The Cricket Thread

[Danny]

Not sure I would have declared yet though

[Ian]

Have they declared? I thought it was just lunch.

[Danny]

Have they declared? I thought it was just lunch.

I heard the comms say "Root is off with his bat under his arm" during a lull in my call and assumed declaration. Looking at the time you are right.

Edit: Checked cricinfo, yep. Lunch. Good.

[thommo]

This Test is dire but I'm a big fan of Jack Leach's bowling figures. It's like we're back in the 50s or 60s.

69.5 - 27 - 118 - 3 :drool:

[Ben]

Maidens. :drool:

In our club cricket we can bowl a maximum of 10 overs. Maidens are all I'm bothered about, give me 10 - 4 - 20 - 0 every week.

[niko_cee]

Another Crawley hundred inbound tomorrow. :sick:

[Max Power]

What’s Jason Roy done then?

[Jimmy Floyd]

Seems to be a case for Hercule Poirot. My best guess is he did something whilst at the PSL that pissed off our mate Rameez (bubble breach/boozing maybe) and ECB had to publish a suspended ban statement to appease our already jilted Pakistani friends.

[Ben]

Roy is "taking a break" anyway so it's one of those meaningless suspensions with the sole purpose, as Jimmy said, of appeasing someone (probably Rameez, I agree).

[Danny]

Fisher dropped and Overton back in and what a waste of time it was dragging Parkinson out there.

Shambles.

[Ben]

Of course Parkinson isn't the saving grace and loves a long hop, full bunger combo but these slow pitches need a wrist spinner. We know what we have in Leach so it makes little sense to keep Parkinson sidelined. Same story with Pope.

[Dave.]

I don't understand not picking Parkinson, it not only goes against all cricketing logic but also basic mathematics. Just look at the number of overs bowled by Jack Leach in the first two tests compared to the other seamers. This alone shows the need for another frontline spinner.

[niko_cee]

What's the deal with "Jonathan Bairstow"? Has he had some sort of Andrew Cole moment or has he always been listed that way? Or am I to take from that that Joe Root, Dan Lawrence, both Bens and C. Woakes all have abbreviated versions of their name as their actual names?

[Ben]

Windies electing to have a bowl. I'd say that's interesting because the cracks will be a nightmare by Day 5 but that is dependent on us getting through the first session whilst there's still moisture around and we know how that usually goes.

[Ian]

The New Era. :drool:

[thommo]

Typical of us to lose the toss in the only Test where it will actually matter.

[Ian]

It's really weird that these things keep happening despite our excellent policy of recycling recently failed test batsmen.

It's like the Windies don't even care that Rooty thinks we've turned a corner.

[niko_cee]

Good to see the middle order engine room back to being outscored by extras, and the bottom 4 [obviously] comprehensively outscoring the top 4.

[Waffdon]

Saq Mahmood ultras are loving life

[Waffdon]

The West Indies WK is some laugh

[igor_balis]

wtf are windies doing

[Ian]

Struggling against our two best batsmen, mate.

[Waffdon]

No :(

The four before was beautiful.

[Ian]

:(

Leach not out though. :drool:

[thommo]

Saqib :(

[niko_cee]

Nothing bodes worse than 10 and 11 lolling their way to a record stand [no idea if it is, probably not but whatever] on a pitch that you've just been bowled out for 200 on.

[thommo]

Nothing bodes worse than 10 and 11 lolling their way to a record stand [no idea if it is, probably not but whatever] on a pitch that you've just been bowled out for 200 on.

How dare you forget Jimmy and Joe putting on 198 on that absolutely dreadful Trent Bridge pitch in 2014.

[Danny]

Trent Bridge set the record 2 years in a row

[niko_cee]

How dare you forget Jimmy and Joe putting on 198 on that absolutely dreadful Trent Bridge pitch in 2014.

Yeah, but who's the Joe here? I want actual 10 and 11, not some 'tenth wicket partnership' shit where the actual 'batter' [god I hate that term] does all the work.

[thommo]

In fairness to Jimmy, he did make 81 in that partnership.

But I get your point, and I've had a little look - 128 is the highest 10th wicket partnership in Tests involving a no. 10 and 11, Higgs and Snow for England v West Indies in 1966. Looking at the scorecard, England were 166-7 but ended on 527 all out and went on to win by an innings. :D

[niko_cee]

So what you are saying is that if we can bowl them out for 3, enforce the follow on and win this by an innings then it definitely COMING HOME later in the year?

[Waffdon]

None of that shite in the classy threads please driver

[Ian]

I absolutely love Mahmood saying he got out to the middle and said to Leach, of their team mates, "the cheeky fuckers have got their whites on" and this spurred the two of them on with the bat.

