England versus Sri Lanka
I know England have won the series but all Test Match results go towards world rankings. So that in itself is a slight incentive to watch.
But the most intriguing aspect about the match starting (weather permitting) tomorrow morning is the inclusion of Josh Turner, a 20 year old 6’ 7” left arm seam bowler.
Extraordinary.
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Haven’t a clue how to delete Attach Poll.
Tried the edit function but Attach Poll moves outside the editable area.
6' 7", you say? Can he play centre half?
No, the ball keeps hitting him in the chest. Could be worse.
Have you managed to bungle Josh Tongue, John Turner and Josh Hull all into one mega bowler combining the attributes of all 3?
Flipping heck. I had a feeling I should have gone back to source.
Tongue it is. Thanks @Croider.
Oh no. Gadzooks. It’s Hull.
@micra it has been a cracking summer of Test cricket, whilst the Windies were poor its been good to see Sri Lank offer some fight & a different set of challenges to England; add to that some stand out performances from the new boys Atkinson & Bashir and one must mention Joe Root batting imperiously.
I too am looking forward to seeing how young Hull performs.
From what I've read, Hull has been selected on potential over form. He's 6 foot 7, quick and left handed, if he clicks would be a great addition to the squad on-going. I too am looking forward to seeing him in action
Off for bad light before lunch on day one! Test cricket doesn’t do itself any favours.
Certainly doesn't, no rain, our batsmen are hitting it all over the place.... and they go off for bad light !
I thought the floodlights were to overcome bad light!
I think this summer has been a bit of smoke and mirrors. We have been lucky to play 2 nations that are struggling / have a weak test side this summer which has been excellent to trial some new players but I don't for a second, think we have fixed any of the issues that was exposed when we last played Australia where we'll easily win against India next summer.
We still have a slight bitterness / are reluctant to change things at the top of the order. Crawley only got one 50+ score and I'm wondering how many opportunities he'll continue to get. Pope, performed well against West Indies but when he's been given the captaincy and played away from the Oval, he's struggled.
Root, Brooks, Stokes and newly appointed Smith have developed a strong middle order to cover up those cracks.
Can Woakes perform away from England? I'm still not sure, Is there another bowling allrounder to replace him?
I do feel for Cook from Essex, he's performed consistently in the County Championship and is then replaced by a 20yr old who has "potential" BUT has only taken 11 wickets at an average of 84.5 and a strike rate of 1 wicket every 100 balls bowled.
Do we need another spinner that we can call upon if/when Bashir was to break?
Agree about the top of the order. We have not really come close to a reliable opener since the great Captain Cook. There will always be pressure on that (admittedly sterling) middle order as a result.
I think we have a decent crop of very good Championship spinners, just not sure other than Leach any of them are quite up to Test level.
Duckett looks decent but we are struggling to find someone to open with him, I too am not convinced Crawley or Lawrence are the answer.
As for Pope, captaincy does funny things to players, some relish it as it takes pressure off why they were picked in the first place, others struggle with the additional pressure.
Tbf to Crawley, he had a great Winter and was top run scorer
And I'm not sure we have a viable alternative at the moment. Plus he fits in with our current attacking policy. I wouldn't want go back to the old days where our openers scratched around for say 50 balls for 10 runs and then got out.
It is the openers’ job to stay in, occupy the crease and wear down the ball and bowlers.
The trouble with quick fire 30s is that numbers 3 and 4 still come in to a fresh attack with a ball that is still zipping about.
Aye but the previous lot didn’t do that - how often were we 50-3? Far too often. Root’s in the form of his life so he’s coping well with the situation - and we’re winning test matches!
You then have to dispose of the Bazball style of play. I haven't looked into our Test Match statistics over the last say 15 years, but it feels to me that England are as successful (or unsuccessful) as the pre Bazball days. No doubt our asteemed cricket aficionado @micra can clarify.
