The Ashes

england's batting is crap
and bar smith & warner so is australia's

Isa should be sacked

Hard to say which is worse, England's batting today or the umpiring!

cant think of any other test side that Denley would get into..including the associates...fair enough if he was 22 with a bit of improvement in him....as for Roy..he will have a couple of more fails at the top of the order be moved down to five/six...fail again...then wont see him playing test cricket again(his hands get so far in front and outside of his body, just a walking wicket)...like to see sam curran back in...unless its swinging he probably will struggle but at least he is far less likely to break down and certainly carrys less mental scar tissue. Vince back in (25 will do)..Archer's gonner be fascinating..cant have both Bairstow/Buttler.
Burns
Vince
Root
Stokes
Foakes
Woakes
Curran
Archer
Broad
Any spinner (doesnt matter all sh1t)
any one of Buttler/roy/Bairstow in any position from 1-7

"England surrender on final day"

Shock horror

That has to be the most pathetic capulation in test match history

Having them 122/8 and heading into the lead with 2 set batsman and 6 wickets in hand and still lose by that margin... that took some doing so fair play to us for that one

A shower of s****

Did think it would turn into a minefield once we batted on it

Root should be sacked as captain for that shower of c*ap yesterday, just gave in and he has no clue when it comes to tactics either

game wasn't lost today. letting them off hook day 1 and after that hard to overcome having no anderson and moeen horribly out of form. root literally had no one to turn to at times yday

Mafeking

Root needed to do some motivating, standing there like a chocolate teapot isn't going to rally the troops

Get in the Aussies faces, sledge them, eff and blind if needs be, something to get your men tails up

Standing there hands on hips and looking like a spare part at a wedding isn't going to do anything, it felt like a funeral yesterday

Broad should be captain if only for the fact he winds up the Aussies

Failing that make Stokes captain?

Someone with a bit of fire in their belly ffs

Root looks like the milky bar kids half brother

all these are getting knighted for winning a mickey. mouse trophy few weeks back, most of them CANNOTplay proper cricket.

Loving this

The selection of Moeen was plain daft. They didn't think him good enough to bowl 10 overs in the World Cup so...

His batting is shot to pieces.

Woakes WAS fit yesterday and bowled 7 overs. Why?

I still question Root's desire to be 'expansive' (yuk). JB's late cut off Siddle was ludicrous and Roy's shot today x rated . Haven't seen any other wickets today but fear the worst.

JB down at 7 and keeping again needs some explaining. Foakes is the best in the country and has the potential to average high 30s at 7. If JB can't average 40+ at 5, he shouldn't be playing.

If Bayliss and Root can't get the off field decisions right, we have no chance.

Root looks like the milky bar kids half brother

I don't know who the milky bar kid is but this made me chuckle.

In ASDA they have a shelf full of "Reduced to Clear" items. At certain times of day a member of staff appears with a price gun to mark everything down even further and hands back to the baying crowd their items that they'd already grabbed and given him to re-price. Usually it's a youngish Asian chap at my local store. I sometimes tell him he is "The Milky Bar Kid" and he gives me this polite-but-clearly-perplexed half-smile, even when I point to the "gun".

You youngsters don't even have a proper old sea-dog for a Captain Birds-Eye these days.

O tempora! O mores!

Archer, Woakes, Stokes and Broad are probably going to be our 4 quicks in the next test

Archer is untried and doesn't look good enough for test cricket, Woakes bowls like he's in 20/20s which is 3 over spells and then is tired, Stokes is basically a poorer version of a prime peter Siddle, will run in all day but hasn't really got the accuracy and pace to really threaten, he's a nice option to have if we've got 2 other great seamers though. Broad is Broad, he can have spells where he's totally unplayable, but he needs back up at the other end. Then there's the spinners Root had to turn to himself yesterday ffs.

I think England are flat track bullies when batting and only bowl well in helpful conditions otherwise look pretty ordinary at times. Aussie got their selection right and we did not.

Unfortunately Moen has to go for Leach. I like Moen but he needs to find some form and runs in County cricket. We could still play him and Leach in the same side with Root at 3.

