If you could get rid of one thing from the cricketing scene...

[Richard]

Plenty of people, I imagine. Plenty enough to make it viable for screening over not being screened and having people have to scramble about trying to find something to fill schedules.

 

[Steulen]

That's been the aim since 2001. The first time the realisation dawned that we couldn't be doing with these three-day Tests regular like was the opening Test in 2001, which was a three-day game and meant that 13 days' play had been lost to early finishes and\or rain out of the last

For the rest of that summer, pitches - at all Test grounds, not just Lord's - offered progressively less to bowlers, culminating in the flattest surface seen in this country for many, many years at The Oval. And from 2002 onwards, pitches at virtually all grounds - Headingley sometimes excepted and very occasionally other grounds as well - have been flat, flat and more flat.

Because much as us cricket affectionados would indeed prefer three days of riveting cricket to five days of torpor, unfortunately TV executives (not all of whom care greatly for cricket) don't - they want their schedules to be filled as per guides. And the reality is that without TV, cricket would be crippled, so it's only fair that we try to be accommodating to TV.

This excess of flat pitches hasn't precluded a decent few results, because despite the fact batting has been far easier now than from 2000 backwards, England's batsmen have gotten worse and opposition's aren't always as good as they used to be. But it's utterly unfair to single Lord's out, because the disease spreads everywhere. Lord's has simply suffered from lost play at the wrong times.

And yes, ideally we'd eliminate lost play entirely. Even if this means we don't get every ball telecast live on the additional days.

It may be unfair to single out Lord's, but as the Home of Cricket it is the most striking example. How many draws on the trot is it now? 7? That's unacceptable, even in English weather.

 

[Richard]

6, only 2 of which haven't had overs lost.

When I've got some time I'll look and find the last time that happened... I'd not be surprised if it wasn't ancient history.

For instance, that a Test at The ARG has ever had a result surprises me.

 

[GIMH]

I don't want to open up an unnecessary can of worms with the Indian posters, so I'll decline to give examples.

But you bait everyone equally!!!

 

[Lillian Thomson]

I want to know though- who actually watched the fifth day in Karachi today that made it so appealing to TV executives?

Plenty tuned in but most tuned out when Younis Khan was out.

 

[Uppercut]

But you bait everyone equally!!!

That is true, and Sachin Tendulkar is overrated.

 

[Julian87]

Second take; throwers and India.

 

[oitoitoi]

When Allan Border was approaching retirement he said that in every controversy to affect the game during his career the common denominator was Pakistan. Not much has changed thanks to Asif & co.

The entire English Cricket System, it is incapable of doing anything right and hasn't raised the standard of the english game for the last 20 years. It just goes in cricles of mediocrity and obsesses about the damn ashes when Australia don't. Stanford is just a big fat Texan cherry. In particular I despise the kind of incompetent, pompous, self satisfied post imperial englishman (e.g. Giles Clarke, Collier) that unfortunately makes up most of the county committee and ECB senior posts. Someone should just make clones of Gooch, Atherton and Stewart and put them in charge of everything. Aaargghhhh! Why the hell is Ashley Giles a selector?????

Bangladesh shouldn't be allowed to play test matches, they're a blight on the international calendar.

Test match days finishing too early because of bad light. Just start them earlier you idiots! Oh no we have to start play before 11.00AM...please... Also slow over rates, they're killing test matches faster than slow run rates ever could.

From the options though I'd have to go with flat pitches.

 

[Brett Dale]

Get rid of the minor nations, Zimbabwe , Bangladesh, Kenya.

Make test series, at least three tests, every time.

 

[Evermind]

Get rid of the minor nations, Zimbabwe , Bangladesh, Kenya.

Make test series, at least three tests, every time.

Yeah. 2-test series are meaningless, and unsatisfactory to watch.

 

[Richard]

The entire English Cricket System, it is incapable of doing anything right and hasn't raised the standard of the english game for the last 20 years.

You are kidding? English cricket in 1989 was of a shambolic, amateurish standard - and it showed, as the Test team hit its lowest ebb. Since 1990, many things have gotten better and professionalism (in terms of attention-to-detail) is unrecogniseable.

Seriously, a good-attituded county cricketer from 2009 would go back to 1989 and be utterly horrified by what he encountered. The work done, especially by Lord MacLaurin and Tim Lamb in the late-1990s, was excellent and they deserve considerable credit for dragging the English game out of its utterly diabolical state and into one of semi-professionalism (in the sense of attention-to-detail) and a culture of making some amount of effort that we see today.

 

[oitoitoi]

You are kidding? English cricket in 1989 was of a shambolic, amateurish standard - and it showed, as the Test team hit its lowest ebb. Since 1990, many things have gotten better and professionalism (in terms of attention-to-detail) is unrecogniseable.

Seriously, a good-attituded county cricketer from 2009 would go back to 1989 and be utterly horrified by what he encountered. The work done, especially by Lord MacLaurin and Tim Lamb in the late-1990s, was excellent and they deserve considerable credit for dragging the English game out of its utterly diabolical state and into one of semi-professionalism (in the sense of attention-to-detail) and a culture of making some amount of effort that we see today.

This may well be true, but at the end of the day they aren't really producing better players than back then in the test arena.

 

[Uppercut]

This may well be true, but at the end of the day they aren't really producing better players than back then in the test arena.

