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*Official* England in Sri Lanka

luckyeddie

luckyeddie

Cricket Web Staff Member
I had to giggle to myself.

Charles Colville in the Sky Sports studio's comment after the fourth wicket went down on 119

"Well, that justifies England playing the extra batsman".

(bear in mind here that Sri Lanka's last 2 wickets added 104)
 
S

Swanny

School Boy/Girl Captain
It was so frustrating this morning. The worrying thing is that they didn't really seem to know how to get the tailenders out. Agree Harmison was badly missed, we just needed someone to blast them out really.

Did anyone else watch it?What an absolute shambles over Murali's wicket. It was obvious he was bowled, so as soon as I saw it my immediate response was that he bowled him. How on earth Harper missed it at square leg is beyond me, Read was miles away from the stumps, how else did he thing the bails had fallen off? Funny watching Charles Colville on his high horse at tea though, he really is an idiot.

Batting well done Collingwood and Thorpe for re-building, although I thought they missed too many four balls, Thorpe especially.
 
Tim

Tim

Cricketer Of The Year
I don't think it matters too much at this stage whether Thorpe & Collingwood miss a few boundaries.

They were in trouble at 130/4 and the situation required them to bat till stumps otherwise they could well have finished 160/6.
 
marc71178

marc71178

Eyes not spreadsheets
Tim said:
I don't think it matters too much at this stage whether Thorpe & Collingwood miss a few boundaries.

They were in trouble at 130/4 and the situation required them to bat till stumps otherwise they could well have finished 160/6.
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Couldn't agree more, and it certainly goes to show the value of playing Collingwood at 6 IMO.

Hands up who could actually see Flintoff playing that sort of knock?
 
V Reddy

V Reddy

International Debutant
marc71178 said:
Hands up who could actually see Flintoff playing that sort of knock?
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*Reddy puts his hand up*

I think he will play a good knock today under pressure
 
Tim

Tim

Cricketer Of The Year
203/6...Flintoff out for 16 off 25 balls.

Hit 2 fours & a 6..im not watching the match, but it sounds as though he was on the charge when he got out..was he doing the right thing considering what the score was?
 
Tim

Tim

Cricketer Of The Year
207/7..Read out lbw.

I got to see some footage of yesterday's action, looks like it's quite a good test series.
 
PY

PY

International Coach
294 all out. The tail kind of wagged :D.

Two collapses in that innings cost us dearly. Now need to bowl Sri Lanka out for 150 or under to be in with a chance of winning this game and that looks rather unlikely IMO. :(
 
PY

PY

International Coach
Tim said:
203/6...Flintoff out for 16 off 25 balls.

Hit 2 fours & a 6..im not watching the match, but it sounds as though he was on the charge when he got out..was he doing the right thing considering what the score was?
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I'd prefer he do that than try and and stick around against a bowler who he can't read.

Think he's right to try get to the pitch of the ball and disrupt Murali because it's his natural game.
 
V Reddy

V Reddy

International Debutant
vishnureddy said:
*Reddy puts his hand up*

I think he will play a good knock today under pressure
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Now

*V starts running for his life with Marc chasing him and says to himself never trust that Freddie again * :D
 
luckyeddie

luckyeddie

Cricket Web Staff Member
When I wrote the day 1 match report, I suggested that the current England selection is a team picked with one aim only - to draw a test match.

So far, I have seen nothing to make me change that opinion.

As far as Flintoff is concerned, I don't think that he is an opening bowler by any stretch of the imagination - and it is an experiment which must be abandoned forthwith.

Notice that he's batting at seven in this game (all the talk earlier in the season about him coming in at 5 or 6 yet he's back in the old, familiar 'no responsibility' position, indicating that England feel that he's a worse batting option than Collingwood).

Well, if the current 'no strike bowler' policy is persevered with, it's going to be 8 for Freddie in the next test, since Chris Read's batting form is likely to open the door for Geraint Jones.
 
luckyeddie

luckyeddie

Cricket Web Staff Member
Put your money on a draw here (yes, I know that the game has over 6 sessions to run).

It was plain from England's selection before the match that victory was something they were not contemplating - now we have the quite absurd situation of Sri Lanka going off for bad light, 127 ahead and with 9 wickets to fall - and with the demons that are Ashley Giles and Gareth Batty bowling. I reckon Sangakkara and Jayasuriya are quite barmy.

So that's two sides playing for a draw.

It seems that the only person trying to engineer a result in this game (from the experience of previous days) is Daryl Harper.
 
S

Swanny

School Boy/Girl Captain
Its all very well people last night talking about crease occupation but its ultimately fruitless if you don't score any runs. The amount of English batsman getting starts this series and not going on and getting a big score has been criminal. Trescothick faced 61 balls, Vaughan 77, Thorpe 198 and Collingwood 88 and yet amongst that lot there were 2 half centuries and a top score of 57. Simply not good enough, after all it wasn't the easiest pitch to bat on, but it was certainly wasn't that difficult.

Have to agree with luckyeddie too, both sides are being far too negative, if either side win it will almost be by accident rather than them having forced the game. Giles and Batty batting before the new ball produced the dullest period of cricket i've ever seen in my life!!
 
S

Swanny

School Boy/Girl Captain
PY said:
I'd prefer he do that than try and and stick around against a bowler who he can't read.

Think he's right to try get to the pitch of the ball and disrupt Murali because it's his natural game.
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Agreed.

If hes coming in at number 7 he can more a bit more freely. Still not sure Flintoffs worked out the subcontinent yet, he would like a faster pitch with the ball coming on alot more to be more effective.
 
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