Ashes 2013/14

[PaulWinch again]

Well my call that Stokes should have started the series seems to be about right! Well done Ben you showed all of our senior batsmen how to play. He attacked the right balls and played straight to the rest. He also got a start and went on to a big score.

Now for the rest of the wreckage, well played Australia as you've battered us. England moving forward, I'm not generally a fan of wholesale changes but I think a statement needs to be made for the next Test. I'd drop Pietersen, Prior, Anderson and Swann and bring in Ballance, Rankin, Panesar and I'd call up Buttler. There needs to be a realisation from the senior players that you can't play dreadfully and keep your place.

[eastie]

Well my call that Stokes should have started the series seems to be about right! Well done Ben you showed all of our senior batsmen how to play. He attacked the right balls and played straight to the rest. He also got a start and went on to a big score.

Now for the rest of the wreckage, well played Australia as you've battered us. England moving forward, I'm not generally a fan of wholesale changes but I think a statement needs to be made for the next Test. I'd drop Pietersen, Prior, Anderson and Swann and bring in Ballance, Rankin, Panesar and I'd call up Buttler. There needs to be a realisation from the senior players that you can't play dreadfully and keep your place.

I suppose  having made so many wrong calls this series you had to get one right eventually

Having seen flowers post match interview I am pretty sure he will walk away after this series although I felt he would go win or lose after this tour.

[willywombat]

Cheers Eastie, makes a nice change to beat England and we're all stoked. Love the battle and I'm sure you'll be back soon enough

[PaulWinch again]

I don't think I was necessarily wrong saying Anderson and Swann should play, with that number of wickets between them you'd give them a chance. Unfortunately those two along with several senior players have badly let us down.

I do wonder whether Cook can remain an opening batsmen and be captain. Carberry has shown enough to suggest he can play in this transitional period, maybe Root can open and Cook go to three.

If Flower does walk it'll be a shame after all he's done for English cricket that this will stain that legacy, but we need to be much more assertive with our cricket.

[aj2k77]

Will someone dig up Gooch as well and tell him his services aren't required.

[PaulWinch again]

Yeah Gooch does need to go. I also hope that Giles doesn't take over the Test team if Flower goes, because I think we need fresh ideas from outside the England bubble. We need to adopt a much more dominant style of cricket. The plus side is there are a lot of good young players coming through, but we need to get them playing in the right way.

The positive of all this is that no-one can pretend things are ok in the England team now like they did when we where winning. In reality this team started to run out of steam some time ago, there's been a couple of good series in that time but we've been slipping for a while. This is now an opportunity to address all those issues and rebuild the team.

[PaulWinch again]

If Flower is staying he needs to make clear that that's the case and the rebuilding has to start from now.

[eastie]

If Flower is staying he needs to make clear that that's the case and the rebuilding has to start from now.

It interested me in the summer when asked about getting back to number one in the rankings that flower said it was no longer a priority as we had achieved it already , I wonder if maybe there's not the hunger and desire in this squad anymore with the likes of kp, swann , prior, etc.

[OzVilla]

I don't think I was necessarily wrong saying Anderson and Swann should play, with that number of wickets between them you'd give them a chance. Unfortunately those two along with several senior players have badly let us down.

Again, disappointing as Swann was, the bowling was not the reason we've lost so heavily. We didn't take our chances in the field and the batsmen gave them no back up whatsoever.

We spent an enormous amount of time in the field thanks to poor batting and the bowlers were on a hiding to nothing quite frankly on flat pitches against 20/20 specialists with a 200+ lead every time.

We bowled them out sub 300 at the Gabba, if we'd held our chances it'd been something similar at Adelaide and a great knock from Smith got them out of trouble at the WACA. On every occasion the batting failed after 60 overs and they were back in the field again. They must be exhausted.

[bertlambshank]

Will someone dig up Gooch as well and tell him his services aren't required.

He has been a disaster.I don't give a fuck if the players think he is such a nice guy he deserves to be there,he did fuck all at Essex and has taken England's batting back 15 years.I called the prick out before.the series started,if I could see it why couldn't the England bigwigs see it.Rant over.

[PaulWinch again]

If Flower is staying he needs to make clear that that's the case and the rebuilding has to start from now.

It interested me in the summer when asked about getting back to number one in the rankings that flower said it was no longer a priority as we had achieved it already , I wonder if maybe there's not the hunger and desire in this squad anymore with the likes of kp, swann , prior, etc.

That was something I noticed in the summer, I was pretty alarmed when Flower said that. The goal should always be to be the number 1 in the world. It shouldn't just be to get there and then think job's done. Like the great Australian side you need to maintain your standards to have a great legacy.

[Monty]

I've said before i'd like Vaughan to be at least asked to come in. He has obvious leadership, understanding of how to build a side mentally and one of the keenest cricket brains around - which would help Cook's captaincy.

He also knows a thing or two about how to play and develop all-rounders, which is useful as we have some player on our hands here in Stokes.

[PaulWinch again]

I think more of the blame lies with the batsmen definitely, but the bowlers have to take their share. We have consistently let Australia off the hook from precarious positions, and that's way before they can be excused for being tired. I think the standards across all three areas of the game were very low.

[PaulWinch again]

I think Swann, KP, Prior and Anderson should be dropped, as much to make a statement as anything else. I'm not saying that's it that's the end of their careers, but I think all of them need to show they have the hunger to get back to the top again. I'm not so worried about age, look at Carberry he's 33 but he's done ok and applied himself. He needs to get 100s but he's shown enough desire to stay in the team. It's all about what these players want.

[eastie]

I think more of the blame lies with the batsmen definitely, but the bowlers have to take their share. We have consistently let Australia off the hook from precarious positions, and that's way before they can be excused for being tired. I think the standards across all three areas of the game were very low.

Agreed , twice we had them at 150-5 and let them off the hook , lets see if we can salvage some pride in the last 2 tests although I think a changing of staff is inevitable after this series .