*Official* Fourth Test at the MCG

[flibbertyjibber]

So basically CWB says our tail are batting like bunnies to prove a point to KP. Glad I know that now.

 

[Hurricane]

Random comments

1) KP would not make a good captain for the sole reason that he is quite quick to not rate certain players. I remember when he decided that Strauss was ****e. Based on the current England team he would probably think that half of the players were crap and that would lead to him being arrogant with the team

2) @CWB - Broad has not batted to his potential in this series and I wouldn't have trusted either him or Bresnan either. It looked like KP was going to trust him in this dig but Broad wasn't interested in building an inning.

 

[Adders]

The idea of installing KP as captain is a sick joke. He has scanty leadership skills and very poor interpersonal skills. His first innings here illustrates this. With Broad - who has scored a test hundred and averages in the mid twenties - at the crease, he played the sort of shot to get out which is only forgiveable when you're Brian Lara, have already scored a big hundred, have thoroughly mastered the opposing attack, and are now batting with a recognized bunny such as a Walsh or an Ambrose. None of those were applicable in the first innings when KP and Broad came together. How many times have we seen Broad and Prior make a happy 50-60 or even bigger partnership in quick time to take the game away from the opposition in similar circumstances? Broad and Prior share good vibes. Broad and KP....not so much. KP was on 71 or so and had at no stage looked on top of the Aussie bowling, and therefore had in no way earned the right to contemptuous hitting out. Moreover, Broad, whatever his failings against Johnson, is no Walsh or Ambrose, and was more than capable of getting a fifty in that situation so long as his senior partner handled him right, gave him confidence and encouragement as required and reminded him above all not to attempt to pull or hook.

KP not only did nothing to encourage Broad, but by his slog sent out a massive "**** you" to him, which probably cost England between 50-100 first innings runs. Come second innings, Broad says to himself "KP wants the world to know he thinks I'm a bunny, and will probably try his calypso slogging from the other end anyway, so I might as well just have fun"...and promptly gets out for a third-ball duck caught slip going for a big drive to Lyon of all people whom I don't rate at all. The subsequent comments by Hussain and Botham which were primarily aimed at Broad to the effect that "Pietersen has done well but the tail end can't bat" (Hussain) and "why can't one of them just hang in there for Pietersen" (Botham) thoroughly missed the point, and failed to factor in the first-innings context, and the selfishness of KP himself which on this occasion as on several others in the past has only brought out the worst in others. I see England as a team functioning well below its potential partly because of the presence of KP.

Apart from the first sentence I really can't agree with much of this.

Have to ask with the bolded section.........have you been watching this series at all?? Where the **** were we ever going to get 50-100 runs from Broad and the rest of the tail?? The shot KP tried was crazy and it's hard to mount any defence for that particular shot selection, but given what our tail has contributed this series I really can't fault his mindset.

 

[CWB304]

So basically CWB says our tail are batting like bunnies to prove a point to KP. Glad I know that now.

No that's not what I wrote.

 

[Cooky Monster]

Prior should be captain after this series, hes had a bad 8 tests but i'ld back him to sort himself out again, Cook just needs to get back to his batting, hes in way over his head being captain.

 

[Spikey]

thank god australia never did anything whenever half the country wanted clarke dropped/sacked as captain/deported

 

[Adders]

Prior should be captain after this series, hes had a bad 8 tests but i'ld back him to sort himself out again, Cook just needs to get back to his batting, hes in way over his head being captain.

Yeah good plan, give the captaincy to a bloke that currently can't hold his spot in the team.

 

[Spark]

KP isn't making Broad et al look like bunnies. They've done that job fine themselves.

 

[wpdavid]

Yeah me and my brother were talking about that today. Maybe you just need to do a Graeme Smith and give it to Root or something?

How was it received in south af when he got made captain at (iirc) 22?

I don't think they were keen. Lots of comments about the youngster being a political appointment who wouldn't rattle any cages about the positive discrimination that was muddling selection policies. Plus it was always silly to sack Pollock because of the DL screw-up in the 2003 WC.

But I don't think that Root is made of the same stuff as Smith, and I really don't think it would be fair on the boy to put him in charge.

