FOURTH TEST: OLD TRAFFORD

England definitely have the momentum. Meanwhile, Australia drops Khawaja for Smith and rotates Pattinson for Starc.

Comments

[Smivvys back]

The Poms have the Ashes wrapped up, the country is about to go through a political maelstrom, and the way God works is he generally offers a carrot with the stick. Having said that, the World Cup win is a reasonable carrot. Come on boys!

[I am Not Trampis]

We will win.
The poms have two batsmen, Root can't hit tons and Stokes has hit his share this series. The rest are Marsh like in batting.

Our batting is weak but not as weak as the poms. This is the fastest pitch. Has Starc recovered his swing? If so we will win in a canter if not it will be harder to win.
I will be interested when Smivvy faces robin Hood. Will he have his Graeme Watson moment. He was a good hooker and puller until Melbourne 1971 against Tony Greig of all people. He looked unsettled against him at Lords before he hot hit.

Bumrah now has a late outswinger to combine with his late inswinger. Like wow baby.

[I am Not Trampis]

This is a poor pitch ( again).
Last season we have great pitches for the England V India series but not for the Ashes.
Why?

[Tony Tea]

A batsmen who had his face smashed by a bean ball, like Watson & Grieg, would maybe have reason to take the bowler to court.

[I am Not Trampis]

My memory had it as a top edge of a short ball not a beamer but it is so long ago I would not be dogmatic about it.

A shame because Watson was almost an allrounder but NEVER should have been picked ahead of Bill Lawry in 1972.

What is with Root.
you have all the aussie batsmen either going straight back not back and across ( like the Big L) or jumping all over the place like Smivvy when robin Hood bowls over 90 mph. so what occurs when Smivvy comes out. He bowls slower than Broad. Chappelli would have given him a rocket in his day and justifiably so

[Tony Tea]

I din't see Smiffy bat, but I'm reliably informed Jaffa was well off the pace.

[I am Not Trampis]

You did not miss much.
yep well under his top pace. Smivvy only gets out to bowlers under 80 mph if the balls swings or seams and it did neither while he was in.

[Carrot]

We’ve looked the better team consistently in this series so far. Better organised, better disciplined/drilled, much more assured. Barring the first day at Edgbaston, t’s taken some really special individual performances from the English to rattle us; Stokes, Archer, Broad has had his moments. You really get the feeling that this series won’t be won until it’s really WON though. We have the look of a football (soccer) team that haven’t really done much wrong but are on the back of a bad strong of results anyway. When they do finally break their duck and remember how to win they go on an extended winning run, but if they don’t it just gets worse and worse, managerial sackings, regulation, recriminations etc etc. We’ve won more recently in India than we’ve won in England and it’s obviously a pretty big psychological hurdle; we really SHOULD win here, but it’s proving a lot harder than it should.

[I am Not Trampis]

Bloody hell, Archer is bowling around Overton's speed. Why pick him? Tell him to get his finger out and get Smivvy jumping all over the place.

The pommies canot bat and they only bowl well every so often

[Tony Tea]

If we can't win this Test, we will lose the Ashes. Like fucken Cardiff, Headingly was yet another example of failing to close out a Test, thus leaving a win unclaimed and giving the opposition an opportunity to pinch the series with one Australian innings of shit cricket. South Africa 2012 Adelaide was a stand-out example.

[I am Not Trampis]

it might be a draw because of the weather tones. We will not lose it. Indeed I cannot see us losing the next test at the Oval

[Smivvys back]

Notable events
we won the toss on a good day to bat - luck
They dropped 3 catches, and bowled a no-ball - luck?
Smith 211 - some luck
Archer 0-90 odd - no luck, and learned some lessons I suspect

Crikcet's a funny game if luck is with you. It was our turn to get the rub of the green. Cant waste it now. Must crush them.

[I am Not Trampis]

funny thing luck.

If you are winning you have it and if you are losing you do not.

amazing how many bad teams drop seemingly easy catches.

I dunno how a spinner no-balls. It occurred in the Windies as well. I dunno how an umpire can not pick it up either.

Question.
Robin hood put the wind up the Aussies bowling over 9- mph but since then he has rarely reached there let alone gone past it.
Any point in selecting him to bowl fast medium?

[Tony Tea]

I don't know about Leach's no ball and luck. Apparently he had bowled a heap of them, but because they had not taken a wicket they were not reviewed and called. That smacks of a systemic fuck up, not luck.

