***Official*** England in India

[TT Boy]

thats a good side from my point of view, but would like to see hoggard in the team, he has been a major player for england for a while now..

Non existent in Pakistan other than being cannon fodder but I would go with him just because I don't think any spinner we currently have could do a decent job, are seamers are the only people who can win this for us.

 

[honestbharani]

I don't think England batsmen are capable of facing the deadly trio of Harb-Kumble on spin oriented Indian pitches, you don't learn over night how to cope with such class bowlers.

Also i think England batting is weak, they badly need someone like Grame Thorpe to strengthen their middle order batting lineup.

ARe bhajji and Kumble so good that they become a TRIO now?

 

[Scaly piscine]

ARe bhajji and Kumble so good that they become a TRIO now?

I think they were including 'spin oriented Indian pitches' as part of the trio.

As I keep saying with Hoggard - he's a luxury England can't afford in India.

 

[Nishant]

V Sehwag
G Gambhir / W Jaffer / D Jadhav
R Dravid
S Tendulkar
VVS Laxman
MS Dhoni
I Pathan
A Kumble
M Patel / Z Khan
Harbhajan
RP Singh / Sreesanth / VR Singh
Reserves: Y Singh, S Ganguly, opener (among the 3 above), seamer

Get rid of one of the seamers and put in Y singh.

 

[tooextracool]

Two of the three tests Udal bowled in had results, whereas the two tests Harbhajan bowled in didn't even have 4 innings of batting.

Yes Udal bowled on flat wickets, however the two Harbhajan bowled on were a fair bit worse. In particular the first test, which everyone knows was one of the flattest wickets ever.

There's no doubt Harbhajan has been in poor form though, and he didn't bowl well all tour. Maybe you're right, and Udal isn't as bad as some of those here make him out to be. I mean after day 1 of the 1st test a few were claiming he should be in for Giles permanently, but that changed quickly. I just can't see him troubling the Indian batsman, even on turning wickets, if the Indians were able to handle Murali fairly well. It would just make no sense at all if he had a good tour.

I'd say that the wicket in lahore against england was just as flat as the wickets in the series against india, there was just plenty of mediocre batting from the england batting lineup. The first test in multan however is a different story, and he should at least have taken more than 0 wickets in the 2nd inning when the ball was clearly turning.

 

[tooextracool]

Only if they move the ball around, or they happen to bowl at Vaughan or the tailenders.

or perhaps if they have a half decent slower ball?

 

[kvemuri]

Left out Sachin as he's past his best

Can only shake my head, underestimate such a great batsman at your own peril. The English media has written SRT off too, I hope he makes them eat their own words.

 

[tooextracool]

On an unrelated note, am I the only one to notice this gem from quote... unquote?

"We want to try and win in India."
Michael Vaughan states the bleeding obvious before boarding the plane to India

beats, "we're going to try and win 3-0" anyday.....

 

[superkingdave]

wow, Richard back and now TEC - its sure going to be busy round here

 

[tooextracool]

If they do that I'd be willing to say England won't win. Its their seamers that are going to be the main reason if they do win the series. I just can't understand why they'd go in with 2 spinners. If there is anything to be learnt about how to defeat India in India, its through sheer brilliant fast bowling. See Allan Donald, Glenn McGrath and Jason Gillespie for examples.

i cant see england not going in with 4 seamers.
1) because they've had so much success in the recent past with 4 pacers, and they struggled in pakistan when they had 3.
2) because i dont see blackwell or udal actually accomplishing anything in india. if murali cant take wickets cheaply in india then i dont see how the likes of blackwell and udal are going to fair even half as good. at least with hoggard, if the conditions suit him he might actually be useful, udal and blackwell arent going to be useful irrespective of the conditions.

 

[tooextracool]

That true! However, it is obvious that Dhoni is a far better batsman than jones as can be seen by the performance today against pakistan. 72 of 47! amazing!

in ODIs quite comfortably, geraint shouldnt even be in the side really.
in tests im not quite convinced. need i remind you that geraint was also averaging over 40 in test matches after playing the same number of tests as Dhoni?