Ah now let's not be silly. England are pretty mediocre, but the England of the 90s were truly horrid.

 

[oitoitoi]

Ah now let's not be silly. England are pretty mediocre, but the England of the 90s were truly horrid.

Personally I don't England were that much worse in the 1990's than they were in the 80s or even than right now, it's just that opposition bowling attacks were far stronger, e.g. Wasim & Waqar, Ambrose & Walsh, Mcgrath & co, Donald & Pollock. Nowadays English pitches are flatter and there aren't too many really good quicks about (though several are emerging) so there's plenty of opportunity for mediocre batsmen to cash in. Cricinfo made a list of the 10 flattest pitches over the last 5 years and 3 of them were in England (Lords, Oval, Headingley). I'm sure that wasn't the case in the 90's.

 

[Uppercut]

Personally I don't England were that much worse in the 1990's than they were in the 80s or even than right now, it's just that opposition bowling attacks were far stronger, e.g. Wasim & Waqar, Ambrose & Walsh, Mcgrath & co, Donald & Pollock. Nowadays English pitches are flatter and there aren't too many really good quicks about (though several are emerging) so there's plenty of opportunity for mediocre batsmen to cash in. Cricinfo made a list of the 10 flattest pitches over the last 5 years and 3 of them were in England (Lords, Oval, Headingley). I'm sure that wasn't the case in the 90's.

County cricket ain't easy to bat in. Check out the respective records of batsmen and bowlers in England compared to other countries, even recently. Compare to Australia and India. Flat pitches are not to blame.

 

[Richard]

Ah now let's not be silly. England are pretty mediocre, but the England of the 90s were truly horrid.

England are not that much better currently or for most of the last decade than they were in the 1990s. In both decades, they were\are considerably better than they were '86 to '89 though.

They weren't truly horrid in the 1990s, they just consistently underperformed. They had lots of good players, and quite a few potentially good ones who didn't deliver as often as they should've, but also lots of injuries and lots of incoherancy. In the second half of the '80s, though, they were just utterly useless, plain and simple.

 

[Flem274*]

England are jsut ****ing random, no consistency whatsoever, except their media always think they're gun, even when they suck.

In saying that, lots of England players rule, luff Caddick and Gough and Sidearse.

 

[Richard]

Personally I don't England were that much worse in the 1990's than they were in the 80s or even than right now, it's just that opposition bowling attacks were far stronger, e.g. Wasim & Waqar, Ambrose & Walsh, Mcgrath & co, Donald & Pollock. Nowadays English pitches are flatter and there aren't too many really good quicks about (though several are emerging) so there's plenty of opportunity for mediocre batsmen to cash in. Cricinfo made a list of the 10 flattest pitches over the last 5 years and 3 of them were in England (Lords, Oval, Headingley). I'm sure that wasn't the case in the 90's.

County cricket ain't easy to bat in. Check out the respective records of batsmen and bowlers in England compared to other countries, even recently. Compare to Australia and India. Flat pitches are not to blame.

Nonetheless there's no doubt that batting in county - and international in England - cricket between 2001 and 2006 (when the ball was generally of a poor quality and very difficult to get to swing as much as it should and from 2002 the pitches at many grounds were often routinely non-seaming) was far, far easier than at just about any point. Scoring-rates and numbers of runs skyrocketed.

And yes, England were worse in the second half of the '80s than they are now or were ever in the 1990s. Much, much worse.

 

[Uppercut]

England are jsut ****ing random, no consistency whatsoever, except their media always think they're gun, even when they suck.

In saying that, lots of England players rule, luff Caddick and Gough and Sidearse.

No, that's not true. You're thinking of their football team. The England cricket team is subject to the most ridiculous of knee-jerk reactions at every possible junction. They lose a wicket in the first five overs of an innings and all you can hear is "WE'RE USELESS! HOW CAN WE EVER HOPE TO BEAT AUSTRALIA WHEN WE LOSE A WICKET TO A NEW BALL!" (because everything in the English media regarding cricket mentions the Ashes in some way or another). Then, when someone bowls a good spell against New Zealand or the West Indies and takes five wickets it's all "Bring on Australia! We can do it! Yeah!"

The truth is that England are a pretty decent cricketing side who have their good days and their bad days. They're a class above the West Indies and New Zealand in tests- that's not to say those teams can't compete with them though- and a class below India, South Africa and Australia. Strangely, the media here only works in extremes.

 

[Flem274*]

No, that's not true. You're thinking of their football team. The England cricket team is subject to the most ridiculous of knee-jerk reactions at every possible junction. They lose a wicket in the first five overs of an innings and all you can hear is "WE'RE USELESS! HOW CAN WE EVER HOPE TO BEAT AUSTRALIA WHEN WE LOSE A WICKET TO A NEW BALL!" (because everything in the English media regarding cricket mentions the Ashes in some way or another). Then, when someone bowls a good spell against New Zealand or the West Indies and takes five wickets it's all "Bring on Australia! We can do it! Yeah!"

The truth is that England are a pretty decent cricketing side who have their good days and their bad days. They're a class above the West Indies and New Zealand in tests- that's not to say those teams can't compete with them though- and a class below India, South Africa and Australia. Strangely, the media here only works in extremes.

i wasn't having a crack or saying NZ are better (we're a mini England) I just think their media are ****ed. Sidebottom>everybody.