[Danny]

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[Ben]

I turn it on for the first time today and they're running off for rain. :D

[igor_balis]

Hahahah that was absolutely amazing

[igor_balis]

Wow wouldn't expect that from overton huh

[igor_balis]

To offer some context to my previous posts:

Da Silva sealing a brilliant century, successfully overturning the wicket once they'd already left the field, then having racist idiot overton lob a ball at his head was a pretty glorious few minutes of sport, possibly the best of the year so far.

[Ben]

The pub I’m sat in doesn’t have BT. :(

[igor_balis]

Lawrence just left a little off cutter from Mayers and had his stumps knocked over hahah

[Ian]

It's really weird that these things keep happening despite our excellent policy of recycling recently failed test batsmen.

I'm too lazy for a new joke. England's batsmen do the same thing all the sodding time so why shouldn't I, eh?

[Ian]

1507785789484285962

is this as out there as it seems?

[Luke Emia]

Imagine thinking Broad and Anderson were the problem…

[Ben]

Yes it is.

[Ian]

21 overs in and Extras is our top scorer.

[niko_cee]

It's fine, our reverse order will carry us to a small lead.

[Ian]

And then our world class bowling attack can skittle them out for the 1 we'll need to stride to victory.

[Ian]

1507785270598549513

[Luke Emia]

Yes it is.

They are a problem and have been for a while. But as has been proven repeatedly as long as we can’t bat we won’t win games.

[Kikó]

It's about time they just binned off the men's team.

[Ben]

They are a problem and have been for a while. But as has been proven repeatedly as long as we can’t bat we won’t win games.

I was referring to the previous comment. You butted in. :D

[Byron]

England captain Joe Root on BT Sport: "The immediate thought is frustration because of how it's finished. We have played some really good cricket throughout and shown what we're capable of. We've grown over the two games and shown a lot as a batting unit. Yesterday we let ourselves down and we didn't stand up to it well enough and it has left us in this position where we've lost after playing so much brilliant cricket.

"We've got to show more frequently, like we did on the first day of the tour, people standing up and us getting to a total more frequently. We've shown we can do it - that's the frustration. That first day of the tour was some of the most tricky conditions we've had - we didn't stand up yesterday.

"I thought the attitude throughout the whole tour has been brilliant - in that respect we've made many improvements. That has to continue. There's so much we can take away from this - it's frustrating not to win because we came here to do that but we can take away some of the things from the approach. We've had three debutants have shown plenty and they've got stuff to take away from it.

"I've made it quite clear at the start of this game and tour that I want to take this team forward. I don't think it's ever in your hands and I feel like the group are behind me. We're doing quite a lot of good things - we just need to turn that into results now."

Oh yeah mate?

All that's missing is a reference to examining the data and executing our plans.

[Ben]

He might as well have outright admitted the "red ball reset" was entirely his idea. Trying to spin that shambles in a good light screams of him needing to be right about it.

[Cord]

It'd be quite nice for him to get the hook just so we don't have to hear him talk anymore. He's just so wet.

Who is the nearest we've got to a Nasser style hard bastard? If we're going to be shit, I'd at least like it if we had someone in charge who sounded unhappy about it.

[Ben]

No one is allowed to have character anymore.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Missed this match on holiday, absolutely devastated to have missed us being absolutely scythed open by the 75mph dobblies of Kyle Mayers. Makes a change from Roston Chase I guess.

[Jimmy Floyd]

https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/graham-thorpe-named-as-new-head-coach-of-afghanistan-1308058

Things you didn't think you'd ever read.

[Ben]

I didn't realise they play "home" games in India.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Joe Root is OUT. Probably SACKED but they're saying 'stepped down'.

All with Ollie Pope 113* overnight for the rey.

[Ben]

So who comes in? Literally Stokes is the only option unless they bring Broad back. I don't think Stokes will be able to cope with the workload. Nobody else even has their place in the team guaranteed.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I would, and this runs against everything I stand for, give it to Jos Buttler. The way he bats, it's basically like having a non-playing captain, in the sense that he can just come in at 7 and do whatever with less scrutiny on his form if he's guaranteed a place as skipper.

He's not a Test batsman but I think he has a much better cricket mind than almost anyone in our ranks.

Nobody benefits from Stokes being captain.

Actually, there is an ideal captain candidate among active English players, but we'd need to tempt him out of retirement.

[Ben]

The scenes if Cook returns. :drool:

[Ian]

I'd get even more tired of Buttler punching balls when he should be catching them if he was also under no threat of his place.

[niko_cee]

Foakes getting bunted out again to accommodate a non-playing playing captain would be classic England.

As would appointing Stokes. He's basically non-playing at this point as well.

Has Captain Morgan been floated anywhere?

There are no good options. Darren Stevens?

[Jimmy Floyd]

Maybe Nasser Hussain as a literal non-playing captain. Doesn't bat, bowl or field, but puts the whites on and directs things from the boundary, as well as giving rockets in the dressing room afterwards.

That said, Rob Key's supposedly in line for the DoC role so Sky can't be raided too heavily.

