The International Cricket Thread

[hilts_coolerking]

I can understand why they did it - right hand / left hand opening partnership, desire to have one attacking opener, maybe even continuity from the WC win - but after two games Roy does look a poor pick as a Test match opener.  I doubt he will ever save a game for England.

[taylorsworkrate]

1-0 down going to the aussies favourite ground is going to be very difficult to come back from.

For starters the pitch at Lords must be extremely green. This dukes ball isn't swinging so we need it to seam appreciably.

Sibley
Burns
Root
Roy
Stokes
Buttler
Foakes
Woakes
Archer
Broad
Leach

Would be my team, assuming that Anderson is injured. Moeen and Bairstow look incapable of contributing at the moment, Denly doesn't look good enough and Roy has played his first class cricket in the middle order.

[PaulWinch again]

Pathetic morning. Also shows how bad Moeen was.

[PaulWinch again]

Look at the difference between Smith and Root. Smith most likely has won the match through his sheer brilliance. Root has produced nothing consequential with the bat and was terrible with his captaincy in the field.

[paul_e]

1-0 down going to the aussies favourite ground is going to be very difficult to come back from.

For starters the pitch at Lords must be extremely green. This dukes ball isn't swinging so we need it to seam appreciably.

Sibley
Burns
Root
Roy
Stokes
Buttler
Foakes
Woakes
Archer
Broad
Leach

Would be my team, assuming that Anderson is injured. Moeen and Bairstow look incapable of contributing at the moment, Denly doesn't look good enough and Roy has played his first class cricket in the middle order.

I'd be ok with that team but Lords isn't generally all that great for spinners so, if it's green, I'd consider Curran over Leach.

[taylorsworkrate]

1-0 down going to the aussies favourite ground is going to be very difficult to come back from.

For starters the pitch at Lords must be extremely green. This dukes ball isn't swinging so we need it to seam appreciably.

Sibley
Burns
Root
Roy
Stokes
Buttler
Foakes
Woakes
Archer
Broad
Leach

Would be my team, assuming that Anderson is injured. Moeen and Bairstow look incapable of contributing at the moment, Denly doesn't look good enough and Roy has played his first class cricket in the middle order.

I'd be ok with that team but Lords isn't generally all that great for spinners so, if it's green, I'd consider Curran over Leach.

I'd go Leach partly because Smith's record against left arm spin isn't great.

[taylorsworkrate]

Look at the difference between Smith and Root. Smith most likely has won the match through his sheer brilliance. Root has produced nothing consequential with the bat and was terrible with his captaincy in the field.

It's force of will with Smith that seperates him mostly from Root. I'd still say that technically there isn't a great deal between the two. However look at Smith in both of his innings in this match. Its almost a point blank refusal to get out, whereas Root seems to think the job is done when he passes 50.

Root has 42 fifties and 16 hundreds. Smith has 24 fifties and 25 hundreds. So Root has passed fifty nine more times than Smith, yet has gone on to hundred 9 less times. For a player of Roots quality that isn't good enough. He should be making match winning/defining innings far far more often than he does.

[hilts_coolerking]

Yes I can see arguments both ways but as a general rule I'd always include a specialist spinner.  Lord's is likely to seam and swing more than spin but in helpful conditions if 4 seamers can't do the trick then a 5th won't help much.

[olaftab]

I'm looking forward to a quickfire 8 off 3 balls cameo from Bairstow.

Just need Vaughan to go into the changing room and tell him he’s a useless lump of meat Devi’s of any brain cells.

[cdbearsfan]

Pathetic morning. Also shows how bad Moeen was.

In fairness the stats show that day four is the best time to bat, and day five is the worst.

Not that I dispute that Ali was nowhere near his best.

[cdbearsfan]

Might put a film on.

[PaulWinch again]

Buttler has also been utter garbage in this game.

[hilts_coolerking]

And to think we had them at 122 for 8 on day one.

[UK Redsox]

And to think we had them at 122 for 8 on day one.

Earlier on, Aggers asked Andrew if a team had ever won a game after a worse start.

The answer.........last week, England against Ireland

[paul_e]

And to think we had them at 122 for 8 on day one.

That's the exact point that this game go away from us everyone 'knew' that they'd do well to set us over 150 from that point and getting near 200 would be brilliant from the tail. We let them steal at least 100 extra runs. We then fell apart in our reply and got 50-60 less than we should've. Their 3rd innings came on the back of us not giving them 250+ to chase which is what the lead should've been. As soon as they got 150 ahead they just piled the runs on knowing that they could be competitive defending anything from there on, which is what we should've been in a position to do the day before.