England v New Zealand, First Test Lord's

First topic message reminder :

So after all the drama and acrimony of the last couple of weeks, its time for the action to begin on the field. The first test of the English summer gets underway at the HQ from tomorrow. An upcoming New Zealand against an embattled England. But England are on home turf, New Zealand don't have a good record in England, most of their recent success has come at home, the core of their test side are just coming on the back of T-20 cricket at the IPL rather than much getting used to English conditions.
England on the other hand are without a coach and questions on Kevin Pietersen are going away nowhere. There are unsettled issues about the combination of the side, with the position of one of the openers, the 3rd seamer and the spinner being open questions.
Adam Lyth is likely to make his debut for England tomorrow, and there is a chance that Mark Wood might come in for Chris Jordan.
For New Zealand, it is being suggested that Matt Henry might get to debut and offer backup to Tim Southee and Trent Boult. Martin Guptill, on the back of a spectacular world cup and 150 in the warmup game is set to come back as test opener, and Corey Anderson, coming back from injury, is set to take the all-rounder position.
Set for some very interesting cricket.......

England's day. Beautiful recovery, despite Buttler falling at the last.

A nibble at 450, perhaps?

We're not missing you, Kevin - no matter how many people pretend otherwise!

Corporalhumblebucket wrote:Since England stumbled to 30 - 4 they have scored just over 300 runs for the loss of two wicket - an impressive comeback.

Jinxed us

Butler losing his concentration at the end but him, Root, Ali and Stokes can be proud of there days play. The others should hang there head in shame.

Well that was a fantastic day of test cricket. A little bit gutted about Buttler, but I still think England would have taken that at the toss, and would have bitten your hand off for it at 30 for 4.

Would be nice if they could get up to 400 tomorrow. Moeen is such an elegant batsman. Not bad for a number 8.

Olly wrote:What a good days cricket that was

It was superb. Almost four runs an over scored and spells of good bowling with seven wickets falling.

msp83 wrote:

guildfordbat wrote:Seen the score but not any of the play in the last session. How is Moeen playing?

I like him as a batsman more than many here. Cheers.

Guildford, he did look rather ungainly and uncomfortable  at the start, but now that he's in, he's playing some very attractive shots that we know he's capable of playing.
Buttler given out last ball of the day, looked out, review more in hope, but he'll have to go.

Thanks, msp. I like Moeen's attacking intent and his desire to try and ensure bowlers - particularly, spinners when I've seen him - don't settle.

As others have said, a very fine comeback by England notwithstanding Buttler's last ball dismissal. Having been put in, England should be the happier of the two sides tonight.

VTR wrote:

Hammersmith harrier wrote:Much prefer Buttler at 7 and Ali at 8, gives Jos a bit more room to build an innings knowing he'll have at least two genuine batsmen to play with.

Yep - I think the batting order was all wrong before and made the combination less than the sum of its parts. I have advocated Buttler at 6, but the point is more Buttler should never be at 8. Happy with him at 7 if there's at least a couple of players who can hold a bat at 8 and lower

I do think Buttler and Stokes are interchangeable at 6 and 7, personally think Stokes is capable of bigger more destructive scores than Buttler so the current order probably does make sense. When it comes to Ali it depends on what you view him as, if as seems likely the selectors see him as the front line spinner you then have to treat him like one and you put him down at 8, he certainly isn't getting in the team ahead of James Taylor based on his batting.

New Zealand making an impact of the final ball of the day, but England would take this, particularly after they were 30-4, and even otherwise. They would be hoping that Broad would recover his lost memories about how to hold a bat, and Wood has a reputation of a bowler who has some batting capabilities. Of course batting the Burnley Lara at 11 in this lineup is criminal...... So if Moeen Ali can push the total pass 425 and get it close to 450, England would be very happy.
New Zealand would hope their bowlers would learn from today's mistakes and try to hit the right areas more often. They would hape the last ball wicket would shift the momentum and that they can have the rest of the innings folded for 380-390, then bat well......

NickisBHAFC wrote:Butler losing his concentration at the end but him, Root, Ali and Stokes can be proud of there days play. The others should hang there head in shame.

Sometimes batsmen get out, it happens. You seem to struggle with the concept of sport TBH.

I didn't watch any of the last session, but seems to be that Buttler has played a nicely paced responsible innings, whilst England's lengthy line-up has (finally?) proved its worth to some extent.

the old adage to wait until both teams have batted still applies, and we know this New Zealand side will move the game on with bat and ball, but England will be relatively pleased with their position. Rare that a side loses once they've posted 400odd.

Hopefully Ali can put on some quick runs tomorrow - no idea about Wood's batting ability but lets hope he can stick around so Moeen can do some damage to take us beyond 400.

Stokes and Buttler have scored some tough runs today - good to see after some doubts about their ability to do so. Root is easily the class of the batting line up, hopefully he can keep his form up throughout the summer.

