So the test match summer is over at the beginning of August so we can all ‘enjoy’ The Hundred…..although there’s a lot of talk it may be converted to a T20 tournament next year when the new franchises begin – understandable I suppose given no other countries have adopted the format.
Who would you add to or omit from the squad that has played this series for this winter?
Finally I thought the series deserved to be a draw as India have played well and actually probably won more sessions than England who put up a very poor effort this morning, but I also think they are probably the worst team in the world for bad sportsmanship….oh hang on, who do we play in November?
England v India….and The Ashes
by 42 Comments
England are also candidates
Fantastic series and pleased it ended up all-square.
Just heard an interview with a guy on the radio who’s written a book called “Test Cricket: A History” – no one could say he made it easy for himself – and the first reference he’s come across about the demise of Test Cricket was in 1884!
I think stories about the demise of Test Cricket (TM) are centred on the ICC’s plans for a two-tier test system that would see W Indies, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe and ireland in the second tier. Promotion and relegation are promised, but without playing the big nations where will the incentive be for the Pakistan cricket board to invest in the test side? Even more Ashes, more Eng v India, but a smaller global game in which theoretically there will never be another Eng v Pakistan test (here in Brum always a big event) and a feeling that the money is talking loudest here.
Great series always seem to involve England there’s been some great games v NZ in recent years too
😃
I haven’t played for decades. On that basis I confidently expect a call- up on the basis the the selectors appear to believe that not playing is the way to improve your skills and talents. How they must laugh at all those golfers, tennis players etc who appear tp tread a different path.
It is bizarre. A couple of games in the Northants 2nd XI and you’re in!
I’ve just had a conversation with my 93 year old mum. She’s glad the series was a draw as she thought the Indian bowlers were far superior overall. She’s also concerned the English bowlers will struggle in Australia at the end of the year. She might well be right.
I think she might indeed be right! Wonder if that’s the last of Woakes in an England side, not a particularly impressive series by his high standards and presumably won’t be fit for Australia and no guarantee he’d have made the squad anyway. That leaves the next test in England which isn’t until next June by which time he’ll be 37. Perhaps age and injuries have caught up with him.
Different world where Indian fast bowlers are now something to be feared
Kapil Dev was a useful bowler back in the day (all rounder indeed)
Kapil Dev was very useful indeed, certainly one the top all rounders of all time, but as a fast bowler he was not exactly feared. Indian cricket has traditionally been associated with world class spin bowlers, but sheer pace, at least until fairly recently, was not an Indian speciality. The big difference with the likes of Bumrah and Siraj is they don’t use pace to intimidate batsmen, as the great Windies or Oz fast bowlers did, rather they use it to take wickets. Their target is the stumps or the line just outside the off stump, not the battter’s body or head.
Our bowling attack feels quite timid. Stokes is unlikely to be able to last out the entire ashes series surely. Without him, how are we bowling Aussies out?
Jimmy Anderson still plays I understand. I’d have him on the plane in November.
Will this current England approach win the Ashes in Australia? Utterly amazing if it does. I don’t think it will.
Last night and today – leave the ball if it’s wide. Why swing wildly? England had time. Make India have to bowl differently. We kind of played into their hands. IMO.
As always … we can’t win the ashes if we don’t win in Adelaide … notwithstanding that it was done in the 70s
“Finally I thought the series deserved to be a draw as India have played well and actually probably won more sessions than England who put up a very poor effort this morning, but I also think they are probably the worst team in the world for bad sportsmanship….oh hang on, who do we play in November?”
That was tongue in cheek, right?
It’s Bargepole. I doubt it.
As if Bargepole would poke fun at the self appointed police of world cricket who think they’re the arbiters of what is and isn’t acceptable 😏
Yep including what is in and outside the spirit of the game. That’s us.
I suspect you may be having the last laugh come next January 😉
This happens every series. Woe is us say the England supporters but times have changed. Talent we have but we are brittle especially in the batting as has been noted.
I was interested in your comment about what bad sports India were. Now I didn’t watch a lot of your series but my impression was England weren’t exactly cucumber sandwiches on the green about things. That Stokes thing just assuming he could say ok games over call it a draw when the Indians were looking at tons was the height of presumption.
But here’s the thing – I don’t mind that ,You got a lot more mongrel these days and it will stand you in good stead.
I was hoping to get to the Brisbane Test with the stepson, although I’ve just discovered it’s a day/night test. Bugger. 2-hr drive afterwards…
Totally agree with everything you say there @junior-wells!
According to the BBC…
England can win the Ashes. They have their best chance of success in Australia since they last won a series down under, back in 2010-11. It is a low bar, mind. In the past 14 years, they have played 15 Tests in Australia, lost 13, drawn two and won none.
