**Official** England in The West Indies

[Langeveldt]

I have just come in from the pub,and I cannot beleive the amount of rubbish that is being spouted on this forum today.

When it comes down to it, no-one can really predict what is going to happen in the ODI series between England and WI....it is quite realistic that WI have a shocker and lose 7-0, and it is quite possible that England will have a shocker and lose 7-0. The probabilty is that the series will be a lot closer, the result of which could go either way.

England are probably the more talented team, but WI have more to fight for.It wouldnt be a shock either way if either team wins the series by what ever score...and to be honest ..who really cares

I am getting a bit fed up of this rather boring thing that is going around about Australia vs India, or Warne vs India. When will people realise that Australia on the whole are miles ahead of any team in the world. Yes India have done very well vs a weaker Aussie team in the last few months (it was still a drawn series, despite what a lot of people will make out on here), and yes India beat Australia in India a couple of years ago (despite the fact that on the balance, Australia were probably more than equal to India, apart from one big partnership , a couple of ropey decisions(but that cricket, so no complaining here),and a one man bowling performance by yesterdays news Harbajan.

India do play against Australias weaknesses well, but talent wise, there really is no comparison...who ever said on another thread that the like of Hayden,langer etc are not talented, just doent know what they are talking about.

When it comes down to it ,in ODI's, Australia are the class team....after that WI, England,SA, Sri Lanka, NZ,Pakistan and India can all beat each other on any given day...no team is that much talented than the other.

England seem to be fashionable to slag off as a team, when really they are a lot better than many would think. I personally dont think there is a better bowling attack in ODI than England's (apart from Australia's) and with a bit of fine tuning the batting could be very good

Great post...

 

[Swervy]

Great post...

why thank you...thats a few pints of tetleys for you

 

[Mr Mxyzptlk]

England are probably the more talented team

Whilst the teams are quite even, I wouldn't say that much.

 

[Swervy]

Whilst the teams are quite even, I wouldn't say that much.

you might not...but I would

 

[roseboy64]

Trinidad and Tobago constitutes all of the West Indian team.

What do u mean by that? Brian Lara perhaps?

 

[Mr Mxyzptlk]

you might not...but I would

Perhaps, but you'd be biased.

 

[Swervy]

Perhaps, but you'd be biased.

you might be right...but that might make me the first Australian biased towards England in a debate

 

[luckyeddie]

I have just come in from the pub

That was your first mistake.

 

[marc71178]

Whilst the teams are quite even, I wouldn't say that much.

I would agree.

I think all 3 Tests were a lot closer than the margins suggest and on each occasion it was only a short spell when England took it by the scruff of the neck. Unfortunately for the Windies, those spells coincided with spells of rubbish from them and things like the 47 happened.

 

[garage flower]

India do play against Australias weaknesses well, but talent wise, there really is no comparison...who ever said on another thread that the like of Hayden,langer etc are not talented, just doent know what they are talking about.

Talent wise I don't think there's a huge gap between the two. It's nonsense to try and devalue India's win at home to Australia by putting it down largely to one player's great individual series and a big partnership, as if to imply that these were freak occurrences that prevented the better side from winning.

I accept that the absences of Warne and McGrath from the recent series outweighed the injury problems India suffered (which you conveniently igonored) to Harbhajan and Zaheer, but one can obviously only speculate as to the impact these players would have made.

The series produced a closely fought draw between two evenly-balanced sides. India are generally a younger side and their young talent, which is led by Sehwag, Patel, Pathan, Balaji, Chopra, Yuvraj seems to me to be superior, on the whole, to the Aussie equivalents I've seen.

Australia are the better side, but I'd argue that the talent gap between the sides is reasonably narrow and getting narrower.

 

[roseboy64]

Actually the WI came pretty close to drawing that ODI series against SA. It went down to the last over and WI could have won save for a few misfields by guys who shouldn't have been playing( don't quite remember who though......).2-2 sounds better than 3-1 doesn't it? Plus re:WC2003 and the following ODI series between WI and Aus, England couldn't beat Aus but the WI eventually did. Discounting the fact that the series was already won by Aus(poor showing by the players but they eventually got back to the form they were in in the WC during the opening match vs SA.What i'm really trying to say is that the WI are a much better ODi side than England(marginally).And about Gough, Anderson and Flintoff, they're not as imposing as Pollock and Ntini but the WI did pretty well aganist them, didn't they?

 

[Swervy]

What i'm really trying to say is that the WI are a much better ODi side than England(marginally)

????????????? Much better marginally????????????????