[I am Not Trampis]

Sorry tones I was not implying that was bad luck simply poor bowling and umpiring.
This occurs to losing teams and rarely to winning teams

[Smivvys back]

I was being sarcastic with my 3 dropped catches and no ball re luck. Hence the ?. No way does concentration and good execution deliver luck.

[Smivvys back]

Forgot to mention - good thing England had the momentum from Headingly....

[I am Not Trampis]

It is a disgrace to our coaching that Starc's right foot points either to the keeper or worse down leg when he bowls instead of to first slip.
This means he cannot swing the ball back into the right hander and will not bowl as fast as he can.

[Carrot]

Posting at the fall of Burns’ dismissal. We’ve struggled for wickets this afternoon, but we’ve created loads of chances. England have deserved their luck and played well, but we’re definitely in with a sniff, here. Again, we’ve looked organised and have stuck to our plans.

[Carrot]

.... and then there was Hazlewood. Cummins definitely deserved one or two of his wickets, but that’s how it goes sometimes. With two new batsmen and the new ball around the corner we might be playing cat and mouse with follow-ons now, but after a demanding series you might expect us to bat again no matter what happens. I just hope we’re able to find a way to shut them out of the game somehow, I’m not sure I could live through another Headingley.

[I am Not Trampis]

terrible pitch. I hate flat tracks. you are playing Steve smith and you have to win and you provide a flat track. Poor memories. Smith was very poor last tour on wickets that gave something to the bowler.

Much better cricket to watch as well

[I am Not Trampis]

Hazel wood has been a better bowler since they knocked down his power station.

[Carrot]

Can’t agree with that, Trampis. I think this has been a perfectly reasonable wicket. There’s turn and bounce there for Lyon, and we saw with Hazlewood’s dismissal of Roy last night in particular that there’s plenty of movement for the quicks as well.

And what “last tour” are you referring to? The last Ashes series here when he averaged over 50? Or the South African series when his brain was fried and clearly not at his best?

[Carrot]

There’s a group in the crowd wearing curly red wigs. I’m deeply offended. That’s gingerface, and cultural appropriation.

[Carrot]

Koo Starc! Inswing! Barnyard door, Jonny - pack ‘em.

[Carrot]

Ha ha - an obvious expletive from Stokes as he wandered off. Reminds me of this:

https://youtu.be/pB4svFVLtXo

[I am Not Trampis]

Carrot check out when the wickets were not flat. Smith was lu=cky to get to double figures,
They are woeful wickets. not much seam as they should be and were against India.

Typical Starc gets Broad on a ball the reveres swing and the clowns say it cut.

grrr

[I am Not Trampis]

Can some-one tell me how an umpire cannot cal la no-ball on a spinner. It happened here and in the
Windies.

[I am Not Trampis]

will Warner be picked for the Oval?

[Carrot]

I’m not sure what you’re seeing, but I think the conditions have been pretty good so far this series. The ball has (largely) dominated the bat too, and that’s usually an indicator of fairly sporting pitches. And I don’t know where you’re getting the idea of Steve Smith being a flat-track bully. That’s just ...... crazy.

[Carrot]

The time-wasting from England at the end of our innings was diabolical, I think Paine pretty obviously wanted a lead of 400 but just got sick of the messing around. I don’t know why more can’t be done about things like that. Obviously I’m biased but it seems like England are really serial culprits.

AND - if we let this one slip I think it’ll be the end of me. 18/2 chasing 380, two of their most reliable batsman dismissed, and two of their shakiest at the wicket. That might be being a bit harsh on Denly, but whatevs. We want a wicket early tomorrow, whatever we can possibly do to get rid of Stokes, and the rest of it will take care of itself, surely.

[Smivvys back]

Im with you Carrot. Their 2 most solid batsman gone, and once the Stokes factor is addressed by Starc again, we have to really knock this over. No miracle as we have too many, and its a 5th day wicket with turn and variable bounce now.

[I am Not Trampis]

ball has dominated because the batting has been weak or very weak as I say go back to the last series in the UK. Take away the two flat tracks and they were pitches where only good batsmen could score runs. Same for India V England last season.

England are gone. Stokes cannot do heroics two tests in a row and I suspect the figure is too large anyway.

England can then have a good clean out for the last test

[I am Not Trampis]

Credit where it is due. The opening spells by Broad and Archer were very good. smith could have been out what 7 or 8 times.

It is typical of a team playing badly they get little luck.

