Root's 110 looking one of the best for many years.
Root's 110 looking one of the best for many years.
Absolute genius. It ticks all the boxes for 'great innings'.
1. It was the highest individual score by a distance,
2. It was made on a lively pitch
3. Team were in a dicey situation two down early after the opponent made 315
4. Changed the momentum of the game with it's speed and positivity
5. Bloody stylish as well, shots all round the wicket played beautifully.
I guess maybe it's not a vintage South African attack but they're no mugs. Rabada and Morkel have bowled very well this match.
When Broad is on it he's a monster, isn't he?
The monster spells seem to be coming a bit more frequently now, which is good. And when he's not running through teams he's miserly. Proper quality bowler now.
Now Mitchell J has fucked off and Steyn seems to be falling to bits, he's the best in the world, probably by quite a long way actually.
I'm not really sure what the point of Hales ending this 9* is going to be.
What a way to get out.
Fuck sake. Might not get this done today with Compton in.
I make his average after 3 Tests to be 13.17. Still has another four Tests to haul himself above Lyth's heroic 20.38.
Sam Robson 30.54 which surprised me.
Should have opened with Elgar.
I was being hard on Hales, 20.00. Maths fail.
This is fairly shambolic stuff now.
I've only just switched on because I was out but from what I heard of Hales' innings today and what I've seen he just doesn't look comfortable.
Roots average to take a hit here.
I was hoping that that'd make that innings there an easier one for him and he'd see it through with a 30 or 40.
To me he looks like he basically can't deal with any sort of probing line and length bowling, which is a bit of a worry. Somewhat like an Indian batsman.
He looks a bit like Buttler and Stokes did when they were having trouble in recent times. Not wanting to give it away, but not really being able to play the shut-up-shop game, and thus just looking shit for a while before getting out meekly.
Should just play his natural game. Good opportunity in a dead rubber to just go for it.
And this is what happens when you don't play real test cricket for a year and a half. Our last proper one was mid 2014 vs Sri Lanka. Fuck that India tour, the cunts.
We were horse shit in the second innings. We got ourselves out for 3 out of the 5 that Broad took. I wish I could be in that dressing room to hear whats being said.
The rebuilding will take fucking long, because of our awesome selection policies in domestic cricket. I'm highly pessimistic currently, mostly alcohol induced, but a fair amount of reason though.
Hey, we got Rohit out for under a hundred.
Nailed on century for Kohli now.
EDIT: Can't we just save everyone some time, give them 309 runs, and then knock it off for three wickets down in the 49th over?
EDIT II: Why are we even having this pointless series of ODI matches?
It's not in an Aussies genes, no matter how level headed the individual, to give Stuart Broad any credit.
Didn't you just watch Trent Boult take his wickets at 38s in Australia and get bunted for 4.25 an over? He's nice but best in the world, no chance.
Wahab Riaz is pretty beastly if we're looking for a contender.
Here's a list of batsmen in the world with the most first class hundreds without a Test cap:
42 - Ed Joyce (plays for a non-Test country)
35 - Stephen Cook, James Hildreth
29 - Darren Stevens
What exactly was he having to do all this time? Rilee Roussouw also has 18 at the age of mid-20s.
Ravi Jadeja is 6 in the test bowling rankings. That's end of days stuff. Do we get to roast India on a bunch of GREENTOPS [read: have Moeen run through them] again this summer?
Ah no, the other two subcontinentals. Put the grass seed away.
Sri Lanka for 3 Tests, Pakistan for 4 and then visit India. World T20 first though, which we're going to win.
Watch us demolish the Under 19 World Cup as well in a couple of weeks. Seriously rate our team.
There's no shame in failing in Australia.
Riaz is talented, and certainly the scariest bowler in full flow now that Johnson has retired. I'll want to see him demolish some batting lineups before I'd put him on top though, the way that we've seen Johnson, Broad and Steyn have done in the past.
Australia are just taking the piss in that series, by the looks of it.
Australian pitches are bordering on 'doesn't count' status these days. Flat, flat, flat and worse, all the same. Look at the difference in their batting from England 2015 to now.
I'm not happy about Australian pitches at the moment. The drop-ins are flat and lack character.
But let's not pretend that England is the baseline for pitch condition, either. Currently you're the exception rather than the rule.
Ours aren't even that great. Much slower and lower than the glory days of the 80s and 90s when we used to roll out lively hard ones for the West Indies quicks to brain our batsmen on. The Australian ones this winter have not given the bowlers a sniff though, it's just smash as many runs as you can and then try to avoid needlessly collapsing to Nathan Lyon.
The one we just played on at the Wanderers was the best I've seen for years. If a fit and firing Steyn had played it could have been one of the greatest ever Test matches. I love the WACA as well (RIP).
I totally agree with you, including your sentiment about the WACA. Every Australian over a certain age has special/horrifying memories of the West Indies blowing us away there every four years. Curtley Ambrose taking 7-1 in 1993.
I will also say that I have no problem with rank turning dustbowls, as long as they're generated by the conditions. It's just important that the pitch does something beyond being a flat mess.
EDIT: Of course, the Gabba is the best cricket pitch in the world. Natch.
Kind of a random point, but I've been reading a bit about Glenn Maxwell lately, and he seems like a really genuinely nice person. The disconnect between his grounded and quiet personality and his larger-than-life playing style ("Big Show" is a nickname that he doesn't enjoy at all ) is really curious to see.
He's moderating his style a bit so that he can play longer innings when the team needs it, like in the chase last night when he clicked along at a run a ball until the last over or two.
He is a total geezer. Never provides anything other than pure entertainment, no matter whether he does well or badly.
He's the best bowler in the world
http://www.relianceiccrankings.com/r.../test/bowling/
He's also the third best all rounder, three places above Stokes.
Which is funny, because I've never seen him crack even the hint of a smile on the cricket pitch. He's 100% grim concentration, 100% of the time.
Exhibits A - F:
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This is not a carefully curated collection, either. It's literally the first six pictures I could find of him "celebrating" a milestone.
http://www.maxwellball.net/play.html
I should have thought that will be up your street. I spent about an hour of office time completing it a few months back.
Someone told me about Pranav Dhanawade yesterday. What a lad.
I'm a twit
I worked that out fairly quickly but it took me fully 45 minutes to get past the autograph hunting kid.
In other news, the new IPL team to replace the banned CSK is called the 'Rising Pune Supergiants'. This is not a drill.
Any bowling shortlist with Jadeja on it should be null and void.
Rangy Herath and Wahab Riaz for me from that list, what heroes. I'll have Holder's hundred as well.
For batting, it's Williamson or Chandimal.
Broad with the ball.
Just finished that Maxwell thing.
Took me forever to get past the kid in the queue. The way to impress the ticket seller is immense.