairstows ODI record over the last year aNd a bit is unrivalled in world cricket....that can't all be down to flat pitches. Both Hales and Morgan have had spells at the top of the odi batting rankings in their careers. Roy has proved time and again he's got magic innings in him. Butter is a genuine star finisher. And theven tail is unrivalled, no nation has ever been able to regulalry field so much depth even when key players are missing.
400 plus scores shouldn't be that great a shock for England or seen as purely down to a flat pitch.

Let's also not forget that both Roy and Bairstow had a couple of very close calls early on. Theres always anice element of chance that plays I to a total this huge ...but England are good enough to capitalise on it.

Without Stokes and Woakes though they need to be. Wood and Willey really just aren't good enough bowlers. Thereally was a scattergram on cric viz recent years that showed Woakes as arguably the best rwgular power play bowler in ODIS ....and Wood and Willey amongst the worst.

I'm very happy to see the Currans given a go in T20s .. England may well need their second string bowlers come world cup time to back up the formidable batting and it would be nice if they could develop as better back ups than these mugs.
* caveat that as I type this undoubtedly wood and Willey will have bowled out the remaining aus wickets with 95mph inswinging yorkers

[Nathaniel Jacobs]

Bairstow’s form is the biggest joke going around. Slogged a couple of hundreds against a woeful Windies side at the tail end of last summer. Windies side without all the star players. Postage stamp grounds in New Zealand, no real achievement. Scotland an association side. And now Australia minus their first choice bowling attack.

Bairstow really is the new Bell. Minnow basher.

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

Bairstow’s form is the biggest joke going around. Slogged a couple of hundreds against a woeful Windies side at the tail end of last summer. Windies side without all the star players. Postage stamp grounds in New Zealand, no real achievement. Scotland an association side. And now Australia minus their first choice bowling attack.

Bairstow really is the new Bell. Minnow basher.

The biggest joke going around are your posts tbf

[JDizzle]

Bairstow’s form is the biggest joke going around. Slogged a couple of hundreds against a woeful Windies side at the tail end of last summer. Windies side without all the star players. Postage stamp grounds in New Zealand, no real achievement. Scotland an association side. And now Australia minus their first choice bowling attack.

Bairstow really is the new Bell. Minnow basher.

The biggest joke going around are your posts tbf

Jonny should just refuse to score runs unless he is playing against McGrath, Garner, Steyn, Trueman on an uncovered pitch with 100m boundaries. Until he does that then I don't care he averages 50 in ODIs.

[Nathaniel Jacobs]

Bairstow’s form is the biggest joke going around. Slogged a couple of hundreds against a woeful Windies side at the tail end of last summer. Windies side without all the star players. Postage stamp grounds in New Zealand, no real achievement. Scotland an association side. And now Australia minus their first choice bowling attack.

Bairstow really is the new Bell. Minnow basher.

The biggest joke going around are your posts tbf

Jonny should just refuse to score runs unless he is playing against McGrath, Garner, Steyn, Trueman on an uncovered pitch with 100m boundaries. Until he does that then I don't care he averages 50 in ODIs.

His average is padded up. He average in Test cricket is a mere 38, thus showing he’s not actually that good

[Nathaniel Jacobs]

Bairstow’s form is the biggest joke going around. Slogged a couple of hundreds against a woeful Windies side at the tail end of last summer. Windies side without all the star players. Postage stamp grounds in New Zealand, no real achievement. Scotland an association side. And now Australia minus their first choice bowling attack.

Bairstow really is the new Bell. Minnow basher.

The biggest joke going around are your posts tbf

Bairstow not fit to lace KP’s boots and he’s the greatest English limited overs batsman of all time.

[guildfordbat]

Bairstow’s form is the biggest joke going around. Slogged a couple of hundreds against a woeful Windies side at the tail end of last summer. Windies side without all the star players. Postage stamp grounds in New Zealand, no real achievement. Scotland an association side. And now Australia minus their first choice bowling attack.

Bairstow really is the new Bell. Minnow basher.

The biggest joke going around are your posts tbf

Jonny should just refuse to score runs unless he is playing against McGrath, Garner, Steyn, Trueman on an uncovered pitch with 100m boundaries. Until he does that then I don't care he averages 50 in ODIs.

Top post, JD.

[JDizzle]

[quote="Nathaniel Jacobs"]

Bairstow’s form is the biggest joke going around. Slogged a couple of hundreds against a woeful Windies side at the tail end of last summer. Windies side without all the star players. Postage stamp grounds in New Zealand, no real achievement. Scotland an association side. And now Australia minus their first choice bowling attack.

Bairstow really is the new Bell. Minnow basher.

The biggest joke going around are your posts tbf[/quote

JJonny should just refuse to score runs unless he is playing against McGrath, Garner, Steyn, Trueman on an uncovered pitch with 100m boundaries. Until he does that then I don't care he averages 50 in ODIs.

His average is padded up. He average in Test cricket is a mere 38, thus showing he’s not actually that good

Just wait till you hear about a fella called Michael Bevan. He only averaged 29 in Tests!

It may surprise you to hear that there can be a level between awful player and a player on the level of Virat/AB.

