Pakistan vs England, 1st Test - Dubai

First topic message reminder :

Early start for this one tomorrow. I hope to catch half hour of play before I head to work.

Bat first is the key on these pitches I feel.

Anyway, thought I'd create the match discussion thread now so that it is there when we wake up. England are playing Test cricket again, I'm going to bed feeling like a kid on Christmas Eve.

Looking forward to the Test and the discussion.

Strauss cant be droped at the moment even if you thought he should be, Unless we ares eriously advocating Trott taking over from him or Davies.

Im very concerned though that were he not capatin that he wouldnt merit a place in the side. It was easy to ignore when England were winning, but suddenly when they take their worst hammering in a long time ( all down to the batting) its thrown up as an issue.

Realisticaly as Mike said the changes come down to :

1a) Do England want two spinners
1b) If so will they need Bopara or go with 5 bowlers and make the batting a bigger problem
2a) Do they stick by Tremlett
2b) If not is it Finn or Onions to replace him


They have said alreayd they are not going to make sweeping changes to the side. They will stick by the long terms fully established menmbers of the side. The only guys I see currently under threat are Tremlett and Morgan, and them being dropped may be more to do with changing the balance ( 2 spinners) than direct replacement.
I was just one game. Tremlett has generaly been dangerous even on flat pitches ( his debut for England a good example). His record is good. Morgan however may find his place under more pressure based on career record.
Its hard to imagine England doing nothing after quite such a spanking, but theres no obvious answer that doesnt open up new flaws whilst trying to deal with others.

I think what is good news is that after this series we have the WIndies at home, surely that would be a good time to try out a lot of youngsters?

I don't think his place is in jeopardy at all in the short term. His batting returns have been far from ideal, but the fact that under his captaincy England have a record far superior to any of their competitors speaks volumes for his inclusion. No time for panic, not even if we lose this series. It is when you lose a couple in a row that the issue becomes far more prominent.

Would moving Strauss to 3 help him? Trott to open

No, not in my eyes. Strauss is an opener, always has been and always will be. I don't see what a drop down the order would do for him. Trott has been a huge success at three, so I'd be retiscent to move him at all.

I was thinking to help Strauss get his confidence back, he seams to struggle against the new ball at the moment

Hopefully he will come good, he has been in such situations before, remember. He was desperately unlucky to be given out in our 2nd innings of the first Test, so you never know that may have been the time that he got a score.

He just needs a little bit of luck and one decent score and his confidence will flood back.

we have had one bad game, and panic sets in lol...

strauss at 3 would be an awful move, leave it as it is, just think monty will come in

maybe Finn for Tremlett too

Think the tactic of hitting Ajmal out of the attack is the last thing you want to do. Three things contributed to this loss. 1. Englands complacency. 2. This belief that you can rattle Ajmal by hitting him out 3. Ajmals variations of GRIP not variations of spin/delivery. The last two are linked in that first - players go in with a pre-conception will be found out - as the batting proved and that preconception combined with the random grips Ajmal employs led to players playing for spin that wasn't actually there. England turned the most innocuous deliveries into wicket taking ones. Look back at all the matches Ajmal has bowled in and see how high a proportion of his wickets are results of bad shots rather than excellent deliveries. He's learned to exploit the mental flaws rather than technical ones because apart from a rather deceptive doosra - his bowling is great but not unplayable.

Also fists - deepest apologies for my bout of gloating and evil cackling the other day - I was expecting a one sided battering and was shocked when england capitulated - good news has been relatively hard to come by when it comes to pakistan.

I've seen a few people say Strauss can not be dropped because of Englands run of results under him. Unless his batting improves drastically, I can see no option but to drop him, you can't play someone just because they are a winning captain, it's like playing with 10 men.

Hampo - as for any batsman captain, it could ultimately come to that. However, we should be nowhere near that at present with Strauss. Calls for his head now are far too premature and resemble the worst of Talk Sport which is surely saying something!

Shah, your 2nd point is totally wrong. None of our top order played an aggressive role against Ajmal, and if anything just let him bowl to them. The likes of Prior and Swann took the attack to him and had by far the most success.

And no worries regarding the gloating, I don't blame you

hampo171 wrote:I've seen a few people say Strauss can not be dropped because of Englands run of results under him. Unless his batting improves drastically, I can see no option but to drop him, you can't play someone just because they are a winning captain, it's like playing with 10 men.

unless hes Mike Brearley

Winning with 10 men works pretty well. hell England keep picking Morgan and hes not even captain

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:

hampo171 wrote:I've seen a few people say Strauss can not be dropped because of Englands run of results under him. Unless his batting improves drastically, I can see no option but to drop him, you can't play someone just because they are a winning captain, it's like playing with 10 men.

unless hes Mike Brearley

Winning with 10 men works pretty well. hell England keep picking Morgan and hes not even captain

It only worked in Mike Brearley's case in say 1981, because he had a certain young Somerset all-rounder in his team who with his exceptional skills helped negate the presence of Mike Brearley in the team as a captain who couldn't bat.