[Max Power]

Mike Brearley is still alive

[Jimmy Floyd]

Rob Key in as director of cricket. I remember him playing for England U19, ffs.

[Ian]

RIP Stokes.

[Ben]

I don't understand why he's taken it. The manic schedule clearly doesn't sit well with him mentally and that was before the burden of captaincy.

Having said that, he's definitely Team Anderson/Broad so at least we won't have to endure Overton's dobbers all summer.

[Ian]

Well Stokes / Key haven't fucked around in saying they want Broad and Anderson back.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Makes it all the more puzzling what was going on before.

Something about the Stokes/Key pairing makes me feel weirdly optimistic. These are flawed men, not corporate robots. We need a bit of that. See what happens with the coaches, I guess.

I'm keeping my Ravi Shastri candle alight.

[Jimmy Floyd]

It seems my man has ruled himself out, but at least in return I get this truly legendary, swear-filled interview in the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/apr/25/ravi-shastri-rob-key-interview-cricket-england-india

First there's the BCCI's hiring practices:


“I had no warning,” he says. “I was commentating at the Oval during India’s [2014] tour of England and came off air to find six or seven missed calls. ‘Seven bloody calls? What’s happened here?’. [The BCCI] just said: ‘We want you to take over, starting tomorrow, at any cost.’

'At any cost' :D


The most important thing is getting among the players and setting a tone from the outset: what you believe in, what you think of them and changing the mindset to compete and win. You have to be bullish and brutish in wanting to achieve that. For us, and now England, it was about setting the challenge of winning abroad, big time. I was very firm when it came to team culture: all the prima donnas and all that shit, that had to go out of the window early.

And it was about attitude, especially when playing the Aussies. I told the boys if one single ‘fuck you’ comes your way, give them three back: two in our language and one in theirs.

Then there's his attitude to qualifications:


And I didn’t have coaching badges [either]. Level one? Level two? Fuck that.

You can kind of see why India have been so good in the last few years with this legend setting the tone.

[Ben]

Cup cricket has started in our league this week and I just noticed a lad I've played against the odd time has managed to record figures of 0.1-0-13-0 for a tremendous economy rate of 78.00.

0nb 0nb 4nb 6, end of game. :D

[Jimmy Floyd]

I was doing a county u15 game on Sunday and some lad started his spell with 7 wides in a row, then two front foot noeys and another wide for a 16 ball over. Was rapid for his age, too, and almost in tears. I wanted to stop the game and find him his mummy.

[Ian]

Fucking hell. :D

[thommo]

Stokes has just hit 18 year old Josh Baker for 34 in an over. He was visibly annoyed that the last ball only went for a 4. :D

And then 2 sixes off of the next two balls he's faced, he's scored 51 off of his last 10. Mental.

[Ben]

Hang on he wasn't even batting when play started this morning. I'd drop by (ground isn't far from me) but guaranteed he'd get castled the moment I walked in.

EDIT: lol it's at Worcester. Maybe not.

[thommo]

Just the 147 not out before lunch. Casual. They might even declare at this point, such was the pace of that session.

[Gray Fox]

He’s obviously got plans for the weekend. Slog away Benjamin.

[Ben]

First ball after lunch out the ground. He's hitting everything so clean.

[Ben]

He's out. Back to work.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Meanwhile at the Oval, Sam Curran was out for 73 earlier which marks the 53rd occasion that he or his two brothers have made a professional half-century, with none of them ever going on to reach a hundred. Possibly my favourite weird sports stat du jour.

[Ben]

I feel their pain. 22 fifties and never made it past 80. I did declare on myself once at 75 and maintain to this day I would have got 100, but I'm a Team Player.

[Ian]

1522597796985061376

[niko_cee]

Never knew Ronaldo was in the squad in '94.

[Ben]

Steamed in for a big four over spell today and I’m absolutely crippled already. I used to bowl 25 on the bounce about 10-12 years ago. Too old.

[Jimmy Floyd]

First league game today and already loving life. Gave a bloke nicked off, he had a massive paddy and threw his bat across the square claiming it had hit the stumps, not his bat. Then (after the home team closed out a win by 10 runs) an away player somehow managed to cause a fight during the post-match handshakes.

My colleague was an Indian guy, who is my favourite type of Indian, the Shastri-esque heavy swearer. So rather than my attempts at calming things down, he steams into the melee going 'What's this fucking rubbish?' which only makes the handbags even more handbaggy.

Eventually we decided to speak to the captains, but Shastri decided we should invite them into the umpires' room for this chat. The problem with that was that the umpires' room was actually the ladies loo, but for the duration of the match they take down the ladies sign and put up a piece of lined A4 that says 'umpires room'. As such the captains came in, Ravi starts lecturing them with his full on 'Now listen to me, your players are a swarm of bloody idiots!' while it's so cramped that I have no idea where to stand, the options being clambering into one of the shower units, or sort of looming behind him in one of the toilet cubicles.