Bell's form is worrying - he got a good ball today, but he didn't play it very well at all. Cook's was the right shot, but just poor execution. Lyth and Ballance both got good uns - as Mike says it happens.

As for NZ I was disappointed by Boult and Southee. Boult's pace in particular was much lower than the World Cup - looks like the amount of cricket has taken its toll on him. Henry bowled well on debut, and Craig looks like he could cause trouble towards the back end of the test. Anderson looks injured to me (labourous in the field, slower than usual with the ball). 

McCullum's captaincy has been questioned, but at 30-4 I'd be a little disappointed if my captain wasn't going in for the kill.

Agree with above posts that Anderson should be in next. Then Broad by default with the debutant at 11, though Broad has made a good case for being number 11!

Bell must be vulnerable if he fails again in the second innings - that would be 3 miserable Tests in a row for a supposed senior player. Not good enough and will alert the likes of James Taylor to a possible opening in the team.

VTR wrote:

Bell must be vulnerable if he fails again in the second innings - that would be 3 miserable Tests in a row for a supposed senior player. Not good enough and will alert the likes of James Taylor to a possible opening in the team.

I get where you are coming from but there is not a hope in hell's chance of that happening. The England selectors are loathe to make ANY changes regardless of results/performance as we saw in the West Indies. They allowed Trott to bumble along for one test or some may say three tests too many and preferred playing an out of shape Ali to Rashid so I cannot see Bell getting the chop until he either retires or has a stinker of an Ashes series and even then the selectors may not awaken from their slumber.

CaledonianCraig wrote:

VTR wrote:

Bell must be vulnerable if he fails again in the second innings - that would be 3 miserable Tests in a row for a supposed senior player. Not good enough and will alert the likes of James Taylor to a possible opening in the team.

I get where you are coming from but there is not a hope in hell's chance of that happening. The England selectors are loathe to make ANY changes regardless of results/performance as we saw in the West Indies. They allowed Trott to bumble along for one test or some may see three tests too many and preferred playing an out of shape Ali to Rashid so I cannot see Bell getting the chop until he either retires or has a stinker of an Ashes series and even then the selectors may not awaken from their slumber.

You are probably right - he is likely to be kept on because of what he did in the last home Ashes series. That looked to be the coming-of-age for Bell, but as ever he never really kicked on after a good season. He probably just about has enough credit in the bank to play, but if we go 2 or 3 down with him failing it could well be the end.

Watch him make a second innings hundred now!

I tipped Bell on the ''Predictions'' thread to be our top scorer against New Zealand. Not because I'm sold on him but because he so often seems to pull out a lot of runs after getting close to the edge. Maddeningly, he never then consistently kicks on.

I also thought Root was due a bit of bad luck. Fortunately, that didn't happen yesterday. I saw a friend last night who had been at Lord's. He said that for a few seconds a collective hush of surprise descended on the ground when Root was out.

My issue with Bell is not so much 3 poor tests - that in my view is not enough to put pressure on one of your classy players (for example if Root were to carry his form over to the start of the ashes, but fail in say the last 3 tests I doubt anybody sensible would seriously be calling him under pressure; Mark Waugh for the Aussies once scored 5 or 6 ducks in a row, etc.). How long does of course depend on many factors - such as prior recent form, age, how well the team is doing, what the dismissals and innings "look like", how settled the rest of the line-up is, how viable the other options are, etc. - but I suspect it's more likely to be around 5 tests, possibly more.

However that's part of the trouble with Bell: the "other factors" don't look that great. His form has been inconsistent for about two years now, he's not the youngest (although with no fitness issues he still has a while to go yet) and he's playing in a middle-order which is looking increasingly settled which makes bringing a new young player in more of an option. And there are some options out there: Taylor, Vince, Hales, etc.

Like CC I don't really see Bell being dropped any time soon, and I think he's got a bit longer than 1 more innings, but a couple more tough test matches and I would start to question it TBH.

That's always been Bells issue. Hes always looked like hes on the verge of being great without ever sustaining it.

it annoys me when people in the media etc, excuse Bell for getting 4-5 low scores because he follows it up with maybe 1 or 2 big scores..that isn't good enough in my book.. It's not consistent enough, and it puts a lot of pressure on the players around him...i think him losing the vice captaincy, is another step on removing him slowly from the side... I would like to see James Taylor get a long run at 4 in the test side

We'll see if New Zealand can get it right today, the pitch didn't help massively but felt they really didn't bowl particularly well yesterday. If England can get through the first part of the day, you'd think they can bat New Zealand out of a realistic win.

harsh on NZ i think GSC..

first session, they bowled beautifully, but when Root and Stokes were coming at them, it was always going to be hard work.. Lords is traidiotnally flat, and it will get flatter and flatter, i think a superb counter attack, will knock any side off their line and length, i thought NZ's seamers, bowled really well, but the spinner let them down, couldn't hold an end up and contain at all, hence the pressure was constantly let off

They had a spell in the first session where they got it right, but on the whole in that session they got a little bit too aggressive and lost their discipline which gave Root and Stokes the ammo to respond.

nothing wrong with being too aggressive...would much rather be too aggressive with the ball, than too negative... wickets win matches.

