***Official*** England in India

[tooextracool]

1. Really?, clearly you haven't been watching Jone's that well...

what have you been seeing? geraint jones in all of his games in his career has only played one innings on any worth, other than that hes been a miserable failure through and through. i dont think theres even the slightest argument here you can make, and the fact that prior makes it into the ODI side ahead of read makes it even worse.

2. Be realistic you know that not going to happen...

whether or not thats going to happen does not change the fact that i have shown enough evidence to suggest that the selectors are making another big mistake.

. Really, lol you want to put it to a test case?...

how many did see him show potential with the ball then? i'd think very very few, and the figures hardly back them up anyways.

4. Then how has england been so successful over the past 2 years if the quality of the selectors is now questionable?

for one thing, their ODI side has not been a success over the last 2 years, its been a complete and utter failure. since he series against SA in england in 2003(which in itself was one hell of a fluke), we have only won 1 series against a hapless indian side in 2004.
England have been fortunate that in tests, in that a lot of their players have been automatic selections(and dont forget that at one point they actually dropped simon Jones, who now looks like their only savior in India). Assuming England lose to India, which seems extremely likely, the questions will be which batsmen should be dropped, and i think there will be at least one option for that. the batting as you should know has failed miserably ever since we replaced the butcher,hussain, thorpe middle order.

 

[tooextracool]

There is no proof that any other batsman has done any better against high quality swing bowling in tough conditions... BTW, the very definition of the word "high quality" and "tough conditions" means that very very few have succeeded in those conditions. .

no actually im not all that concerned with high quality bowling. i merely mentioned it because someone suggested that he had succeeded against the likes of wasim and waqar in their prime. i would not mention his innings against tuffey,oram and co as a performance that counters my point otherwise. his performances in conditions which are conducive for bowling have been disastrous period.

Did you even watch his 150 odd at Bloemfontein in 2001/2002? What about that 169 at Cape Town? Maybe Mumbai, where the ball was reverse swinging like crazy and he SMASHED 55 off McGrath, Gillespie (at his best) and Kasper? His first ever test 50 wasn't on a feather bed either... What about his first test 100 against England at Old Trafford where he helped India avoid the follow on as a mere 17 year old? I guess his 100 at Perth was a fluke too... And what about his solo 100s in NZ and England in the mid 90s? You do know more than every other international player who has played the game, though. So I guess we should discard their almost universal opinion and take yours.

most international players are concerned with playing their own game rather than watching innings after innings of tendulkar bat.
as far as those innings are concerned, ive referred to every one of them at some point in time and dont see the point of going through them again.

 

[tooextracool]

Under sub continental conditions, I don't think I have ever seen Wasim bowl better than he did in the 99-2001 period. He was doing all sorts of things with the ball. The only reason I think he didn't do better was because of *cough*matchfixing*cough*...

matchfixing was IMO something that he was definetly involved in, and i have in the past mentioned that the 98-99 series be examined intensely.
further i think calling akram at his best while he was averaging in the 60s against england and 50s against australia would do him a great disservice. honestly there was no way akram was bowling as fast as he used to be able to, and by and large he wasnt swinging the ball the way he used to either, especially conventional swing.

 

[aussie]

what have you been seeing? geraint jones in all of his games in his career has only played one innings on any worth, other than that hes been a miserable failure through and through. i dont think theres even the slightest argument here you can make, and the fact that prior makes it into the ODI side ahead of read makes it even worse.




whether or not thats going to happen does not change the fact that i have shown enough evidence to suggest that the selectors are making another big mistake.



how many did see him show potential with the ball then? i'd think very very few, and the figures hardly back them up anyways.



for one thing, their ODI side has not been a success over the last 2 years, its been a complete and utter failure. since he series against SA in england in 2003(which in itself was one hell of a fluke), we have only won 1 series against a hapless indian side in 2004.
England have been fortunate that in tests, in that a lot of their players have been automatic selections(and dont forget that at one point they actually dropped simon Jones, who now looks like their only savior in India). Assuming England lose to India, which seems extremely likely, the questions will be which batsmen should be dropped, and i think there will be at least one option for that. the batting as you should know has failed miserably ever since we replaced the butcher,hussain, thorpe middle order.

1. Fair enough i agree thaat maybe Read may be the best option for england in ODI because he seems to be a better late order hitter than Jones or Prior could be, plus he is the best glovesman, so for a OD team:

Trescothick
Strauss
Vaughan
KP
Freddie
Collingwood
Blackie
Read
Harmy
Jones
Anderson

2. Lets put up a poll & see how many people think that Plunks showed potential or not with the ball in Pakistan then

3. Yes england since the last WC have been pretty poor in ODI's at least but they have a team now that can become a very good ODI unit, they just need to start producing.