League cricket.

[Danny]

Harry Brook has to be in with a shout this summer. Passed 50 in all 6 innings so far for Yorks including 3 centuries (and still going in the third)

[Ian]

First league game today and already loving life. Gave a bloke nicked off, he had a massive paddy and threw his bat across the square claiming it had hit the stumps, not his bat.

So, he wasn't arguing that he wasn't out just the nature of the dismissal?

[Jimmy Floyd]

Well the bails didn't come off, otherwise he'd have been bowled. So he was saying it was a thin edge off the stumps (that didn't remove the bails) and not from his bat.

Not a form of dissent I've had in my 150 odd games umpiring to date.

[Ian]

Oh, of course.

Excellent.

The image really would be complete if you'd just stood atop one of the toilets behind him.

[Ben]

Graham Thorpe in hospital and apparently it's very serious.

[Kikó]

I've read it's an attempted suicide.

[Ben]

It appears 'Baz' McCullum has interviewed for England coach. :cool:

[Jimmy Floyd]

Has he not destroyed every T20 side he has coached?

[hfswjyr]

I will forever be amazed by what he did to turn around the NZ cricket team when he was appointed captain in unceremonious circumstances. In retrospect, he really was the right man at the right time. I'm guessing England are hoping for the same.

[Ben]

Surrey managed to muster 671 without anyone making a century, although Jacks at 9 and Clark at 10 is cheating a bit.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Curran's record goes to 0/22 in first class matches now. I don't know what the all time record is, can't find anyone higher than Tony Lock's 0/27.

[Ian]

How long did it take Bale to win for Spurs? Wasn't that some really weird streak too?

[Ben]

I seem to recall that being around the same ballpark. 23?

[Jimmy Floyd]

The great Misbah went 0/42 in ODIs, though there is a time constraint there which explains some of it.

[Ian]

Close, Google tells me 24.

And yet doesn't Curran have a really good Test win rate? I'm sure either BBC or the Guardian did a thing recently about which players have the best winning records for England and Curran's was quite high. No idea if that's skewed by him being picked more for what we perceive to be easier games, I'd need to cricinfo it.

[Jimmy Floyd]

He was unbeaten for a long time off the start of his career. Just a quirk I think, like Anderson going a ridiculously long time without a duck off the start of his career.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Apparently Durham's Matthew Potts is in line for a call up. I'm none the wiser, surely in Ben's local knowledge?


Potts, tipped for higher honours by Stokes last week and with three five-wicket hauls in a surging summer, looks the likely beneficiary. Surrey’s pacy Jamie Overton will also be discussed when Key, the newly-hired McCullum and Stokes – plus performance director Mo Bobat and head scout James Taylor – convene.

I swear Mo Bobat and James Taylor could survive nuclear winter in lofty ECB positions.

[niko_cee]

I thought this 0/22 was referring to 100s/50s conversion rate, not wins.

[Ian]

Oh. :D

American sport has indoctrinated me.

[Danny]

1525615085099839488

Jesus

[Ian]

Didn't realise he'd turned into a portly Mitchell brother knockoff latterly.

[niko_cee]

Obviously some Faustian pacts made during that era of Australian dominance.

[Ian]

BBC reporting that the hero of English cricket, Tom Harrison, is stepping down. Maybe he was told the bonuses are drying up.

[Ben]

Thank fuck for that.

[Jimmy Floyd]

His selfless efforts in sacking 62 staff and doling out £2.1 million in bonuses for 'leadership retention' in the same year will not be forgotten.

[Ben]

Archer is out for the season with a stress fracture of his back. I think that might be him done, certainly in Test cricket.

[Ian]

That's something of a pisser.

The racist is gonna be in the team for fucking ages isn't he.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I don't know what Zak Crawley has to do to get the chop either. Averages fucking 30 in seventy-five first class games and less in Tests, but stays in forever because he has a pretty technique or whatever.

[Ben]

He's averaging 19 this season. They like the idea of him realising some sort of potential with that lovely straight drive. No chance he's going anywhere now Keysy is in.

[Jimmy Floyd]

30.39 in 75 matches is clear evidence that you're just not good enough. It would at least be 35 even if you're using the most spurious 'Oh but what about Trescothick more than two decades ago!' arguments.

Burns 35, Sibley 38, Haines 37, Bracey 35, the list goes on. 30 is just shite.

[Ian]

Yeah it's been clear for ages that he's not up to it.

[phonics]

This is almost, almost enough to get me to go to the cricket :drool:

1527322397728448518

[igor_balis]

30.39 in 75 matches is clear evidence that you're just not good enough. It would at least be 35 even if you're using the most spurious 'Oh but what about Trescothick more than two decades ago!' arguments.

Burns 35, Sibley 38, Haines 37, Bracey 35, the list goes on. 30 is just shite.

