A fictictious world test championship played in the south of France.

Just for fun.

If we had to see a world cup test series played right now, where the top 4 ranked teams had to play. Which team would be the winner?
The matches will be played in the South of France where the pitch offers a bit to the bowlers and a bit to the batsmen. Condition are fair, not too much wind and a fair bit of swing is offered, but nothing to worry about.

So for the purpose of this fun exercise I decided to use the top ranked players of each nation to select their teams and the one with the highest total ranking points will be the winners.

It is just for fun, so sit back and relax.

England team.
Strauss batting 581
Cook batting 795
Bell batting 756
Pietersen batting 699
Trott batting 780
Morgan batting 404
Prior batting 668
Swann bowling 750, batting 360
Broad bowling 760, batting 503
Anderson bowling 787
Bresnan bowling 611, batting 374

Total points: 8828

Australia team.
Warner batting 544
Hughes batting 464
Watson bowling 585, batting 598
Ponting batting 735
Clarke batting 821, bowling 128
Hussey batting 728, bowling 95
Haddin batting 534
Peter Siddle bowling 768, batting 284
Hilfenhaus bowling 725
Watson bowling 585
Johnson bowling 583, batting 318

Total points: 8495

South African team.
Petersen batting 424
Smith batting 731
Amla batting 760
Kallis bowling 467, batting 845
Prince batting 561
De Villiers batting 815
Boucher batting 470
Dale Steyn, bowling 895, batting 255
Morkel bowling 715
Philander bowling 584
Harris 545

Total points: 8067

Indian team.
Sehwag batting 644, bowling 192
Gambhir batting 584
Tendulkar batting 749, bowling 135
Laxmann batting 662
Dravid batting 708
Kohli batting 472
Dhoni batting 525
Zaheer bowling 697
Ojha bowling 574
Sing bowling 560, batting 321
Sharma bowling 515

Total points: 7338

Looking at this England will win as long as we steer clear of Asia. It is clear from this that England has a much more settled squad than the other three, India has a number of players losing ranking points and are probably on the out.

Australia is building nicely and when their openers start to settle will have a much higher collective ranking, as will South Africa who are currently on the search for an opener and some young bowling talent in Philander and Marchant de Lange still climbing the rankings.

But for now, England is master of all continents except Asia.

How do you think the matches will go?

Yeah probably fair enough, Biltong. In those conditions we are certainly as good as anyone, if not slightly better, but our nearest rivals at the moment, South Africa, are probably a slightly more rounded side i.e. they can probably hope to have a little more success than us in foreign conditions.

Its a little unfair on Australia that they have to select Watson as an all rounder asnd as a specialist bowler isnt it?

Peter, I still took their top ranked players, I lloked at their bolwing and batting in put their top eleven players in.

biltongbek wrote:Peter, I still took their top ranked players, I lloked at their bolwing and batting in put their top eleven players in.

Under the logic you use whats Morgan doing in the England side? Shouldnt Broad be in as a bowler and a specialist batsman?

If you had him in as an all rounder once as one player hed get that score plus his batting counted.
Then take say Pattison as the fifth bolwer so you have 11 players rather than just watsons bowling twice youd get 508 + 209 for his batting, except for some bizzare reason youre not counting speacilist bowlers batting points but you are counting part time bowlers bowling points?

Im flummoxed by this!

As you point out the ratings arent a direct guide on how good a player is anyway, simply how much they have contributed over time. Those who play more or who have been in sides longer get higher, which can seriously under value some players.

I looked at the top 100 batting rankings and if the bolwer had batting points I added this, I may have missed one or two, you are welcome to advise me who must change.

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:
As you point out the ratings arent a direct guide on how good a player is anyway, simply how much they have contributed over time. Those who play more or who have been in sides longer get higher, which can seriously under value some players.

Peter this is for fun, if there are ommissions or mistakes it is by accident, and yes, players just coming into international cricket is undervalued, hence me saying teams still developing will have a higher collective ranking later on.

The south of France is quite a big place...

Anyway it would be played on astroturf, we don't have any grass wickets south of Saumur (not that these would be the first tests played on astro anyway). Not much in it for the spinners, and most balls will be flying around your chest and head. Think India would seriously struggle...

Maybe the Indians will bring some sand paper of grinders to rough up the pitch?

biltongbek wrote:
But for now, England is master of all continents except Asia.

Master of the incontinents?

They don't wear diapers do they?

biltongbek wrote:They don't wear diapers do they?

Trott may have the other day

watching them bat i think all of the english batsmen might have been having similar problems to trott

What about the French Cricket Team?

The team that represents France or the England team that plays French cricket?
Either way Im guessing they are low on the ICC rankings radar regardless of what bizzare system BB comes up with to rate them by ....

Kiwireddevil wrote:

biltongbek wrote:They don't wear diapers do they?

Trott may have the other day

45th or thereabouts. Much improved from a few years ago though...

Did anyone use to play French Cricket?

Stella wrote:Did anyone use to play French Cricket?

Occasionally at primary school, if the older kids had kicked us off the concrete pitch they played on with tennis balls. "Bat-down"* and "hit-and-miss"** were more popular options though.

* in bat-down someone soft-ball pitched the tennis ball at you, and you hit it. You could be caught, caught 1-hand 1-bounce or if the ball was fielded on the ground you laid your bat down on the ground and the fielder got to throw the ball at it. If he hit it he got to bat.

** hit-and miss was really simple. Again an underarm pitch, you swung, if you missed you were out and the pitcher got a bat, if you were caught the catcher got to bat, or else the fielder got to pitch the ball from where he fielded it (so hitting the ball a good distance, along the ground was good. If someone got to pitch from 2 yards away, you were probably going to miss).

I used to play French cricket, always seemed to end with a bat in the face followed by a punch up.

Galted wrote:I used to play French cricket, always seemed to end with a bat in the face followed by a punch up.

Tough school?

got played indoors when it was raining so there was frustration at that plus about 10-20 kids crowding the batsman, was inevitable

but apart from that yeah, tough school. used a handgrenade for a ball & a pitbull for the bat

Mike Selig wrote:....Much improved from a few years ago though...

Since you left?

lol that was a bit below the belt.

Juniors are ranked 8th in Europe which is higher than the seniors (6th at the last tournament which didn't include Ireland, Holland or Scotland, hence 9th overall).

Sorry couldnt resist Mike, you understand its all in jest! Im sure its the firm foundations you laid bearing fruit. Its about time someone tried to cvilise that nation.