Who can captain the poms. Root is no good. It would destroy Stokes like Botham and Flintoff before him perhaps Bairstow. Maybe bring in Folkes to be the WK. Of course when he retires he will go to an old Folkes home.

[I am Not Trampis]

Hmm is Smith a flat track bully. Perhaps a mild form whereas Warner is the real deal. Smith does come back to earth when the balls starts swinging or seaming as for example the Aardvarks showed. He still top scored just not a ton.

If you produce flat tracks he will score tons. He has in two tours of England and it seems the poms are slow learners. He has had more than his share of luck as well. He has produced Border luck in a few innings which naturally the jourmos either ignore or forget

[Smivvys back]

The umpires can give batsmen out no trouble if the right arm bowler is arounnd the wicket, but not a left arm bowler over the wicket. I think the unpiring in this series has been consistently poor, Rub of the green: Poms dark green; us extremely light green.

[I am Not Trampis]

amazing they change the ball and it starts swinging bigtime.

surely it mist be nearly time now and I won't cal you shirly again.

what you have never watched flying high. for shame for shame

[I am Not Trampis]

everyone bar the third umpire saw the ball hit the bat. No wonder this is the specsavewrs test.

[I am Not Trampis]

I don't get this.
Cummins is swinging it like Bob Massie, Hazelwood is just swinging it and Starc is not swinging it at all

[Carrot]

No one “saw” the ball hit the bat. We all know it did, but that’s beside the point - he needs conclusive evidence. I bet he was thanking his lucky stars when ball-tracking showed it was outside the line. On that point - I don’t know why they have to look at the footage in that order. Why can’t we jump towards and backwards as needed? As in “this is taking ages and I’m not sure about it; let’s skip a step and see what that says, and if we need to we’ll come back to whether he hit it or not then”. If the ball-tracking clearly shows it’s not out, then we’ve saved ourselves a load of time and hassle.

I am now officially Concerned about this; it’s an extended session coming up, but it has the look of 8 or 9 down at the close, and fvcken Cardiff will be joined by fvcken Old Trafford. Expect loads of delay tactics from the English, with plenty of “whoops, I accidentally brought out two left-handed gloves, silly me”.

[I am Not Trampis]

can I just say I love watching Jack Leach bat

[Carrot]

I love and hate cricket like this. One one hand it’s excruciating and exciting as well no matter who you support, but on the other it’s really one-dimensional and kinda uninteresting. One side desperate for wickets, the other just barely clinging on, and runs are completely unimportant. And it shows that survival in cricket is actually quite easy when you take runs out of the equation, which is why sides often cling on in these situations longer than you think they would.

[Carrot]

Corrections:

*ON* one hand

Exciting as *HELL*.

But you all knew that anyway, right?

[Carrot]

Well, they’re 9 down. Fourteen overs to go. That’s a lot of overs for the last pair to get through. Anderson and Penasar survived eleven in 2009.

[Carrot]

It’s ours!! Wow. That’s awesome. We haven’t won it yet, but that’s just fantastic stuff. Can’t believe it’s been 18 years since we last took it home. I just want to thank Tony, and God and Mum and Dad, and everyone else for letting me be here tonight.....

Let’s hope we can win at the Oval and properly win as opposed to just retain it.

[Bruce]

Headingly might be the Poms equivalent of the Summer of Kidding Ourselves(tm). One miracle innings to paper over their cracks.

If the strategy for winning is based on once in a generation heroics then it might not be a reliable game plan.

[I am Not Trampis]

you are totally right Bruce.
The poms need wholesale changes.
One of the funny things is they have perhaps 4-5 fast bowlers who can bowl above 250k yet have only picked one despite our batsmen ,smith included, showing they are very suspect against it.

We are kidding ourselves if we think we are going well. Our batting is sub standard. Who will be the new captain and please do not say Smith.

Our bowlers saved us here.

[I am Not Trampis]

I forgot to mention the poms need a captain as well.

[Tony Tea]

The Poms have caught the disease we suffered from after the retirements of Warne and co. They've over-egged the ODI basket and forgotten how to play Test cricket. You could make a case that we've won just about every session of the series.

[I am Not Trampis]

Tonee,
I still cannot believe pommies going at the ball with hard hands over there. Definitely world cup hangover.

Should Paine retire before the oval test or after it?
We simply need to select a decent batting lineup. At some point smith will either run out of the luck he has had in this series or get out when the ball is swinging or swinging around. It will be interesting to see the Kiwi's tactics.

As for the poms. please do not tell me Malan and Vince are bo not better batsmen than Roy or Denley. Then there is their opening problem.

