**Official** Sri Lanka in England / Scotland - 2011

[Himannv]

pace has never been sri lanka's strong suit. To compound matters we lost malinga. Then we lost dilhara Fernando & nuwan pradeep to injury right before the first test. Although even those guys being there i was pretty confident of our guys not being able to take 20 wickts

Pradeep too only has 60 FC wickets in 57 innings which is poor. These bowlers just are not taking enough wickets. It is quite severe. I'm unsure whether the issue is the pitches or whether the bowlers just aren't good enough, perhaps a bit of both. Is Dammika Prasad injured, he seems the best prospect, to me, outside of Fernando/Malinga un-retiring.

I think Kulasekara is a player that should be thrown into the mix. Sure, he's not going to be a spearhead or anything but he can definitely get more out of these conditions compared to the bowlers we have used so far in this series. Him combined with Fernando and Prasad may be a temporary fix until we find a natural spearhead from somewhere to replace Malinga.

Might be good to give Senanayake a try sooner or later and also give Randiv a few more games. I think those two have a better chance of taking up the spin slots better than Herath and Mendis.

 

[Cevno]

It's a tough comparison. Harris will probably be replaced by Tahir, which is really only a complete unknown coming in for a 5/10 player, but you'd be seriously tempting fate to describe a player like Tahir as a weak link. You can sniff at Jacques Kallis being the third best seamer but at least he means they actually get to have a fourth best seamer. As we saw on Friday, England have to basically temporarily give up an end if there's still a decent partnership going after 60 overs.

There's so much uncertainty around the England attack too. No one can really be sure exactly how good Broad and Finn will turn out, or whether Tremlett can put a decent run of games together when he never managed to before. For most of the Ashes they were a class above any other attack in world cricket, but you really need to assume that they're going to be capable of keeping that up to say they're better than South Africa. It's really just a case of "let's wait and see".

As new ball partnerships go, you need to dust off the bias if you think Anderson-anyone is comparable to Steyn-Morkel. Steyn is better than Anderson and it's not close, and Morkel is better than all other England seamers and it's not close.

Agreed.

Broad is still inconsistent and a bit overrated sometimes,though certainly has potential.
And Tremlett has had only one good series,tbf.

Agreed with the last bit, but it's worth noting that you don't necessarily have to assume Broad, Finn, Tremlett are the only names in the mix. That's one where England have a big advantage over SA IMO.

Agree with this too.
But then ultimately they can only play 4 bowlers and still have to find out who those are.

 

[Cevno]

Depends what you mean by attack. If you're talking about new ball bowlers, I might give it to South Africa (although Morkel has yet to prove himself outside of South Africa). If we're talking about the entire attack, then sorry, there's no way in hell where a side who have Paul Harris as a spinner and where Jacques Kallis is comfortably the 3rd best seamer is better than England's.

Kallis has declined as a bowler the last few years while he may have improved as a batsman.

Tsotsobe is comfortable better than him at the moment.

 

[Howe_zat]

Tremlett is a bit of a strange one, it's easy to forget that he's actually been around for a while, and the impression I get is that he really should have been an international cricketer for three years. A succession of injuries and a few dodgy runs of form just at the wrong times have meant that he hasn't lived up to his potential by any stretch. Yes, he's unproven but it's not like he's a fresh-faced kid out of the academy. He was always good enough.

 

[Himannv]

Regardless of our rubbish bowling attack, I'm enjoying watching us play a test series in England for a change. Good to get out of the subcontinent after so long.

 

[Howe_zat]

Restart in 20 minutes. 75 overs scheduled.

Wonder if we can switch to day/night Tests just for Cardiff.

 

[Manee]

I think Kulasekara is a player that should be thrown into the mix. Sure, he's not going to be a spearhead or anything but he can definitely get more out of these conditions compared to the bowlers we have used so far in this series. Him combined with Fernando and Prasad may be a temporary fix until we find a natural spearhead from somewhere to replace Malinga.

Is Kulasekara not injured? I'd have had him as the first pace bowler out of those who are available, even ahead of Fernando. He swings it and he is actually not slow, he bowls at 130kph and in England, I think he could do a great job. I just assumed he was injured.

Might be good to give Senanayake a try sooner or later and also give Randiv a few more games. I think those two have a better chance of taking up the spin slots better than Herath and Mendis.

Yes. Herath and Mendis do not look like long term Test options.

