The cricket thread

guitars4you

So a few tweaks - No Crawley, Lawrence or Broad - Hope Anderson is fine for 5 days - Always a worry about such niggles so hope he feels fit and comfortable - Wood is probably an obvious edit for Broad - Haseed Hameed is time for a change, but is this the end for Crawley and Lawrence - I can see why Ali is in as a spinner and can bat, so more of an all rounder role, but Leach must be wondering what he has to do to earn a chance - I dare say Ashwin is thinking like wise 

scrumhalf

The cynic in me thinks that Moeen has been picked to fail so that he can be terminally ignored.

I worry about both Jimmy and Woody breaking down, it's not outside the realms of possibility. 

But it's Thursday and the first day of the Lords test, the second test as it used to be and I'm looking forward to it. 

guitars4you

I think with Hameed coming in, then a touch unfair on Crawley - I think Burns and/or Sibley should have been chucked in the go home box first - The point is that Crawley might need a tweak or two but when does he get to play a county game to try out any changes - So much one day cricket, then add a few days of rain and his chances to play a good game before mid/end Sept is not exactly high - The whole team selection is to hit/miss with not enough logic and/or game plan for the Ashes and beyond 

Heartfeltdawn

guitars4you said:

So a few tweaks - No Crawley, Lawrence or Broad - Hope Anderson is fine for 5 days - Always a worry about such niggles so hope he feels fit and comfortable - Wood is probably an obvious edit for Broad - Haseed Hameed is time for a change, but is this the end for Crawley and Lawrence - I can see why Ali is in as a spinner and can bat, so more of an all rounder role, but Leach must be wondering what he has to do to earn a chance - I dare say Ashwin is thinking like wise 

It's remarkable that a few tons in county cricket gets you into an international side after years of poor form but taking wickets all winter against the best Test side in the world and having an average under 30 as a Test spinner is not enough to keep you in a Test side. What's more, you can lose that slow bowling slot to a guy who has not played many Tests in recent years because he lost form and this winter we're in Australia, a place where that same off-spinner was utterly destroyed... 

We're in deep shit. But so are lots of other sides. Hilarious to see Harry Gurney on Twitter talking of the Hundred and how we needed to utilise more 2nd XI and league cricketers because that's what Australia do and their Big Bash is producing great players. It really isn't and Gurney's comments came after the Aussie T20 side had been beaten by Bangladesh and been dismissed for a measly 62. 

Noting that our top six batsmen are all privately educated. Also noting that our state school representatives are all bowlers from the Midlands and the North (Ali, Wood, Anderson) and the two privately educated bowlers are both from the South (Robinson did debut for Yorkshire but born in Margate and educated at King's School in Canterbury, Curran is ex Wellington College in Berkshire). In 2005 we used 12 players all series against Australia and our private school reps were KP (private SA school), Simon Jones (Millfield), Ian Bell (Princethorpe College) and Strauss (Radley College). 

Of our top 20 Test wicket takers, only Broad was privately educated. Bob Willis attended a grammar school that became fee paying after he left. 

Of our top 20 Test run scorers: Cook, Root, Gower, KP, Atherton, Bell Cowdrey Strauss, Hussain are definites. Hobbs went to a fee paying school but I can't find out much about it as it's long been abolished and I'm not convinced it's fee paying in the same way Eton and Tonbridge are. He also had a job as a cleaner before school hours and the money went back into the family so it's arguable that he contributed financially to his own education. Either way, it's pretty stark when you compare educational backgrounds of our top bowlers versus batsmen. 

scrumhalf

Oh crap. India 100-0, having been put in. It's not going very well, is it? 

chris78

guitars4you said:

I think with Hameed coming in, then a touch unfair on Crawley - I think Burns and/or Sibley should have been chucked in the go home box first - The point is that Crawley might need a tweak or two but when does he get to play a county game to try out any changes - So much one day cricket, then add a few days of rain and his chances to play a good game before mid/end Sept is not exactly high - The whole team selection is to hit/miss with not enough logic and/or game plan for the Ashes and beyond 

I’m a Kent fan and I’ve seen enough of Crawley to be slightly surprised he was picked in the first place. He’s done for England what he’s done for Kent- gone big amongst a long run of getting out early. He’s got potential and he’ll hopefully come back, but his technique isn’t as good as Denly’s who was jettisoned for him. 