Of course there is. They lost their discipline a tad, really gave Root and Stokes the room to counter attack where building some pressure simultaneously might have given them greater rewards and kept England under the cosh. As it was, they ceded momentum back to England a bit too easily

McCullum gambled he would get the wicket, which is fine, but as he would've got credit if it paid off, he gets some criticism if he doesn't.

50 for Mo. Good start to the morning for him

Ali goes for 58.

400 decent total from here you think

GSC wrote:Of course there is. They lost their discipline a tad, really gave Root and Stokes the room to counter attack where building some pressure simultaneously might have given them greater rewards and kept England under the cosh. As it was, they ceded momentum back to England a bit too easily

McCullum gambled he would get the wicket, which is fine, but as he would've got credit if it paid off, he gets some criticism if he doesn't.

Agree with that. In particular, I think Stokes is better suited to counter attacking than grinding it out and if McCullum had concentrated on the latter in the second hour, New Zealand might have been more likely to have the Durham man back in the hutch before lunch. Inevitably, there's some hindsight in that view but I didn't need all of the 60 minutes of the second hour to confirm it.

Genuinely think I'm a better bat than Broad

Anderson last man out, England all out for 389.

Probably roughly about par. Nobody really went on to make that big score that converts these scores into 500+

Once more, the first hour goes to New Zealand.

Probably not such a good day for batting as yesterday. Bit of breeze and more cloud here 25 to 30 miles south of the ground.

Olly wrote:Genuinely think I'm a better bat than Broad

You can come and play for my club then , Olly

Seriously , Broad has lost his confidence and looks a walking wicket at Test level at present. Although today he looked determined to battle it out ...just got a faint edge. Not sure he'll ever get it back , to be honest. That smack in the face has left a lasting impression...and every opponent cranks up the short stuff as soon as he comes in now...

England would have liked to get 420 or so ; but once Moeen went early that was never going to happen. Still a decent recovery ; but as GSC says , no one went on to a big hundred...

Will want to bowl well with the new ball now...might not be much for the bowlers later today.

I suppose the question with Broad is when will he ever get the opportunity to get his batting back? He hardly ever plays a run of CC games, which would allow him to operate under the radar for a while. So he presumably has to try and reconstruct his batting in the nets with England

Pitch it up Jimmy

So England bowled out for 389. New Zealand managed to restrict them, and took out the last 4 for 35. Ali couldn't add much, Broad showed yet again as to why he should bat number 11 and Anderson provided a bit of entertainment and a few runs. Boult and Henry sharing the wickets today, Henry having a decent debut test.......

So far so good for NZ . Gulptill in particular has been leaving well when he can ; and they've both been watchful defending the straight ones.
England don't look impatient yet ; but they'll have hoped for one by now....Here comes Wood for his first bowl in Test Cricket...

Good first over. Rather nippy off a short run - and awfully close to an lbw !
Good signs.

Wood loses his first Test wicket to a retrospective no ball

Wood, who looked the best of the 3 English bowlers so far, strikes to get Guptill. New Zealand 40-1.

Not exactly!

Would Mark overstep? Mark Wood

Oh no!. Disaster for Wood and England, its a no-ball.......

Have to say not too surprised. Botham flagged earlier that he was cutting it close all the time.

What is it with these young quicks ? (Stokes as well)

Maybe the way umpires rarely call them "live" contributes. Though that presumably doesn't happen in the CC..,

Not a great morning for England ; will have some hard work to do after the interval.

Jordan should never of been dropped.

Thanks for another stellar contribution Nick.

Jordan isnt ready for test cricket right now. Hes too unpredictable in the longer format

England not helping themselves, now Latham dropped by Bell. Stokes the unfortunate bowler.
Like Ryan Sidebottom in 2007-08, Stokes developing an unfortunate streak where he's been let down by the fielders....

NickisBHAFC wrote:Jordan should never of been dropped.

I'd dread to see what team you would come up with!

England missed their chances to separate the New Zealand openers at scores of 40 and 53, and they have now moved on to 70 without loss.

VTR wrote:

NickisBHAFC wrote:Jordan should never of been dropped.

I'd dread to see what team you would come up with!

It'd change every game even batsmen didn't get hundreds and bowlers didn't take five wicket hauls

Catches off no balls ...drops...all after the innings folded quickly this morning...not going too well for England today.

NZ started well and they have a chance to take a bit of a grip on this game this afternoon ... Of course a wicket can change things ; but they have some fine batting to come , and they look like they are going to come in with a nice platform to build on.

Long way to go yet. A few things nearly happening ; England need to refrain from getting rattled...the ball will probably move a bit as long as the cloud stays in place.

New Zealand have 79 on the board without loss, but both Guptill and Latham are not looking entirely settled yet.......

Cook turns to Andrson again.........