*Official* Australia in England T20s and ODIs

[pasag]

Just one of those small bowls that get put ont he coffee table when people come over. That sort of thing. Not like a giant bowl or anything like that.

7-0 is a giant bowl.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

So what did Clarke do wrong last night?

Nothing, and fair play to him. If he can do that consistently without striking at 55-65 for majority of his next ten matches then this criticism will go away.

 

[pasag]

Yeah, not like we want Clarke to fail and are looking for a chance to bag the guy.

Not sure if the stats back me up, but Clarke in general plays his best ODI role when in a partnership playing second fiddle to a heavy striker at the other end like Symonds, just rotating the strike. However with the decline of the big hitter, that role has disappeared.

 

[pup11]

Yeah, not like we want Clarke to fail and are looking for a chance to bag the guy.

Not sure if the stats back me up, but Clarke in general plays his best ODI role when in a partnership playing second fiddle to a heavy striker at the other end like Symonds, just rotating the strike. However with the decline of the big hitter, that role has disappeared.

Yeah guess you are right to a certain extent, Clarke is very good when it comes to putting together good solid partnerships, previously when guys like Symonds or Ponting or Hussey use to go bonkers, Clarke used to play some excellent run-a-ball knocks from the other end without garnering much focus or attention.

Though like you mentioned, now the problem seems to be that, Clarke probably doesn't know what his role is in this new look Aussie side, I guess he feels because he is one of the few senior players in the side, he should be taking more responsibility upon himself and making sure he scores runs consistently.

Unfortunately that has resulted in him going into his shell, and hence doing more harm to his side then doing any good, therefore either he should be opening the innings, or like someone said earlier in the thread, he should just move down to no.6 in the batting order.

 

[GIMH]

I like cashews, tbh.

...

Simon Barnes wrote this about a week ago re: the one day series and the Ashes:

The England cricket team are in the position of a person who charges back into a burning house to rescue the baby and comes out with the cat. It’s a nice cat, and you are fond of it, but it’s not exactly what you went in for. Still, there’s not much you can do except stroke it.

Yeah, I'm a little bitter.

 

[pasag]

...

I don't think I've ever been hit as hard from a cricket result as I was after that ODI series. Was absolutely shattered.

 

[pup11]

With the series done and dusted, should we give a game or two to the likes of Hilfy, Siddle and Voges, all of these blokes are in the CT squad, so one probably doesn't want them to go into such an important tournament without any match practice.

 

[Furball]

Has England actually cared about anything else then winning the Ashes, it feels as far as they are concerned, as soon as they won the Ashes it was the the end of the English summer for them, and atm they just seem to going through the motions in this series.

They're not going through the motions; England are not a great limited overs side and this has been compounded further by some inexplicable decisions from the selectors, particularly with regard to the make up of the batsmen in the squad.

From a rant I made on another forum:

Right, can anyone seriously explain WTF the England selectors are playing at in selecting this ODI squad?

Problem position number 1 - openers. You've got a young English wicketkeeper batsman who can take advantage of powerplays, and who over the past 2 seasons has averaged mid 40s with a strike rate exceeding 100. No, let's ignore him in favour of a young batsman who barely averages 30 with a strike rate of 70 in his List A career, and a wicketkeeper who time and again has proven he's a shocking ODI batsman. Because what possible use would there be for a player who scores big runs, quickly at the top of the order?

Problem positon 2 - the middle order. Any team would struggle with the loss of your 2 best ODI batsmen - strike MS Dhoni and Yuvraj down and watch India struggle - however in the wings you have 2 England qualified batsmen, one of whom is in fantastic form this season, has just made a ton on Test debut, and has a career List A average in excess of 40 - something pretty much no English batsman bar Pietersen has. The other one has scored 3 hundreds in this season's FP Trophy andis the top domestic run scorer in limited over cricket, averaging in excess of 50. Are any of them near the squad? No, instead we've got the above mentioned serial failure wicketkeeper, another serial failure ODI batsman who plunges new depths of ineptness in running between the wickets, which is possibly the most important skill for a middle order batsman, the wrong Irishman, and a batsman who has somehow managed to fool most people into thinking he's a bit of an ODI specialist, usually with epic feats of minnow bashing, and the occasional great performance just when people start to notice he's done **** all for the last 20 ODIs.

And just to compound matters, we've picked a bowler who doesn't even get a game for his county in limited overs.

England are staring down the barrel of a 7-0 series defeat and it's so obvious where the problems lie. The Champions Trophy will be even more embarrasing.

 

[pasag]

Tanking, IMO.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Tanking, IMO.

Worth it for the first draft pick tho, tbh.

 

[Penguinissimo]

They're not going through the motions; England are not a great limited overs side and this has been compounded further by some inexplicable decisions from the selectors, particularly with regard to the make up of the batsmen in the squad.

From a rant I made on another forum:

Right, can anyone seriously explain WTF the England selectors are playing at in selecting this ODI squad?