 

[tooextracool]

Dennis Lillee

i dont know much about lillee, but looking at his record, he played only 4 games in the subcontinent, one of which was against SL and has no relevance given how mediocre SL were back then anyways. and 2 of the tests which lillee played in pakistan were high scoring draws in which no one else did much better anyways. really 1 series failure in the subcontinent cannot take away from someone whos done brilliantly elsewhere.

 

[Sanz]

most international players are concerned with playing their own game rather than watching innings after innings of tendulkar bat.

Yeah man Ian Healy and Adam Gilchrist were thinking about their own batting when Tendulkar was scoring his centuries in Australia. How about he commentaors they would have been thinking about commentry too, obviously they were not watching SRT bat either, they were concentrating on their commentry. Warne/Mcgrath were concentrating on their bowling, so they were not watching Tendulkar either.


Only person in this world who has watched Tendulkar since 1991-1992 is TEC.

 

[tooextracool]

1. Fair enough i agree thaat maybe Read may be the best option for england in ODI because he seems to be a better late order hitter than Jones or Prior could be, plus he is the best glovesman, so for a OD team:

Trescothick
Strauss
Vaughan
KP
Freddie
Collingwood
Blackie
Read
Harmy
Jones
Anderson

that side is just about as miserabe as the current ODI side that we have. Strauss is currently batting like a player who can hardly hold a bat in the test side, let alone how miserabe hes been in ODIs. as ive said before, there is absolutely no hope for Vaughan in ODIs. and Jones would be better served if he just played tests, given his spate of injuries and the fact that he has limited experience in ODs.

2. Lets put up a poll & see how many people think that Plunks showed potential or not with the ball in Pakistan then.

you can go ahead and do that. either way its not going to change my opinion that he has been a very ordinary player thus far.

3. Yes england since the last WC have been pretty poor in ODI's at least but they have a team now that can become a very good ODI unit, they just need to start producing.

i dont think we do at all. bar pietersen and flintoff there has been no consistency from anyone else, and for unknown reasons we continue to carry players who clearly arent good enough.

 

[aussie]

So tell me then, why do you support Australia desite having no connection with the country? Wasn't it something to do with them hammering England in the 1997 Ashes?

no, when i first went to a cricket match at OT in 97 & i saw the events in that test i became a strong supporter of the team and at that time england weren't to good, but i was barely 8 i didn't understand the game well enough to make much of a judgement all i knew i liked the aussie team because seeing them play make me like cricket & i've supported them since..

But since i live here i will have interest in england's team, gosh

i see they are many people that are on this forum that are in england that support asian teams, then their is jono who lives in australia but he supports india, richard lives here & supports SA, if you want to call me a ``glory hunter`` what about them?

 

[tooextracool]

Yeah man Ian Healy and Adam Gilchrist were thinking about their own batting when Tendulkar was scoring his centuries in Australia..

yes im sure that healy and gilchrist, decided to take a break of their cricket just to watch tendulkar bat all over the world.

How about he commentaors they would have been thinking about commentry too, obviously they were not watching SRT bat either, they were concentrating on their commentry. Warne/Mcgrath were concentrating on their bowling, so they were not watching Tendulkar either.

its not always that the commentators know everything, a lot of them are as incompetent as any other person who watches cricket. certainly i think some people on here know more than the commentators do.

 

[tooextracool]

so you know more about swinging conditions than Pollock, Gavaskar, Cullinan, Symcox, Procter and Shastri?

gavaskar is about the most biased commentator that is out there, and honestly he just wastes whatever knowledge has has on the game by being an absolute clown. as far as the others are concerned, did they mention that the ball was moving around while tendulkar was batting? because if they did they were hugely mistaken.

 

[tooextracool]

why should the fact that Kapil was MILES better than Freddie at the start of their respective careers be taken out?

because its clearly obvious that flintoff was clearly drafted into the side while he was not ready and was not even half the player he is now.

 

[aussie]

that side is just about as miserabe as the current ODI side that we have. Strauss is currently batting like a player who can hardly hold a bat in the test side, let alone how miserabe hes been in ODIs. as ive said before, there is absolutely no hope for Vaughan in ODIs. and Jones would be better served if he just played tests, given his spate of injuries and the fact that he has limited experience in ODs.


i dont think we do at all. bar pietersen and flintoff there has been no consistency from anyone else, and for unknown reasons we continue to carry players who clearly arent good enough.

you are such a harsh crtic TEC, how can that side be miserable baring Blackwell it was the its about the exact side who challenged australia so well in the natwest series last year. Strauss may have had a though time in Pakistan but surely how could you say he has been miserable in ODI's?, all he needs to do is be more consistant and he can be a decent OD opener.

Yes we all know Vaughan is miserable in ODI's but we all know he wont be dropped, plus i he is another who has shown glmpses that he can be a good OD player, he might never. In the end he may just end up like Hussain as a OD player.

