West Indies v England, 1st Test, North Sound, 8-12 March, 2022

When you have a glaring weakness at the top of the order, you just shouldn’t be exposing it by choosing to bat first.

To reverse an old saying… you win the toss, and you bowl. Unless it’s blazing sun, 35C heat, and an absolute road, in which case you think about it for a moment, and then bowl.

Decent response from Bairstokes, the Ginger Ninjas at least getting us back in the game a bit. No idea what par is here.

Oh well, back to thinking about scraping to 200 somehow.

With each batsman dismissed so far scoring more than his predecessor, your mob might yet exceed 350.

It’s not a Rawalpindi Road, but batting doesn’t look too difficult.

I’m tipping 500.

I was thinking that can’t have happened too many times, each of the top six scoring more than the man above him on the scorecard.

Still wouldn’t put money on Jack at jack top-scoring though

Foakes breaks the sequence, but still a good effort… can Jonny make it to three figures? Woakes follows Stokes and Foakes as his batting partners…

Looks a good knock by Johnny. England recovered through him and Foakes (given a go at last).

Yeah, at 29 he was at risk of slipping into the Read/Foster category of keepers sidelined for flashier batting alternatives. It’s still probably the case that everyone wants a Gilchrist, but like the man he most famously kept wicket to, he was a one-off. And an explosive player to take the game away from the opposition is wasted anyway if he’s coming in at 100-5.

Impressive century from Jonny B, anyway. Maybe he can finally find a settled role in the side. If we can’t sort the top four he’s going to get shoved up the order again, though, rightly or (most probably) wrongly.

Honours just about even on day 1 thanks to Jonny and Team O(a)kes. Pitch seems flat but their top order is inexperienced as well and hopefully we can get amongst them.

beamer wrote:Foakes breaks the sequence, but still a good effort… can Jonny make it to three figures? Woakes follows Stokes and Foakes as his batting partners…

Sequence still not broken - each batsman dismissed has scored more than the previous batsman dismissed. Woakes has to be next out for > 42 to maintain the sequence.

it's not Stokes, Foakes, Woakes in the official batting order?! you suck, England!

Nath wrote:it's not Stokes, Foakes, Woakes in the official batting order?!  you suck, England!

They did partner Bairstow in succession in that order…

Anyway, they were talking shite on TalkShite re. England top order batting… it’s a fair point that county cricket isn’t producing (particularly top three) batsmen ready for Test cricket due to playing most of it in the Darren Stevens Twilight Zone of the season, but the other points made little sense.

They were talking of technique, but it’s surely more about shot selection and temperament than technique, or otherwise why did the likes of Chanderpaul and Graeme Smith average around 50 in Tests? And then they started to talk about players having to average 70 and make 2000 runs in county cricket, as Ramprakash did. But Ramps couldn’t cut it at Test level either, so what does that prove? Particularly as the likes of Vaughan, Trescothick etc. didn’t have spectacular county stats, and Cook and Bell were fast-tracked before they could get to that stage. The county averages in the ‘00s were topped by overseas/Kolpakkers, the semi-retired and Ramprakash, and we still produced capable Test batsmen who usually made centuries on debut!

And the “these are our best players” argument… well, so were Hick, Ramprakash and Crawley the elder in their day, but they didn’t live up to it and were dropped. Sometimes leftfield selections come off in an unexpected way, and we can’t just stick with “chosen ones” averaging less than 30.

Tail subsiding but Jonny goes on after being dropped by Noddy.

Great knock from Here's Jonny. Poms crack the 300.portand cigar time at his Club for our favourite Lord Member.
Wackies making a fair start.

Pretty poor to let the Tavare-like Kraigggg score 55 off 70. Looks hard work on this pitch but things about even at this stage.

...and the Mitch Marsh-like Johnson score 35

Leach keeping it tight, but the seamers not doing likewise.

At 4-127 things were dire for the Ganjas, but the impressive Holder is pulling them out of the poo.

The Wis could fall in a heap, but at this stage might push for parity.

BBC text commentary describing that session as “as flat as the Netherlands”.

Even if we’re right to move on from Anderson and Broad, this attack certainly doesn’t look like the future…

This is turgid stuff. The draw could be coming into the equation here.

Go the Windies! Get that lead and put some pressure on the England top order.

A sharp run-out by sub Pope and Foakes sees off Papa Roach, but nothing doing for England otherwise.

Wood injured (elbow). Pass me the gin someone.

Darth Permaul digging in as well. Shall we just let them bat out the 5 days then have a rethink?

Sure they’ll want a crack at our openers tonight.