I just don't get how actual professional #cricketmen can't see what I, probably about the 10th most informed cricket poster on this forum ffs, can see - that a nice looking technique doesn't make you a good player. It's especially galling in a sport where an integral part of how players are presented and gauged is literal mathematical proof of how good you are.

[Ian]

They are absolutely obsessed with lovely strokes because they seem to have not been able to see that that isn't the only / best way to be "positive." Hopefully Keys manages to change that.

I saw that Pope is likely to end up at 3 which seems like another failure waiting to happen as well.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Even Hameed averages more, and he had a period where he was so bad he got dropped into club cricket.

A lot of proper cricket men like being gatekeepers, i.e. thinking they know something that effete concepts like stats cannot prove. I kind of go the opposite way - when I'm looking at players at club level I'm always thinking shut your eyes, does he make scores.

The only time scores would lie would be in making someone who averages a billion in first class cricket (like Ollie Pope) fail at the level above because he has a specific failing against a specific type of bowling that only appears at Test level (I don't know if this is actually true with Ollie Pope, it's just an example). Scores never lie in the sense that someone will magically average loads more than their first class average in Tests (assuming a decent sample size) because they have some magical properties that will bring them to the fore. It just doesn't happen. We've made the same mistake with Buttler.

[igor_balis]

Read a funny story on the fighting talk Facebook:

Without looking at the teams, I wondered if it was more a "the first team game is cancelled, so let's pull a few players into our second and third team, but let's not make it obvious, so we'll bat them a bit down the order" vibes.

My best example was playing for our first team against an opposing second team. That team's firsts played a much higher level and their game was off, so coming in to bowl was a then Scottish international opening bowler. I was a relatively competent batsman, but he got me with a Yorker that did everything but play Beethoven's third symphony. It was the plumbest plumb in the history of plumbness. I almost walked but thought I'd wait for the decision. Inexplicably, I was given not out. According to the non-striker, the bowler asked why, to which the panel umpire very quietly said "because you shouldn't be playing in this f*£king game, and what your team is doing is unfair. So I'm being unfair." I think it was the umpire's last season and he apparently got a lot off his chest that season.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Full solidarity with that ump.

I gave an ex-Notts pro out LBW on the sweep at the weekend. He glowered at me and stayed there. I kept the finger up. He then started walking down the pitch staring at me. I kept the finger up, and looked at it for a bit just to make sure it was still up. He then went to his mate, right in front of me: "What did that look like, Jonny?" Jonny, wisely, said: "Erm, I couldn't see mate." Ex-pro gave me another look and stalked off. If it wasn't a massive hassle, we'd have law 42'd him.

[Ben]

That’s good form from the umps. I’ve had Plunkett and Sidebottom roaring in at me over the years and it is not fun. Pumping Plunkett for four through the covers was not my greatest idea.

[Ben]

Full solidarity with that ump.

I gave an ex-Notts pro out LBW on the sweep at the weekend. He glowered at me and stayed there. I kept the finger up. He then started walking down the pitch staring at me. I kept the finger up, and looked at it for a bit just to make sure it was still up. He then went to his mate, right in front of me: "What did that look like, Jonny?" Jonny, wisely, said: "Erm, I couldn't see mate." Ex-pro gave me another look and stalked off. If it wasn't a massive hassle, we'd have law 42'd him.

Wasn’t Bilal was it? Arsehole.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Speaking of law 42, this cracker happened in our Prem last week:

1525844681850077185[/url]

The miscreant was also their captain. Just the 4-match ban.

[igor_balis]

Gotta say, twitter preventing playing that in the embedded link cus it was "potentially sensitive content" definitely led to quite an anticlimax :D still though, what a twat.

[Ben]

Ran myself out on 99 today. :thbup:

[Jimmy Floyd]

Bowling.

Matty Potts, as well as being called Matty Potts, is another one from the Jordan Pickford/Michael Keane school of looking like a soldier about to be killed at the Somme.

[hfswjyr]

Playing with "intent" already.

[Jimmy Floyd]

It's amazing how even as we move into the 5 billionth year of his Test career, still no one has a clue how to play against Jimmy in England.

Hint: fucking leave it.

[John Arne]

Potts with a wicket deyboo.

[Ben]

Leach is toast. We are allowed a like for like replacement, which fuck knows what that means. Do we need to put forward an unthreatening left arm spinner?

[Jimmy Floyd]

Do we need to put forward an unthreatening left arm spinner?

I'm available if so.

Surely Liam Dawson outlawed due to his batting, but I'll bet they were gagging for it.

[Ian]

Bad news, lads, I'm back in the house and the TV is on so prepare for New Zealand to sort their shit out and for these two to put on a 400 partnership.

[Jimmy Floyd]

If time is of the essence then the closest left arm spinner to the dressing room might be Phil Tufnell.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Bit of a trigger finger from Goughy there, isn't he from up there as well? Go on wor lad, have a wicket.

