The International Cricket Thread

[PaulWinch again]

I think Strauss has just summed things up nicely, this time yesterday you had people genuinely talking about England losing by an innings, today we've won all 3 sessions and people are still upset, we probably have 100 runs more than if we'd been conservative and history has shown us that when we play defensively against Australia it doesn't work. In reality we're probably going to go into the 3rd innings at some point in the 2nd session tomorrow and the game will be in the balance, which is how it should be with 2 good teams.

I think that’s missing the point slightly. The passage of play people are unhappy with was just dumb and you can see that from how Stokes came and played. The rest of the day, level of aggression was perfect. That hour they lost their heads. They didn’t need to be defensive they just needed not to lost their heads.

[olaftab]

England are clearly intimidated by Aussies and making poor decisions. Declaration at Edgbaston, persisting with selection of legends in the bowling attack and brainless batting today all points towards a team wanting to prove a point rather than cool heads taking calculated risks. Still in this match but the morning session tomorrow is going make or break this series.

[PaulWinch again]

I find it weird that some people (outside of this forum) are going binary - it’s good or bad from England. It’s not that black and white - overall it’s a good day and we’re back in the game, but that was still an hour of poor judgement that’s enabled Australia still to be in a decent position. Both things can be true.

[TonyD]

Strange how quiet the Lords crowd are.
Even by their standards.
Barely a murmur when Starc went. 

[LeeB]

Strange how quiet the Lords crowd are.
Even by their standards.
Barely a murmur when Starc went. 

It's the graveyard of English cricket. We should burn it down, put it in a big urn and play for that instead

[Ads]

Excellent from England today. The negativity has been excruciating mind. Yeah some daft shots to hole out, but it's this brand of cricket that has us right back in it.

[Sexual Ealing]

Excellent from England today. The negativity has been excruciating mind. Yeah some daft shots to hole out, but it's this brand of cricket that has us right back in it.

I agree with *checks notes* Ads.

[Rory]

I find it weird that some people (outside of this forum) are going binary - it’s good or bad from England. It’s not that black and white - overall it’s a good day and we’re back in the game, but that was still an hour of poor judgement that’s enabled Australia still to be in a decent position. Both things can be true.

Yep, pretty much.

[PaulWinch again]

Nah the aggressive brand of cricket is fine, but once everyone is on the boundary you’ve kind of achieved your aim. The Aussies were desperate, we could have continued to be aggressive and done it in a different way. Get lots of ones and twos and then they’ll bring the field in and then start hitting the boundaries.

You can support the aggressive approach, but acknowledge when they’ve got it wrong. It’s not negative, it’s just realistic. I think Stokes’ approach probably shows he knew that.

[Villan For Life]

England are clearly intimidated by Aussies and making poor decisions. Declaration at Edgbaston, persisting with selection of legends in the bowling attack and brainless batting today all points towards a team wanting to prove a point rather than cool heads taking calculated risks. Still in this match but the morning session tomorrow is going make or break this series.

I disagree, we got to them at Edgbaston and we got to them today. They are wary of us.

[PaulWinch again]

Australia are also an absolutely key man down. Keep them in the field and they’ll be massively struggling.

[TonyD]

We need to declare asap before Lyon recovers.

[tomd2103]

Nah the aggressive brand of cricket is fine, but once everyone is on the boundary you’ve kind of achieved your aim. The Aussies were desperate, we could have continued to be aggressive and done it in a different way. Get lots of ones and twos and then they’ll bring the field in and then start hitting the boundaries.

You can support the aggressive approach, but acknowledge when they’ve got it wrong. It’s not negative, it’s just realistic. I think Stokes’ approach probably shows he knew that.

That's the thing.   We had opportunities at Edgbaston, but didn't take them and lost.  There was a big chance today with Lyon off the field and their fielders on the boundary to grind their seamers down.  Like at Edgbaston though, we gave wickets away and let them off the hook.  We've got a long tail in this game so really needed the top order to fire. 

[tomd2103]

We need to declare asap before Lyon recovers.

Looked a bad one to be honest and could potentially be a tear.  Not good to see and have to feel for the bloke, but it gives England a big opportunity.

[taylorsworkrate]

The frustration for me is that for how good this Australian side is (and I think they are a very good side), we've blown numerous situations in both tests when we were well on top and they were rattled.

I absolutely love the way we are trying to play our cricket, but when we are 190/1 and their world class spinner has a bad injury, why are we falling into their short ball trap and gifting them an easy route back into the match? I'd get it if the rewards for the shots played were tangible but the majority of the time it was risk for the reward of a single at best and any miscue meant trouble.

It's not hindsight to say that we should have just allowed their quicks to tire themselves out with the tactic as it was simple to see at the time. We really should have got to the end of the day no more than 2 wickets down and we would be in a very strong position