 

[Cevno]

Tremlett is a bit of a strange one, it's easy to forget that he's actually been around for a while, and the impression I get is that he really should have been an international cricketer for three years. A succession of injuries and a few dodgy runs of form just at the wrong times have meant that he hasn't lived up to his potential by any stretch. Yes, he's unproven but it's not like he's a fresh-faced kid out of the academy. He was always good enough.

Yeah !! Tremlett i rate pretty highly tbh from what i have seen of him ,but he still is unproven.

The only concern with him is his natural length is too short for English conditions and he still has to prove how much he can adapt.
While he will trouble the batsman with that length and look good for most part ,his modes of dismissal shorten with that.
As with his height and that length the LBW and bowled becomes tougher,plus the Batsman get time to adjust to the movement.

Generally the pitch it up swing bowlers like Zaheer and Anderson tend to do better traditionally in England than bang it in the pitch type bowlers like Tremlett who rely more on seam.

 

[Spark]

Raining again? seriously?

 

[TopCat]

Raining again? seriously?

The strange thing is, that there is no rain showing on the radar when I put in CF11 and zoom in on Cardiff!

Must be really light occasional drizzle at most.

 

[grecian]

Restart in 20 minutes. 75 overs scheduled.

Wonder if we can switch to day/night Tests just for Cardiff.

Wonder if we can switch away from Cardiff altogether, **** country, **** weather, **** pitch.

Play all around the counties, but not there.

 

[Furball]

It's a tough comparison. Harris will probably be replaced by Tahir, which is really only a complete unknown coming in for a 5/10 player, but you'd be seriously tempting fate to describe a player like Tahir as a weak link. You can sniff at Jacques Kallis being the third best seamer but at least he means they actually get to have a fourth best seamer. As we saw on Friday, England have to basically temporarily give up an end if there's still a decent partnership going after 60 overs.

There's so much uncertainty around the England attack too. No one can really be sure exactly how good Broad and Finn will turn out, or whether Tremlett can put a decent run of games together when he never managed to before. For most of the Ashes they were a class above any other attack in world cricket, but you really need to assume that they're going to be capable of keeping that up to say they're better than South Africa. It's really just a case of "let's wait and see".

As new ball partnerships go, you need to dust off the bias if you think Anderson-anyone is comparable to Steyn-Morkel. Steyn is better than Anderson and it's not close, and Morkel is better than all other England seamers and it's not close.

WAC.

Might reply to this later.

 

[PhoenixFire]

Which ****ing idiot thought it would be a good idea to have a Test in Cardiff?

 

[Uppercut]

Tremlett is a bit of a strange one, it's easy to forget that he's actually been around for a while, and the impression I get is that he really should have been an international cricketer for three years. A succession of injuries and a few dodgy runs of form just at the wrong times have meant that he hasn't lived up to his potential by any stretch. Yes, he's unproven but it's not like he's a fresh-faced kid out of the academy. He was always good enough.

His fitness is the big concern, really. I've seen nothing to suggest that he's anything other than an excellent test bowler when he plays but he's broken down constantly for the past four years. It'll be a massive bonus if England manage to get a decent test career out of him. But if Watto can kick the injury bug then there's hope for anyone.

 

[Nate]

I've been too busy to watch most of this game, and when I have free time, it's raining. Am refusing to go to bed tonight until I see a Mendis over.

 

[GIMH]

Been no heavy rain all day, just pissy drizzle. Get on with it.

 

[flibbertyjibber]

What odds on it raining again befroe the next alleged start.

Bloody Welsh and their stupid weather, Ryder Cup was same.

 

[keeper]

Which ****ing idiot thought it would be a good idea to have a Test in Cardiff?

The ****ing idiot who received the biggest bid to stage it there. Sadly.

 

[keeper]

Take your time lads.

No rush or anything.

 

[Migara]

The biggest reason for SL pace bowling to go down is nothing but injury. Now imagine this line up playing.

Mathews, Malinga, Fernando, Thushara

All these guys are different to each other and latter three are strike bowlers, and by any means not pedestrian at all. After all they have raw pace, not like the current lot. Malinga is retired, F'do out temporarily, and Thushara is injured too. Then the replacement would be Kulasekara or Prasad, and both are out of form due to various reasons. If SL can field an attack of Mathews, Senanayke, Thushara, Fernando and Welagedara / Kulasekara, I don't see them failing to take 20 wickets.