[Ben]

Yep both Durham boys. My first/only memory of Gough is him smashing one at 15 year old me at mid off so seeing him standing as the best umpire in the world will always be a little odd.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Smart from Stokes bringing him on that end.

Loved watching him bowl so far, does everything an English seamer should. Might be workable abroad too as seems to have that Darren Gough type personality that will never give up. Just need to avoid the stress fracture grim reapers.

[niko_cee]

I'm sure the boffins at ECB towers are already thinking up ways to improve his action.

Parkinson may struggle to actually make it to the ground whilst the game is still on.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Luckily the ECB are well-versed in flying people in to Lord's to plug a gap.

https://c8.alamy.com/comp/2EBMGM5/cricket-ecb-sir-rallen-stanford-press-conference-lords-11608-sir-allen-stanford-2nd-l-arrives-at-lords-by-helicopter-mandatory-credit-action-images-john-marsh-livepic-2EBMGM5.jpg

[hfswjyr]

It's a Southee high score kind of day.

[Ben]

Parkinson as sub. At this rate he won’t get there before he needs to pad up.

[Ben]

I can’t help but laugh at Trent Boult here. He’s taking the piss out of Steve Smith surely.

[Jimmy Floyd]

16 wickets taken today and I reckon about 4 of them weren't massive batting errors.

[Ben]

Just piled in on NZ at 2/1.

[Kikó]

The Queen will be furious with this batting.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I liked us before play at 7/5, probably still do, NZ batting absolutely honks.

[Ben]

England win is nailed on now I’ve bet on us to be honest. But if NZ can bumble us out tomorrow morning then muster 220-250 then I don’t back us whatsoever.

[Gray Fox]

I've just looked up the score and seen 17 wickets have fallen on day 1. Christ.

The Stokes era providing solid entertainment.

[Ian]

16 wickets taken today and I reckon about 4 of them weren't massive batting errors.

Yeah there was a lot of shit in there.

[niko_cee]

Left this and we were absolutely cruising, so good to see that some things never change.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Fucking groan at Kevin being on Sky. Biggest gobshite in sport.

That said, he's been bang on throughout this analysis of England's batting.

Then he moves onto facts. 'We were batting in India. We hadn't been in India for 20, 30 years'. Six years, Kevin. Six.

[hfswjyr]

Sky are absolutely obsessed with Williamson's "soft hands".

[Jimmy Floyd]

I did laugh that they did an entire third man feature on how you would position your slips to combat his 'soft hands', about five minutes after he had hard-handed one straight to third slip.

[Ian]

1532712917874970624

[Gray Fox]

England are definitely failing to win it now.

[Jimmy Floyd]

That period of Stokes bowling half trackers down the leg side for 40 minutes as a 'game plan' was pretty tragic.

[niko_cee]

It really is remarkable how consistently England have been able to turn absolutely unassailable winning positions into heavy defeats in recent years.

[hfswjyr]

And here comes the english pessimism, right on cue.

How long before we get the Baz 'inside man' narrative?

[Jimmy Floyd]

English pessimism? Have you seen the scorecard/WTC standings?

[niko_cee]

:D

Maybe the pitch is 'flattening out'. Seems to be an increasingly prevalent phenomenon all over now, which is in turn perhaps indicative of modern batsmen being largely unable to do anything other than ATTACK in most situations.

If we can bundle them out for less than 300 it might be interesting to watch us flounder in pursuit, but anything more than that [inevitable] and it'll just be dull dull dull.

[Ian]

Yeah I'm not sure it counts as pessimism if what you're predicting has been the norm for the last two years or whatever. :D

[Gray Fox]

Wait an age for a bus and all that.

I love some chaos. :D

[hfswjyr]

England were absolutely never going to suffer a heavy defeat in this test.

[niko_cee]

You sure about that?

[Gray Fox]

You should never underestimate the England BATTING COLLAPSE.

You don't know when it's coming, but it is. It always is.

[niko_cee]

Here we go.

Oh lol, how can you be overstepping whilst bowling that absolute trash?

[niko_cee]

Conditions looking fairly dicey for a tranquil morning run chase.

[Jimmy Floyd]

We're getting shot out here. Imagine Broad coming in with 30 to win. Proper hide behind the sofa stuff.

Root will be gone in the first six balls he faces, caught third slip.

[hfswjyr]

Are you guys watching the same match as me?

[Ian]

That ended up being a remarkably comfortable morning, and it feels like fucking ages since we resumed in the morning and didn't quickly lose a wicket.

[Gray Fox]

Well that's bought Stokes about 3 years of captaincy. As you say, strange to just come out and get the job done.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Williamson blew it changing the ball yesterday. Don't know why fielding teams are so obsessed with having the ball changed.