The answers unfortunately are not so obvious as the problems. Foakes is one of the answers. Get him in for Bstard or Butler.

I like the look of Malan this year. Maybe he is ready for another crack. I have seen enough of Roy to know every gun fast bowler in Test Cricket would fancy him. It is a shame as I would like to see someone like him in the side but not Bstard, Butler and him.

Too early to panic. Maybe Lords will return to a normal pitch and our batters might flourish I think only desperation will call for one of the young guns to open and then it will be too late.

I am not a huge Broad fan, 1-91 in the second innings but he is now the leader of the line. Archer must come in at Lords. How does curran get in? I would rather play him than Denly. Move everybody else up.

So for me

Burns
Roy
Root
Stokes
Butler
Curran
Foakes
Woakes
Archer
Leach
Broad

I wouldn't be averse to throwing in a youngster at the top instead of Roy but he ought to be given a chance. Test Cricket is a hard game. At the moment he does not look well adapted to it.

WD - Roy has no desire nor charge to adapt. Root wants him to play HIS way. Madness for sure but it's the brand....

Leach HAS to play. Archer is box office. As your team suggests, it's a no brainer to pick Foakes ahead of Denly.

Archer is untried and doesn't look good enough for test cricket

Give him a chance we need a FAST bowler

WD

I will give him a chance, I thought he should have been in ahead of Woakes personally

But is he good enough? I'm sure we'll find out soon enough

Aug 5, 2019 -- 6:43PM, SontaranStratagem wrote:

WD I will give him a chance, I thought he should have been in ahead of Woakes personally But is he good enough? I'm sure we'll find out soon enough

You haven't given him a chance because you've already said he doesn't look good enough for test cricket.
What is that actually based on?
He's been fantastic in white ball cricket for England.
His red ball record is exceptional and he himself has said he's a better red ball bowler than white ball

SaveTheWhales. • August 5, 2019 3:04 PM BST
Odds for Lords?

wondersobright • August 5, 2019 3:06 PM BST
11/8
5
11/8
something like that

not bad

Aug 5, 2019 -- 6:03PM, Whisperingdeath wrote:

I think England are flat track bullies when batting and only bowl well in helpful conditions otherwise look pretty ordinary at times. Aussie got their selection right and we did not.Unfortunately Moen has to go for Leach. I like Moen but he needs to find some form and runs in County cricket. We could still play him and Leach in the same side with Root at 3.The answers unfortunately are not so obvious as the problems. Foakes is one of the answers. Get him in for Bstard or Butler.I like the look of Malan this year. Maybe he is ready for another crack. I have seen enough of Roy to know every gun fast bowler in Test Cricket would fancy him. It is a shame as I would like to see someone like him in the side but not Bstard, Butler and him.Too early to panic. Maybe Lords will return to a normal pitch and our batters might flourish I think only desperation will call for one of the young guns to open and then it will be too late.I am not a huge Broad fan, 1-91 in the second innings but he is now the leader of the line. Archer must come in at Lords. How does curran get in? I would rather play him than Denly. Move everybody else up.So for meBurnsRoyRootStokesButlerCurranFoakesWoakesArcherLeachBroadI wouldn't be averse to throwing in a youngster at the top instead of Roy but he ought to be given a chance. Test Cricket is a hard game. At the moment he does not look well adapted to it.

As much as I like Curran that batting order looks a batsman light to me, do we really need 6 bowling options at home.

Burns
Roy
Root
Bairstow
Stokes
Buttler
Foakes (wk)
Woakes
Archer
Broad
Leach

They need to take the gloves off Jonny.
We don't need a wk batsman, we have plenty of those. We need some batsman capable of scoring runs and Jonny is capable of that if liberated from the gloves!

As long as I get my green I don't get wound up about Eng losses.

Nevertheless this Eng team if you look through last 5 years have a habit of bouncing back after a dreadful display at home so don't get too despondent.

likely as not to get owned again at Lords
weather may help them salvage a draw
zero chance of winning(beforetiming)

Laying aus at 2.3 for 500

When people drink away the sorrow of the loss tonight, England will be favorites again.

