How good a pair are Harmison and Flintoff ?

[a massive zebra]

But Trescothick, Vaughan (top all-rounder), Strauss, Gough, Giles - all are clearly too good for Australia (as I am clearly too good for you, friend)?

Whats your point?

Trescothick has played against them before and struggled, Vaughan made hay but has long since declined, Gough has never starred in Ashes series and it is blindingly obvious that Giles is not too good for Australia.

 

[a massive zebra]

I agree with that one, the game proved nothing as far as future contests go, England were better on the day and played extremely well.

Exactly

(1000 posts!!!!!!!!)

 

[luckyeddie]

Exactly

(1000 posts!!!!!!!!)

But you implied 5 minutes ago that neither, arguably, were good enough. Honestly. You're about as consistent as Steve Wayward-Ha.... Brett Lee. Yes, that's right.

Well done on the big one oh oh oh, incidentally. I know we have often not seen eye to eye, but debating with you is more rewarding than some I could mention.

 

[marc71178]

I mean, who would have ever guessed, in January 2003, that someone who maintained that Vaughan should not be opening the batting in Test-cricket (like me) would turn-out to be right after all?

Right, so we're not allowed to claim that we're right about Harmison and Flintoff because they've not done it against Australia, South Africa (away) or India (away), yet you can now say you're right about Vaughan, even though he's not done it against SA or India away (although he did do rather well agianst Australia I seem to remember)

At the moment, he averages 13 less at 4 than opening, so how are you proven right?

 

[a massive zebra]

But you implied 5 minutes ago that neither, arguably, were good enough. Honestly. You're about as consistent as Steve Wayward-Ha.... Brett Lee. Yes, that's right.

No, I responded to your comment by saying that, after this failure, you could just as easily conclude that that they are not good enough . I am not for one minute suggesting they are or are not up to it...

 

[marc71178]

It's shorter - and less to the point, and less accurate.

Pedant is also short, but it is to the point and accurate.

Everyone knows what it means in real terms.

 

[luckyeddie]

Whats your point?

Trescothick has played against them before and struggled, Vaughan made hey but has long since declined, Gough has never starred in Ashes series and it is blindingly obvious that Giles is not too good for Australia.

Just highlighting the players who were actually responsible for doing the damage. Now if the good players start contributing soon, we might actually draw a test with Australia next year (if it rains)

 

[marc71178]

interesting neither of them did much against Australia last night

Yet we still won (and we were playing Solanki so did it with 10 men )

 

[a massive zebra]

Well done on the big one oh oh oh, incidentally. I know we have often not seen eye to eye, but debating with you is more rewarding than some I could mention.

Thank you....and ditto.

I must say that you are by far the most entertaining cricketweb member (but you knew that anyway)

 

[marc71178]

Trescothick has played against them before and struggled, Vaughan made hey but has long since declined, Gough has never starred in Ashes series and it is blindingly obvious that Giles is not too good for Australia.

Yet all 4 performed really well today.

Could it be that as a side, England are improving?

Mind you the way it is, if we were to win the Ashes next year, there'd be people on here writing it off because the Aussies are past it.

 

[Craig]

Tell me last time France actually played quality opposition.

He has played against the likes of Holland, Italy, Portugal in the last four or so years and even England.

 

[marc71178]

In friendlies...

 

[Richard]

this is what confuses me..you go on about how good Caddick was for that short period of time a few years back compared to Harmison (the use of their averages was meant to prove this I think)..but now you are knocking people for using the figures in the scorebook as a way of judging success or failure..an average is just a culmination of what goes into the scorebook isnt it.

make your mind up

It all comes down to the fact that I believe Harmison is flattered by his figures of the last 7 months, I don't believe Caddick was in his 24 month-period of referance.

 

[Richard]

Harmison did well on a pitch that didn't help him one iota, but unfortunately it was one of those days when the edges went for runs instead of wickets. Still he compares well with some of the Aussie bowling figures...

And yet the thing that is supposed to be so special about Harmison is that the pitch doesn't matter - he can bowl well on any surface...

 

[Richard]

Right, so we're not allowed to claim that we're right about Harmison and Flintoff because they've not done it against Australia, South Africa (away) or India (away), yet you can now say you're right about Vaughan, even though he's not done it against SA or India away (although he did do rather well agianst Australia I seem to remember)

At the moment, he averages 13 less at 4 than opening, so how are you proven right?

Because the scorebook-average isn't what counts with Vaughan-the-opener, it's the first-chance one, and that's all I've ever claimed a case on. In 2002, he was nowhere near as good as he seemed to be, and in 2003, when his luck dried-up, that was shown with 3 exceptions.
Vaughan-the-middle-order-player has actually done pretty well against India away (his first-chance average is infinate, because he got 2 poor decisions and a not-out in his 3 innings, in which he scored something like 100 runs), and he'll get the chance to take on all three in the next year. I'm very confident he'll play very well at four.

 

[Richard]

Pedant is also short, but it is to the point and accurate.

Everyone knows what it means in real terms.

Everyone knows that a poor term means something other than what it suggests.
Personally I think I'll just stick to criticising it's use, and let you call me a pedant so many times everyone else'll get bored of it, too.

 

[Richard]

Whats your point?

Trescothick has played against them before and struggled, Vaughan made hay but has long since declined, Gough has never starred in Ashes series and it is blindingly obvious that Giles is not too good for Australia.

Trescothick has played some good innings against Australia, almost always in partnership with Nick Knight, and finally one has resulted in a victory, unlike his previous plenty.
Vaughan's average against Australia is actually, rather surprisingly, better than against the rest.
Gough has actually starred in Ashes (he's just never been on the winning side or quite got the rewards he could have) and he's certainly played a part in beating them in ODIs before now.
My prediction is that Giles will be too good for Australia (unless Hayden can farm the strike against him) like he's been too good for everyone else on a sufficiently turning (or stopping, like yesterday) pitch in both Tests and ODIs. And my prediction is that he'll be useless on a normal pitch against them the same as against everyone else.

 

[Richard]

or another way of looking at it is that one game proves jack ****

1 ODI makes a tiny suggestion as to how the next summer's 7 ODIs (don't think I'm being TOO complacent there, can't somehow see Bangladesh reaching the NWS final) will go.
It provides nothing as to suggestion of how Test-matches might go.
Anyone attempting to read anything into it is very stupid indeed.

 

[Scaly piscine]

More tosh from Richard, I watched most of home series against India when Vaughan got some big scores (on some pretty batsmen-friendly wickets) which was really his breakthrough season and most of those big scores he got dropped or a bad decision in his favour 2-3 times. The thing that seems to be totally beyond your comprehension is that luck evens itself out over time.

 

[marc71178]

I don't believe Caddick was in his 24 month-period of referance.

Even when the period was broken down and it was showed how skewed it was by series like 2000 when the scoring was so low?