I am actually quite worried about the future of our batting when the current lot are gone. Taylor looks like he has what he takes but still needs to prove it, our current number 6 looks out of his depth at Test level and his deputy is Bopara who is average at best. Everyone else pretty much falls under the category of 'promising' or 'potential' but there really aren't many stand out candidates. I think a case for Strauss being dropped could be made if there was a good viable option to replace him but imo there really isn't.

Is Carberry still a potential candidate these days?

Carrotdude wrote:I am actually quite worried about the future of our batting when the current lot are gone. Taylor looks like he has what he takes but still needs to prove it, our current number 6 looks out of his depth at Test level and his deputy is Bopara who is average at best. Everyone else pretty much falls under the category of 'promising' or 'potential' but there really aren't many stand out candidates. I think a case for Strauss being dropped could be made if there was a good viable option to replace him but imo there really isn't.

There are a number of good batting talents however many aren't ready yet. The likes of Hales, Root, Stokes and Bairstow all look good but are still raw. They need more county cricket, to prove they aren't one season wonders - for instance, people were suggested Lyth as a replacement for Cook for last year's Ashes after Cook's awful home summer and Lyth's impressive season for Yorkshire (first to 1000 runs I think), but then he went on to average just 26 in 2011.

The key thing you said is "when the current lot are gone" - that's not going to be for a few years and several of our top 6 could easily go on for 5 more years.

Only Taylor could be considered ready for Test cricket though, but even then he's got to cope with a new county and a new home ground this year. If he has a good start to the county season, I wouldn't be surprised to see him leapfrog Bopara should England rest a senior batsman for the Windies series.

Older options include Carberry and Hildreth, but neither have been involved with the Lions so maybe they aren't under consideration? Gale also has his fans, though mostly from Yorkshire (I remember Vaughan talking him up a while back).

What about bringing back Michael Vaughan out of retirement to replace Andrew Strauss, as the 2012 equivalent of bringing back Mike Brearley out of retirement to captain England in that 1981 ashes series?

m@tt wrote:

Carrotdude wrote:I am actually quite worried about the future of our batting when the current lot are gone. Taylor looks like he has what he takes but still needs to prove it, our current number 6 looks out of his depth at Test level and his deputy is Bopara who is average at best. Everyone else pretty much falls under the category of 'promising' or 'potential' but there really aren't many stand out candidates. I think a case for Strauss being dropped could be made if there was a good viable option to replace him but imo there really isn't.

There are a number of good batting talents however many aren't ready yet. The likes of Hales, Root, Stokes and Bairstow all look good but are still raw. They need more county cricket, to prove they aren't one season wonders - for instance, people were suggested Lyth as a replacement for Cook for last year's Ashes after Cook's awful home summer and Lyth's impressive season for Yorkshire (first to 1000 runs I think), but then he went on to average just 26 in 2011.

The key thing you said is "when the current lot are gone" - that's not going to be for a few years and several of our top 6 could easily go on for 5 more years.

Only Taylor could be considered ready for Test cricket though, but even then he's got to cope with a new county and a new home ground this year. If he has a good start to the county season, I wouldn't be surprised to see him leapfrog Bopara should England rest a senior batsman for the Windies series.

Older options include Carberry and Hildreth, but neither have been involved with the Lions so maybe they aren't under consideration? Gale also has his fans, though mostly from Yorkshire (I remember Vaughan talking him up a while back).

Yeah I know that most of our lot will be around for a while barring a freak set of injuries, the trouble is they aren't under a lot of pressure right now as there isn't anyone waiting in the wings to replace them. A lot of our talented youngsters seem more focused or better at the shorter forms as well (Roy/Hales/Bairstow). Vince of Hampshire is another possibility but again this is a couple of years away. Point is, if our top 6 all broke their legs in a freak bobsleigh accident who would we pick?

Maybe:

01 Carberry, 02 Davies, 03 Bopara, 04 Taylor, 05 Hildreth, 06 Patel

England tend to be conservative in their Test selection, so they'd avoid picking Hales, Bairstow and Stokes due to inexperience.

Openers are a issue, but Steve Davies has opened in County Cricket for Surrey. Carberry has a Test cap to his name, although I'm not sure if he can tour any more due to his medical condition (I would imagine that with drugs, he could do the main flights, but internal flights would be problematic).

Bopara is first reserve, Taylor captain of the Lions and probably second reserve, Hildreth was pushing hard for a place in 2010 whilst Patel has done well for the Lions and offers a bowling option.

With Strauss gone, the captaincy would go to one of the bowlers, although Taylor is regarded by some as a FEC.

I suppose at the end of the day you never know who will 'make it'. Not many would have picked Trescothick or Vaughan for major international success when they saw them at county level.