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***Official*** 2nd Test at Adelaide

Burgey

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The GOAT just turning it on for the fans these days. He’s some cricketer these days.
 

adub

International Captain
Gaz > left handers

Looking forward to have a bowl with the new pill under lights
#positivethinkingjoerootstyle
 

Starfighter

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Nice time for my computer to freeze up.

Let's see if Woakes' batting proves to be more than theoretical this time.
 

mr_mister

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
When was the last time England flew out someone on a plane just because of a lack of form from the players mid series? So the Stokes situation is different, and I know for injuries you bring over people. But it'd be so funny if they were like nah we need to replace 2-3 batsmen and we only have Ballance and Foakes in reserve. So buy a ticket for Westley too
 

Chrish

International Debutant
Didn't Root/Smith play against the same SL bowling? The racism I am talking about is undermining Kohli/India's records by saying that playing in/against SL is just like a home game for India.
Weren't you the one banned for making derogatory remark before?
 

stephen

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Lyon just continues to refuse to allow us to marginalise him behind our seamers. He's been brilliant for the last 12 months. He could always bowl at home but now that he's figured out how to bowl away his game is insanely good.
 

Motorwada

Banned
So here is the thing. I was talking more recently about a quirk of the scheduling giving the Indian ranking a boost.

There's nothing at all racist about saying that subcontinent wickets right now are all very similar. The strengths of all three teams that play at home in the subcontinent are similar and the characteristics of the pitches are similar.

Australia and South Africa have very similar conditions and England and New Zealand have similar conditions to each other. I would expect if there was a decent gap between the two sides then one side would have the upper hand in each of these match ups too. Australia and South Africa are pretty evenly matched though. And England haven't played in New Zealand in the last 4 years (4 years is a much better frame to look at than 5 since 5 takes us past the tour cycle).

And looking at India's record over the last 4 years they've won a single match vs England and lost or drawn every away/neutral match since outside Sri Lanka or the West Indies.

Saying that they have the best away record over the last 4 years is true but not by much at all. They are clearly the best team on low, slow pitches. In the last two years they have played virtually all of their cricket on such pitches, meaning that the rankings don't truly reflect where they're at (since the rankings strongly favour the last two years).

Combined with the fact that they don't play the second best subcontinent team (a team which was ranked #1 during this time) it's hard to tell where India truly are. This also means that their players haven't been thoroughly tested in foreign conditions. Hence the comments about the stats.

Kohli I rate very highly. The rest of the Indian batsmen have a lot to prove. Whether Root/Williamson are better than Kohli or not is up for debate since both are to shelf batsmen. Smith is way ahead of the other three in tests.

I daresay that India over the next two years have their golden opportunity to cement themselves as the best team in the world.
Isn't that true of all nations - Aus has won a single match vs India and lost or drawn every away/neutral match in Asia outside Bangladesh, England have won 0, SA have won 1, NZ (of all teams) have won 2. Even against Bangladesh these teams could not win and drew their series (SA at least had rain interruptions although they conceded a lead, Aus/Eng lost matches). Not to mention the fact that they keep losing home matches/series to each other (and England to everyone).

India is the only team to have won series against ALL teams in their last series in India. So India has a home record rivaling the greatest teams of all time (20-1 since the 2012 England defeat) and an away record which although not very good is still better than others means India is definitely the no 1 team and the best team.

As far as playing against the second best subcontinent team there are political reasons for that and considering the fact that the same SL team we just whitewashed away and are beating now just whitewashed Pakistan in their fortress is there any doubt where we stand in regards to that Pakistan team. People might say Misbah/Younis etc but they have retired and we are talking of now.

Being no 1 means being better than the others, doesn't mean being an 80s Windies or a 00's Australia.

If India do well in the next two years it does not cement India as the best team currently (which it already is) but one of the best teams of all time.
 
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Adders

Cricketer Of The Year
Just come home from work and honestly, I can't even bring myself to turn on the TV to watch this. I've never felt like that before, not even during the other 2 whitewashes.

Englands killed cricket.
 

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