The England Thread

[Richard]

what i thought was funny was how the commentators justified mahmoods simply terrible delivery that got sangakkara out as completely intentional. you could see clearly from how the ball left the hand that he had ****ed it up. im sorry but he is a poor bowler, a poor batsman, he struggles to get in the lancashire first team so he should NOT be playing simple as.

Haha, yeah, I thought that exact same thing. The lengths people will go to to credit a bowler for a delivery that happened to be gifted a wicket! So a massive great Full-Toss was a deliberate ball, was it? Yeah right.

 

[Richard]

One of the percieved issues with Lewis is that his inclusion reduces team flexability as he is useless with the old ball and there is no choice but to bowl him through early.

They have a point, but I rather have a bowler who is good for a period of the game than someone who is poor throughout

TBH, I have no problem with a bowler who bowls 10 straight off the reel, especially if he can give you one half of stability through the presumed 20 straight overs of Powerplay. I always thought Andy Caddick was under-used in that role, though he did usually bowl 7 or 8.

If someone does that role well, IMO there's a place in a one-day side for him.

I mean, otherwise I'd never get a game myself.

 

[Prince EWS]

and whats everyones opinion on stuart broad for england?

Even though I quite like the look of him, he's been spectacularly overhyped IMO. He seems to have a lot of the things you'd look for in a young bowler - but hey, so does Mahmood. Broad's action seems to be one that would allow him more control, but really, for the amount of hype and expectation he's been given, he has done basically nothing at List A level to deserve it.

While I have a feeling he just might turn out to be quite a good one day bowler, there's little doubt in my mind that he's not ready for ODIs yet, and there's absolutely no doubt that he'd benefit infinitely more from two more seasons of development and refinement in domestic cricket than jet setting around the world with "Team England" doing little other than playing the odd warmup match and watching Saj get hammered.

 

[Ash_A55]

I'd have liked to have seen Darren Gough included in the squad. His experience would be invaluable. He could open the bowling and then bowl at the death.

 

[stafford_1990]

i think darren gough maybe would have been good. he can bat better than saj, plunkett and lewis and is undoubtably a better bowler than saj and plunkett. i dunno though he might just be past it at internationals, since he's done nothing special as of late apart from win that 'strictly come dancing' program!

i think that the bowling attack should consist of anderson, lewis, panesar, flintoff and a bit from colly and perhaps bopara. i would like to see a more experienced bowler who can bowl at the death in there, but since no one really springs to mind TBF i think that would be good.

i would love to see broad in the future but i think he still has some bowling to do at county level to get there fully at international level. he had a very good season for leicestershire in the twenty20s last year. i think he should definately be in the squad for the twenty20 world cup.

 

[Prince EWS]

Gough is by no means a better batsman than Plunkett.

 

[stafford_1990]

also i don't know why but i feel england would have a much better chance at winning the twenty20 world cup than the current world cup. they need to select darren maddy for that and vaughan must definately NOT play.

 

[Ash_A55]

i think darren gough maybe would have been good. he can bat better than saj, plunkett and lewis and is undoubtably a better bowler than saj and plunkett.

My point exaclty, doesn't Gough bat 3 in One-Day matches?

 

[stafford_1990]

he batted 3 for essex in twenty20s for some bizarre reason

 

[stafford_1990]

but i think he is more experienced in run chases than plunkett which makes him more useful at 9 than plunkett.

 

[Prince EWS]

Experience or not, Plunkett is just plain "better" at batting - in all situations.

ODI Batting
Plunkett - Avg: 26.09, SR: 86.70
Gough - Avg: 12.42, SR: 64.30

List A Batting
Plunkett - Avg: 22.05, SR: 86.30
Gough - Avg: 13.64, SR: N/A

Now, you can make a case for Gough being a better bowler all you like and you'd have a fair point, but Plunkett is a much, much better batsman and he's only going to get better at this aspect.