But its obvious the crop of players england have now is the best crop of OD player options england have had since before the last WC in 2002 & if they all play has well has they have done in tests over the past 2 years they can be successful.

 

[tooextracool]

Why don't we take the BEST 30 tests of Kapil's from that first 56 as well, since that is what you are doing with Freddie? What is wrong with comparing both their performances after 56 tests each? Why is it flawed? Is it because Freddie was crap at the start while Kaps wasn't?

you can go ahead and take kapils best 30 test period. however my argument is not that flintoff is better than dev, but the fact that his record is at least comparable with the those 4 which makes him a great all rounder.

 

[Sanz]

yes im sure that healy and gilchrist, decided to take a break of their cricket just to watch tendulkar bat all over the world.

I am talking about the matches where Tendulkar played against Australia (which you obviously chose to ignore).

its not always that the commentators know everything, a lot of them are as incompetent as any other person who watches cricket. certainly i think some people on here know more than the commentators do.

And among that some people (or rather experts) you must be on TOP.

 

[Sanz]

you can go ahead and take kapils best 30 test period. however my argument is not that flintoff is better than dev, but the fact that his record is at least comparable with the those 4 which makes him a great all rounder.

But the fact my dear is the tag 'All Time Great' cant be given to someone who has been good/comparable with the best only at his peak but pathetic for rest of his career. No one says flintoff is rubbish, infact far from it, he is superb but I am not willing to say that he is all time great as of now. He could very well become one in next few years, but not right now.

 

[tooextracool]

you are such a harsh crtic TEC, how can that side be miserable baring Blackwell it was the its about the exact side who challenged australia so well in the natwest series last year. Strauss may have had a though time in Pakistan but surely how could you say he has been miserable in ODI's?, all he needs to do is be more consistant and he can be a decent OD opener..

almost anyone will tell you that England competing with Australia was largely a freak of cricket and was due to a fair many Australians being out of form(Gillespie, Kaspa,Ponting etc). Strauss was miserable all ODI series against Australia, as was vaughan. when you remove Strauss' performance against bangladesh, he averages 29 in ODIs he hasnt had a single successful ODI series in over a year.

Yes we all know Vaughan is miserable in ODI's but we all know he wont be dropped, plus i he is another who has shown glmpses that he can be a good OD player, he might never. In the end he may just end up like Hussain as a OD player...

Vaughan has been playing ODI cricket for nearly 4 years now. i dont know how long people are going to expect him to suddenly come good, because its not going to happen. as ive said before, he does not hit the ball in the air often enough and is unable to pinch singles(at least one of which is a major requirement to succeed in ODI cricket). as far as hussein is concerned, there was not one point in his ODI career where he merited selection as a batsman, not a single one.

But its obvious the crop of players england have now is the best crop of OD player options england have had since before the last WC in 2002 & if they all play has well has they have done in tests over the past 2 years they can be successful.

England were hardly anything but a very ordinary side before 2002, so aiming to be better than that would hardly be anyting briliant. further at least that side had players like nick knight, alec stewart, darren gough, andrew caddick, craig white etc all of whom were very capable ODI players.

 

[tooextracool]

I am talking about the matches where Tendulkar played against Australia (which you obviously chose to ignore).

because one can come to a conclusion about a pattern in a players international career, based on a couple of series against a particular team? especially considering how many flat pitches we've seen in those series.

And among that some people (or rather experts) you must be on TOP.

i dont see the point of this, either focus on the discussion or dont bother.

 

[tooextracool]

Most people would also say that Sachin is amongst the best players of QUALITY SWING BOWLING in CONDITIONS AIDING SWING BOWLING. BTW, just why does his 95 in the recent series against Pak in an ODI when the ball swinging bananas doesn't count? How is that inferior to any great test inning played under similar conditions?

because tests are different from ODIs. there are different fields, different mindsets etc. i havent watched too many ODIs recently so i could hardly tell you much about what happened in that game anyways.

 

[tooextracool]

Incorrect, for most of his career Kapil averaged around in low 30s as a batsman and high 20s as a bowler. Flintoff has been incosistent and cant be called an alltime great allrounder based on one good year.

as i have said before, its 2 years and his 3rd year was hardly anything poor when you consider that he is an all rounder. expecting him to average in the 40s with the bat and low 20s with the ball is about as ludicrous as anything else ive heard.

 

[tooextracool]

So when Flintoff scores 100 runs and rest of his team mates failed, it is considered an all time great performance, but when Tendulkar scores when his teammates failed, you come up with this ******** logic ?

there is no connection whatsoever. without flintoffs 73 vs Australia at edgbaston, England would have lost not just the test but the series. i dont see what that has to do with tendulkar being incapable of scoring runs in seamer friendly conditions.