New Zealand v England, 1st Test, Auckland, 22-26 March, 2018

beamer wrote:Surprised they shoehorned this in at the end of an Ashes winter. I don’t remember this happening before. I’d rather we had a decent series in NZ rather than another of the lambs to the slaughter trips to subcontinental dust bowls, but commercial pressures tell I guess.

It happened after the Bodyline tour.

I don't remember that one, but I do remember the 1971 NZ v England series.

lardbucket wrote:I don't remember that one, but I do remember the 1971 NZ v England series.

It was when Wally went over and scored 500+ for once out, including gleefully taking the WR test score from DGB.

1971 gave Bob Taylor a debut that he probably felt (at the time) would be his only test.

OP Tipping wrote:Well done them.

On another note, it's sad that NZ only merits a 2-test series versus Blighty now.

Aye a 5/0 flogging would cheer up most of us.

From 1946/47 to 1974/75, England played tests in New Zealand after every tour to Australia.

Made sense in the coming out by boat.

WideWally wrote:From 1946/47 to 1974/75, England played tests in New Zealand after every tour to Australia.

Yeah, those slipped my mind... perhaps because I wasn’t born

skully wrote:

horace wrote:Is the Pig 🐷 playing?

Good question. Seems all is forgiven.

Stokes has the support of his countrymen.

lardbucket wrote:

skully wrote:

horace wrote:Is the Pig 🐷 playing?

Good question. Seems all is forgiven.

Stokes has the support of his countrymen.

He doesn't have the support of this one, for sure.

If the courts find him guilty, I'd be satisfied with a suspended sentence if it was conditional on getting serious professional help with anger management.

Interesting stuff, Growls.

Smith condoned a bit of ball tampering and gets 12 months (a $5M+ sentence) and Stokes drunkenly bashes the tripe out of someone and misses one Test series.

Perspective in the Great Game seems to be a little skew-whiff atm.

WideWally wrote:From 1946/47 to 1974/75, England played tests in New Zealand after every tour to Australia.

So did just about every other touring team that came to Oz. And over the summer we'd all become so used to these guys being on the scene that the ABC sent a commentator over to call the action back to Australia.

skully wrote:Interesting stuff, Growls.

Smith condoned a bit of ball tampering and gets 12 months (a $5M+ sentence) and Stokes drunkenly bashes the tripe out of someone and misses one Test series.

Perspective in the Great Game seems to be a little skew-whiff atm.

Not comparing apples.....

Match-fixing and crashing into a mountain. Apples and apples.

One series so far...and he only missed that for logistics reasons. If he does wind up in the slammer he'll miss a bit more then, and maybe even more after they let him out.

Growler wrote:

lardbucket wrote:

skully wrote:

horace wrote:Is the Pig 🐷 playing?

Good question. Seems all is forgiven.

Stokes has the support of his countrymen.

He doesn't have the support of this one, for sure.

If the courts find him guilty, I'd be satisfied with a suspended sentence if it was conditional on getting serious professional help with anger management.

Think you may have missed a joke, Growls. Or am I imagining one?

The right result in the end btw.

Some half-decent efforts in the visitors' second innings - but none going on past the 60s to give a greater likelihood of salvaging a draw. A draw that overall would have been a travesty in any case, given the previous two innings.

I don't know where this England team is going, from its current alternation of throwing a couple of swings, being on the ropes, and landing on the canvas. It don't look too good.

A side of any substance would take some morale boost & succour from the 50s in the second knock. And regroup. But where a restart will come from, I'm not sure. Root tends to look a bit exasperated in his attempts to fire the team. Bayliss increasingly looks like a LO motivator.

PeterCS wrote:

Growler wrote:

lardbucket wrote:

skully wrote:

horace wrote:Is the Pig 🐷 playing?

Good question. Seems all is forgiven.

Stokes has the support of his countrymen.

He doesn't have the support of this one, for sure.

If the courts find him guilty, I'd be satisfied with a suspended sentence if it was conditional on getting serious professional help with anger management.

Think you may have missed a joke, Growls. Or am I imagining one?

Maybe - to both questions Peter, regarding a joke.

Stokes has the support of the ECB, as proven by his presence in NZ - including club cricket when The Ashes was on. I'm with beamer that the ECB can't, and shouldn't pre-empt the outcome of the justice system over what is not strictly a cricketing matter.

However, the man is a professional, internationally capped sportsman. Whether he's eventually convicted or not, the moment that news broke that he was the subject of police investigation into allegations of violence he's automatically guilty of bringing the game into disrepute IMHO.

I don't believe that suspension from international selection until the matter is completely settled is unduly harsh, and if our team is weaker due to his absence, so be it.

Well put. I think the guy and others had broken rules by getting on the turps. That was prolly enough for a significant suspension. Still the justice system needs to play out. Personally I would not want the bloke representing my team until the case was resolved. The burden of proof in a criminal case is of course higher.

Australia made the error of tolerating rubbish behaviour from gcspoc for years. The English team management has the opportunity to nip the problem in the bud before Stokes goes down in a heap as gcspoc.