Michael "Frosty" Beer

[GotSpin]

Love this post to bits, agree totally. So nonsensical.

Also enjoyed this article. Like Adamc just brought up, and the article mentions, I'm positive that had Warne not mentioned Beer (and I doubt it was much more than a throwaway sentence in his column), the bloke wouldn't be this close to his Test debut.

It's amazing how much the words of Warne influence the selectors.

 

[vcs]

The mismanagement of Australian spinners by the selectors has been truly poor. The selectors are not at fault for the quality of bowlers on the circuit, but some logic in selections would be fantastic.

Looking back to Bangladesh in 2006 when the selectors made the good call of selecting Dan Cullen. That was a forward thinking move, Cullen was coming off a massive 43 first class wicket season and looked a supreme talent. The selectors simply cut him off after the one Test he played. How about keeping him around the ODI setup? Four years later, and Cullen almost looks stamped as 'career over' at the age of 26.

The selection of Beau Casson at the time was questionable, and yet considering what has happened in the past month would pass as a good move today. They give Casson one Test match, he actually bowls quite well, and then they never select him again. Casson suffers from a complete loss of confidence and will now likely make the NSW team more for his batting than his bowling. At 28, another career looks destroyed.

They take White to India as the number one spinner. This is despite the fact that White has almost completely ceased bowling his leg-breaks. Is it a shock that White struggles to take a wicket?

Selecting Krejza was a brave move considering he had done little in his first class career other than show the ability to bowl a massive off-break. In a surprise twist, Krejza bowls out of his skin in India. They bring him back to Australia, and discard him after one Test. Surely he was worth persisting with?

McGain should have been persisted with for more than 1 Test. It was a terrible performance by him, but considering they gave North > 20 Tests to prove himself a failure, how about give the only consistent spinner in this country of the past 5 years more of a chance.

They select the completely underserving Hauritz and he proves to be a solid Test spinner. Discarded after one poor series in India (despite returning from a massive layoff). They select the promising Smith, he does better than many expected, and then the selectors have hardly shown interest again until today. They select the proven first class failure in Doherty based on 1 good first class game, and 2 good ODI games. It’s funny how the bowler with a first class average of 50 struggles to take a wicket at Test level.. Let's not forget they took Holland to India two seasons ago for the experience, and then never take a look at him again. They take O'Keefe to England, they select him for Australia 'A' and now don't want to touch him.

....and Michael Beer...WTF???????? I worry that Chris Simpson might return for Queensland and take three wickets and be selected for Australia. What is going on at the moment?

That is shocking, "Indian pacer wheel of mediocrity" type stuff. I always wonder how bowlers like Brad Hogg, Bracken and Tait come out for Australia and suddenly look world-class in a World Cup but completely fail in the Test arena. Brad Hogg was fantastic in the '07 WC, nobody was able to pick up his googly.

 

[GotSpin]

That is shocking, "Indian pacer wheel of mediocrity" type stuff. I always wonder how bowlers like Brad Hogg, Bracken and Tait come out for Australia and suddenly look world-class in a World Cup but completely fail in the Test arena. Brad Hogg was fantastic in the '07 WC, nobody was able to pick up his googly.

Calling our spinners mediocre is very much a compliment.

 

[Neil Pickup]

One of my colleagues mentioned this selection to me at lunch today and I couldn't stop laughing for the next minute. It took some explaining to random boarders.

Panic stations much?

 

[joels344]

I've never seen Beer bowl, so I cannot fully criticize him, yet. That being said, just looking at his First-class numbers alone, he's not very impressive at all. Only 5 FC matches, not even a 4 wicket haul, an average of almost 40, an economy rate above 3.50, and he's already getting a baggy green? That's just ridiculous.

 

[Rant0r]

Hilditch reckons that there's a huge gap between the Shield and Test cricket now, so he wouldn't let Johnson go back to WA, so what are we supposed to gauge players on ? Net Form ? Now they want to get rid of the Shield Final in favour of more t20... *shakes head*

And to think they sacked Merv

 

[simmy]

Has to be in contention for title of "Most Undeserving Test Cricketer in History"

Given that I'm not amongst the 8 people who have seen him bowl at fc level, I cant comment any further

Since Xavier Doherty?

Bless him, he might not get to keep his one achievement for long...

