England 2012 Cricket Thread

[Villan For Life]

The next few months are going to be important for Swann, he's really dipped over the last year and now that Monty has come back with real form he may be under threat.

I don't think that there has been a drop in form. He took 38 wickets from the start of the English summer against Sri Lanka last May to the end of the Pakistan series last month.

Monty is a good bowling option but Swann overs so much more with the bat and is also an excellent slip fielder. Monty in the side leaves us weaker in the field and at number 11.

[PaulWinch again]

No idea what's going on in England's warm up game, on BBC is said Bopara was out for 66, but now they say he is 82 not out?!

[TheTimVilla]

He was out for 66. Currently 286/5 with a minimum of just under 12 overs to go, requiring an unlikely 73 to win...

[Colhint]

getting a bit worried about Bell, aint scored many runs for a while

[TheTimVilla]

He was about the only one not to have a decent knock. Well, that was bonkers:

SLC Dev XI 431/6d & 199/4d
England XI 272/4d & 360/6 (60.4 ov)
England XI won by 4 wickets

[PaulWinch again]

That's an impressive chase down regardless of the scenario, good for a lot of batsmen to get a few runs under their belt before Monday.

[spangley1812]

If Bopara cant bowl then I would put Patel in............

[PaulWinch again]

Bloody hell I just watch the Windies put the Aussies to the sword, about 149 off last 15 overs!

[TheTimVilla]

It looks like, after Russell was out, they scored 54 off 22 balls!


And Pollard's second 50 took 18 balls...

[Villan For Life]

Reasonable start by England with Sri Lanka 15-3 at one stage. The ball will do plenty 1st thing when the pitch is still wet from overnight dew. As it dries out wickets will be harder to come by. We need to take our chances and hope for a little reverse swing later in the day.

[PaulWinch again]

Broad struggling is a bit of a concern.

[PaulWinch again]

Good wicket to get straight after tea, we need to knock them over quickly here.

[PaulWinch again]

Hope dropping Jayawardene isn't too costly.

[PaulWinch again]

My view that Swann is on the wane is not being changed by this display. He's becoming pretty expensive and not overly threatening. Hopefully he'll pick up, because he hasn't been great for the last year.

[PaulWinch again]

Hmm they are putting on too many runs here. We need to knock them over quickly.