***Official*** 3rd Test at the WACA

[Furball]

Yep. It feels like he's let all the"play your natural game" stuff get to his head, or is distracted.

My theory is that over the last couple of years he's found playing shots so easy that he's forgotten what it's like to be tested.

 

[Furball]

His conversion rate is so much worse away from home (3 hundreds/17 50-99 scores), despite his away record actually being pretty good overall. It's pretty baffling.

His away record is good because he constantly gets 50s, that's always going to make your average look good.

It's basically a rerun of the Shane Watson conundrum, where despite maintaining what at face value looks like an acceptable level of performance, his output isn't actually helping the team a great deal. He gets to 50 more often than Smith (at least, this was true at the start of the Ashes), Smith is just much better at making it count once he gets in.

 

[Spark]

My theory is that over the last couple of years he's found playing shots so easy that he's forgotten what it's like to be tested.

I mean some of his batting in this series has just been mindless. He could really easily have been caught at gully/backward point about three times at Adelaide early on, surely you just have to put that shot away when Starc is angling it across you at 145km/h?

An enormously underrated part of disciplined batting is the ability to say "okay, the bowler's trying to get me out by making me play that shot, therefore I just won't play that shot". Smith has it in spades. Root would be a truly astonishing batsman if he had it to any comparable degree, despite having the much rarer skill of counterattacking in difficult conditions.

 

[Top_Cat]

Tall lefties swinging it at pace is such a rare challenge, though. He can't just not play the shot because otherwise he'll be stood there looking silly when Starc bends one back and takes his off peg. The only comparable bowler Smith himself has faced is Amir, definitely not at his best last series, certainly not as quick as Starc. Compare that to Starc who, in between the dross, is super difficult to face right now. As you yourself have been saying when comparing the English to the Aussie bowlers, the extra pace changes everything and why the other lefties Smith's faced don't really compare.

That tension whether to play or leave, that's literally the tough bit and horribly magnified at 145Km/h vs 135Km/h. One thing that can save you is getting more forward, you negate the swing and it simplifies the decision whether to leave because if it's slightly short, it won't swing enough to come back so you can leave or if it's full, you can get right forward and negate the swing. But Starc being tall ****s with that too; he can throw it up there to swing it and it'll bounce so even if you cover the swing it can take your edge, especially since he more consistently hits the seam than, say, Boult.

Starc being a bit erratic is literally the only thing stopping him from being the most nightmarish quick to face in world cricket right now.

 

[Daemon]

Tall lefties swinging it at pace is such a rare challenge, though. He can't just not play the shot because otherwise he'll be stood there looking silly when Starc bends one back and takes his off peg. The only comparable bowler Smith himself has faced is Amir, definitely not at his best last series, certainly not as quick as Starc. Compare that to Starc who, in between the dross, is super difficult to face right now. As you yourself have been saying when comparing the English to the Aussie bowlers, the extra pace changes everything and why the other lefties Smith's faced don't really compare.

That tension whether to play or leave, that's literally the tough bit and horribly magnified at 145Km/h vs 135Km/h. One thing that can save you is getting more forward, you negate the swing and it simplifies the decision whether to leave because if it's slightly short, it won't swing enough to come back so you can leave or if it's full, you can get right forward and negate the swing. But Starc being tall ****s with that too; he can throw it up there to swing it and it'll bounce so even if you cover the swing it can take your edge, especially since he more consistently hits the seam than, say, Boult.

Starc being a bit erratic is literally the only thing stopping him from being the most nightmarish quick to face in world cricket right now.

He's the sort of bowler you can be hitting boundary after boundary off and still feel relieved when he's taken out of the attack.

 

[Furball]

I mean some of his batting in this series has just been mindless. He could really easily have been caught at gully/backward point about three times at Adelaide early on, surely you just have to put that shot away when Starc is angling it across you at 145km/h?

An enormously underrated part of disciplined batting is the ability to say "okay, the bowler's trying to get me out by making me play that shot, therefore I just won't play that shot". Smith has it in spades. Root would be a truly astonishing batsman if he had it to any comparable degree, despite having the much rarer skill of counterattacking in difficult conditions.

It's not really much different to how he's batted over the last 18 months or so. His two most significant hundreds in the last couple of years have probably been at Cardiff in the last Ashes, and the 190 vs South Africa. In both innings he was dropped on multiple occasions. Difference this time is Australia have the bowlers to trouble him and get him out before he's raising his bat for his 50.

2nd paragraph is what I'm getting at and it's why I keep making reference to Root's stroke play rather than batting. Part of the art of batsmanship is your defence and not getting out, and in Test cricket a solid defence is still at least equally as valuable as the ability to play shots. It's probably more valuable because as the old cliche goes, you can't score runs from the pavilion.

 

[ImpatientLime]

remember when he played that brilliant, disciplined 254 v pakistan in 2016 after being crucified for throwing it away in the previous test? then all that lip service about how he'd learnt his lesson and would play in a more responsible manner going forward? yeah 3 centuries in 37 innings since.

so many english players just plateau and never go on and fulfil that early promise. signs that he's just another in that long list.

