The International Cricket Thread

[Meanwood Villa]

Definitely England's day but still a long way behind. Duckett was great.

[paul_e]

Great innings from Duckett but I'm honestly more impressed by Bethell, he was very good when it was the 2 of them and he kept rotating the strike and letting Duckett do his thing but once NZ broke the partnership he realised his job had changed and was now about getting the stumps ready to push on tomorrow. It's innings like today that show why they're so eager to train him for a leadership role. The job now is to bat until tea and turn it into, effectively, a single innings game, anything over 400 works for us.

[Steve67]

I like the fact that they dug in and played proper test cricket.  Setting a decent platform with a softer ball for the rest of the batters to take advantage of.  So much better and sensible from England today.  Should be another cracking day tomorrow.

[PaulWinch again]

I thought we were pretty aggressive in the main. Basically up until the last hour, but it was controlled aggression.

[Gareth]

I thought we were pretty aggressive in the main. Basically up until the last hour, but it was controlled aggression.

Controlled aggression is exactly right - hope it’s the same tomorrow and everyone gets runs, not a collapse like NZ had

[Brazilian Villain]

Ireland beat India for the first time. https://www.bbc.com/sport/cricket/articles/cwy0k47k3wno

It must have been the Belfast heat that did for the tourists.

[PaulWinch again]

I’d love to know what Root’s record is starting again the next day. In my head he seems to always get out straight away.

[Dante Lavelli]

Spooky, the BBC just posted this “ Is it my imagination or is Root terrible at restarting an innings on the next day? He always seems to go cheaply in the morning. Any stats on that?”

[taylorsworkrate]

I thought we were pretty aggressive in the main. Basically up until the last hour, but it was controlled aggression.

Controlled aggression is exactly right - hope it’s the same tomorrow and everyone gets runs, not a collapse like NZ had

Looks like the latter

[PaulWinch again]

And Bethell gone. Terrible start to the day.

[taylorsworkrate]

Poor, lazy nothing shot from Bethell.

[taylorsworkrate]

New Zealand into the tail now

[PaulWinch again]

Poor again. This first half hour has been a disaster.

[PaulWinch again]

Lots of work needed now.

[taylorsworkrate]

I'm still confident we can avoid the follow on