I don’t get Hameed at 3 though. He’s an out and out opener and Sibley just doesn’t have the game to be a solution at the top of the order. It was right to bring Hameed in, but a poor decision not to replace Crawley with someone else, like Malan for example.

As for the toss- whoops. Looks like a decent batting surface. Root has had a mare.

guitars4you

scrumhalf said:

Oh crap. India 100-0, having been put in. It's not going very well, is it? 

I remember the old days when you put the opposition into bat it would often mean 2/3 early-ish wickets !!!!!!!!!!!!

Stuckfast

I don't understand Hameed at 3 either. We've been crying out for a specialist opener ever since Cook retired, so we get one and we don't open with him. Weird.

I have no problem with playing Moeen ahead of Leach. His best performances came against India in England and he's a more attacking bowler. 

Really not convinced by Sam Curran though. He looked horribly exposed as part of a four-man attack in the previous Test and he has leaked runs again here. Why not play a batting all-rounder instead? 

scrumhalf

If Curran can improve as a batsman then there might be an argument for picking him but as a fourth seamer he isn't quick enough to worry too order batsmen.

They say that you can't judge a wicket until both sides have batted on it but I fear we could be our usual 65-3 chasing 400 if Kohli gets going. 

crunchman

Curran isn't threatening enough as a bowler to bat at 7 or 8.  If he's good enough to bat in the top 6 then fair enough.  You can play him in the allrounder role as the fifth bowler.

Moeen has the other problem.  His batting isn't good enough to be an allrounder at test level in recent times.  Leach is a better bowler and should be playing.

sev112

Curran scores runs, is gritty and has the right attitude - he looks angry all the time but that’s probably because he’s short and fed up that he never got picked for anything as a youngster - and I quite like the variation in fast medium bowlers - different angles of attack and bounce if the quickies are not succeeding.  

I like Moeen but he really only has one ball - the one that goes straight on - and I like his batting, but he doesn’t score many runs

Heartfeltdawn

chris78 said:

I’m a Kent fan and I’ve seen enough of Crawley to be slightly surprised he was picked in the first place. He’s done for England what he’s done for Kent- gone big amongst a long run of getting out early. He’s got potential and he’ll hopefully come back, but his technique isn’t as good as Denly’s who was jettisoned for him. 

I don’t get Hameed at 3 though. He’s an out and out opener and Sibley just doesn’t have the game to be a solution at the top of the order. It was right to bring Hameed in, but a poor decision not to replace Crawley with someone else, like Malan for example.

As for the toss- whoops. Looks like a decent batting surface. Root has had a mare.

The thing I'd look at is whether a player adapts to Test cricket. Folk like Vaughan and Trescothick came into Test cricket with not stellar records at FC level and they made the step up. You see that boost. 

With Crawley, his Test figures and overall FC figures are so similar. The average, the strike rate, the 50 to 100 conversion rate. Even something like the number of balls faced per innings (53.38 in Tests, 52.22 in all FC cricket). It really suggests that all he has done is take his county performance level into the Test arena and there's really been little improvement. Oddly it's a bit like another Kent chap, Rob Key: big double ton, 15 Tests, looks the part at times but can't truly step up. 

https://www.espncricinfo.com/player/zak-crawley-665053

https://www.espncricinfo.com/player/rob-key-15876

Stuckfast

Eh? Moeen puts more revs on the ball than any other finger spinner in world cricket! It's not his fault he's bowling on the first day on a flat pitch.

Curran is usually good for a jolly 20 or 30 batting at number 8, but is that really enough to justify a place in the side when his bowling is going at more than four an over?

sev112

20 to 30 at number 8 , any day I’d take that 

let’s see Moeen take  5for the, swing as it’s Lords

Heartfeltdawn

Stuckfast said:

I have no problem with playing Moeen ahead of Leach. His best performances came against India in England and he's a more attacking bowler. 