[Gooseberry]

KP averaged 40 at 86, Trott in the same era averaged 51. He was never anything special in that format, good and a stand out in a weak England team for the way he went about things but no great globally.

Roots averaging 50 at the same rate KP scored.

Bairstow averages 51 at 103, and in the last 18 months 68 at 111. No England player has had a run like this before, it cant solely be down to weak opposition (like India in India). Hes noticeably outscored Root, Morgan, Hales and Roy in this period all of whome are good ODI batsmen and were largely facing the same attacks in the same conditions.

He cant quite lay claim to being the greatest of all time or anything like that, but you'd be hard pressed to find a player with a better return over that period and hes markedly a better player than the young guy who flitered around the fringes of the team for a few years.
He got his second chance on sheer weight of runs domestically, and hes proven it was fully deserved.


Meanwhile I think we can all agree that Australia suffering their heaviest ever loss is a fitting tribute to the reason Warners not here to enjoy it.

[Corporalhumblebucket]

Devastating hitting by England throughout the innings. Most of those sixes were colossal hits, landing way beyond the boundary. Which in turn set things up very nicely for Moeen and Rashid to rake in another decent haul of wickets.

[LondonTiger]

Craig Overton and Sam Curran moved from the Lions squad to full ODI squad for last two games.

[JDizzle]

Craig Overton and Sam Curran moved from the Lions squad to full ODI squad for last two games.

Guess that means we will see some guys rested. Which is a shame. England are still prone to taking games off, which isn’t ideal with the WC round the corner, so would have been nice to see them really go for the 5-0 jugular.

[Gooseberry]

Craig Overton and Sam Curran moved from the Lions squad to full ODI squad for last two games.

Guess that means we will see some guys rested. Which is a shame. England are still prone to taking games off, which isn’t ideal with the WC round the corner, so would have been nice to see them really go for the 5-0 jugular.

Bear in miund two of the bowlers ( or one and batsman) wouldnt be in a first choice England XI anyway. So it does rather depend on who they drop if either of those are included.

Woods got a very poor ODI record and taken 3 for 198 so far this summer. England really should be looking at alternatives whether hes seen as a first XI player or just a world cup squad member ... hes really done nothing to suggest he deserves to be near the wolrd cup. Woods selected for all formats because hes got slightly more pace than others, but not enough to make a real difference and his returns are poor.
Willeys figures have been even worse ... his 3 wickets have cost 209 runs. Although he started his career well and can hold bat hes really only being selected on the basis of being a left armer.

Sam Curran offers an alternative to retain the left arm variation, and hes no mug with the bat either. Craig isnt as fast as Wood but does offer a challenge from his height and bounce.

Id see looking to push forward a different choice of reserve seamers as a positive not a negative move from England. Depth to their bowling is the weakest part of the squad.

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

I think both Dizzle and Goose make good points - it would be nice to see them put together 5 straight good games, but Goose is right that trying out some young reserve bowlers won't hurt, especially with those seamers in position right now not doing a lot.

Could we see an attack of Curran, Curran, Overton, Ball at Old Trafford on Sunday?

[LondonTiger]

Could we see an attack of Curran, Curran, Overton, Ball at Old Trafford on Sunday?

Unless they dropped a batter, that would mean losing one of the spinners - and they really are a key part of our bowling plan. I would like to see someone other than Wood and Willey having a go with the new ball. Up to the end of the series with SL in 2016, Willey had taken 29 wickets in 19 games, while in the 19 games since then he has 10 wickets. We need to find someone better. (I see Topley is with the Lions for the next few weeks. He has a lot more potential with the ball - but shame hi sbody is so fragile.

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

Hameed with another duck today - taking his average for the season to a measly 5.50 and he’s yet to crack 50 cumulative runs in the county championship.

He’ll be doing well to get another Lance contract at this rate...

[JDizzle]

Hameed with another duck today - taking his average for the season to a measly 5.50 and he’s yet to crack 50 cumulative runs in the county championship.

He’ll be doing well to get another Lance contract at this rate...

Ball that got him today was an absolute nut tbf - https://twitter.com/WorcsCCC/status/1009488344995287040

[guildfordbat]

I think both Dizzle and Goose make good points - it would be nice to see them put together 5 straight good games, but Goose is right that trying out some young reserve bowlers won't hurt, especially with those seamers in position right now not doing a lot.

Could we see an attack of Curran, Curran, Overton, Ball at Old Trafford on Sunday?

Although not playing in Surrey's current match at Guildford, Tom Curran was training there today which suggests he won't be lining up for England at Durham tomorrow.

[king_carlos]

Hameed with another duck today - taking his average for the season to a measly 5.50 and he’s yet to crack 50 cumulative runs in the county championship.

He’ll be doing well to get another Lance contract at this rate...

Ball that got him today was an absolute nut tbf - https://twitter.com/WorcsCCC/status/1009488344995287040

That right there is the epitome of 'when you're out of nick nothing goes your way'. An absolute beauty.

[Gooseberry]

I think both Dizzle and Goose make good points - it would be nice to see them put together 5 straight good games, but Goose is right that trying out some young reserve bowlers won't hurt, especially with those seamers in position right now not doing a lot.