*today's loss

Beyond me how England's batsmen can be so hopeless at playing Lyon's severe spin. Anyone who has played any game involving a ball will

know that if all you do is to block the ball the spin will take on your bat/racquet. It is essential to do one of three things: 1.Go down the wicket

and hit it on the full, 2: hit the ball at the moment it bounces or 3, hit through the ball to cancel out the spin.

Unbelievable naivety from England.

Sibley
Vince/Burns your choice but I prefer Vince
Stokes
Root
Roy
Buttler
Foakes
Woakes
Rashid/Leech your choice but I prefer Rashid
Archer
Broad

such a shame Morgan cant/wont play Test cricket purely for his captaincy. Root has been pitiful in this department

Foakes has to play,i believe his technique against the quicks is as good as anyone we have, Roy has to go , his dismissal  was one of the worst shots I've seen at test level (would loved to have been in Boycott's presence when he played it!!), would bring Vince in for Denly, Archer has to play if fit along with Woakes and Broad, Moen out prob for Leech, as for an opener to go with Burns (still not convinced) I'm struggling, what happened to the lad from Lancashire?,  he looked a proper batsman but seems to have dropped off the radar!

Lyon was made to look like Warne today, he's not even in Giles class ffs

It baffles me how he manages to get the amount of wickets he does, he's a part time spin bowler in the 90s in my opinion

Part time is the new full time.

agree sontaran, standard in sport in decline, but one area that cricketers have made giant strides is in their fielding

I have never liked Nathan Lyon or Stuart Broad for that matter but Nathan Lyon is a World Class bowler make no mistake. The fact that England batted worse than schoolboys does not make his bowling average, which, it was on the first innings fair enough. He is a kwality player and ought to get a little more respect.

It baffles me how he manages to get the amount of wickets he does, he's a part time spin bowler in the 90s in my opinion

He obviously baffles plenty of batsmen as well
Over 350 test wkts so the guy is no mug despite the opinions of a few on here

SS thinks averaging over 60 in tests for a batsman is no big feat.

No wonder he's baffled by a 'part timer' representing his country for years now as the lead spinner.

He gets many of his wickets because he tends to use over spin instead of side spin as his main weapon. This sometimes makes it harder to pick up the length as the ball tends to dip at the last minute. It also bounces quite high and he gets many wickets in that way also and that is why he likes bowling to right handers and the perceived wisdom is that an offie should be bowling to lefties.

Still don't like the bloke!

Not in Giles class FFS! Really? I would have to agree with that. Definately not in the same class as Ashley Giles!

Lyon is nothing more than a decent spin bowler

Its the lack of patience and stupidity from todays can't be bothered to dig in generation

Back in the late 90s early 00s he'd have struggled to get any wickets

Roys dismissal today was the perfect example

"f*** it ive got 28 lets go mental and blast this out the stadi... f*** he's bowled me "

And the most infuriating thing is they don't even read the situation

28 to 34 is totally pointless because we are chasing an impossible score, so going to smash the leather of that delivery is dumb is any book

We needed them to dig in and grind out a draw, but Roy decided for that one delivary to go after a cheap 6

Bonkers and mental

That's bad batting. I don't understand how you can use that to say Lyon is average. Its not his fault the batsmen are stupid.

You were making no sense with Steve Smith yesterday either. Calling Stokes and Woakes ordinary bowling all rounders to justify Steve Smith being an ordinary cricketer.

If Steve Smith averages 60 with a stupid technique(I don't know what work you used but you made fun of his moving around), why is it that others with proper techniques don't average anywhere close, let alone better? Do you have an explanation for that? Or do you think every batsman in the world is ordinary in today's times?

Smith was made to look better than he was I stand by that

I find it hard to think a lad with his iffy technique can keep wracking up runs like he does. I remember South Africas trio of bowling machines Steyn, Morkel and Philander had his number a few years back, bowled with pace, line and length and he had no clue.

You put those 3 in our team with our conditions and he'd been nicking to slips all series. In Australia they'd bounce him out in my opinion.

