What Tim Bresnan brings to the England team...

Brass Monkey wrote:I take the whole 'shit' thing was for me.

What I actually said was:

Brass Monkey wrote:What Tim Bresnan brings to the England team... ?

Very rarely gets important runs.

Cannot be trusted for penetrative bowling within a four-man attack. Easily the worst bowler on show thus far.

No, I was speaking generally of overreactive responses to particular players in the course of their attempted careers. Some more humorous than others.

Though actually you have said a lot less measured tings bout TT! But, rather than rummage via a shiote Search function to nitpick for an at best ultimately entirely self-defeating and pointless point, I will take back any implication that I was avvin a dig at you in particular about a large barrely Tyke leprachaun in particular ... and, if you need one, offer an apology for any such possible imputation being understood!

If you say so.

But yeah, I've said worse about him.

Essentially, anything of note needs only to be said once. For shit, read the above. Fact of the matter is that both he and Broad consistently don't perform with the ball and, less importantly, with the bat.

With most of the batting 'being shit' we can count ourselves in the utmost of good fortune to be three matches clear of Australia, as we all know. But, the England management don't seem to. So, the cracks will be papered over.

It galls.

It's just lucky for us that there aren't that many teams around that can punish us for our ignorance.

Wholeheartedly agree on the second half of that.

I shiver slightly that Flower & Co will let the euphoria of results over Oz suspend intelligent judgment as to what the results mean, and where the games could have gone.

Part of why I wish (without great expectation) that Jim will be stood down to try Knee (Trembler), and perhaps Tiny Jim given a runout, at the Oval. Don't bloody rotate. But think forward, think "Return Series".

PeterCS wrote: suspend intelligent judgment as to what the results mean, and where the games could have gone.

I don't think we've ever had it, regardless of the success we've obtained through our current methods. Numbers and nothing else.

PeterCS wrote: But think forward, think "Return Series".

That'll never happen. Sounds strange for such an apparently tough bloke, but I don't think he'd want to upset 'the lads'.

We'll muddle through most series. And think we romped them at a canter.

But, in some regards, does it matter? We've 5 Tests against Aus, who will no doubt be in some way psychologically scarred, which will give us an edge, to certain extents. We'll start as favourites, but if they get the win, we'll tell ourselves that the rarely get beaten at home - which is true enough. Then we've got Tests against India next year, who are still an unknown force and are still reasonably likely to find our conditions foreign.

Then what? A shitload of hit and giggle crap. So, we could escape for a couple more years without a fair bit of trouble.

Either that or the lights go out, the walls come tumbling down.

Both your last paragraphs sound like T20.

Let's look at this pragmatically. (which is what I suspect the likes of Flower and Cook try and do) How could this team genuinely be improved? I'd say with two changes- The number six spot, and the third seamer.

Number six incumbent- Bairstow.
Other number six options- Taylor, Ballance, Stokes, Bopara, Morgan.

Third seamer incumbent- Bresnan.
Other third seamer options- Finn, Tremlett, Onions, Rankin, Jordan, Plunkett, Meaker, J. Overton.

If someone asked me who is genuinely the best person for each of those two spots at the moment, I would say Ballance and Tremlett.

The second opener may be considered a spot open for debate as well. But all things considered, I think Root should be persisted with. He's clearly got a lot of ability, he's young, and it's hard to say he doesn't have the potential to be a player with the stats of Cook in 6-7 years time, so I think he should stay there. We didn't drop Bell in 2005, and we didn't drop Cook in 2006-07, and they came through in the end.

So therefore, England's current best XI would be-

Cook(c)
Root
Trott
Pietersen
Bell
Ballance
Prior+
Broad
Swann
Tremlett
Anderson

Henry wrote: We didn't drop Bell in 2005, and we didn't drop Cook in 2006-07, and they came through in the end.

Bell in 2013, arguably in 2011.

Cook in 2010/11.

How many Tests did they play before that?

Brass Monkey wrote:

Henry wrote: We didn't drop Bell in 2005, and we didn't drop Cook in 2006-07, and they came through in the end.

Bell in 2013, arguably in 2011.

Cook in 2010/11.

How many Tests did they play before that?

Bell in 2006, really. He made runs for fun against Pakistan that season. Cook made some good contributions between 2006 and 2009 as well. Both of them averaged around 41 in that period, which may not have been amazing, but certainly wasn't terrible. Looking back, who would have been better in that period? Sales? Ramps??? I'm sure at the time we may have called for them to be called up, but in hindsight, the England selectors made the right call by sticking with Bell and Cook. Root's of a similar 'ilk'.

Cool. I found them so incredibly mediocre and wishy washy - and very fortunate people could point to their youth as a constant excuse.

Nice that you cite a horrendously poor Pakistan '06 attack as Bell 'making it'. But, we've been down that road before.

The Pak attack wasn't FAST.

Brass Monkey wrote:Cool. I found them so incredibly mediocre and wishy washy - and very fortunate people could point to their youth as a constant excuse.

Nice that you cite a horrendously poor Pakistan '06 attack as Bell 'making it'. But, we've been down that road before.

My point is, it's a big ask to expect 21/22 year olds to have significant success against the best one or two bowling attacks in the world straight away. If Bell had looked like a scared child against New Zealand in 2005, or Cook had been poking and prodding and nicking against the West Indies in 2006-07, then it would have been a big cause for concern, but in regards to them playing against Australia back then (Mcgrath, Gillespie, Lee, Warne) and Root against Australia now (and forget how woeful their batting is,,,,their current bowling attack is very good) it shouldn't be that surprising or concerning that they struggled (Bell, Cook)/are struggling (Root).

No it's cool. You don't want them to perform against the best, really. Just stick them in there all the same.

Well Root DID make 180 at Lord's. And yeah yeah, he should have been out on 8, but how many batsmen in the history of the game have made a hundred without offering at least one chance? He still made 172 more runs after that without offering a chance. As the old saying goes- Show me a batsman who's made a hundred, and I'll show you a batsman who's had some luck.

Root is about seven years away from his peak years. He'll be alright.

If we hadn't stuck with Cook and Bell through their early years they could have had Ramprakash-like careers, constantly dropped and recalled and never having long enough to develop into Test players. Advocating the 90s approach to how to treat young batsmen is advocating the 90s outcome of ending up 9th in the Test rankings.

True, we want players who come into the side at 21, dominate Test attacks for the next 15 years and end up averaging 55, but there's probably been a handful of players like that in the history of world cricket, if that. I do think our selectors have potentially dug a hole for themselves in promoting Root to open too soon, he doesn't look quite ready for it and it will be hard to drop him back down the order now, but perhaps he will build his confidence against lesser attacks and on quicker pitches and quickly develop into one of the best in the business.

I'm not saying any of that in particular - I'm just saying that the bloke who didn't look right could've been doing drinks whilst the bloke who did could've been given the leg up at six whilst a guaranteed ball facer could've dried their attack up.