England's Summer of Cricket 2023, Featuring The Ashes

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50 up for Mo at an absolutely vital moment.   

A fortuitous way to get there with Cummins not picking it up. It frankly looked like he wasn't moving well chasing back for it either.

Starc back on which I think slows how key a period the Aussies know this is. He's looked their best bowler today.

alfie wrote:Will indeed be interesting to see what approach Australia take when batting again : suspect depends a lot on warner as he's the one in the top four really inclined to be positive from the off. If he comes out early , could be a bit of stonewalling for a while.

Feels like a dangerous approach to just set up shop, Khawaja, Marnus and Smith all good enough but the rest probably better off playing their natural game

And rain. Hopefully not too long though

This was the slight chance of rain I mentioned earlier. Might be around for a little while now it's hit, but hopefully it'll blow through quickly.

England have wasted a lot of time for little reward.

Probably time for a declaration I think

I would definitely declare if the conditions are going to remain overcast for the rest of the day. Could be a great opportunity for Jimmy as we all know what he can do in these conditions. Broad is not too bad either

Covers coming off so not losing too much

Ball really moving in the wind

Duty281 wrote:Forecast from the Met Office has actually got worse for Sunday since I last looked at it. 60% chance of precipitation for 10:00, 40% for the rest of the day (BBC at 70%).

Now 80% for most of Sunday, so fair to say it looks like a wet weekend.

England need to declare now and try to bowl Australia out in 60 overs.

This really is the perfect time for England to bowl.

It's a rarity when Stokes is more conservative than the viewing public with a declaration

The declaration will need to be taken in view of how England bowl too. If they're hyper aggressive with lengths and field placements then the extra runs make sense. If they drag lengths back a bit early after going for boundaries, as England's seamers who are so used to not being hit sometimes do, then it will look like wasted time.

Broad out, is this it? No Jimmy comes out for a bat at OT

Hazlewood's snuck up with a five-for in this spell.

Anderson coming out to bat.

Probably time to get on with it at this point yeah

This is really silly, it all looks like he wants Bairstow to get his 50 before declaring.

Australia need to try and not take a wicket here.

9 out on the boundary, no matter as Bairstow clears all of them. 50 up, might not be long now

Perhaps the thinking is that the more runs scored now increases the chances of not having to bat again in what could be very challenging conditions on Sunday.

Saying that, I'd have declared just after lunch.

I guess every run added just gives more leeway to not worry about keeping the run rate down. But not sure this is adding much

Suggest Bairstow better hitting it to the boundary or out at this point

Guess from an England perspective, they're expecting to need more time on Sunday regardless.

Bairstow taking a bye against Carey

Duty281 wrote:

VTR wrote:That is surprising, I'd have been convinced without looking it up that they made 500 when Hussain and Thorpe had that huge partnership at Edgaston in 1997. Even Mark Ealham whacked a few I seem to remember!

That is indeed the closest to 500 in that time frame (or second closest now), with 478/9 declared. Ealham and Devon Malcolm could have got England to 500 without that declaration!

https://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/stats/index.html?class=1;home_or_away=1;opposition=2;spanmin2=01+jan+1986;spanval2=span;team=1;template=results;type=team;view=innings

Two Bazballers born in the wrong era 

At this stage, beginning to look like England won't declare until Bairstow gets a ton.

Just declare already, do not see the point of this...

Maybe 250 lead?

It's raining (sixes)

Have as many slips as you like now

eirebilly_01 wrote:This is really silly, it all looks like he wants Bairstow to get his 50 before declaring.

His hundred you mean?

I'm loving this anyway. I grew up watching the Aussies flay the likes of Malcolm, Mullally, Cork and Tufnell. They are being destroyed here

Aye it might not be doing too much for Englands chances of winning but it is very entertaining

The only person having a worse day than Carey is Cummins

VTR wrote:

eirebilly_01 wrote:This is really silly, it all looks like he wants Bairstow to get his 50 before declaring.

His hundred you mean?

Looks like it and he is flying in fairness.