His average is inflated with the poor bowling he's faced, which is odd because its much more bowler friendly today

In fact we can go more recent, where he had to get his youngster to cheat with sandpaper in South Africa

My advice to our bowlers is go yorker length on him, he shows his stumps a lot so aim for them, he misses and we hit?

Sontaran your observations and judgement really stinks imho

I don’t know why you are so angry with Lyon and Smith. I dislike Smudge immensely and called him a cheat when I saw him in the a World Cup but he is shaping up as a great batsman, not Cookie great but proper all time great!

His idiosyncrasy does not make his technique poor just unusual. He practises harder than anyone

Aug 5, 2019 -- 4:53PM, SontaranStratagem wrote:

Failing that make Stokes captain? Someone with a bit of fire in their belly ffsRoot looks like the milky bar kids half brother

Sadly Joe Root's imagined resemblance to The Milky Bar Kid is an aesthetic one only.
He and his team are neither "strong" nor "tough" and clearly don't subscribe to the maxim of "only the best is good enough".

In era gone by , with players who had the focus and discipline needed , it would have been no result at stumps.
How many times do test matches last the duration in the 21st century ?
They all want to play baseball .

Aug 6, 2019 -- 1:16AM, SontaranStratagem wrote:

Smith was made to look better than he was I stand by that I find it hard to think a lad with his iffy technique can keep wracking up runs like he does. I remember South Africas trio of bowling machines Steyn, Morkel and Philander had his number a few years back, bowled with pace, line and length and he had no clue. You put those 3 in our team with our conditions and he'd been nicking to slips all series. In Australia they'd bounce him out in my opinion. His average is inflated with the poor bowling he's faced, which is odd because its much more bowler friendly today

Smithy is an all time great, he excelled in South Africa v Steyn, Morkel & Bilander in 2014 Steyn was still at his peak.........he's excelled in India & now he's excelling in England All Time Great Deal With It!

I would prefer England to batter the Aussies but nobody can doubt Smith even if he plays for the opposition ... his average early in his test career was 333 and now over 60 so it has greatly improved ...
At this moment of the series with some of our players badly out of form and others not good enough at Test level I think only Stokes would get into their team

*33

Broad would get in as well

Anderson if not injured would probably get in as well, the rest I have to agree with

I stand by what I said about Smith and Lyon, made to look better than they are by our bowling and none existent batting, although I think Australia win this series easily

My advice to our bowlers is go yorker length on him, he shows his stumps a lot so aim for them, he misses and we hit?


I ashley think there is a grain of merit it this though although it is over simplistic. If we keep bowling straight and he gets 140+ in each innings the strategy though correct in theory is not working!

When he comes in is the time to get him out either nicking off or missing a straight'ish inswinger.

The most successful bowler against him is the slow left arm although that might be skewed because the Great Rangana Herath got him out a lot, but he got a lot of people out!

He likes to get bat on ball first up so I would try and nick him off with slips but still look for the inswinger so have a leg slip, fine leg and a midwicket but bowling mainly 4/5th stump or wider but have the confidence to bowl him a straight one as a surprise.

If you can't get him out early then you have to bowl one side of the wicket with a six three field. Either wide outside off early on six offside  three leg side or bowl straight with six on the leg and three on the off.

My leg theory would have a leg slip, fine leg and leg gully / backward square leg, deep square leg as square as possible maybe one short mid wicket and a mid on. If the bowlers can hit their marks you might try two short mid wickets.

The bowling would have to be extremely disciplined on line. Length and pace should be varied.

You could also have different bowlers bowling either straight at one end and wide outside off from the other particularly if there is any pace, bounce or hint of movement.

The idea is to either try and dry up his scoring areas or make him hit with a chance of hitting into the air and pack those areas.

I notice we did not play the Lords man of the match who not only should bravery and batting application but is a SLOW LEFT ARMER!