Problem position number 1 - openers. You've got a young English wicketkeeper batsman who can take advantage of powerplays, and who over the past 2 seasons has averaged mid 40s with a strike rate exceeding 100. No, let's ignore him in favour of a young batsman who barely averages 30 with a strike rate of 70 in his List A career, and a wicketkeeper who time and again has proven he's a shocking ODI batsman. Because what possible use would there be for a player who scores big runs, quickly at the top of the order?

Problem positon 2 - the middle order. Any team would struggle with the loss of your 2 best ODI batsmen - strike MS Dhoni and Yuvraj down and watch India struggle - however in the wings you have 2 England qualified batsmen, one of whom is in fantastic form this season, has just made a ton on Test debut, and has a career List A average in excess of 40 - something pretty much no English batsman bar Pietersen has. The other one has scored 3 hundreds in this season's FP Trophy andis the top domestic run scorer in limited over cricket, averaging in excess of 50. Are any of them near the squad? No, instead we've got the above mentioned serial failure wicketkeeper, another serial failure ODI batsman who plunges new depths of ineptness in running between the wickets, which is possibly the most important skill for a middle order batsman, the wrong Irishman, and a batsman who has somehow managed to fool most people into thinking he's a bit of an ODI specialist, usually with epic feats of minnow bashing, and the occasional great performance just when people start to notice he's done **** all for the last 20 ODIs.

And just to compound matters, we've picked a bowler who doesn't even get a game for his county in limited overs.

England are staring down the barrel of a 7-0 series defeat and it's so obvious where the problems lie. The Champions Trophy will be even more embarrasing.

Can you be a selector, please?

 

[Furball]

Haha, I'd also have picked Saj Mahmood though.

 

[pup11]

Haha, I'd also have picked Saj Mahmood though.

I think there is no harm in trying likes of Mahmood, Plunkett, Tremlett in the limited over formats, of course those guys have their weakness, but alteast they can something different to the English bowling attack, which at present is steady at best.

AFAIC, likes of Sidebottom and Anderson aren't really gonna be much of a threat with the white ball, unless they get to play in favorable conditions, on flat decks though its handy to have bowlers with that extra yard of pace or bounce, which are missing from the present English bowling line-up.

Though I'm rather surprised about how someone like Plunkett in particular has gone off the radar, he was pretty good in the CB series down under a few years ago, and was instrumental in England winning that series, but he discarded pretty much after the 2007 WC debacle.

Anyways, Wright is doubtful for today's game after a net injury and Dimi Mascarenhas has been called up as cover for Wright, I think its a blessing in disguise for England, because Mascarenhas should have been in the team all along.

 

[marc71178]

Why exactly should he have been?

Extremely overrated with the bat (and nowhere near good enough to play the role Wright is in the team for) and unthreatening medium pace cannon fodder with the ball.

 

[pup11]

Why exactly should he have been?

Extremely overrated with the bat (and nowhere near good enough to play the role Wright is in the team for) and unthreatening medium pace cannon fodder with the ball.

Mascarenhas is a good striker of the ball and can be a good finisher for England, and though he is only medium pace, he is pretty accurate and canny as a bowler, not saying Wright shouldn't be there, but I think he would be much more useful opening the batting, as he can provide the English innings some much needed early impetus.

 

[inbox24]

England's ODI players are too plain with the bat, plain and simple. There aren't any flair players in that team missing Pietermaritzburg. I'm shocked that Prior who is quite an aggressive player in tests can be so inconsistent in ODIs.

Australia are kind of leaning toward that trend too, which is why they need to get guys like David Hussey into the team who can strike centuries at a rate more than a run a ball, especially after Symonds has departed. ODIs are about innovation and finding ways to squeeze runs from the innings at any stage, even the traditionally slow middle overs. With orthodox players you can't really do that.

 

[marc71178]

Mascarenhas is a good striker of the ball and can be a good finisher for England, and though he is only medium pace, he is pretty accurate and canny as a bowler, not saying Wright shouldn't be there, but I think he would be much more useful opening the batting, as he can provide the English innings some much needed early impetus.

How does losing a wicket in the first over or 2 provide impetus?

 

[four_or_six]

I think Mascarenhas was injured a few weeks ago... maybe partly why he wasn't picked.

 

[TT Boy]

England's ODI players are too plain with the bat, plain and simple. There aren't any flair players in that team missing Pietermaritzburg. I'm shocked that Prior who is quite an aggressive player in tests can be so inconsistent in ODIs.

Australia are kind of leaning toward that trend too, which is why they need to get guys like David Hussey into the team who can strike centuries at a rate more than a run a ball, especially after Symonds has departed. ODIs are about innovation and finding ways to squeeze runs from the innings at any stage, even the traditionally slow middle overs. With orthodox players you can't really do that.

Prior is consistent in ODI's, consistently poor.

 

[TT Boy]

Mascarenhas is a good striker of the ball and can be a good finisher for England, and though he is only medium pace, he is pretty accurate and canny as a bowler, not saying Wright shouldn't be there, but I think he would be much more useful opening the batting, as he can provide the English innings some much needed early impetus.

He had already had that job and failed miserably.

And Mascarenhas isn't much better. Has no potency and offers free runs in the middle stages of the innings whilst he has played all of one good 50 over knock.

Tells you how bad the England side is when Luke Wright is the least of your worries.