[niko_cee]

Just watching a bit of THE BLAST [Surrey v Middlesex] and a couple of things. I wasn't paying much attention but have they changed the fielding restrictions? It seemed 'up' to me at the end of the Surrey innings [well, last over] and Jordan was smashing to all parts. The other thing is I think I have a new favourite name in sport with this national socialist Inuit [Eskinazi] opening the batting for Middlesex.

[niko_cee]

Also, is the 'kiss cam' really a thing in 2022?

[Ben]

Middlesex were penalised for their slow over rate with losing a man outside the circle for the last over.

[niko_cee]

Wullyumsun has covid.

The Brendon Bounce. :cool:

[Clunge]

Somerset were cruising to a dismal loss last night. 15 mins later, Van Der Merve had smacked 48 off 15 and we’d won.

[Jimmy Floyd]

The rey are fucking unbeatable in T20 this year. Not sure why we bothered signing Pollard, who is garbage.

[Ben]

He's barely bowling either, so it's doubly strange. Surely anyone in the 2nds can hit the odd six and be immobile in the ring?

[Jimmy Floyd]

Ben Geddes doesn't get the coked up city boys through the gate I guess.

[niko_cee]

Dead cat bounce

[Ian]

Sky don't normally have Gough on comms do they? He's good fun anyway.

My dad always spoke very highly of him from when he met the England team of the time in Pakistan

[niko_cee]

Needed that wicket. Good catch by Crawley.

[niko_cee]

Seems that was the catching high point. Some expensive drops since.

Casually perusing the BBC cricket page I noticed that the opening fixture of the Hundred is the Southern Brave Men versus the Welsh Fire Men, hands down the most amusing fixture on the list.

[Ian]

Yeah the slips haven't been great. They were saying earlier than McCullum has basically told them to back themselves and go for everything they reckon they can get, hence Crawley not catching one that might have gone for an easier catch to Root.

Is that how good slip fielding works? I'd have thought it's guys being confidence in their own position and that of their mates and knowing what's theirs and what they should trust the player next to them to catch.


Southern Brave Men versus the Welsh Fire Men

:D

[niko_cee]

I always found slip catching really hard [ball just fizzes out of your hands] but my understanding is that the best outcomes are achieved by players who are very familiar with each other, therefore have an innate sense of when to go for something and when to leave it. I think the best route to that is to have loads of good batsmen established in the team, so, yeah, tricky. Backing yourself is fine, but also carries the implication that you aren't backing your colleague [perhaps Crawley in the right as Root dropped a bit of a dolly]. That our best slippers seem to be bowlers [Stokes and Anderson] also not ideal.

[Ben]

That was a good double leave. Fuck Baz’s advice eh.

[Max Power]

Crawley needs binning ASAP.

[igor_balis]

Crawley needs binning ASAP.

Persisting with him after we gave up on carbz and other nuggety players who actually scored a few runs is well annoying.

[hfswjyr]

I genuinely thought this photo/graphic was of Boult batting.

https://i.redd.it/zbr2pdpb01591.jpg

[Danny]

Root :cool:

Delighted for Pope too. Hopefully he can kick on.

[Max Power]

Root can genuinely break all records. Now he’s shedding the captaincy he looks even better. Some of the drives today were absolutely sumptuous.

[niko_cee]

Shame we ever made him captain in the first place.

[niko_cee]

Just clicked in on, literally the first ball I watched Pope top edges it and is out. Apologies to all concerned.

[Kikó]

The 6 from Joe Root then was ridiculous.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Everything connected to Joe Root at the moment is ridiculous. If Foakes stays with him he could get a few here.

[Ian]

How long was it after that post, Jimmy?

He did look ace though.

A big four from Anderson. :drool:

[hfswjyr]

That is some leave to start.

[Ben]

That leave. :D/:cool:

[Jimmy Floyd]

It was one run afterwards, Ian.

[Ian]

Perfect.

[niko_cee]

Crowd looks a bit disappointing there today.

[Ian]

Root looks so much more at ease now he's not the captain, even in the field, etc.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Crowd looks a bit disappointing there today.

Modern cricket crowds are basically fuelled by rich yuppies boozing and kids, if neither market is available then you don't get the numbers in. The north can't keep up, hence them always complaining about loads of Tests in London.

[Ben]

That's two proper club cricket run outs today. Makes me feel better about myself being about three yards short on 99 a few weeks ago.

[Kikó]

Humble brag.

Reminds me before a game of football a few weeks back in Frankfurt, there was a cricket game on with the expat subcontinent bringing cricket to the Germans. Was lovely to see.

[Jimmy Floyd]

The last thing we need is the Germans learning cricket. Imagine their battery of 6ft 5 blond-haired quicks called things like Ralf Horstmann and Gunther Schmidt who would shout JAAA as another Englishman nicks one that jags up the hill at Lord's.