You can't just bowl yorkers at him all the time agreed

bouncer, bouncer, short, full, yorker then whatever for the final delivery

Pepper him with bouncers as well, try to hide some of them, mess around with the pace as well, make him think a lot more

Because just bowling the same type of ball over after over isn't achieving anything, they've got to mix it up with the "it" ball being the yorker

He moves around a lot and that would throw him off

It might be they've tried this though but aren't skilled enough in pulling it off

Its harder to put it into practice out there in the middle

But hopefully they are trying it

yorkers are the hardest delivery to perfect ?

They can easily become full tosses or be sprayed around when trying to bowl fast

Who bowls good yorkers?

Fast and slow?

Archer is untried and doesn't look good enough for test cricket

Who bowls fast, and straight?

Who hides his change of pace well.

Who has great control of line and length?

Who bowls really really fast?

Archer is untried and doesn't look good enough for test cricket

let's not overrate this australian team. minus smith and warner they were thrashed at home by india in the winter. their batting line up is full of holes too. head, wade and paine must one of weakest 5, 6 and 7s they've fielded in living memory

made to look much better than they are on sunday by an england attack down to about 2 proper bowlers without anderson, moeen totally out of sorts and woakes strangely hardly bowled

We need the the groundsmen to prepare seamer friendly pitches in the next few matches to allow for movement otherwise we can't beat them ...
Archer could have an influence because of his pace but we need to see if he has the consistency to bowl full and fast under pressure
As for Smith they need to dry up his runs ... bowl to a 5th stump to try and tie him up ...
If there is movement every batsman is susceptible to a nick or two

Aug 6, 2019 -- 1:24PM, mafeking wrote:

let's not overrate this australian team. minus smith and warner they were thrashed at home by india in the winter. their batting line up is full of holes too. head, wade and paine must one of weakest 5, 6 and 7s they've fielded in living memorymade to look much better than they are on sunday by an england attack down to about 2 proper bowlers without anderson, moeen totally out of sorts and woakes strangely hardly bowled

Aus won one of those 4 tests by 140+ runs, the 1st test was close and the last was a draw

Australians have played more red ball than England this summer. Just saying!

This is not the best Australian batting line up ever nor the worst! They are decent enough on a flat or slow wicket. They have some strength lower down the order too and that used to be England's advantage, not now.

I would say that's still our advantage, WD

Woakes, Broad and Ali can all supposedly bat a bit and are 8,9,10

We had them in all sorts of trouble at 120/8 and let them off the hook there, then had them level with 6 wickets in hand with Stokes well set on 50, then collapsed

Had them 3 down before they got level and then starting bowling part time spin

How they conspired to lose that test by 250 runs is anyone's guess, it was a thrashing scorecard wise but we were on top multiple times in the test

re: roggrain • August 5, 2019 7:53 PM BST

This post sums it up for me, but on a more fundamental level. If you have no hope of winning you should know how to block out for a draw against all types of bowling - the basic premise of a Test match is to defend your wicket at all costs and score runs only as they arise naturally and if they improve your position. The opposite is often true when overs are limited, but professional cricketers should know the difference for the situation they are in.

CS, best part of 2 days were lost to rain in that sydney test. india clearly would have won otherwise

australia's recent test results are every bit as ropey as england's

if england go down by a margin of more than 1 test in this series it will be the worst result in a major home series in decades. the oz and west indies sides who routinely used thrash england at home would brush this australian team aside with the minimum of fuss

Archer is the most likely to bowler to dismiss Smith. Leach could follow Kesh and Herath in SLAs who have success against him.

The selection of the shot to pieces Moeen was as bad a decision as we've seen. According to Aggers he was dropped TWICE in the WC. Roy's shot was a disgrace and Bairstow's 1st innings one was a close second.

Archer got 6 wickets today at Blackstone for Sussex 2s and then a quick 50.

He will have a big impact over the next month, on slightly larger grounds...

injera, could yet see a worse one with him retaining his place. wouldn't rule it out even it though it's obvious to anyone his confidence is lower than a snake's belly and has been for months. the 2 moon balls were clear evidence that something is not right at the moment

I wouldn't put it past Root/Bayliss. They're fiercely loyal to certain players and the 'way they play'.

Mo was apparently attempting a doosra with his donkey drops. Why? My bigger issue with his bowling are the constant hip balls. Offies pitching straight, spinning and helping the batsman turn through the leg side off the back foot.