 

[tooextracool]

wow, Richard back and now TEC - its sure going to be busy round here

dont count on it, with my schedule as hectic as it is, its quite likely that i may only be a regular poster for a week at best. which is probably for the better anyways, considering that most users on here would rather see a dead forum than have to browse through pages and pages of richard and my constant ramblings.

 

[superkingdave]

dont count on it, with my schedule as hectic as it is, its quite likely that i may only be a regular poster for a week at best. which is probably for the better anyways, considering that most users on here would rather see a dead forum than have to browse through pages and pages of richard and my constant ramblings.

nope its actually quite refreshing for a while - it gets boring after a time but every now and then its ok imo

 

[superkingdave]

anyway the tv broadcasts rights are still to be sorted, seems a company called Nimbus have rights for the India games for the next 4 years, but i think im right in saying they are just a production company, they don't have a tv channel and will just sell their coverage on to the networks?

Sky don't have the series listed, but hopefully they'll snap it up - although one of the reports i found (from the hindu business line) said "BCCI's Working Committee is expected to meet on March 21 following which the broadcaster for the England-India Test and One Day series due in March-April 2006 will be announced. " which doesn't bode well considering the test series starts on 1 March

 

[tooextracool]

Tresco sounds more and more like a captain every day. Drop Vaughan from your ODI side already

Anyway, as an Indian fan I hope Blackwell gets a game I have to admit I'm happy Giles is out, and not because I see him ripping 5-fers against India, but rather I fear that the same old negative line tactic may have been used again this series. And what's worse, it may have worked. I don't think Blackwell is disciplined enough to do that IMO. Logically one would think he won't get a game anyway, with Udal apparently England's front-line spinner now, and Panesar selected ahead of Blackwell too.

actually based on his ODI performances so far and even his FC ER one would think that he is tidy enough to bowl into the rough outside the leg stump. but when it comes to variety and being a big turner of the ball blackwell scores a big 0.

 

[tooextracool]

Yes, I agree, the top four were rubbish, but what did Ganguly and Yuvraj ever do to make up? It does not matter whether they scored 20, 40 or 60, they didn't do enough to make up for the failures of the top four.

Now look at the other team. They had one batsman less. Yet everyone from one to seven scored over 50. Two of them were not even specialists. Akmal wasn't even in that list. Now look at the Indians, who lost by 341 runs, with SIX specialist batsmen. And one of them, no two, maybe three, isn't scoring enough runs to make a difference, and doesn't even bowl enough overs to support the four bowlers. Clearly, there not adding even half as much value as one Shahid Afridi. The team would be better off with one slam-bang hitter who bowls eighteen overs an innings (getting a few extra wickets) than one specialist batsman who won't score a double century even on an Antigua deck.

you seem to forget the fact that the reason 7 pakistan batters scored more than 50 was because of the ineptitude of the indian pace bowlers. its no coincidence that on the same wicket on which the indian bowlers rarely ever beat the bat, both akthar and asif managed to extract significant movement and beat the bat almost at will with the new ball. now i dont know how highly you rate pathan, rp singh and zaheer, but as far as im concerned neither of the 3 are test class bowlers and the only one who looks remotely like he has any sort of potential is shree santh.

 

[adharcric]

you seem to forget the fact that the reason 7 pakistan batters scored more than 50 was because of the ineptitude of the indian pace bowlers. its no coincidence that on the same wicket on which the indian bowlers rarely ever beat the bat, both akthar and asif managed to extract significant movement and beat the bat almost at will with the new ball. now i dont know how highly you rate pathan, rp singh and zaheer, but as far as im concerned neither of the 3 are test class bowlers and the only one who looks remotely like he has any sort of potential is shree santh.

