NZTailender
I can't believe I ate the whole thing
And when Australia and New Zealand play at the end of the month, the winner of that will be the best in the world. It's rubbish to speculate right now.
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Your best current test team is..
- Thread starter Pratters
- Start date
Black_Warrior
Cricketer Of The Year
Yes. If Australia win in New Zealand, then they make a legitimate case as people are holding their away record against them.
Speculating is all the fun man. When you have 6 closely ranked teams, this is the best part of it.
smash84
The Tiger King
Did you watch the series they lost 0-2 in the UAE (probably not)? They ran Pakistan mighty close.
kiwiviktor81
International Debutant
With no clear leader it's a great opportunity for the BCs to fluke the No. 1 ranking for a few weeks after some tinny result.
NZTailender
I can't believe I ate the whole thing
Eh, not really. You can argue as much as you want but there isn't going to be a clear number 1 until one team starts racking up wins away just as much as they do at home. And the argument for which team you consider number 1 out of the 6 contenders right now can be applied to all the teams anyway. They're all pretty strong at homes with some random away wins. Except for England, who lost to Sri Lanka and India at home in the last 4 years so for me they're towards the bottom of the pile
NZTailender
I can't believe I ate the whole thing
2 losses by over 100 runs. They competed well but couldn't do it for the whole match.
Niall
International Coach
Pretty much this. The first test was meandering to a dull draw until an LOL collapse, second test England were unlucky not to save it, but were out of the running to win it very early on and third test despite a poor start was a comfortable win for Pakistan.
Bear in mind, Yasir missed the first test, the useless Shan played 2 tests (free wicket) Azhar was injured and the silliness on the eve of the first test with Gohar.
In saying that though, I think England will be handing them an absolute trashing this Summer despite the quality of their bowlers. Anderson and broad in England conditions against that batting line up is going to be absolute carnage.
You'd also expect England to beat Lanka although not as sure it will be as easy as Pakistan due to the Matthews factor and that a lot of their batsmen have some experience outside SC and in England quite recently unlike the Pakistani batsmen who have been in the SC exclusively for long long time.
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Black_Warrior
Cricketer Of The Year
2016-2007 = 9Eh, not really. You can argue as much as you want but there isn't going to be a clear number 1 until one team starts racking up wins away just as much as they do at home. And the argument for which team you consider number 1 out of the 6 contenders right now can be applied to all the teams anyway. They're all pretty strong at homes with some random away wins. Except for England, who lost to Sri Lanka and India at home in the last 4 years so for me they're towards the bottom of the pile
NZTailender
I can't believe I ate the whole thing
Oops, so you're right. edit: was thinking of the recent India tour of England which I thought was 2-2 and not 3-1 for some reason.
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TheJediBrah
Request Your Custom Title Now!
actually a good post. The sheer certainty so many are having over "England are the no. 1" is a bit laughable. They've had a few good Test matches and couldn't beat NZ at home or WI in the last year.
There's simply no outright no. 1 at all atm. England are as well places as any to get there though, their team looks very good atm but it's hard to say how much that opinion has been affected by a couple of good recent performances and whether it will hold up.
And yet Australia have a better recent away record than any other side except for SA
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AndyZaltzHair
Hall of Fame Member
I would vote for England as no 1 now and Pakistan as second.
England vs Pakistan in July will decide no 1 again
England vs Pakistan in July will decide no 1 again
hendrix
Hall of Fame Member
Since then, England have improved and NZ have gone backwards. Australia have improved as well, but don't have the overseas record England have. Ditto re: India. Pakistan have lost Yasir and haven't done much overseas anyway. SA have backpedaled out of sight.
Hence, England the clear number 1. It's not by much but it's pretty clear.
Spark
Global Moderator
Hmm, England's overseas record basically boils down to the SA win, as the India 2012 win is a bit in the distance now. Which is exactly the same as the Aus overseason record.
TNT
Banned
How does that work, I'm only asking because Australia have a better record depending on how you view it, so I'm interested in how you conclude that.
hendrix
Hall of Fame Member
yeah fair.
Just feel England were beaten down a little less than Aus in the UAE.
I was going to say that they seem like their personnel would perform overseas better but that's probably not fair given Anderson and Broad don't actually have particularly good overseas records.
TheJediBrah
Request Your Custom Title Now!
Can't agree with that at all. And the recent Aus overseas record is comfortably better than England's.
Except agree that SA definitely seem to be out of the mix.
TNT
Banned
another thing to include is the home record, Aus have only lost 1 of their last 22 home matches in the last 4 years compared to Eng who have lost 7 of 27.
Reduce that to 2 years and Aus have won 6 and lost 0 while Eng have won 7 and lost 5.
flibbertyjibber
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I can see the arguments for all sides in this such is the murky state of cricket at the top at present but if England have a good home summer and beat both Sri Lanka and Pakistan there is a fair chance they will top the rankings by September. Safe to say whoever is ranked number 1 now or in September wouldn't beat the great Aussie side of the 90's onwards, the England side that got to number 1 the Saffer team under Smith or Dhoni's side that got to the top.
Having said that we are in a transition phase and each side has some very exciting players making their mark on the game at present and we don't quite know how good these guys are in comparison to the ones of the previous top sides. A fun year or so ahead I think.
Having said that we are in a transition phase and each side has some very exciting players making their mark on the game at present and we don't quite know how good these guys are in comparison to the ones of the previous top sides. A fun year or so ahead I think.