At the end of the day Test Match cricket is still meant to be entertainment and personally, until 2 or 3 years ago I had lost interest watching it.
Thanks @mooneyman ! I watch most England Test Matches and if I knew what an aficionado was, I’d try to live up to it.
The only statistics that interest me are those relating to the match I’m watching.. I’ve no idea whether we’ve won more or fewer matches in the period since the introduction of Bazball compared with the corresponding period prior to its introduction. All I do know is that I watch matches now with a mixture of pleasure and frustration. It’s great to see England scoring so freely and with such a complete absence of fear but the old Boycottian instincts about the need for Test batsmen to preserve their wicket at all cost does occasionally kick in and give rise to a degree of frustration.
For example, to see Duckett standing with his back to the stumps facing a fast bowler yesterday and flipping the ball behind him over his and the wicket keeper’s head when 14 runs short of a century was pretty frustrating.
To see Joe Root intelligently adapting the Bazball concept to the needs of the situation in the second Test was very pleasurable.
Can I take issue with the ‘Test Match cricket is still meant to be entertainment’ comment?
NO IT ISN’T!
Test match cricket is supposed to be a contest in the most demanding format of the sport that takes place over a defined number of matches, each lasting up to five days between the best practitioners of that format of the sport.
Within that timescale there may be moments or even long periods of time which could be perceived by some as ‘entertaining’ (taking into account that someone slogging every other ball to the boundary may be entertaining to one person whereas a duel over after over between a skilful spin bowler and a batter concentrating on not making a mistake but where very few runs are scored can be equally entertaining to others)but the purpose of it ultimately is to win.
I like the fact we’re trying to give people experience in the test arena and build a squad that can take teams on.
I’m not sure this team will do so well in Australia but blooding them three/four series out seems to be sensible option.
Dan Lawrence is not an opener in tests, I think I’d be a bit gutted if I was a county opener and not being given a chance. I’m not sure Keaton Jennings is the answer but he has consistently scored a weight of runs over last few years and gone away and worked on his game. The Aussies have a good history of sending people back to first class cricket and then bringing them back in to the team in their early thirties. He should at least be given a chance to see if he has learnt and grown.
This is so poor from England. Complete lack of respect for Sri Lanka’s ability and those who’ve come to watch by the top 3.
Sri Lanka have then bowled brilliantly at Root, Brook and Woakes.
Rain would be a timely intervention here. I hope Chandimal is ok, great take that.
We've shown no respect to text cricket, Sri Lanka or the paying public in the last few days. We deserve to lose tomorrow.
Really piss poor performance from the top order today; a combination of poor shot selection & disrespect for the opponent. The Sri Lankans showed that they are no fools by the way they have worked out Brook in particular, but also how to frustrate Joe Root...
Deserved victory for Sri Lanka.
I had a prize giving day at Lords last week and got talking with the head groundsman. I asked him about Pitch preparation and he said that since Brendon had come in, he was wanting more pitches to do more and become more challenging. His through process was that he wanted a 2 & a half or 3 day test match but the ICC & Umpires need assurances that the pitch will last for the full 5 days. He then also has the pressure from the MCC / Lords that they want a pitch that will make the games to last as long as possible. It was really interesting & a fine-balancing act between all 3 parties
I completely agree. I have no idea why Dan Lawrence was selected as an Opener. Does he have something over Brendon or Stokes? Hameed has scored over 1000 runs this season, Burns isn't far behind, Rhodes (War), Robinson (Dur) or Kennings (Lan) all have 800+ and have a very healthy when compared to Lawrence.
Don't get me started on Hull's selection. If they see / saw promise in him, why isn't he playing and getting experience through the Lions or Training Squads before getting the nod? Cook (Essex), Overton (Som), Taylor (Worcs), Barnard (Warks) or Gregory (Som) would have been better and are mature enough to make that step up. Also, most of them will strengthen the batting in the lower order too.