[Kikó]

I wouldn't worry. From my 15 minutes of watching and Google searches after, the playing population isn't German born.

[Ian]

This sort of chat will always make me think of this: https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/sport/sport-headlines/dutch-to-invent-word-for-cricket-200906081811

Also seeing a lot of "Ooooh Ollie Pope has finally cracked test cricket!!!!!" stuff. Studiously ignoring him doing fuck all in the first test, that it was an absolute road for the first few days and just the whole "how many times are we going to get excited by a bloke having one good innings?" thing.

[Ben]

English media. They’ll batter him again when he does fuck all in the next few games.

Also Bracewell hits a lovely sweet ball. Edit: lol.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Pope is better than your Vinces and Crawleys, and has shown it with a shit ton of first class runs at a silly average. Real anomaly that he hasn't succeeded until now. Hopefully this is the last hurdle.

[Ben]

Mitchell trying to blame Southee. :D

[Kikó]

Please bowl at the stumps ffs.

[igor_balis]

This is hilarious.

[Ian]

Ah, nice that the RED BALL RESET still allows for the final wicket going for about 70 unnecessary runs.

[Kikó]

299. Looks close enough to achieve but will result in a mad scramble as we get towards the end of day at 199-8.

[Ian]

I'd love to be wrong but I don't quite get where all the positivity is coming from for this. Is it just because McCullum and Stokes talk a good game? Do we think Root is going to average 100 for the rest of his career? It'd be our fifth highest ever run chase I think they said and let's be honest at least one of our openers is gonna chuck their wicket.

[Jimmy Floyd]

4+ an over for 72 overs is tough, the only thing that makes it doable is NZ being a bowler light.

It'll need someone to go postal as well as Root going big again.

[Ian]

* gasp *

[Jimmy Floyd]

Averages 27.21 in 23 Tests, how many more does he need?

[Ben]

42 innings and over 25% of his total Test runs came in that one knock.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Tonbridge School, though, where the Cowdreys went, good school. Give him another 20 Tests just in case.

[Ian]

42 innings and over 25% of his total Test runs came in that one knock.

Thought I'd posted it here but can't find it on my phone. I worked out recently that if you take out Crawley's four best innings his average drops by about half to just under 17 or something like that.

[Gray Fox]

:nono:

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[Max Power]

There’s gonna be some Ben Stokes madness this afternoon.

[Ben]

Meanwhile the BCCI have pocketed $6bn for the new TV rights sale of the IPL. Jesus.

[niko_cee]

Here we go.

[Kikó]

Some start after tea.

[Jimmy Floyd]

If he sends Broad in next ahead of Foakes, he's officially stark raving mad.

[Ben]

This is insane.

[Danny]

I want to load up the steam but I know ill curse it :uhoh:

[niko_cee]

New Zealand lapsed into England bowling at Angelo Mathews mode for a moment there.

[Max Power]

Hahaha this is glorious

[niko_cee]

Somebody in 1902 scored a 76 ball hundred for England? Mind blown.

[Ben]

Somebody in 1902 scored a 76 ball hundred for England? Mind blown.

Yeah that surprised me as well. :D

[Danny]

Hopefully Stokes reads this right and doesnt try to keep up with Bairstow. YJB batting on different wicket here.

[Jimmy Floyd]

Jessop came to the crease with England at 48 for 5. He scored his first 50 runs in 43 minutes and reached his century in 75 minutes. He was eventually dismissed after 77 minutes for 104, which included 17 fours and an all-run five. Many of the fours had well cleared the boundary, but the laws of cricket in 1902 meant that to obtain six runs the ball had to be hit out of the ground. One of these "fours" was caught on the players' balcony. A newspaper managed to keep a detailed record of his innings, which shows that Jessop reached his hundred off 76 balls – one of the fastest Test centuries of all time.

Probably got it off about 70 by today's laws. The all-run five sounds spicy.

[Danny]

Practically 6 an over in a 4th innings chase. Madness.

[Ian]

Yeah, fair play. That's short form stuff. I mean it's not sustainable but it was fun.

[Ben]

That was a terrific Test match. More than 4 an over, 1600 runs, 35 wickets, result in the final session. Can’t ask for more.

The intensity versus last summer’s rejected run chase (which was a lot more attainable than this one) is astounding.

[igor_balis]

Went for a nap at 2pm, woke up half an hour ago. Don't tell YJB or my boss, oops.

[hfswjyr]

You lot sure are a pessimistic bunch.

3 out of 3 next week?

[Ben]

No chance.

[Jimmy Floyd]

New Zealand were the real winners yesterday. Another crushing blow for English cricket.

[Jimmy Floyd]

This video that's going round of the England team in a kebab shop last night will do more to connect cricket with the public than a thousand years of the Hundred.

[Max Power]

You worry for the state of Ollie Pope’s guts after that monster

[Danny]

500 is on here. However we should declare so the score against the Aussies remains the highest one.