******Cricket Thread******

[Protein Junkie]

Stokes has a rather fractious relationship with the ECB, and up until 2020 hadn’t captained any significant side.

Traditionalists will likely view him as not the kind of ‘character’ to captain England, whereas others might view that sort of ‘character’ as exactly what England needs.

Leaving character aside, that lack of captaincy experience may not make him any better than Root.

Your Premier all rounder also Captain ?
I don’t think Root is the answer though.

 

[Protein Junkie]

the spinner has to play every test even if he's a sitting duck at batting his game comes into play later on in the test
even if its a batting wicket you rest your bowlers at one end and spin the other end ? its something different to face and the batter needs to work out

You talk far too much sense on here :-)
Test Cricket should be the pinnacle for all so make the remuneration impossible to resist.
For a start how about giving Test Cricket free to air status again.
Less and less kids are playing now and amateur teams are dying in their thousands.

 

[Gabriel]

Your Premier all rounder also Captain ?
I don’t think Root is the answer though.

I don’t think Stokes is the answer nor indeed Root. Lose at the weekend and Root will be heading Down Under looking not to lose four series on the bounce.

 

[Octavian]

Stokes won’t be England captain, the lad is taking time off for mental health reasons, adding the pressures of captaincy on his shoulders when he returns is daft and it won’t help him.

There isn’t really another option than Root unfortunately and whilst he isn’t good, he’s the best of a bad bunch.

 

[Gabriel]

Stokes won’t be England captain, the lad is taking time off for mental health reasons, adding the pressures of captaincy on his shoulders when he returns is daft and it won’t help him.

There isn’t really another option than Root unfortunately and whilst he isn’t good, he’s the best of a bad bunch.

If he is to continue, then I would suggest the West Indies tour in March should be seen as a 'new dawn'. Anderson, Broad, and Ali all had poor tours the last time they visited Australia, and it's hard to envisage anything different this time if they all travel, so if the trip Down Under is another heavy defeat, then a line should be drawn and a new team built around that Caribbean tour- either with Root as captain or someone else. That would allow a 'new' team to evolve before facing New Zealand and South Africa(?) next summer

 

[Octavian]

If he is to continue, then I would suggest the West Indies tour in March should be seen as a 'new dawn'. Anderson, Broad, and Ali all had poor tours the last time they visited Australia, and it's hard to envisage anything different this time if they all travel, so if the trip Down Under is another heavy defeat, then a line should be drawn and a new team built around that Caribbean tour- either with Root as captain or someone else. That would allow a 'new' team to evolve before facing New Zealand and South Africa(?) next summer

Something has got to change and we need to start again with the squad in my opinion.

 

[liamctid]

Without accepting mediocrity, isn't this just where England have been most of the time? We're not as good as India, New Zealand have a great team at the moment and for me there's not a lot in it between us and Australia but we're better than all the other nations - take away the Strauss/Flower years when we were world number 1 it's not the worst we've ever been is it? It just looks worse as we've played India twice and NZ this year with Australia on the horizon. We easily won in South Africa last year, beat West Indies, drew with Pakistan but that was rain effected and hammered Sri Lanka.

I get the England team not wanting white ball players in the test team talk but look at India - Pujara aside everyone of these players are stars in the IPL team they play for.

 

[Citizen of Legoland]

Without accepting mediocrity, isn't this just where England have been most of the time? We're not as good as India, New Zealand have a great team at the moment and for me there's not a lot in it between us and Australia but we're better than all the other nations - take away the Strauss/Flower years when we were world number 1 it's not the worst we've ever been is it? It just looks worse as we've played India twice and NZ this year with Australia on the horizon. We easily won in South Africa last year, beat West Indies, drew with Pakistan but that was rain effected and hammered Sri Lanka.

I get the England team not wanting white ball players in the test team talk but look at India - Pujara aside everyone of these players are stars in the IPL team they play for.

England cricket fans, innit? Most seem to forget what a "test series" is, it's an opportunity to see how you compare to an opposing team over x number of games, so it should be expected against the better teams to lose some of these matches through being outplayed, or having the worst of the conditions or just making a bad selection choice. Yes it's great when the team picks itself but no team has that forever, they have to go through tricky periods. I'm not overly impressed with India to be truthful despite them having some obvious talent and more experience.

In the game just gone, the mistake was letting the Indian tail wag at the end of the first innings and that was down to bad captaincy, poor fielding but also a hell of a lot of luck, the ball was often not going where Thakur played it. Stokes may just have been the difference, especially if he'd been stood where Rory Burns was in the slips. That Indian recovery gave their bowlers the lift they needed because if they'd been all out for under 150, I think this is a very different game coming on the back of poor batting performances in the previous game. For all the criticism test cricket gets for being long winded and boring, it often comes down to one bad session when the teams are close. You just have to take it on the chin. There's still a chance England can get a draw out of this series which would be a good result looking at the two squads.

 

[Big Swifty]

None of my cricketing friends call Test cricket "long-winded and boring". Many of the recent series in England have been gripping, in a way that knockabout stuff can never be.

This is the highest form of the game, and it's a pity that followers have had to put up with potted versions of the game, mainly because the mass of people haven't been encouraged to appreciate the virtues of the real stuff.

So much of cricket's magic and tradition and meaning have been swept aside in the grubby search for money.

 

[waspish]

Be better if the likes of channel 4 itv or the bbc has full rights to test cricket