It's a the ball you bowl in T20 cricket to keep it to a single. In Tests those singles and rotation kills you. He and the captain aint very bright..

indeed he just couldn't keep the same batsman on strike for even 3 or 4 balls in a row on sunday. was milked for endless singles. he was effectively dropped during the match with root and denly bowling 25 overs cos he couldn't be trusted. would be incredible if he's given another go after that

Aug 6, 2019 -- 2:27PM, VardonVoo. wrote:

re: roggrain • August 5, 2019 7:53 PM BSTThis post sums it up for me, but on a more fundamental level. If you have no hope of winning you should know how to block out for a draw against all types of bowling - the basic premise of a Test match is to defend your wicket at all costs and score runs only as they arise naturally and if they improve your position. The opposite is often true when overs are limited, but professional cricketers should know the difference for the situation they are in.

Roy doesn't

He decided to go for a smash out the stadium shot and even if it comes off it doesn't improve our position in the slightest, we are still in defence mode and looking to bat out 90 overs for a draw, that was our position in the game ffs

He went for heave ho out the stadium like it was the final ball of a world cup final and we needed 6 to win it off the last ball ffs, todays players don't have it in them to dig a trench and block it, dumb as anything today but its the "brand" isn't it so sod the draw lets go down for less than 150 swinging it.

WD

Archer deserves a crack and hopefully he can prove me wrong

Aug 6, 2019 -- 5:28PM, Injera wrote:

Archer is the most likely to bowler to dismiss Smith. Leach could follow Kesh and Herath in SLAs who have success against him.The selection of the shot to pieces Moeen was as bad a decision as we've seen. According to Aggers he was dropped TWICE in the WC. Roy's shot was a disgrace and Bairstow's 1st innings one was a close second.Archer got 6 wickets today at Blackstone for Sussex 2s and then a quick 50.He will have a big impact over the next month, on slightly larger grounds...

Roys shot should mean he's either dropped or demoted to 7, where his wham bam twa*it style is more needed by that point

Moeen has to be dropped, when Root is bowling himself and a part part timer in Denly over him its over surely?

Roy would have been told to play his natural game. And that's what you get. It's the Root way. Ignorant. Root doesn't see 3 formats. He sees one way to play cricket.

Bayliss is disconnected from his captain. No way does he sanction this. At Lord's when Roy got cleaned up in the 70s, Bayliss said 'he needed 170, not 70...' Root, instead, 'took the positives'.

On Day 4 Woakes bowled just two spells of 5 overs and 2 overs.

Was an explanation given for this lack of action?

injured his hand on saturday but apparently was fit. some guff about managing the workload of the bowlers with anderson out but if they didn't want him to bowl that many overs he should have bowled first up with broad when the lights were on and it was quite gloomy. little point saving him for the afternoon session when the game was running away from  england

Thanks

I can understand a calf injury worsening through running but struggling to understand how you would make a hand injury significantly worse by bowling ?

that excuse sounds like a cover story for Root's inept captaincy

was there on sunday and we were utterly baffled at what was going on. not only woakes not bowling before lunch but root himself came on after just 5 overs of the new ball

Warwickshire's England fast bowler Olly Stone has aggravated his previous back injury, which will rule him out of contention for the second Ashes Test.

Following an injury to James Anderson at Edgbaston, Stone was one of the candidates to replace him at Lord's.

But Stone has been ruled out of action for the next two weeks because of the injury to his left lower back sustained in training at Edgbaston on Tuesday.
"It's really disappointing for Olly," said sport director Paul Farbrace.

"To be ruled out of action for such an important two weeks of cricket because of a reoccurrence of his back injury.

"At the moment there's a bit of inflammation, but he will undergo a scan later this afternoon so that we know the full course of treatment that he can undertake with the club's medical team and with the support of the ECB.

"In the meantime, he needs to rest up before he can get his body strong again and ready to deal with the demands of being a fast bowler."