Pathan is definitely test-class, he just hasn't had any support. RP Singh and Zaheer may lack penetration at the test level and since they aren't pacy, they might not get as many wickets as desired. Zaheer at top form is test-class, but he's far from that and I'm afraid he's done for as a cricketer. RP Singh has looked promising thus far and should compete with the 3 genuine quicks (sreesanth, munaf, vrv) to open the bowling with Pathan in tests.

 

[tooextracool]

Pathan is definitely test-class, he just hasn't had any support. RP Singh and Zaheer may lack penetration at the test level and since they aren't pacy, they might not get as many wickets as desired. Zaheer at top form is test-class, but he's far from that and I'm afraid he's done for as a cricketer. RP Singh has looked promising thus far and should compete with the 3 genuine quicks (sreesanth, munaf, vrv) to open the bowling with Pathan in tests.

i cant see how pathan is test class with the ball. hes been exposed to be woefully below par almost everytime hes stepped onto the field except when the conditions were completely in his favor and his record is almost disgraceful when you remove his games against bangladesh and zimbabwe. he doesnt have too much variety in his bowling either, and im afraid when you bowl at a bit over 75 mph you're never going to threaten anyone unless the ball is swinging vigorously.
RP singh i fear wont be too much different from the zaheer khans and ashish nehras that have run wild in indian cricket. i havent had a chance to see munaf patel or vrv singh bowl, but from what ive seen off shree santh so far, other than the fact that his radar is shocking, hes shown at least some potential to be test standard.

 

[Jono]

you seem to forget the fact that the reason 7 pakistan batters scored more than 50 was because of the ineptitude of the indian pace bowlers. its no coincidence that on the same wicket on which the indian bowlers rarely ever beat the bat, both akthar and asif managed to extract significant movement and beat the bat almost at will with the new ball. now i dont know how highly you rate pathan, rp singh and zaheer, but as far as im concerned neither of the 3 are test class bowlers and the only one who looks remotely like he has any sort of potential is shree santh.

You honestly think RP Singh has no potential as a bowler and will be a Nehra or Zaheer? I'm not saying he's world class or anything, but he hasn't shown you the slightest thing that suggests he may become a good test bowler?

If that's the case, what do you think of him as a ODI bowler?

 

[sheerindianspeed]

England have no chance baby

England have no chance in India: Kambli

MUMBAI, Feb 14: Vinod Kambli, a scourge of England bowlers in the past, believes Michael Vaughan’s men will suffer heavy losses during their current two-month tour of India.

Kambli, better known as Sachin Tendulkar’s childhood friend, averaged 105.66 in three Tests against Graham Gooch’s England in 1993, including a double century in the final Test in Mumbai which triggered a 3-0 sweep for the hosts.

The left-hander, now 34, told the Mumbai-based Mid-Day on Tuesday he could still take a century off the current England attack — provided they agreed to allow someone to run for him between the wickets.

“Like there is a super-sub facility, there should have been a super-runner rule because I could get a hundred off this attack on one leg,” said Kambli, who last played for India in 2000.

“I don’t think England stand a chance out here.

“They have a good set of quick bowlers in Andrew Flintoff, Steve Harmison, Matthew Hoggard and Simon Jones, but I don’t think they will have an impact on the series. Our batting power and wickets will ensure frustration.

“As for their spin attack, they have to be careful not to play the new boy Monty Panesar. I fear for him.”

England, who play three Tests and seven one-dayers during the two-month tour, are without seasoned left-arm spinner Ashley Giles who is recovering from a hip surgery.

The three spinners in the touring squad — Shaun Udal, Panesar and Ian Blackwell — have played just three Tests between them.

Panesar, a 23-year-old Sikh left-arm spinner in the Bishen Singh Bedi mould, is on his first international tour after scalping 46 first-class wickets for Northamptonshire last season.

Kambli acknowledged that England played superbly to win back the Ashes from world champions Australia, but insisted it would have no bearing when it came to tackling India.

“They went to Pakistan after winning the Ashes and it did not make a difference to the Pakistanis,” he said. “I don’t see it making a difference to India as well.”—AFP