England's Winter

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204 - that’ll do. Brilliant showcase of England’s formidable batting depth that will make them leading contenders at the upcoming World T20 events. South Africa took regular wickets, but England kept blasting away.

My top 7 for T20s would be - Buttler, Roy, Bairstow, Banton/Malan, Morgan, Stokes, Moeen.

Archer and Rashid have got two bowling spots locked down. Interesting battle between the Currans, Wood, Jordan, Brown, Mahmood, Parkinson and possibly Gregory for the final two spots.

Root would surely feature in that line-up Olly?

Pope has all the shots to be a fine batsman in three formats. He's an anomaly in terms of young modern players in that he's played more first class cricket than list-A or T20. Once he gets time further up the order I think he'll evolve into a very fine one day player as well.

Ravi Bopara was pretty good as a finisher for Essex last season. His bowling figures in T20 are pretty solid as well...

Two of my suggestions called out by others whilst I typed!

No Denly

1.Banton
2.Livingstone
3.Hales
4.Salt
5.Root
6.Billings (wk)
7.Gregory
8.Woakes
9.Crane
10.Parkinson
11.Mills

I'm more convinced by the batting than the bowling...

I suppose Bops wasn't/isn't the worst T20 player, but forgive me, I once paid actual money to watch him open with Luke Wright in a World T20 match against South Africa. We got absolutely drubbed

Looks like the Lions are playing on an absolute road in this 4 day game, a bit of a shame. Gregory only bowled 4 overs, Gleeson only 9, but Keaton Jennings 12 overs? Surely the first two must be carrying knocks...?

Is Willey completely out of the reckoning now?

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:Looks like the Lions are playing on an absolute road in this 4 day game, a bit of a shame. Gregory only bowled 4 overs, Gleeson only 9, but Keaton Jennings 12 overs? Surely the first two must be carrying knocks...?

A waste of time and effort having them bowl so saving them for other games?

Afro wrote:Is Willey completely out of the reckoning now?

Does seem so. He doesnt have a contract and hasnt been with England or the Lions  since the extended 50 over world cup squad. There was an interview with him a few days ago where he talked about being burnt out by the experience, but has got the Blast captaincy for Yorkshire. 
S Curran has taken his place as token left armer, and theres a push for more fast options ahead of someone like him. I can understand his frustration as hes still quite young, but it does look like he had his chances and came up short. Hes didnt get an IPl or BBl contract either so no real opportunity to throw his hat back in the mix by kicking the door down. (Harry Gurney managed to get both but is not kicking the door down with a poor BBL) 

 

Just read Fafs "retired" the SA captaincy, which makes a lot of sense. Also means SA can drop him if he doesn't score some runs.  That does put a hell of a lot on De Kock, reminiscent of the situation for England when they were falling apart in the 90s and relied on Alec Stewart to do everything (including bowling!). It must be incredibly frustrating for a player of his talents to be in a losing side.

Soul Requiem wrote:

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:Looks like the Lions are playing on an absolute road in this 4 day game, a bit of a shame. Gregory only bowled 4 overs, Gleeson only 9, but Keaton Jennings 12 overs? Surely the first two must be carrying knocks...?

A waste of time and effort having them bowl so saving them for other games?

Mightve thought so but Overton bowled 31 overs. Also Bess 50 for no wickets which is pretty worrying, his fingers must be as sore as his pride with part time spinners taking 5. Their load cou;d be a problem as the most senior bowlers in the squad and only a 4 day turnaround.

ECB statement

"Gregory and Gleeson will remain unavailable for the final day and will have their injuries monitored in the coming days."

Gleeson and Mahmood gone back home. Shoulder and knee injury. Mahmood bowled 5 overs in SA. Altogether 26.3 overs since September. Cook called up for the Lions.

Hundreds for Sibley and Lawrence overnight again - both unbeaten at the moment too

Another fail for Crawley, may have to wait a long while for another cap.

Gooseberry wrote:Another fail for Crawley, may have to wait a long while for another cap.

That's assuming Jennings is going to replace him immediately in Sri Lanka . Maybe : but they do seem to value continuity ; and I wouldn't rule out the SA lineup starting .
Jennings may be seen as as an Asian pitch specialist ; but it seems they are set on retaining Buttler as keeper despite the presence of Foakes in the squad so incumbency may still count ahead of suitability ? We shall see.

Good to see Dan Lawrence scoring runs - he is a fun guy to watch bat.

Dreadful performance from England in the WT20 earlier losing to SA. Seems they don’t have any idea what their best batting line up is at all and 123 always looked considerably below par.

Ecclestone is an absolute superstar with the ball - the best spinner in the competition by a mile, but she can only do so much when you have 120 on the board.

JDizzle wrote:Dreadful performance from England in the WT20 earlier losing to SA. Seems they don’t have any idea what their best batting line up is at all and 123 always looked considerably below par.

