The International Cricket Thread

[PaulWinch again]

England are looking salty here. Accept you’ve been found wanting on a very flat pitch and show some grace.

[PaulWinch again]

For me there can be no complaints from England there - they put on part timers to preserve the bowlers, which is fine the game had gone, but Washington and Jadeja had earned the right to get those centuries and were entitled to continue until they had.

[Lsvilla]

Liam Dawson is the pefect number 8 batter, now let's see if he be as effective in his day job.

That would be a no

Wonder if they'll be brave / ruthless enough to pick Rehan Ahmed on Thursday. BTW hoping England bat first as I'm going on day one.

[tomd2103]

Disappointing not to win from such a strong position. Bowling attack without Stokes looks toothless.

Stokes being able to bowl properly is a key component of the team.  Take him out of the bowling attack and the balance goes. 

[tomd2103]

Oval selection will be interesting. The bowling attack is on its knees.

Due to, yet again, the ridiculous scheduling of what should be the blue ribbon series of the season, all so the ECB can put all the attention on flogging their pile of shit dead horse. 

[cdbearsfan]

Disappointing not to win from such a strong position. Bowling attack without Stokes looks toothless.

Disappointing, sure. But on the other hand it has been such a back and forth series that it seems apt that it should still be undecided going into the final test.

[PaulWinch again]

Disappointing not to win from such a strong position. Bowling attack without Stokes looks toothless.

Stokes being able to bowl properly is a key component of the team.  Take him out of the bowling attack and the balance goes. 

It does but I think the reality is the pitch, barring the odd anomalous period, just got flatter and flatter. I don’t think it was bad bowling per se, Bumrah went for a tonne.

[paul_e]

Disappointing not to win from such a strong position. Bowling attack without Stokes looks toothless.

Stokes being able to bowl properly is a key component of the team.  Take him out of the bowling attack and the balance goes. 

It does but I think the reality is the pitch, barring the odd anomalous period, just got flatter and flatter. I don’t think it was bad bowling per se, Bumrah went for a tonne.

Yep, and then once a pitch goes that way your catching has to be immaculate because you might get 1 chance every 20overs. We put down 3 (tough) chances, which we needed to take to win it.

[PaulWinch again]

Oof Stokes injured and Dawson, Jof, Carse out. Bethell, Overton, Tongue, and Atkinson in.

I think not playing Dawson is a big risk.

[Monty]

Going to be about our top order getting runs on the board here.

[Rotterdam]

Oval selection will be interesting. The bowling attack is on its knees.

Due to, yet again, the ridiculous scheduling of what should be the blue ribbon series of the season, all so the ECB can put all the attention on flogging their pile of shit dead horse. 

I couldn't agree more.

[Lsvilla]

Oof Stokes injured and Dawson, Jof, Carse out. Bethell, Overton, Tongue, and Atkinson in.

I think not playing Dawson is a big risk.

I don't. He failed his audition. We'll never know how much Manchester could have spun because he couldn't even land it in the rough against 2 left handlers. Very disappointing as I liked him but the fact is he's not good enough. Would get absolutely annihilated in Oz.

[Beard82]

Oval selection will be interesting. The bowling attack is on its knees.

Due to, yet again, the ridiculous scheduling of what should be the blue ribbon series of the season, all so the ECB can put all the attention on flogging their pile of shit dead horse. 

I couldn't agree more.

+1

[PaulWinch again]

Oof Stokes injured and Dawson, Jof, Carse out. Bethell, Overton, Tongue, and Atkinson in.

I think not playing Dawson is a big risk.

I don't. He failed his audition. We'll never know how much Manchester could have spun because he couldn't even land it in the rough against 2 left handlers. Very disappointing as I liked him but the fact is he's not good enough. Would get absolutely annihilated in Oz.

On a pitch where all bowlers struggled I wouldn’t leap to a conclusion. He did bring control and if control is needed, or it spins, we are pretty open.

[paul_e]

Bethell needed a game if we're thinking of him going to Oz and with Stokes out we risk being a batter light so him coming in makes sense. Then you're left deciding whether to risk 3 seamers and 2 spinners at the oval and picking between, I suspect, Overton or Dawson, I'd have been surprised if they went the other way. Dawson did offer a little control of the run rate but he just didn't look threatening, which has always been his problem for England at any format.

Aside from that Jof rested for Tongue is just sensible managing of his minutes and then one of Woakes or Carse was always going to drop out for Atkinson and Carse looked like he was feeling the minutes more than Woakes in Manchester.