 

[S.Kennedy]

I wouldn't write him off yet but he definitely seems like he comes out in one-day mode sometimes. He needs to take some pointers from Boycott. To be honest though Cook has also been coming out and attempting extravagant (pull) shots in the first three overs and he usually epitomises the Presbyterian stodge merchant.

 

[Burgey]

Rodney Hogg on the radio this morning:

We hoped England would be hopeless but we didn’t realise they’d be this hopeless.

 

[Starfighter]

Tall lefties swinging it at pace is such a rare challenge, though. He can't just not play the shot because otherwise he'll be stood there looking silly when Starc bends one back and takes his off peg. The only comparable bowler Smith himself has faced is Amir, definitely not at his best last series, certainly not as quick as Starc. Compare that to Starc who, in between the dross, is super difficult to face right now. As you yourself have been saying when comparing the English to the Aussie bowlers, the extra pace changes everything and why the other lefties Smith's faced don't really compare.

That tension whether to play or leave, that's literally the tough bit and horribly magnified at 145Km/h vs 135Km/h. One thing that can save you is getting more forward, you negate the swing and it simplifies the decision whether to leave because if it's slightly short, it won't swing enough to come back so you can leave or if it's full, you can get right forward and negate the swing. But Starc being tall ****s with that too; he can throw it up there to swing it and it'll bounce so even if you cover the swing it can take your edge, especially since he more consistently hits the seam than, say, Boult.

Starc being a bit erratic is literally the only thing stopping him from being the most nightmarish quick to face in world cricket right now.

Except Starc, or any bowler this series for that matter, has not been swinging the ball past the first few overs or so (and not much swing at that generally) except in the second innings at Adelaide (more our's than England's). The times when Root was threatening to get out like that there was no danger whatsoever that one would swing back because there was no swing. A batsmen should know where Starc is bowling from and what the ball is generally doing. He's going to swing the ball a good amount or not at all, he's not going to produce a random swinging delivery after bowling a whole bunch of non-swinging ones.

The times he's been playing that shot (and also Vince's dismissal second at Adelaide) have nothing to do with the ball threatening the stumps and everything to do with the batsman thinking that they can get a boundary from a ball which they should not be trying to get a boundary from. A delivery on a good length angling away is always going to be dangerous.

 

[Burgey]

Nah, **** that. Throw hands at it and get on with things. #intent

 

[theegyptian]

Bar the odd innings, this is how Root has played the last year or two. He always gives the bowler a chance.

 

[Compton]

Root plays lots of shots.

When he’s in touch it’s a run-a-ball 50, when he’s not it’s a bad looking dismissal.

 

[Top_Cat]

Bloke also has 13 Test tons at 26. So did Cook but Root is also averaging 50+. Bad conversion rate or not, he's world-class.

Except Starc, or any bowler this series for that matter, has not been swinging the ball past the first few overs or so (and not much swing at that generally) except in the second innings at Adelaide (more our's than England's). The times when Root was threatening to get out like that there was no danger whatsoever that one would swing back because there was no swing. A batsmen should know where Starc is bowling from and what the ball is generally doing. He's going to swing the ball a good amount or not at all, he's not going to produce a random swinging delivery after bowling a whole bunch of non-swinging ones.

The times he's been playing that shot (and also Vince's dismissal second at Adelaide) have nothing to do with the ball threatening the stumps and everything to do with the batsman thinking that they can get a boundary from a ball which they should not be trying to get a boundary from. A delivery on a good length angling away is always going to be dangerous.

This is all post-hoc. Also I don't agree at all that the ball hasn't been swinging. Not always ragging outrageously but there was some around in every game and, especially in Adelaide, always plenty of seam movement.

Again, it's less to do with whether Starc is moving them lots or the possibility he might bend even one back. That's the tension lefties play with.

 

[Starfighter]

This is all post-hoc. Also I don't agree at all that the ball hasn't been swinging. Not always ragging outrageously but there was some around in every game and, especially in Adelaide, always plenty of seam movement.

Not really. And never so much movement that batsman could think that a ball passing half-way along the crease is going to swing back.

Again, it's less to do with whether Starc is moving them lots or the possibility he might bend even one back. That's the tension lefties play with.

Except international class batsmen, afaik, are pretty good at judging the line of a ball from the hand. The deliveries that Root has been flirting with are so far from the stumps that it would take an extraordinary event to bring the ball back that far. The shot selection has nothing to do with the possibility that the ball might swing back (an amount that Starc has never produced anywhere) and everything to with Root's (and Vince's) intent to score boundaries off the particular delivery. They're attacking strokes designed to score runs, not defend against an incoming ball, but are being played to the wrong deliveries.

 

[Spark]

Yeah I don't buy that it's just a "holy **** it's Starc" reaction at all. His approach against Starc playing those high-risk shots is consistent with his approach against every other bowler. Starc is hardly unique in drawing some loose strokes from him.

 

[Top_Cat]

Oh sure he goes at them hard. But putting the shot in the kitbag is not a solution mainly because it doesn't minimise the risk of a nick by much anyway. Maybe it's #intent speaking but, were I the coach, I'd not want to see him stop playing those shots and just take the brickbats when it doesn't come off.