*Official* England Tour of West Indies 2019

[SillyCowCorner1]

First hundred run partnership for England this series

Well done lads

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Kraigg-Chase in tandem.

We're killing this over rate now

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

They can go all the way up to 6PM?

We might get 90 overs... (hopeful)

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

New ball taken

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Roach us spraying the new cherry all over. Not what was expected.

Personally I would not have taken it today. Let the spinners bowl and get close to 90 overs.

And at the start of play tomorrow, take it then.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

England's session.

Good batting by these two. Hundreds are in store for them

 

[Beamer]

Well played England, that was a performance worthy of a test match batting lineup.

I don't think we were at our best tbh. A little bit of zip was lacking and I really don't rate Kraigg as a captain, he lets things drift.

Thought Keemo was excellent though.

 

[Beamer]

Also Shannon Gabriel is still taking 10 minutes per over even now. He'll get Kraigg banned for our next test!

 

[Contra]

Joe Root is such an amazing batsmen overseas /hack.

 

[Bijed]

I know I already linked to it in the CW Twitter thread, but I'll cheekily mention my Twitter feed here too.

Anyway, a few thoughts from today:

• Roach was disappointing. Granted, he was unlucky with the dropped catch early on, but he generally bowled too wide a line and wasted the first new ball. He was better with the second, but still not great. I think all the bowlers other than Paul were underwhelming tbh
• Root's dismissal was abysmal and was especially annoying as he'd got past a scratchy start to the innings and was starting to look good
• The bad drop at slip aside, the West Indies fielding was pretty good, lots of impressive stops
• Too many extras given away, especially sides
• Both had their moments of fortune, but Stokes and Buttler were very impressive and played some great shots. Did a very good job of just milking Chase and not trying to force the pace unnecessarily

But overall, it was a very enjoyable day and the Darren Sammy ground is a nice venue

 

[Starfighter]

Is this one of those times where the WG Grace dictum of always batting first should have applied?

Not even being able to get through 13 overs an hour really is pathetic.

 

[Burgey]

Good to see the thug make a few runs.

 

[Bijed]

Is this one of those times where the WG Grace dictum of always batting first should have applied?

Not even being able to get through 13 overs an hour really is pathetic.

I think Braithwaite probably did make the wrong call, though the pitch was a bit green, but even so, if they'd held that first catch and not bowled so poorly with the new ball they'd probably have had us in plenty of trouble anyway

 

[MW1304]

Joe Root is such an amazing batsmen overseas /hack.

Cool post

 

[Cow]

Good to see the thug make a few runs.

Any problems sleeping last night?

 

[Daemon]

Really starting to feel it’s the captaincy that’s got to Root’s batting. Just seems to play worse and worse the poorer his side is doing. He certainly looked a lot more free in SL.

 

[trundler]

It was a Denly-like shot from Root. Stokes and Buttler had really jammy starts.

 

[GoodAreasShane]

Root has always been a pretty ordinary captain, but now that his batting is starting to splutter questions must be asked if he would be better without leadership responsibilities. Trouble is the lack of alternatives, Anderson is probably too old and Stokes is too unhinged. Heard some proposing Eoin Morgan as a specialist Test captain, but he hardly even plays FC cricket anymore

 

[OverratedSanity]

Given his talent and achievements at Test level, Root seriously has to be one of the most ill disciplined batsmen of his calibre I've ever seen

There's definitely something very flaky about his batting. Looks as good as any batsman when he's playing well, but the innings yesterday shows he doesn't yet have the necessary ruthlessness required to be a genuine great. He looked scratchy and was lucky to survive his first few overs, but didn't take advantage. Doesn't get enough ugly runs imo. His 70s/tons are almost always fluent and free flowing, just doesnt find a way to get runs when he's batting poorly.

If Smith has a scratchy start like that and gets a bit of good fortune early, it's almost a guaranted ton.

 

[vcs]

He batted pretty well but threw away so many 60s and 70s in India and Australia. Looked in great touch but didn't put up the quality numbers he should have, the way Kohli and Smith have done.