England v Australia, 3rd Test, Edgbaston, Jul 30 - Aug 3

Chivalry Augustus wrote:If Watson scores a hundred against us I will die of shame. All those nadirs of before will be nothing compared to this.

Anyway, this Test is lost. Flat pitch, England are rubbish. As you'd expect. Swing track bullies. Jimmy Anderson has been dog-shit in this series in all bar one innings. Stuart Broad has just been shit, full stop.

Farking hell, it took you an hour to have a major moan that everything is 'rubbish'. You're slipping.

JKLever wrote:

Blimey not sure you can rip a bowling attack apart on the first day of a game when only 30 overs were bowled on a decent pitch!

Did you not watch it? Makes no difference what the pitch is like when you're bowling both sides of the wicket to seemingly no plan whatsoever.

Dello wrote:

JKLever wrote:

Blimey not sure you can rip a bowling attack apart on the first day of a game when only 30 overs were bowled on a decent pitch!

Did you not watch it? Makes no difference what the pitch is like when you're bowling both sides of the wicket to seemingly no plan whatsoever.

Nope - had to go shopping so only caught the last 5 overs. It was that bad was it? 4 an over doesn't seem that poor on a flattie.

Pitch chart and bowling patterns showed the bowling up as filth Leve ...
No other way to describe it.

Half volleys way off line were either spanked (22 fours) or else were easy leaves. Never seen Katich play with such ease... the batsmen hardly had any decent balls to actually worry about!

Serious bollicking this evening I reckon ... and improvement tomorrow or else England are going to have a farking long day out in the middle - rain permitting!!

Stuart Broad has bowled rubbish all series, but when Strauss immediately sets a man back at deep square leg when he comes on, it only encourages Broad to bang it in half way down. I think Strauss is as much to blame for Broad's crapness so far as Broad is himself.

Merlin wrote:

Serious bollicking this evening I reckon ...

That's the thing with this England side - I don't think anyone ever does get a kicking. There's a strange sort of "we're buddies and buddies don't give other buddies a hard time" aura about Team England.

I can well imagine after today's play they went "Unlucky boys. Flat pitch. Nothing you could do."

Aye, 22 boundaries in 30 overs does suggest crapola.

Swanny, LOL

"We didn't bowl as well as we had hoped and we knew they'd come at us hard,
which they did," said Swann.
"We didn't put the ball in the right areas and we must change that."

Nice of him to take the blame for the seamers ineptness...

Got to say Strausser was rather wooden and, at times, lost for ideas between overs 10 and 30.
Broad's figures flatter him.
Jimmy was way off touch.
Swanny bowling just 2 overs was ridiculous, despite little or no turn - but FFS he takes the pace off the ball so the batsman have to go for it if they want to score quick.
And ..... WTF is Onions doing in the side?

Fred was Fred - honest and a trier.

Flintoff was disappointing- Too short, and didn't make the batsmen play enough. Let's not let his performance at Lord's cloud our judgement of him here today. I thought he had learnt that he needs to pitch it up more to take more wickets. I guess this England team just don't do 'learning'.

Or alternatively, we're not that good and it's rather humourous we're 1-0 up having been battered in the 1st test....

Henry wrote:Flintoff was disappointing- Too short, and didn't make the batsmen play enough. Let's not let his performance at Lord's cloud our judgement of him here today. I thought he had learnt that he needs to pitch it up more to take more wickets. I guess this England team just don't do 'learning'.

He's no Kallis, that's for sure.

taipan wrote:

Henry wrote:Flintoff was disappointing- Too short, and didn't make the batsmen play enough. Let's not let his performance at Lord's cloud our judgement of him here today. I thought he had learnt that he needs to pitch it up more to take more wickets. I guess this England team just don't do 'learning'.

He's no Kallis, that's for sure.

Yes, he puts the team above his own average for a start...

Don't bite! Must not bite....

beamer wrote:

taipan wrote:

Henry wrote:Flintoff was disappointing- Too short, and didn't make the batsmen play enough. Let's not let his performance at Lord's cloud our judgement of him here today. I thought he had learnt that he needs to pitch it up more to take more wickets. I guess this England team just don't do 'learning'.

He's no Kallis, that's for sure.

Yes, he puts the team above his own average for a start...

That's a given, given his averages.

taipan wrote:

Henry wrote:Flintoff was disappointing- Too short, and didn't make the batsmen play enough. Let's not let his performance at Lord's cloud our judgement of him here today. I thought he had learnt that he needs to pitch it up more to take more wickets. I guess this England team just don't do 'learning'.

He's no Kallis, that's for sure.

He's probably not even half a Kallis these days......

JKLever wrote:Don't bite! Must not bite....

Too late.

Already got one.

Jeez, they got on?? I gave up at midmight Aus time.

And POCson got going?? WIBF.

So I guess all we need now is the twit to go onto a big score and then Midge to get a bag, and I will happily look like a dill. [leaving himself wide open for some obvious lines]

skully wrote:So I guess all we need now is the twit to go onto a big score and then Midge to get a bag, and I will happily look like a dill. [leaving himself wide open for some obvious lines]

It was a given after all the anti-Watson mincing You wait till his 5-fer...

My money's still on a twanged hammy or pulled calf muscle.

It was utter dross England sent down, no doubt about it. But it was just 30 overs, so no need to write off the game as some seem to be doing.

Broad does seem to be having real problems. I defended him on the basis of considerable improvement in the West Indies and not wanting to jettison him on the basis of one game where everyone was dreadful, and another average performance.

But he needs to perform this test, he really does.

The seamers were all pretty crap, Freddie probably the least crap of the four though didn't do anything special. You just can't give away that many boundaries at this level, it stops any pressure from building and keeps the scoreboard moving along so the batsmen don't need to worry about playing risky shots to deliveries they don't have to play at.

This should have been a tricky little session for Australia, if they'd kept it tight then they might have been rewarded with two or three wickets, instead it was a comfortable start for them to build on. Let's just hope we get the sort of swing that is necessary to make Anderson effective tomorrow.

It appears that Phil Hughes has done himself no favours with the hierachy, apparently leaking news of his dropping on Twitter, prior to the official announcement.

Watto

*snigger*

beamer wrote:The seamers were all pretty crap, Freddie probably the least crap of the four though didn't do anything special. You just can't give away that many boundaries at this level, it stops any pressure from building and keeps the scoreboard moving along so the batsmen don't need to worry about playing risky shots to deliveries they don't have to play at.

This should have been a tricky little session for Australia, if they'd kept it tight then they might have been rewarded with two or three wickets, instead it was a comfortable start for them to build on. Let's just hope we get the sort of swing that is necessary to make Anderson effective tomorrow.

But that's England's problem through and through - their entire bowling plans are built around the hope that conditions will do all the work for them.

There's no back up plan in place if that doesn't work out. They just look totally lost and devoid of ideas.

The concept of keeping it tight and boring batsmen out either hasn't occurred to them or is beyond their limited skill sets.