Good ball by Holder. Pope with the right idea, scratching around in these conditions is delaying the inevitable.
English cricket thread
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
Holder basically has half of his test match wickets in his last 10 tests. That is absurd.
His first 29 tests:
His next 12 tests:
His first 29 tests:
| 29 | 47 | 788.4 | 199 | 2042 | 53 | 5/30 | 6/65 | 38.52 |
His next 12 tests:
| 12 | 23 | 313.3 | 99 | 775 | 55 | 6/59 | 11/103 | 14.09 |
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That's a daft shot 10 mins before lunch. Just no logic to this batting performance from England, from one extreme to another.
I'm sure I've asked this before, but what is the point in Denly, his first class average is 36 and is 34 years old so he's not going to get any better yet is England's number 3 batsman?
Am I the only one that thinks the coopting of the rainbow flag in support of the NHS is a bit odd given its a well known and well understood symbol of LGBT+ rights?
Nah I have thought that too.
Rusty innings from Stokes.
Not great batting from us, but I do like Holder. He's hung in captaining largely poor teams the best he can and is now getting the rewards to his own figures his skills deserve.
Best West Indies' captain since Viv by my reckoning.
I knew it was out once it was reviewed 
Remember when Archer was an all rounder?
Remember when Archer was an all rounder?
Wood should be 8 on merit of the last few tests. Shows the difference between county and test match cricket.
Honestly, I'm not convinced Anderson shouldn't bat ahead of him. Think he averages under 8 in test cricket now, proper number 11 stuff.
No point in the tailenders hanging around, they're eating into prime bowling conditions.
Forgot to reply to this, but was reminded of it by the discussion going on at the minute. It wasn't my preference, personally would have played either Broad or Woakes over one of those two, I just think we've seen it time and again with England selectors that they get carried away with PAAAACE and will pick the fastest options available to them.
We'll see how they go, but I think it currently looks the wrong selection here, too.
Will be interesting to see how Stokes captains himself because these are the exact conditions he gets his big hooping swing going.
Yeah, I assume they'll open Archer/Anderson based on last summer, but I don't know if Stokes taking the new ball would be the worst idea.
Definitely would have had Woakes over Wood or Archer and played the other one in the next Test. Michael Holding said it earlier that they are best in 5-6 over spells England are reliant on Bess to bowl long spells. Either that or Stokes himself will do a mammoth 12 over spell at some point.
Thing is Archer has shown he's perfectly capable of bowling to conditions and in bowling longer spells, he got a 6'fer at Headingley last summer in basically the same conditions as right now and even then people were asking why he was bowling so slow
.Also wrt Broad I think he arguably talked himself out of the team when he was talking about struggling find motivation without a crowd.
The fact that a number of the English batsmen have had starts but not gone on reinforces the idea that it's a good pitch but current conditions are sufficient to keep the bowlers in the game.
Dom Bess on fire Windies terrified
Thing is Archer has shown he's perfectly capable of bowling to conditions and in bowling longer spells, he got a 6'fer at Headingley last summer in basically the same conditions as right now and even then people were asking why he was bowling so slow
Yeah I think there's a fair argument that Archer is still a bit of an unknown quantity. In terms of styles he's a quicker McGrath rather than a Mitchell Johnson, from what we've seen, but I don't think the media are ever going to accept him being used like that.
Now for England to drop it too short after being shown the correct lengths to bowl.
I know which one I prefer.
Yes but he can bowl 90MPH an hour so he has to bowl FAST and AT PEOPLE'S HEADS.
Automatic review with these umpires.
Sigh this game doesn't deserve to have fans.
I thought they'd be more lenient than usual because of TV pressures etc. Do they even offer the light to batsmen now?
Was going to say these chaps aren't providing a strong argument for Home Umpires.
Nah they took it out of the batsmans hands. They take a reading once when the umpires deem it 'too dark' and then have to go off whenever the reading is below that level.
I mean the weather is clearly shit, but there are no obvious signs that batsmen are struggling to pick the ball up. Just get on with the fecking game.
They should let some crowds in for this seasons test cricket.
Tickets are all via scanner nowadays anyway, so no need for turnstiles and associated covid19 issues.
Ask people to sit with 2 seat gaps, and work out how many people that allows per stand. Say max of 3-4,000 in entire stadium.
Also should allow for the corporate boxes, again with limited numbers.
Given its a 7 hour window, people can come in at staggered times. I'd go for the day out!
Tickets are all via scanner nowadays anyway, so no need for turnstiles and associated covid19 issues.
Ask people to sit with 2 seat gaps, and work out how many people that allows per stand. Say max of 3-4,000 in entire stadium.
Also should allow for the corporate boxes, again with limited numbers.
Given its a 7 hour window, people can come in at staggered times. I'd go for the day out!
Atherton mentioning Roberts is interesting, he used to have 2 bouncers. The first one was slower, one to allow the batsman to feel like they had the measure of him and the second one was the proper bouncer. With Archer I can't help but feel he's a bit too quick to try different things in his armoury, the thing about a surprise ball is that it is a surprise.
They appear to have marked some of the seats at the Ageas Bowl for that.
, this is absurd.Finally, would have been easy for the umpire to err on the side of caution there.
Would have had Stokes on first change. A strange field they have set to Brathwaite considering the conditions.
The umpires have got 5 decisions wrong in the first 100 overs. Both of them should be fined at the end of the match. Shambolic.
Why? He isn't a great 'swinger'?
He is when the conditions permit.