***Official England in India***

[Precambrian]

BTW England will have to face a bigger worry tomorrow.

Showers forecast for Sunday at Bangalore

 

[Rant0r]

Gotta love the Crapinfo headline writers. Preview for tomorrow's game titled

England to face Tendulkar in crunch tie

bahahaha @ crapinfo ^5

 

[Richard]

BTW England will have to face a bigger worry tomorrow.

Showers forecast for Sunday at Bangalore

Damn, really hate a ODI that has regular interruptions.

It truly will be remarkable if it happens: three India-vs-England seven-match ODI series' are played within 2-and-a-half years. Two have a rain-shortened or rained-off game, one doesn't.

The one that doesn't is in England.

(Yeah, the Fifth ODI in England was terminated early, but the game was already long since decided by then and a result wasn't denied)

 

[gettingbetter]

Shah's been pretty poor. The fact that no-one - even Pietersen - has been any better isn't an excuse.

Probably not an excuse, but there are mitigating factors to say that Shah probably has been 2nd best since mid 2007. (Maybe even best, I'm not sure how well KP has done in that period)

 

[Langeveldt]

Probably not an excuse, but there are mitigating factors to say that Shah probably has been 2nd best since mid 2007. (Maybe even best, I'm not sure how well KP has done in that period)

gettingbetter - Great forum name, relevent at the moment, could be applied to England's dismal one day showings in India..

 

[tooextracool]

NZ have also had some better ODI players than people have given them credit for. People have looked at the Larsens, Harrises, Twoses etc. and said "well they're not good Test players so they're not good players, they just punch above their weight in ODIs". Which, well, is wrong, pure-and-simple.

Those 3 players you listed spanned a decade and a half. Larsen hasnt played since the 90s, twose retired in early 2001 and Harris retired a while ago. However, even then you'd really have to stretch to call any of them great ODI players. Harris was not bad, but it would be a stretch to put him even in the top 20 ODI players of his time and Larsen often gets more credit than he deserves when he could barely take a wicket to save his life. You could throw in Dan Vettori to that list(who is arguably better than all of them) and perhaps Cairns. How many quality players have NZ produced over the last 8 years? Possibly only Shane Bond.

England, on the other hand, have had 1 quality ODI player debut in the last 8 years: Pietersen. That, I think, sums-up the cause of the problems. There has, obviously, got to be something wrong somewhere but I don't think it's at county level, as players once they get to county level are 20-21 years of age mostly and by that stage most development has been done. Pietersen himself had already undergone his development elsewhere. This means that there hasn't been a British-raised quality ODI player debut for England in the last 8 years.

The problem, I think, just lies in the fact that the ODI game has never been treated seriously enough in this country. The fact that Twenty20 apparently is, though, doesn't seem to make any difference to the calibre of English Twenty20.

Yeah thats true, the attitude that England have had towards ODI cricket has been a big issue. It wasnt always like that IMO, methinks in the early 90s there were plenty of good ODI players floating around and there were lots of players like Dermot Reeve who really were specialist ODI cricketers which is an abstract concept in domestic cricket these days.

 

[SpaceMonkey]

BTW England will have to face a bigger worry tomorrow.

Showers forecast for Sunday at Bangalore

Worry? only way we'll not lose its a blessing!

 

[gettingbetter]

gettingbetter - Great forum name, relevent at the moment, could be applied to England's dismal one day showings in India..

Thanks, the song that got me into the Beatles.

What is your take on England? Its a bit harder to comprehend than appears. And considering that you are South African, you must hold some opinions as they beat SA in England (and India too).

 

[gettingbetter]

Worry? only way we'll not lose its a blessing!

6-0 then? Or maybe England will get the better rub of D-L system. I read on cricinfo that KP is worried about the application of D-L in this game too. Game starts at 8.30 am local time (I don't think these players have played taht early since under 15s) and that it may get dark by 3.30.

 

[Richard]

Thanks, the song that got me into the Beatles.

What is your take on England? Its a bit harder to comprehend than appears. And considering that you are South African, you must hold some opinions as they beat SA in England (and India too).

He's only a fake SAfrican really. He's very much British in a sense.

 

[gettingbetter]

That may be so, but I'm just curious as to what opinion he holds where (it appears) that the team he supports was beaten convincingly by England and at the current moment, England are being dealt with by India.

 

[Arjun]

From an Indian point of view, the return of Tendulkar may be more damaging to India than beneficial. We may see Gambhir playing out of position, and that's not a good thing. You're changing a winning combination just to accommodate someone who apparently can't bat anywhere else but opening. Frankly, the Sehwag-Gambhir partnership should stay, while Tendulkar should bat at three or four. That's something his old coach has always advocated, so that he can decide how to pace his innings, and it's appropriate now. He may not have a great average (38 at four is the best by position) in the middle order, but when you have middle-order batsmen with averages in the 20s, it's a better idea.