Dizzy: '"I was surprised he didn't play the first Test, to be perfectly blunt," Gillespie told TalkSPORT radio. "It's easy to say that in hindsight, but he's 100 percent fit, ready to go.

"He had to start the first Test, but the powers that be decided he wasn't quite ready. They thought he'd not played enough red-ball cricket … but the same people were saying he hadn't played enough 50-over cricket and he's gone and been the leading [England] wicket-taker in the World Cup.

So he WAS fit?!

know bowling and fielding are not the same thing but if he wasn't considered fit enough to play surely there were better alternatives as a sub fielder than archer. another odd decision

of course he was fit more smoke and mirrors to cover up the completely farcical decision for him not to play

it's one thing pissing off Willey by replacing him in the one day squad but a whole different ball game where Anderson

and Broad are concerned.......it seems we had to lose the first test to placate those two egos

of course he was fit, fully agree with sewter post,

Moeen Ali

gone

just the expected changes. suppose only question is whether they consider dropping denly for curran

Australia blow as captain Steve Smith suffers shoulder injury.

"He has had an MRI scan which has excluded serious injury, but we believe the best course of action is for him to not continue to aggravate his shoulder and allow it to recover," said Australia's team doctor Richard Saw.

I don't think that will affect the aus price.

Why not bring in Steve Finn.
A Middlesex bowler in form at Lords.
Has he retired from test/red ball cricket?

One of the problems with test contacts is the lack of flexibility.
It IS tough for players to perform at a high level over long periods so why not spread it around a bit more?

England playing catch up again. Archer and Leach to play. Pity Foakes isn't in for Denly or Roy but but maybe we have to wait till Headingly for that.

yeah come and have a game when the series is over. thanks very much

foakes must feel very pished off. 100 on debut man of the series then dropped almost immediately. could make a claim to being a better red ball bat than anyone but root in the side. would never ever happen to an established player

Adil Rashid, England's World Cup-winning legspinner, has been ruled out for the rest of the season as his shoulder injury continues to plague him.

Rashid's shoulder injury was first made public when England's World Cup squad was announced, and was cited as a reason for the inclusion of Liam Dawson over Joe Denly.

It was not sufficiently serious that it caused him to miss any World Cup games, but Rashid revealed that he had needed an injection to manage the pain, and said that bowling his variations in particular had hurt.

He declared himself "100% fit" after the group stages, but after a brief period of rest, told Yorkshire's medical staff that the injury was "the worst it has been this summer", and withdrew from their Vitality Blast squads.

Rashid will undergo a period of rehabilitation, and hopes to bit fully fit in time for England's T20I series in New Zealand in November.

I have backed draw @ 6.2 I suspect weather trade here, I might be wrong

Foakes should have been in the squad-at the very least to signal to Bairstow what would happen if he fails again

all we need now is for Bairstow to drop Smith...

draw just wrrecked me

Aug 10, 2019 -- 12:00PM, detraveller wrote:

draw just wrrecked me

I cannot work out for the life of me why your were laying the Draw at this point, given the forecast

Yep Wednesday might be a better time to lay the draw!

It's a coin-flip (literally) as to whether you have a long-batting side in first or a collapse-prone side, so why lay the draw before the toss, except if you'd already backed from longer odds.

I'll tell you why!

people said " smile , things could get worse "

So I did!

Noah may turn up in a boat!

draw now odds on , still 16/1 with 365 for aus to be leading 1 0 after 3 test, must be great value

Aug 12, 2019 -- 11:15AM, trader pj wrote:

Aug 10, 2019 -- 12:00PM, detraveller wrote:draw just wrrecked meI cannot work out for the life of me why your were laying the Draw at this point, given the forecast

I backed draw for 500 bucks at 4.8. Started laying 3.3 or so downwards and have layed till 1.96, with a couple back bets when it drifted.

I am still badly placed as i've also backed Eng which I haven't layed yet.

Not been trading this well i'll admit that. When mugs check the weather on Wednesday they'll back draw. Once TV coverage starts draw will shorten again. Happens every time. So yeah it doens't make much sense why I keep laying now when I will probably get much better odds on wed. But im doing what im doing.

Currently 500+ red overall.