However,
That chance to win begins and ends with Ben Stokes. If that sounds like hyperbole, consider this: Of the England squad that travels to Australia, none will have ever tasted victory in a Test down under and as few as five will have played a Test there.
Between them, they will have one Test hundred on Australian soil, and that will belong to Stokes. Of the two bowlers to have a five-wicket haul in Australia, one will be Stokes, the other Mark Wood. If Wood is fit for November, he will not have played a Test in 15 months.
Stokes’ task is clear. He needs to recover from a shoulder injury, play like Ian Botham, captain like Mike Brearley, and stay the course. The last part is probably the hardest. He has now not played a full part in any of England’s past four Test series because of injuries.
Play like Botham? I think I remember correctly that Stokes fifer/century was only about the fourth time it’s happened for England? Three players did it once … Beefy did it five times … different level.
One major problem… Stokes is the captain.
And he is CRAZY, and then not crazy, and then not crazy, and then really, really, CRAZY.
Hey, and then not crazy.
And Cummins just wins by standing still.
If anyone has contact with the guy, be sure to tell Keir Starmer to operate in exactly the same way with Fromage.
Engage, and you’re doomed.
It would have been a bit of an injustice if England had won at the Oval and the series 3-1, although the ability of this team to defy the odds and very nearly make it over the line was thrilling (if not particularly good for my health). Test match cricket is extraordinary isn’t it? Tiny moments have a huge effect. A different match if Woakes hadn’t injured himself, but also if Siraj hadn’t stepped on the boundary when he caught Brook.
My fear is that Test match cricket is now being ruined by the demands of the short forms of the game – not by the skills that the players now have and have brought from that format (which is great), but by the squeezing of the calendar so that the players get no respite. Time was when this match would have been played over the Bank Holiday weekend, and the games seperated by a fallow weekend at least, but now we get that abomination which is the Hundred.
The players who are so in need of respite that when offered the chance to rest, or take the money and play The Hundred matches, opted to play?
They aren’t in charge of where the money is and who decides the schedule. It’s a mess but the players have to earn a living in a short career.
I rather like England’s mission to entertain rather than win. This has been a fantastic series where I really found myself rooting for both sides at once. It is beyond daft that England turn to a batter who’s carried drinks all summer, and a bunch of second-rate bowlers who’d rather be working the franchise tour. But that’s the game now, and as long as they keep manufacturing these kind of finishes, I’ll be watching.
Not in Australia though. We’re going to get creamed.
Australia have the best bowling attack in the world, but they are all really getting on. Batting I would say they are inferior to England. I think it will be a close series if top English players are fit throughout. Key player could be Lyon though
Hard to assess the Aussie bowling squad. The incumbents have been so good for so long that other bowlers arent getting a sniff. Look how many matches Boland has had?
There could be a raft of young tyros just waiting.
The key player in 2023 ‘was’ Lyon and he got injured.
I know… we’ll run them into the ground, that’s the way to go.
Stokes: ‘Let’s bat as quickly as possible so they’re batting not bowling|”
Cosmic.
We’d have won with Lyon. No doubt
England don’t seem to have much of a warm up schedule only two games plus a couple of Lions games where I guess the likes of Bethell and Tongue could play
I like the idea of cricket but I just can’t watch something for 5 days or whatever. How do you manage it?
Beer
I don’t sit there for 5 days…does anyone..?! The patience of Mrs. T would be sorely tested for one thing, but I’m not that sedentary anyway. I dip in and out as my schedule allows – generally in the morning for a bit, then later in the afternoon session, and after tea from about 5ish. I tend to have it on the telly all day if I am in so I can wander in and out to keep up.
I listen to it.
There’s a sports comedian down here. Tells a joke ….so I’m lying on the couch watching a dead rubber between Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe. My brother in law comes in and asks “ are you gonna lie there watching that match all day ?
No! … Five days !
I know he always predicts a whitewash , but he does make some pertinent points.
Glenn McGrath on the Ashes.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/articles/c4gzk8lxjnro
I would have Rehan Ahmed and Jack Leach as the spinners, but we will only ever play one and if he is fit it is likely to be Bashir. as long as fitness permits a bowling squad of Stokes, Wood, Archer, Atkinson, Tongue, Carse … Cook might get a look in now if Woakes remains unfit … I still don’t see the point of Overton, he hasn’t done enough to warrant a place. not a fan of Crawley but the partnership he has built up with Duckett works. I remain unconvinced about Pope or Bethell yet but at least one will play Brook and Smith are now nailed on as is a certain chap called Root who needs that century in Oz to shut up those who say he is still not one of the greatest because he hasn’t achieved it. there might be the odd left of field selection in the party … Hameed as a back up opener, Stone or Hull as a bowler if they remain fit possibly Cox as wicket keeper/batting cover but no real shocks expected in the squad