The only thing I can see behind the reason to keep batting is to totally demoralise the Aussies.

With a batsman on 98* in an Ashes test, Atherton wants to declare.

Here we go...

Most pressure on Jimmy as a batter since that Cardiff test

Arse

Well tremendous fun but ends 99 not out.

Runs well out of the equation now. England can set whatever fields they like.

Bairstow's inning brings terms like
Last nail in the coffin
Meltdown
to mind

To be honest when I look back I think it was that inning of 160 from Stokes in T2 that was the start of Meltdown of Aussie confidence.

Colossal waste of time. Ended up delaying a declaration just to chase an individual accolade and didn't even get it.

Good innings from Bairstow, but Australia are finished in terms of bowling. Lyon's loss was monumental. Genuinely not sure what they're going to do for the 5th test.

Almost certainly a draw from here. England had one chance of victory, a very outside one admittedly, but they needed to declare overnight and try to spark a collapse, then chase down the rest tonight, possibly with the aid of the extra 30 minutes. Instead they've given themselves about 45 overs to bowl Australia out, and if they can't manage that then they're praying for a dramatic change in what's forecast on the weather front.

Absence of Nathan Lyon has changed the series massively. Without him to check England during the middle of an innings, and the seamers running low on energy it's carnage

Maybe? I think England were resigned to needing some weekend play regardless. Fastest way to win this test realistically was always batting once and they're in position to do that now.

Cmon now Jimmy - your time to make an impression on this series!

Agree GSC - going to need some time on Sunday to win this, and forecast for that day has changed like 50 times already the last 24 hours. Who knows what it’ll do

Should also say bowling the Aussies out on this quickly is going to be tough too - clearly a very good batting deck

I think Eng has 30 runs too many.....the issue is I think they need about 80 overs to bowl Aus out.
Runs were coming so fast that those 30 extra runs cost not more than 15 min time and ended up creating a psychological dent.

Aus has to regroup and show fight...and the only way of doing that is to bat positively go at 3.5RPO and aim to bat 100 overs

Exciting stuff...shame Jonny was stranded one short ; but honestly it is certainly not a waste of time .

If they are going to bowl Australia out for 150 , plenty of time to do so still . Unlikely though.

If Australia make 300 , declaring at lunch wouldn't help at all ...either way they'd need Sunday play.

Poor old Stokes : when he declares "early" he gets criticized left right and centre . Now he's too late ? Give me a break

Yeah I mean last night we weren't expected to get the morning session and we started right on time so it's not 100%. Especially if it's windy it can clear quite quickly

5 down tonight gives us a chance if we get a couple of hours from here.

Yes, let's see what happens first before saying this was the wrong decision. As Olly says, that forecast for Sunday is chopping and changing all the time. This could be the right call with the side benefits ahead of the fifth Test of Bairstow back into form and the Aussie attack even more broken and demoralised

VTR wrote:Yes, let's see what happens first before saying this was the wrong decision. As Olly says, that forecast for Sunday is chopping and changing all the time. This could be the right call with the side benefits ahead of the fifth Test  of Bairstow back into form and the Aussie attack even more broken and demoralised

No, let's say it was the wrong decision now - it's what Baz606 is all about!

I mean, the only way the forecast for Sunday has changed is that it's gone from 30-40% chance of precipitation on the Met Office to 80% for most of the day, whereas the BBC has kept it at 70%. Heavy rain, too, not the light shower that arrived this morning, and constant as it's through the entire weekend. There's no little gaps of a few hours of dryness, for instance.

England added 86 after lunch in just 11.4 overs...

Reckon that is a pretty fair use of resources . Hardly anything to do with individual milestones - just scoring at seven plus per over , eh ?

Obviously going to be a tough job to bowl Australia out on this : but that was just as true had they declared at lunch or half an hour beforehand. Hard to imagine a scenario in which an early declaration could have given a better chance of winning this than they have now. Think it has been clear since day one that if the last two days are totally lost there is virtually no chance of a result. Nothing has changed...