If you're just selecting one over the other based on bowling, then their home strike rates are 51.7 and 52.2 respectively and their averages are 32.8 and 28 (MA v JL). Moeen being selected is all about two disciplines, not one. Leach not playing potentially this whole summer is down to weather and our pisspoor batting lineup. 

Incredibly bored today of people quoting KL Rahul's lack of first class cricket. Suspect that's going to be the going line for ages now justifying the continual fucking of FC cricket by the ECB. 

Good to see Tom Harrison out on the media rounds today after George Dobell called him out on his absence. Even better to say Harrison making shithouse excuses for mismanagement at all opportunities. 

crunchman

Stuckfast said:

Eh? Moeen puts more revs on the ball than any other finger spinner in world cricket! It's not his fault he's bowling on the first day on a flat pitch.

Moeen might put revs on the ball but he gives the batsmen too many four balls.

If revs were everything, everyone would be playing wrist spinners, but control is important too.  Leach has better control than Moeen.  As HFD said above, he has a better strike rate, and a better average than Moeen.  Given Moeen's batting the last three years, I wouldn't bet on him to make more runs than Leach either.  An average of 17.8 since the start of 2018 is not an allrounder.

Heartfeltdawn

Easiest way is to compare records since Leach made his Test debut. 

Moeen: 12 Tests, 336 runs at 16. 
Leach: 16 Tests, 277 runs at 13.

One might also argue that in that time, Leach has played two innings that were absolutely pivotal to England winning a Test match. Moeen might have but one isn't jumping out at me immediately. 

With the ball, it's a different matter if you go by bare statistics. 

Moeen: 12 Tests, 56 wickets at 26.41
Leach: 16 Tests, 62 wickets at 29.98

Taken upfront, you'd go Moeen but you have to look at the teams he played against in that time. Of those 12 Tests Moeen has played, he was indeed fabulous against India at home in 2018. Against the top sides since then... he's been generally quite absent. He didn't play the whole series in India and he got annihilated in Australia. You look at his overall career record and he averages nearly 65 against Australia and 61 against New Zealand. True, Leach averages 66 against NZ after his first taste of how shit NZ wickets are for slow bowlers but you look at career averages of 25, 28, and 26 against Australia, India, and Sri Lanka and there's a consistency there to his bowling.

Conversely the only nations Moeen averages under 30 against with the ball are SA, Bangladesh, and Ireland. 

So if it's a straight 'let's pick the best spinner', Moeen doesn't have an outright case for being ahead of Leach. it should also be remembered that Moeen wasn't in the First Test squad. One wonders why they're bothering to make Dom Bess go through all the squad hoop jumping. 

Stuckfast

Well this is a better start.

A bit concerning that Anderson looks fitter than Robinson despite being ten years older though.

Heartfeltdawn

Stuckfast said:

Well this is a better start.

A bit concerning that Anderson looks fitter than Robinson despite being ten years older though.

Jimmy's a freak. Most people would look like carthorses next to him even now. Robbo's definitely more in the Angus Fraser mould of movement (ie. moving after the first over of the day like a sofa being chucked down a flight of stairs) 

Interesting on the bowling front: he's come in and looked the part at 27. Graeme Swann memorably came in young, got chucked, and came back much older and fitted into Test cricket. We dropped older folk like Denly and brought in younger ones who have struggled far more than Denly did. Australia's one big batting newbie success of the last few years: an older player in Marnus Labuschagne. Devon Conway for NZ: come in as an older player, takes to international cricket superbly. 

England on the other hand: the young uns have had trouble. Crawley and Sibley obviously, Dan Lawrence, even Curran now and Bess. Too much too young, as someone once sang? 

Stuckfast

Dead right. When the Aus team was at its strongest, players like Michael Hussey had to wait til their late 20s before they got a chance, even though they were hitting triple hundreds for fun in first-class cricket.