 

[wpdavid]

KP as captain is just ridiculous, never gonna happen and not even worth tabling for discussion.

because ...?

 

[Spark]

I mean, really. What was KP meant to do? Take the single, expose Broad to Mitch in the first innings because that's gone so well, and expose Anderson in the second?

 

[CWB304]

KP isn't making Broad et al look like bunnies. They've done that job fine themselves.

Gee, I guess "Global Moderator" means someone thinks he has a license to throw straw men around with impunity. In case you're genuinely confused, I didn't write, mean, suggest, or hint that Pietersen was "making Broad et al look like bunnies". The points I was making were altogether more nuanced. Point one, that by slogging before giving Broad a chance to show what he could do, he wasn't doing a very good job of encouraging and getting the best out of the lower order batter...which is what he should have been doing given the match situation. Point two is that when you do what KP did in the first innings you create a self-fulfilling prophesy: the surest way to get a lower order batsman to bat like Broad did in the second innings is to show the disdain for his batting ability that Pietersen did in the first innings. In case you hadn't noticed, Broad *has* got runs on a couple of occasions in this series; at times he has looked better than some of the top order. The issue is not lower order "bunnies". The issue is that even in a series when no. 8/9 Broad has performed so poorly with the bat, there still isn't all that much to choose between his aggregate/average and those of some of the top order batters.

 

[ajdude]

i always just thought spark changed his custom title to Global Moderator after he racked up enough posts

 

[Dan]

CWB, there'd been 3 previous Tests in which Broad showed he had no aptitude for handling the best of Johnson. While I agree KP's shot was absolute rubbish, the idea that he could have huge amounts of faith in Broad and company is pretty flawed, given that while Broad has got runs (and apparently looked better than the top order, like that's a compliment), he's also been prone to, y'know, running away from the ball and getting bowled. KP simply couldn't know which Broad would show up, and while I think he may have been premature in trying to hit everything (and practicing dire shot selection in trying to hit a Johnson inswinger to Mars), the idea that his shot cost England 100 runs is absolutely ludicrous.

EDIT:

[mod] Also, would rather you play Spark as a poster and not as a mod. Whether he's a mod or not has nothing to do with his post or argument. Given you're trying to pin his argument on straw men, invoking ad hominem isn't a great response. [/mod]

 

[uvelocity]

yeah he did there was a thread about it and everything. think king_pietersen suggested it tbh

 

[social]

Obvious that there are too many cooks (no pun intended) in the English team as everyone seems to get a say and it is blatantly obvious that current setup is not working

Hard decisions may need to be made and plenty could lose their livelihood but first consideration needs to be given to Cook as guy is 29, has just become the youngest player in history to 8000 runs and could play for another 7-8 years ending up with the guts of 14000 runs so don't throw the baby out with the bathwater

 

[Spark]

Let's be real here. The majority of Broad's runs in this series have come when he's simply thrown the bat, which is hardly a reassuring way of getting runs. And since Johnson's worked out that Broad really doesn't like fast yorkers early on - which is hardly news, to be honest - he hasn't so much as looked like getting the ball off the square against Johnson.

As for Anderson and Panesar...

 

[Adders]

In the first innings at the WACA Mitchell Johnson nearly broke Broads ankle, he got him out with the exact same delivery and hit him on the same sore spot here in Melbourne.........unless we want our best bowler finishing the series on crutches the less he sees of MJ the better as far as I'm concerned.

The shot KP played in the first innings here is impossible to defend but I do not blame the thought process that was behind it.

 

[Spikey]

It amuses me that so much discussion is taking place over that shot, like it did with Rad Haddin in 9/21

 

[Spark]

In the first innings at the WACA Mitchell Johnson nearly broke Broads ankle, he got him out with the exact same delivery and hit him on the same sore spot here in Melbourne.........unless we want our best bowler finishing the series on crutches the less he sees of MJ the better as far as I'm concerned.

The shot KP played in the first innings here is impossible to defend but I do not blame the thought process that was behind it.

Yeah the shot was dreadful. But he had the right idea. Generally speaking, full yorkers against a new Broad is a pretty good tactic, especially when he's camped on the back foot because of the short ball.