 

[gio]

Actually the WI came pretty close to drawing that ODI series against SA. It went down to the last over and WI could have won save for a few misfields by guys who shouldn't have been playing( don't quite remember who though......).2-2 sounds better than 3-1 doesn't it? Plus re:WC2003 and the following ODI series between WI and Aus, England couldn't beat Aus but the WI eventually did. Discounting the fact that the series was already won by Aus(poor showing by the players but they eventually got back to the form they were in in the WC during the opening match vs SA.What i'm really trying to say is that the WI are a much better ODi side than England(marginally).And about Gough, Anderson and Flintoff, they're not as imposing as Pollock and Ntini but the WI did pretty well aganist them, didn't they?

England beat SA 3-1 in the summer, skittling out SA for under 100 once, and that was with an experimental side. England already have the mental edge this series, and I suspect they'll take the series 4-3.

 

[Swervy]

.......India's win at home to Australia by putting it down largely to one player's great individual series and a big partnership, as if to imply that these were freak occurrences that prevented the better side from winning.

yep, that pretty much sums it up

 

[Lions81]

England beat SA 3-1 in the summer, skittling out SA for under 100 once, and that was with an experimental side. England already have the mental edge this series, and I suspect they'll take the series 4-3.

I don't know if you've noticed, but South Africa aren't exactly the Kings of the one-dayers anymore. They're living off of their reputation.

 

[Lions81]

yep, that pretty much sums it up

Haha, well so India have superstar players who know when the chips are down and can step it up? That makes India a worse team than Australia? You can't beat us, so quit your whining. When you win a Test Series against India, then come talk to me!

 

[gio]

I don't know if you've noticed, but South Africa aren't exactly the Kings of the one-dayers anymore. They're living off of their reputation.

But I thought WI were one of the best ODI sides around because they almost drew with SA?

 

[Lions81]

But I thought WI were one of the best ODI sides around because they almost drew with SA?

I think WI, while not one of the best sides, is one of the better sides because they have top-flight batsmen perfectly suited for the one-day game, like Chris Gayle, and ODIs are really batsmen's games. I think the problem with ranking teams in ODI terms is that since there are a lot of ODIs, the rankings'll change a lot quicker than with test matches. There aren't too many tests being played, so a test win goes a lot farther than an ODI win.

 

[Lions81]

But I thought WI were one of the best ODI sides around because they almost drew with SA?

SA just got destroyed in New Zealand. New Zealand are a good ODI side, don't get me wrong, but they manner in which SAF capitulated and got massacred really showed me a lot about their fighting spirit. I don't see the kind of will to fight back that the Aussies have. They've long been labeled as cricket's chokers but that applies mainly because people thought they were so good, they would have won except for their choking, but now the case may be that they're no longer chokers because it's expected that they'll lose more than they'll win.

 

[Swervy]

England since the start of the World Cup...

Played 19
Won 12
Lost 6
No Result 1

ok..so discounting wins vs the crap teams (ie Holland,Namibia,Bangladesh etc)

Played 14
Won 7
Lost 6
No result 1

The first loss was vs India...India hammered England but I cant help but think if England had batted first the result would have been different..just one of those things (the same could be said of when England hammered pakistan in the world cup)

Next loss was an oh so close one vs Australia, where in all honesty,Australia pulled a miracle out of the bag....

Then Pakistan just pipped England at Old Trafford...but then England outplayed Pakistan to win the series 2-1.

England somehow lost to Zimbabwe at Nottingham after having Zimb at 15/4, but after that England really dominated the tri series (one loss 3 wins vs South Africa)

Forgetting the series (3-0 obviously vs Bangladesh,and a great performance by Flintoff), you come to that awful game vs Sri Lanka, that England completely botched up.

So to who ever said England are an awful ODI team, i think you will see that they are a tough team to beat these days, but are prone to the odd collapse.

It would be fair enough to say that over the last year, they have shown themselves to be better than Pakistan,and certainly as good as SA, not to be sniffed at that.

in the same time West Indies have played 26 games...won 11 and lost 13 (2 NR's)

taking away the poor teams: won 9 lost 13 and 1 no result.(bear in mind the three wins vs Australia were in a dead rubber,and were already 4-0 down)

Pld W L T NR ave ave con rpo rpo conc
v Australia 7 3 4 0 0 32.2 40.2 4.98 5.16
v New Zealand 1 0 1 0 0 22.1 34.4 4.44 4.82
v South Africa 6 2 3 0 1 32.7 43.1 4.96 5.27
v Sri Lanka 4 1 3 0 0 31.1 29.1 4.72 4.70
v Zimbabwe 5 3 2 0 0 36.5 30.2 5.38 4.50

so i just dont see on what basis people can say WI are much better than England in ODI's.

WI's can be good, but to be honest (and I find it quite sad),they are still down in the lower half of the ODI's 'table'...I have gotta have England quite a bit ahead of WI's.

England should win this series