Ecclestone is an absolute superstar with the ball - the best spinner in the competition by a mile, but she can only do so much when you have 120 on the board.

All true. The batting seems to have fallen off a cliff lately...wasn't just this game.

I am mystified as to why the devil they are insisting on leaving Tammy Beaumont at number seven as she is the team's proven best opener. This idea that they can use her as a "finisher" is the sort of daft notion Ed Smith might have come up with : when she gets in with a likely ten-twelve balls to play at most , the team's prospects are already "finished" - as we saw in this match. And Winfield down the order is basically a waste of space : may as well pick another bowler , though in truth the bowling is pretty well covered. Ecclestone was indeed excellent but I'd give a tick to her young spin partner Sarah Glenn as well...

Think England will struggle to make the knock outs from here. Won't beat West Indies unless the batting improves out of sight.

I don’t hate the top three - Wyatt has a couple of T20 tons, against the gun side in Australia too, and Sciver is the best player for me. Jones could be shuffled down for Tammy though - but both should be coming in before Wilson, who looked particularly frenetic the other day. Then I would agree Winfield coming in at 8 is a total waste - pick another bowler for the ballA she will face!

Glenn landed them nicely, but compared to the mystery and rip Yadav from India was putting on them it looked a bit vanilla. Hopefully as she gains confidence and experience she will trust herself to give it a bit more of a rip!

Huge win for the Lions in the end, very good given they were down to bare bones on bowlers and had to limit the use of Bess. Nice to see him bounce back from the mauling he took in the previous game with a couple of wickets all the same. 
Overton 6 for 101 and 7 wickets for Robinson is a big feather in their respective caps and shows that its possible for English medium pacers to take wickets in Aus, pitches allowing.

Yep very good from the Lions - a very strong Australia A batting lineup in particular with Khawaja, Harris and Maddinson all playing.

Can't say I know too much about Brydon Carse though - seems to have had a decent game

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:Yep very good from the Lions - a very strong Australia A batting lineup in particular with Khawaja, Harris and Maddinson all playing.

Can't say I know too much about Brydon Carse though - seems to have had a decent game

A Kolpak with a British grandparent apparently! His father is JACarse , rather unfortunate name.

Women back in town with a clinical destruction of Thailand - though losing both openers for ducks wasn't the best start
Does underscore the absurdity of leaving their best opener at seven but I've nearly given up on that..
Knight a century , Sciver another fifty and the bowlers weren't troubled at all. Sterner tests ahead.

But now West Indies are in deep trouble against Pakistan so the unexpected seems to be the norm at this WC !

Edit : we probably should have a separate thread for this tournament. But I'm not detecting a great deal of interest on here so maybe not worth it ...

Not much to gather from that win... Heather Knight does get a piece of history as she becomes the first English player to make an international hundred in all three forms.

Wonder who the first bloke will be? Buttler favourite as he now opens in T20, but Malan a dark horse - as he has the trickiest two in T20 and Tests, but will he ever get a go in the ODI side?

Very surprised to see that Bairstow has a high score of 68 in T20i's , but that is maybe a function of how few hes played. 

Buttlers played 69 internationals and 252 domestic T20s without getting a century, although most of them have seen him bat down the order it doesn't suggest hes likely to get one soon especially given Englands bat through the order approach. 

Would be a great pub quiz question to ask, Hales and Malan are the only England players to get centuries in T20i's. Thats partly because our best batsmen have sat a lot of the bi laterals out. That may change over the coming games building up to the world cup and hopefully defence of the title in a couple of years.

A rapid 70/80 is often enough to win a T20 though. So the century stat is less important. Buttler opening with success in the IPL sums that up.

I would argue that how much better Buttler is than our other 'finishers' compared to strength at the top of the order makes him more valuable lower down. Morgan's remarkable performance in the recent T20i shows we do have more than one player who can play those innings though. The key thing with finishers is being able to 'go' pretty much from ball one, without needing time to play yourself in. Morgan is very good at that as well.

I was intrigued to notice that about how few T20i centuries the England players have scored though, Goose. I was looking at the stats, starting with Malan the other day and ended up in a cricinfo stats hole. As always I somehow ended up looking at the phenomenal statistics of the great Saffas who missed out on long test careers due to apartheid such as Barry Richards, Graeme Pollock and the sublime Mike Proctor.

Whenever I look at stats I always end up wondering just how good Viv Richards would have been in the modern game. He averaged 47 at a strike rate of 90 with 11 centuries in ODI cricket. In an era with smaller bats, bigger boundaries, tougher batting wickets and the red ball still used in one day cricket. Remarkable.

Sir Viv makes the current crop look like amateurs. I'd say you'd expect an average of 60 with a strike rate of over 120 based on his actual stats.