Could we see an attack of Curran, Curran, Overton, Ball at Old Trafford on Sunday?

This is it.

For me its complacency to not address the issues with Willey and Wood just because your batsmen and Plunkett are doing all the work to cover for them.

Id like to see England play 5 straight good games. I just think they arew more likely to do that if Wood and Willey are dropped.
If they are going for like for like that would be Ball for Wood (although Balls international record is even worse than Woods) and Curran for Willey.


Lions squad:
Nick Gubbins (Middlesex), Tom Kohler-Cadmore (Yorkshire), Sam Hain (Warwickshire), Liam Livingstone (Lancashire), Steven Mullaney (Nottinghamshire, captain), Ben Foakes (Surrey, wk), Liam Dawson (Hampshire), Matthew Parkinson (Lancashire), Matthew Fisher (Yorkshire), Reece Topley (Hampshire), Tom Helm (Middlesex), Chris Jordan (Sussex). *Craig Overton (Somerset) to replace Jordan after the first two matches of the series.

Jordans alive! Just, very much a fringe player now.
The man Topley mentioned above is in. Foakes over Billings as a keeper obviously. Dawson is still the reserve spinner, which makes some sense despiote their being some youngsters pushing through on the tests scene now. Good mix of raw talent and expereinced second string players.

[JDizzle]

I quite like Ball - think he is a good bowler. Never been given a decent run in the Test side, and it did take Woakes a long to time to develop in the ODI side.

But you can’t just change things for the sake of it, I don’t think Overton and Curran are better options than Willey and Wood. So you are just hoping rather than actully believing they will improve the side.

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

Ball and Tom Curran are injured - Overton comes in for Plunkett who is rested.

[alfie]

Bit surprised its just Overton for Plunkett...I'd been expecting Sam Curran to come in for Willey ; but maybe that will happen on Sunday.

(Nothing against Willey , by the way : he is no world beater but does pose a threat with the new ball and gives a left arm option ...but it would be interesting to see young Sam by comparison for that role. It makes sense to try out options leading up to the WC)

Aussie selection shortens the batting but they really need something in that bowling and Lyon is well worth a try.

Ah well ...back to the football for now...

[Gooseberry]

Yeah exactly the sort of negative change none of us wanted from England....although the injuries may have played a part.
Plunketts easily been the best of the England seamers so far this summer.

They still should win though, Australia will be forced into a conservative bat first approach with a ridiculously short batting line up....can't see a 450 score being set here!
Their hope is England try and win it in 20 overs and chuck wickets away again.

[Gooseberry]

Solid start from Australia and the usual lack of penetration from wood/Willey has allowed them to have a go at Overton.
I'm not sure about this two overs of root as first change theory either. It's just odd.
Looks like they could set a total that will make England work.

[alfie]

I've not been watching yet...they seem to have been batting steadily . Presume pitch good for batting ? What do you think is a par score on this , Goose ?

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

In unsurprising news Australia are struggling against spinners

[alfie]

Ha . Head gets himself out to a rotten long hop from Rashid ...just picks out the fielder perfectly.

Got to love the way wrist spinners get wickets with rubbish

England rather needed that. 101/1

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

I saw an interesting article from Vaughan the other day, suggesting that when Stokes and Woakes are fit they should come in for Wood and Willey, sticking with the 5 bowlers and Root strategy, and thus bolstering the batting to rather ridiculous levels (you could endup with Woakes at 9 and Moeen at 8!).

So an XI of;
Roy
Bairstow
Hales
Root
Morgan
Buttler
Stokes
Ali
Woakes
Rashid
Plunkett

What do people think? To be honest, I don't think it's a bad idea...as Goose has pointed out it's not like Wood and Willey are pressing hard to be included as bowlers (Stokes could easily match the output from them, maybe even better it). And then of course that means they would have possibly one of the strongest ODI batting line ups ever!

[Good Golly I'm Olly]

Root, 10 overs for 44 runs - shouldn't be happening from an Aussie perspective...

[JDizzle]

I saw an interesting article from Vaughan the other day, suggesting that when Stokes and Woakes are fit they should come in for Wood and Willey, sticking with the 5 bowlers and Root strategy, and thus bolstering the batting to rather ridiculous levels (you could endup with Woakes at 9 and Moeen at 8!).

So an XI of;
Roy
Bairstow
Hales
Root
Morgan
Buttler
Stokes
Ali
Woakes
Rashid
Plunkett

What do people think? To be honest, I don't think it's a bad idea...as Goose has pointed out it's not like Wood and Willey are pressing hard to be included as bowlers (Stokes could easily match the output from them, maybe even better it). And then of course that means they would have possibly one of the strongest ODI batting line ups ever!

I get where he is coming from, the batting line up would be ridiculous, but I’d always lean towards having 6 genuine bowling options. How often do you really see numbers 9/10/11 having a huge outcome on the game batting wise? And I think Stokes and Ali and 7/8 would not be a million miles better than Ali/Woakes as they will only have minimal time to affect a game with the bat anyway.

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