*Official* England in South Africa

[Jono]

20% chance of precipitation I read. Not sure when rain is expected though.

 

[GIMH]

Realistically we shouldn't need more than an hour or two

 

[archie mac]

What happened

Went to bed, with SA looking as safe as Bradman in the 90s

 

[Burgey]

We declared about 250 ahead (possibly a bit less) and Saffa finished up 76-6

Hoping they score an absolute maximum of 23 more runs tomorrow, would be so awesome

Setting my alarm, will go down as our best away performance since Mumbai 06 if we do finish it off, which god knows we should

Wow, amazing collapse.

 

[DaRick]

Very poor performance by South Africa. Some anodyne bowling and poor captaincy, but England have bowled very well for most of the match.

It seems like Strauss/Flower have managed to galvanise this side. I was already impressed by Flower the batsman and the individual, but now it seems that he's put this England team right after having lost their way post-September 2005.

 

[Top_Cat]

Y'know, it really shouldn't be too far away where we go from labelling their somewhat regular batting collapses against England 'poor batting' to 'good bowling'. England's is surely one of the more under-rated bowling attacks going around.

 

[Rant0r]

Indeed, although on paper you probably wouldn't have picked this by any stretch of the imagination

 

[Jayzamann]

Indeed, although on paper you probably wouldn't have picked this by any stretch of the imagination

It would have to be a fairly crazy paper to suggest that Kallis, AB and JP would get single-figure scores in a fourth innings.

Power to England, though. When they click, they're hot piss.

 

[Jono]

Y'know, it really shouldn't be too far away where we go from labelling their somewhat regular batting collapses against England 'poor batting' to 'good bowling'. England's is surely one of the more under-rated bowling attacks going around.

Definitely.

Gotta string it together though throughout the series. Lost at home after a good first test, let's see if they can beat or at least draw SA away from home.

 

[Rant0r]

It would have to be a fairly crazy paper to suggest that Kallis, AB and JP would get single-figure scores in a fourth innings.

Power to England, though. When they click, they're hot piss.

AHAHAHA, so eloquently put, but true, Anderson, Broad and Swann look like cannon fodder, but they continue to impress at key times, still shaking my head at the ASHES performance

 

[pasag]

Bloody Saffies. Good for nothing.

 

[Jono]

Harsh.

 

[Stapel]

The second match winning Broad spell I've missed this year .

Well, my planning for the day is messed up. I didn't bother to watch after lunch yesterday, as I expected the Saffies to lose 2 or 3 wickets on what I thought was quite flat pitch. And I was looking forward to a good 5th test day.....

 

[Craig]

Bloody Saffies. Good for nothing.

Only when they play for other countries

 

[tooextracool]

England's is surely one of the more under-rated bowling attacks going around.

I agree. Without wishing to go into comparisons with other bowling attacks around, I think this attack of Anderson-Onions-Broad- Swann complements itself quite well. Even though Onions hasnt really taken a lot of wickets this series, I honestly do believe that if he continue to bowl as well as he has so far it is only a matter of time. And Swann completes this bowling attack, to the point where I think it would be significantly weaker without him.

 

[silentstriker]

Definition of addiction: staying up until 2:30AM on a weekday for five weekdays in a row, and watch cricket until 10:00AM, getting three hours of sleep per day, all so you can watch two teams you don't even support play Test cricket.

 

[silentstriker]

Even on a day where the result is a foregone conclusion.

 

[tooextracool]

Only when they play for other countries

To be honest, this decline has been coming for a while now. They beat England in England whilst carrying a very ordinary attack and did the same against Aus where Dale Steyn, Harris and Kallis covered the shortcomings of their other bowlers. With the loss of Pollock, Nel and more recently Ntini, and with Kalllis struggling to overcome injury, their bowling attack is crying out for some younger blood. Hopefully for their own sake De Wet and Tsotsobe are given a run in the side fairly soon.

 

[GIMH]

Y'know, it really shouldn't be too far away where we go from labelling their somewhat regular batting collapses against England 'poor batting' to 'good bowling'. England's is surely one of the more under-rated bowling attacks going around.

Not in my house

Definitely.

Gotta string it together though throughout the series. Lost at home after a good first test, let's see if they can beat or at least draw SA away from home.

I can't remember the last time we lost a series after going one up, so presuming we do win this today I'm fairly confident we will at least draw the series

Aaaaaaah that was close

 

[GIMH]

Doesn't matter, yes!