Mike Proctor is an unsung player who I think would be outstanding in the modern one day game. His round the wicket, 90mph yorkers were sublime and from the angle he bowled them almost impossible to get away.

When I think about players from that era in the modern one day game the two bowlers who come to mind are usually Procter and Joel Garner. The two of them just had unplayable yorkers combined with the pace to force batsman to play from back in the crease due to their pace and bouncers.

The game has changed so much it's so difficult to compare across generations though. IVA is a bit of an outlier in the shorter form in that regard as all his ODI stats (average, strike rate and centuries) are just unbelievable.

Viv also played in an era when fielding was optional. Although they had proper boundaries you could hit a ball into massive gaps with pretty high degrees of certainty than noone would have time to walk over and miss the catch.
The levels of athleticism have sky rocketed with the advent of T20. Even Collingwood looks more ripped now hes a coach than he did at the height of his playing career. 30 years ago there was a handful of players starting to take fitness and fielding seriously. Now the best of that era is a basic standard ( unless youre Chris Gayle)
The likes of Sir Viv and Sir Botham are certainly much more like modern cricketers than most of those who were around then.

Anyway the Buttler issue is an interesting one. I'm not overly emotionally invested in it, I just find the logic of leaving out Malan for Denly being a requirement of him opening utterly bewildering (broken record emoji) and hope england have moved on from that. They are at their best when they play like they have quality batsmen down to 7 and an strong tail, which they do when they pick their best players.

Yep, the improvement in fielding is undoubtedly the biggest effect of the modern era and T20 cricket. Out fielding standards now are truly remarkable.

1.Roy
2.Buttler (wk)
3.Bairstow
4.Malan
5.Stokes
6.Morgan (c)
7.Moeen

Agree on your view of the batting order, Goose. Those are our best players in the top 7, with Banton and Root probably best to provide back up. Though Liam Livingstone is also a very useful option who's legbreaks are becoming better all the time.

I think Malan is top three or bust really - don’t want him coming in and taking a while to get going. It also means that middle order with Stokes and Morgan, contains a lot of relatively slow starters.

Throw in Banton or Livingstone for me - just pick your 7 most destructive batsmen and trust one of them will come off.

I’d also have Mo floating. He smashes it, spin especially, from ball one. So you can promote him and do no damage - if he gets our first ball it doesn’t really matter, you just don’t want him wasting balls.

This will cheer some of the regulars up

https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/_/id/28794091/rory-burns-admits-probably-play-warm-football-again-ankle-surgery

Guess we are still using this for Women's w t20 ?

Mixed start for England against Pakistan. 46 off the first five overs but both openers gone cheaply again. Nat Sciver rattling along nicely 24 off 16...

Commentators are still supporting the opening pairing of Jones and Wyatt for some reason : I'm not saying they're bad ; but they aren't exactly firing at the moment and in the meantime Beaumont languishes at seven ; if they want to get past the good teams I reckon they need to wake up and pick the best bat for the key spots. If , say , Jones , is considered to be capable of scoring fast from the off , why not let her do so at seven or eight ? Seems a fair place for a keeper.

Anyway the Sciver show continues - 28 from 21 - and Heather Knight is tuning up nicely : 61/2 in the eighth

England cruising at 110/3 off 14. Lost Sciver for 36 to a truly brilliant stumping but Knight is in full flow and they look to be set for a big total assuming they do the usual last five over charge...

Going to be a bit less than I'd expected : 152/6 with one over left. Knight gone for 62 one ball after Beaumont , both caught on the fence.
And now Brunt has gone ...another stumping victim.Still don't think this batting order is optimum. just singles this last over ...158 is England's lot. Should be enough.

Pakistan struggling in reply...50/5 in the tenth with the England spinners weaving a web. Not going to repeat their surprise win over West Indies.

Earlier on , SA destroyed Thailand and look pretty safe to finish top of the group.

Only watching the scores - but I see Winfield faced three balls again. Good job she bowls too...

JDizzle wrote:Only watching the scores - but I see Winfield faced three balls again. Good job she bowls too...

Haha... She must feel like a fifth wheel at the moment. They actually interviewed her during the early part of the innings - asked her if she knew where she would be batting today. She was non-committal

Team has done the job today ...spinners were excellent. But the batting order still doesn't look right and needs fixing before the semis , I think - assuming they don't mess up against West Indies .

Shrubsole did very well too...three wickets to bring up 100 in t20 s Would have had a good chance at a hat trick at the end but had finished her over...

Win by forty two runs

Mark Wood is injured again

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:Mark Wood is injured again

Sadly it does seem there'll be more injuries than highlights with Mr Wood. Perhaps inevitable but we supporters seem at our most understanding of his situation when he's delivering with the ball and we're winning. Frustrating for all, not least him.

Maybe we should start a thread to track his and Jofras injuries? Replaced by Mahmood in the Sri Lanka squad.