Then there's the fifth bowler puzzle. It's only a matter of time until a batting side bats sensibly and takes apart this rubbish. You can't have the likes of Sehwag and Yuvraj bowling more than three overs between them. They're no good with the ball. They're also very vital batsmen. You need big hundreds from them regularly, not ten overs of rubbish. It won't do them much good, tiring them out, and possibly even affecting their batting form if top batsmen put them in place. Let the hard work of sending down overs be left to less relevant batsmen like Yusuf Pathan, who's also a strike spinner for his state and zone team.

On the other hand, England's frontline bowlers can be picked to attack in the early overs. We've seen Sachin and Sehwag smash Darren Gough and Andy Caddick a few times, and surely an Indian top three can hit Anderson and Broad around the park. Flintoff is a tough cookie at first, and they should play out his first few overs. Swann may be a surprise, so they better be careful, and not be too extravagant against him. For quick runs, the real targets are Anderson and Broad.

Munaf Patel hasn't looked too good. He's been accurate, but not threatening at all, and also gets worn out with time. He's also looked clueless against set batsmen, struggling to survive an over when they get after him. His pace has also been very low- you can't win matches bowling in the 130s all the time- and he's even slower than RP Singh! Yes, the statistics have favoured him, but England just haven't batted well, and there's danger round the corner out here.

 

[Precambrian]

From an Indian point of view, the return of Tendulkar may be more damaging to India than beneficial. We may see Gambhir playing out of position, and that's not a good thing. You're changing a winning combination just to accommodate someone who apparently can't bat anywhere else but opening. Frankly, the Sehwag-Gambhir partnership should stay, while Tendulkar should bat at three or four. That's something his old coach has always advocated, so that he can decide how to pace his innings, and it's appropriate now. He may not have a great average (38 at four is the best by position) in the middle order, but when you have middle-order batsmen with averages in the 20s, it's a better idea.

Then there's the fifth bowler puzzle. It's only a matter of time until a batting side bats sensibly and takes apart this rubbish. You can't have the likes of Sehwag and Yuvraj bowling more than three overs between them. They're no good with the ball. They're also very vital batsmen. You need big hundreds from them regularly, not ten overs of rubbish. It won't do them much good, tiring them out, and possibly even affecting their batting form if top batsmen put them in place. Let the hard work of sending down overs be left to less relevant batsmen like Yusuf Pathan, who's also a strike spinner for his state and zone team.

On the other hand, England's frontline bowlers can be picked to attack in the early overs. We've seen Sachin and Sehwag smash Darren Gough and Andy Caddick a few times, and surely an Indian top three can hit Anderson and Broad around the park. Flintoff is a tough cookie at first, and they should play out his first few overs. Swann may be a surprise, so they better be careful, and not be too extravagant against him. For quick runs, the real targets are Anderson and Broad.

Munaf Patel hasn't looked too good. He's been accurate, but not threatening at all, and also gets worn out with time. He's also looked clueless against set batsmen, struggling to survive an over when they get after him. His pace has also been very low- you can't win matches bowling in the 130s all the time- and he's even slower than RP Singh! Yes, the statistics have favoured him, but England just haven't batted well, and there's danger round the corner out here.

Disagree with Tendulkar being shunted down to No.4. He might have batted there before, but he has explicitly stated his displeasure there in recent times.

And there is absolutely nothing wrong he has done at opening position to be removed from that place. If he's comfortable at that give it to him.

Also, Gambhir showed that he can be quite a handy No.3 in Australia. So there should be no problem on that front.

Also Sachin and Sehwag has opened successfully in ODIs before and that;s not a problem either.

 

[Precambrian]

Looking ominous the weather. Full game ruled out.

 

[Precambrian]

England win toss, and put India to bat. Good decision.

 

[Richard]

And in a less good one, Anderson stays in the team.

Mind, if he's not going to be effective today, he surely never will be again.

 

[Richard]

Haha, Sehwag and Tendulkar to strike again? Just always seems too good to be true, but I suppose it must happen again sometime.

Typically woeful start from Anderson.

 

[Richard]

Apparently Ishant Sharma has had a haircut.

 

[Richard]

Prior and Shah apparently combine to miss Sehwag, though I'm not watching (Sky isn't working) so it might just be commentators exaggerating on what's catchable as so often.

 

[Rebecca]

Unfortunately they weren't exaggerating!