 

[Rant0r]

Lol @ that Chris Simpson comment earlier by the way

 

[pup11]

Rightio, may as well start a thread based on him, maybe keep some of the discussion in the Match thread about the match.

Have played quite a bit of cricket against Beery. He was stuck behind McGain and Jon Holland here in Victoria, but had three or four huge grade seasons before WA approached him. He'd been given a number of 2nd XI games for Victoria, but hadn't done too well.

He's not a huge spinner of the ball, he has tended to get most of his wickets in grade cricket with sliders and quicker balls; LBWs and bowled plenty of the time. Very yappy and confident guy.

Sounds like we have Doherty 2.0 on our hands here, pretty much the same things were said about him before Brisbane.
Anyways agree completly with what Noble one said, also just read that Hilditch believes that left arm orthodox is the way forward not only for the Ashes but also for the future, which pretty much means mean likes of Hauritz, Cullens, Boyce, Krezja should look for some other job.....

 

[Xuhaib]

I hope Jack is still taking the sport seriously might get a test cap at Sydney.

 

[Teja.]

I don't get it.You pick a spinner for variety when there isn't much in quality between the spinner and a pacer above whom the spinner is being picked.

I simply don't buy the argument that Beer is close to as good a bowler as Johnson is. Johnson for being terrible for one match certainly doesn't deserve to be dropped, particularly for Micheal Beer.It's pretty easy to forget that the man has about 170 wickets in about 40 games.

I don't know that much about the Aussie FC set-up but I assume there are atleast 5-10 better FC bowlers than Beer in the country.

FMD, This is like the BCCI picking Granika Prasad for the SA tour because Sachin makes a passing comment about him having talent.

 

[pup11]

Hilditch reckons that there's a huge gap between the Shield and Test cricket now, so he wouldn't let Johnson go back to WA, so what are we supposed to gauge players on ? Net Form ? Now they want to get rid of the Shield Final in favour of more t20... *shakes head*

And to think they sacked Merv

The gap is only going to get wider if this nonsense isn't stopped, I mean a young athlete would hardly see any future for himself in cricket if this is how future Australian sides keep getting picked.

 

[Rant0r]

State contracts help that, but sometimes they hinder as well. Young blokes work to get their contract then do the minimum possible to keep it, see Cosgrove and Pomersbach, lost talents

 

[Faisal1985]

Heard this guy knows the pitch much better at Perth....not sure how good he is though.

 

[Rant0r]

Not sure how, considering he's only been living in the state for 6 months, another wonderful justification for selection by Hilditch

 

[flibbertyjibber]

The one redeeming feature about Doherty's selection was that he had been bowling well in OD cricket and returned good figures in his ODI debut, as well as recently taking a 5-fer in the Shield. Beer on the other hand has absolutely nothing, not even a 4 wicket haul FFS.

AWTA

The worst thing is the fact that Hilditch says a SLA is the way to go and O'Keefe is totally ignored.

Seems strange to me from afar, some of these selections are as bizarre as what we used to have to put up with in the 90's.

 

[Prince EWS]

Heard this guy knows the pitch much better at Perth....not sure how good he is though.

He averages more in Perth than he does in his career and he'd been playing cricket grade in Melbourne up until this season.

If you were going to pick a spinner because of local knowledge then it'd have to be North.

 

[joels344]

I was never impressed with Nathan Hauritz as a spin bowler, but it's a real shame that the selections went with Beer, instead of him. Beer might do well, but his experience worries me. At least Hauritz has some test experience.

 

[Xuhaib]

even though Nathan was poor in India but his performances in the last Ashes and last home summer surely meant he should have been starting atleast the first 3 tests.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Heck of a Hail Mary, it really is. I've never seen the boy bowl, but the selection does look rather a desperate one.

At the start of the series Australia named an unnecessarily bloated (IIRC) 17 man squad, of of whom was Hauritz. Hauritz was overlooked for Doherty (also a punt, but one at least based on some form in internationals, albeit limited overs) but goes away, performs with bat and ball and now sees another bowler, one not named in the original inflated squad, named ahead of him.

If I was Doogie I'd wonder what I'd done, tbh. One might also wonder why an SLA bowler who played second fiddle to Holland at Vic and was overlooked for O'Keefe as recently as the Oz "A" fixture is now a better prospect than either.