Think England could really struggle to take 20 wickets now. No Moeen, no Rashid and no pace. Leach has bowled 5 first class innings since the ashes. Bess had a pretty bad Lions tour. Parkinson hasn't played any red ball cricket at all since summer. Broad said it was a waste of time taking him and they are anyway. Stokes is the only one of the seamers who actually managed to make an impact in Sri Lanka (that was only 5 wickets in 3 matches) and needs his load managing.

Looks like it could be as much of a tour from hell as the South Africa one....oh.

They pick the squad and THEN the day before leaving everyone gets a fitness Test instead of fitness tests before the squad is announced. Mahmood didn't go to the Lions last week as he had a sore knee but this week he is in the squad.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/cricket/article-8057715/England-face-injury-blow-Jack-Leach-doubt-Sri-Lanka-tour.html

I guess naming players in the squad means they get the England medical cover? Im reading that Woods injury was actually picked up in the T20s against SA. I suppose theyve given him time to recover then named Mahmood when they knew he was fit. It perhaps looks more last minute than it really was.

Leach is an absolute disaster if he cant play. Will they go back begging to Mo? I assume Rashid was left out because shoulder/age keeping/needing him for T20 and that wont have changed. Missing the first choice 3 spinners who took all the wickets last time is about as bad as it gets. Dawson the only left arm option?

(Reads the article) OK yes they cite Dawson as next in too. Hes at least playing in PSL and should be match fit and gives that extra batting to allow 6 bowling options but a huge step down in threat...and with no proper pace theres little value to add in 3 seamers. Does sound like they are hopeful that Leach can play, perhaps a little click baity as is essentially its just saying hes lost fitness rather than actually suffering directly from the injury. It may be that he doesnt play as much (if at all) in the warm ups which would be less than ideal, but I reckon theyll take the risk of having to hide him in the field and sub him off as much as possible to have even a ring rusty Leach in the first test. They simply dont have a chance of taking 20 wickets without him.

alfie wrote:Guess we are still using this for Women's w t20 ?

Mixed start for England against Pakistan. 46 off the first five overs but both openers gone cheaply again. Nat Sciver rattling along nicely 24 off 16...

Commentators are still supporting the opening pairing of Jones and Wyatt for some reason : I'm not saying they're bad ; but they aren't exactly firing at the moment and in the meantime Beaumont languishes at seven ; if they want to get past the good teams I reckon they need to wake up and pick the best bat for the key spots. If , say , Jones , is considered to be capable of scoring fast from the off , why not let her do so at seven or eight ? Seems a fair place for a keeper.

Anyway the Sciver show continues - 28 from 21 - and Heather Knight is tuning up nicely : 61/2 in the eighth

They were listening! Tammy opened today, albeit it failed but T20 can do that. Villiers playing as the extra spinner over Winfield too. All round a better looking side for me today.

Another good knock from Sciver to hold things together, and Jones finished the innings well. 143 should be enough.

Don't follow women's cricket, but it's ludicrous to hear that the ICC haven't installed a reserve day for the women's World T20 event at the semi-final stage, and that both Australia and England are facing an exit because of it. Makes a mockery of the competition.

Duty281 wrote:Don't follow women's cricket, but it's ludicrous to hear that the ICC haven't installed a reserve day for the women's World T20 event at the semi-final stage, and that both Australia and England are facing an exit because of it. Makes a mockery of the competition.

Especially when you’re playing it in March in Australia - agree completely, absurd

Pretty unlucky really. We have had a lot of drought conditions this year ...but strangely even in the local game we have had a disproportionate amount of wet weather on the weekends . And it is definitely happening at the WC this week ! Seems somebody up there doesn't like cricket ...

Someone in the England or Australian team must have sworn or sinned or something.




I have my money on Shrubsole and Healy.

Not looking good for these semi finals...lot of rain seems to be targeting Sydney this afternoon as promised.

They'd be no better off here in Melbourne today ; been hosing down last night and much of today...

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:

Duty281 wrote:Don't follow women's cricket, but it's ludicrous to hear that the ICC haven't installed a reserve day for the women's World T20 event at the semi-final stage, and that both Australia and England are facing an exit because of it. Makes a mockery of the competition.

Especially when you’re playing it in March in Australia - agree completely, absurd

According to the BBC there'll also be no reserve day until the final for the men's T20 World Cup competition later this year. Foolish!

Well England were certainly washed away this afternoon...

Against all odds , the Aussies have got a game going v SA this evening...and although SA had kept them fairly under control for most of the innings , a dreadful 18th over that went for 17 has put the home team in a good position to reach 140 - which should be enough.

Unless the rain returns , of course.  Which is not impossible

Lanning has played really well for 49  : mainstay of the innings.

Actually held to a total of 134. Still fancy they'll win with that . Weather permitting.