 

[Scaly piscine]

i think darren gough maybe would have been good. he can bat better than saj, plunkett and lewis and is undoubtably a better bowler than saj and plunkett. i dunno though he might just be past it at internationals, since he's done nothing special as of late apart from win that 'strictly come dancing' program!

i think that the bowling attack should consist of anderson, lewis, panesar, flintoff and a bit from colly and perhaps bopara. i would like to see a more experienced bowler who can bowl at the death in there, but since no one really springs to mind TBF i think that would be good.

i would love to see broad in the future but i think he still has some bowling to do at county level to get there fully at international level. he had a very good season for leicestershire in the twenty20s last year. i think he should definately be in the squad for the twenty20 world cup.

Rubbish. Plunkett is a better bowler and a better batsman. Gough has been as expensive as anyone except Saj and doesn't get people out.

 

[stafford_1990]

ok fair point on the averages then! i didnt realise plunketts batting was that good, apart from that 50 in pakistan i've never really seen him do much else.

 

[Prince EWS]

ok fair point on the averages then! i didnt realise plunketts batting was that good, apart from that 50 in pakistan i've never really seen him do much else.

Plunkett is a bowling allrounder really - England just haven't really used him in that role because their wicket keeping options have been too dire for that balance to work properly. Early in the tournament, I was an advocate of picking...
7 - Nixon
8 - Plunkett
9 - Lewis
10 - Panesar
11 - Anderson

However Bopara has obviously taken his chances since then and deserves his spot at the moment so there's no possibility of this occuring.

 

[Ash_A55]

I would have Plunkett and Gough in the team, both are bowlers who, on thier day, can bat rather well!

 

[stafford_1990]

what i don't understand at the moment is why everyone is ranting on about panesar and flintoff being the genuine wicket takers in the england ODI side. fair enough with flintoff but monty hasn't done anything special so far in the world cup has he? the commentators say he's a wicket taker and then when he's brought on they just say that he doesn't vary his pace enough which stops him taking wickets. true he doesn't but will they ever make their mind up on wether hes taking wickets or not?

 

[Prince EWS]

I would have Plunkett and Gough in the team, both are bowlers who, on thier day, can bat rather well!

Gough should never, ever, ever be picked with his batting in mind. He averaged 12 for crying out loud!

 

[open365]

what i don't understand at the moment is why everyone is ranting on about panesar and flintoff being the genuine wicket takers in the england ODI side. fair enough with flintoff but monty hasn't done anything special so far in the world cup has he? the commentators say he's a wicket taker and then when he's brought on they just say that he doesn't vary his pace enough which stops him taking wickets. true he doesn't but will they ever make their mind up on wether hes taking wickets or not?

Some of the punditry in this WC has been abysmal;

Nasser Hussain; "England's big 3 of Flintoff, KP and Vaughan must fire"
Since when has Vaughan ever been a big player for England in ODIs? He's one of the worst ODI batsmen of the modern era, the only worse batsman i can think of it Hafeez and he's more of an off spinning all rounder.

They were talking about Vettori as being a strike bowler as well which is ridiculous as he's got less wickets than caps. The reason they put Panesar as a strike bowler is because he's good in tests and better than Ashley Giles, Flintoff is more a run stopper than a wicket taker as well but England don't have many better.

 

[BoyBrumby]

And Hoggard's had 1000001 chances in ODIs and IMO you can't just keep going back to him. Fair enough, drop Mahmood when neccessary, but pick instead someone yet to play (at least much) like Broad or, heck, even Tremlett.

I've always been a fan of Tremlett, but he absolutely froze when he got his chance in the Commonwealth Bank & his fielding was sub-Panesar.

I do agree with your point about Hoggy tho. He doesn't seem to be able to make the white ball swing as much as he does the traditional cherry, so batsman are more able to hit through the line.

Only change I see for the Oz game is Strauss coming in. Probably for Joyce, although it should be for Vaughan. Our batting is no-where near strong enough to carry a specialist captain.

 

[Richard]

Plunkett is a better bowler and a better batsman. Gough has been as expensive as anyone except Saj and doesn't get people out.

I mean, even by your usual pro-Durham standards, that's nonsense beyond almost anything you've ever posted.