They need to select some-one to succeed Broad. They certainly missed an in form Ali. I do not know what they can do on spinning.
Root should stand down as skipper for the last test perhaps give it to Bairstow ( no not to Stokes look to Botham and Flintoff to see what would occur.) Bring in Foakes as wikky.

[Carrot]

There’s absolutely no reason to jettison Paine. He’s as good with the gloves as anyone we’ve had for a long time. He needs runs, but he just came off a half century and a not out, and you could argue that his bowling changes won us the match and the series last night. The move to Labuschagne was fantastic.

We have missed Warner’s runs. He will come good, particularly at home.. Labuschagne has been a find. We have been very dependent on Smith, but we’ve been just as dependent on the likes of Waugh, Ponting, Clarke and even Martyn in series past, even in our pomp. Dropping Khawaja was a bold move and I’m sure he’ll play again at some point; it’s still early days for Head, and he still averages over 40. The second opener’s slot is still open (what does Burns have to do to get a run again?). The only other guy I’d really be thinking seriously about is Wade; there must be better and more permanent solutions than him at 6, but he’s the only other player in our ranks to score a ton in this series and until he becomes genuinely unselectable he probably deserves a decent run.

We’ve won with worse and more flawed sides than this. I think there’s enough there to at least keep ahold of the core of this team for awhile - we’ll always tinker with the odd player here and there, but what side doesn’t.

As for England - they’ve got to stop picking their one-day side, or at least until they’ve proven themselves at first-class level again. Roy, Butler and Bairstow were all found out this series. They’re probably all good enough to succeed at this level one way or another (opinions will differ on Roy), but they need first-class cricket under their belts again.

[Smivvys back]

Im pretty sure I wrote before Edgbaston that I would be happy for the poms to win the world cup - or be gifted it - and for us to win the Ashes. I m glad I wrote that, and I am glad we have. Win, retained its the same thing. But 3-1 will avenge the disaster that was the 2010/11 series out here. They have been outplayed in about 80% of the sessions. Will Broad be rested? Did Jimmy's absence make the difference. Who cares.We keep them. Mission accomplished. Well bowled to the unit, and the Lab can take a bow as well. He might be shorr odds to open at the Oval as well. An extra right hander will make some difference.

[I am Not Trampis]

Paine is clearly neither the keeper nor the batsman he once was. He is on the decline. Retiring at wining in the UK is what he should do. We have Alex Carey is the wings. Letting four byes occur when keeping to Lyones was very Wadeish.
However no likely captain is on the horizon.

Our superb bowling was papered over our weak batting lineup.

However the Poms have heaps of problems. Poor captain, even poorer batting and who will succeed Anderson and Broad.
One big difference between this and the last tours apart from the pitches was how vital Ali is when in form in England.

What ifs. how about if Anderson was fully fit. smith's luck in the first test would have been up with Anderson bowling and we would have probably not made 100. I dare say Smith's average would be more like 50 than it is at present.

However this does not matter.
The poms are in dire straits.

[I am Not Trampis]

They have names an unchanged eleven.What planet are the pommy selectors on.

3-1

[Lou]

Been busy and not been able to watch too much of live play. Though whenever I see some, Cummins is bowling like he's blessed by God. If he keeps this up, he's going to be one of our all-timers. He ca bowl seam, swing, bounce, the bloody lot and can bowl in the channel for ages. He seems to have had a really good effect on Haze who bowled a lot of junk last time he toured here. I've not seen much of Smith's innings, but has he really been that lucky? He's been averaging over 70 for about 5 years, it ain't just luck, and I saw that he kept out a grubber during the match which would have got anyone else out.

Anyway, very pleased for Paine and Langer. Extremely pleased for the players despite both teams being a bit gash apart from Smith, Laboosh, our bowlers, Stokes and a couple of their bowlers.

[Carrot]

Smith played a missed a bit in his first dig in Edgbaston, and then again in the early part of the second innings at Old Trafford, but I wouldn’t describe his series as being lucky. Getting caught off a no ball in the first innings is lucky I guess, but the reality is that the longer you’re out there the likelihood is that you’re going to offer up a chance every now and again, and he has been out there rather a lot! There has to be some room in there somewhere for him being very, very good.

Cummins bowled a fantastic length at Old Trafford. His natural length can often be a bit short, but he was right on there money there.

[I am Not Trampis]

Cummins bowl seam?? When. I have only seen him bowl an offcutter which is the odd ball after bowling outswingers.