Comments on these important games to decide who gets through to the Quarter Finals below.
Writing something on the KP stuff at the moment, but will probably put it up tomorrow sometime, awaiting what the Sunday guys say.
- Comment
- Reblog
-
Subscribe
Subscribed
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
Being Outside Cricket 
Will look forward to that Dmitri.As you know I have always supported KP and wanted him to finish his career in Test matches.Know anything can still happen but am feeling much happier for him.He knows more than he can say at the moment, I’m sure.If he comes back that will force changes at ECB
LikeLike
Scyld Berry has a second piece up about the Pietersen return and Vic Marks has a review of England’s campaign (his third article today after a quiet spell).
LikeLike
Jerome Taylor is whipping of the yorkers like it ain’t no thang. It’s very gratifying to see cartwheeling stumps. Twice.
LikeLike
And Holder joins the party. Well, he already had 3 wickets, so now 4-16. He’s looking to bowl out, I suppose…
LikeLike
Interval – watching Ireland beat Pakistan 2007 atm, featuring E. Morgan and W.B. Rankin who became disengaged with their own country. No worry. England will take anyone.
LikeLike
Not much new on Pietersen this morning that I can find. Nothing at all on cricinfo still.
Sam Peters in the Mail has a little new info. It alleges KP first approached the ECB last month and has been in talks with Surrey for “several weeks”. The main new snippet is “England’s players would resist Pietersen’s return but their position has been weakened by their dire form since he was sacked. ‘They’d just have to suck it up if he does come back,’ said one insider on Saturday”. It also adds Surrey have only three CC matches before the first test.
Brenkley has an article looking back and forward at the England team. The first seven paragraphs are about Woakes dropping Finch. Yes – if England had taken that chance we’d have won the WC! Better than Selvey focusing on the Jordan run out but only just. The main future focus is on Trott’s recall. Sam Robson is described as “intermittently adequate” – I can think of some reporters who fit that description, Bunkers old chap. Pietersen isn’t mentioned at all. Finger on the pulse has Bunkers – I wouldn’t want him doing the check before my organs were harvested.
LikeLike
To be honest, I’m getting really fed up of these insinuations… who are the players who would resist KP’s return? If it’s old guard, I think “their position has been weakened by their dire form” understates the matter. If it’s the new guard, perhaps that’s a different issue. But one that could be helped by having a coach who isn’t implacably anti-KP…
LikeLike
“Who are the players”? Cook, Anderson and Broad surely? One report I’ve read (can’t remember which one) mentioned them specifically. I haven’t seen any younger player said to have a problem with KP (some might say Taylor but their Twitter exchange seemed to show no lasting trouble).
Moores “implacably anti-KP”? He’s all over the press saying no problem with KP! (See Ali Martin in the Guardian for example). “He fell out with me, I didn’t fall out with him” has been Moores’ line.
LikeLike
I guess I don’t trust any coach who went along with the “you can’t select Player X, because we don’t like him” philosophy from Downton.
As for the old guard, Cook needs no further comment – and I think the bowling performances stretching all the way back to the 0-5 loss Down Under say all we need to about the other two.
LikeLike
Since when have the players been the selectors? If it’s the case that some players are unhappy with the idea of a KP return(should it ever happen) then it might be a good idea to remind them that personal feelings must be put to one side.
LikeLike
I don’t believe everything the Mail says
LikeLike
I would have thought that Pakistan will see off this target. However Pakistan’s batting is notoriously brittle. They are also hopeless at rotating the strike, so Ireland are not totally out of this.
LikeLike
Have to say it looks grim for the European champions. 237 all out and Pakistan now 22-0.
Pakistan only managing 3.6 RPO so far, but can’t see run rate being a problem – Ireland need wickets.
LikeLike
One prolific over off Dockrell and it is looking a grim task for Ireland now. I was thinking Dockrell being a slow left armer was a bit of a weapon for the Irish as Pakistan has often played that type of bowling rather poorly in recent years but that is looking forlorn now.
LikeLike
Alas, this is one of those ODI games that I hate. Team A gets bowled out for relatively low score. Couple of bad overs from the bowlers and Team B now need 4 RPO and the batsmen know there’s no reason to rush… So we’ll have 30 odd overs (at a guess) of milking the bowling – a slow painful death…
LikeLike
LikeLike
Broad’s WC post-mortem here:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/cricket/article-2995168/England-s-World-Cup-exit-leaves-angry-embarrassed-m-definitely-not-quitting-says-Stuart-Broad.html
Mostly down to lack of experience says the guy with 119 ODIs. His not at all self-serving conclusion is that the same players need to be selected lots more times to gain that experience.
On his own bowling, there are no clues what’s going on. He claims he bowled “as fast as I could” in the early games then cut his pace looking for movement in the later matches. I’m struggling to remember the searing pace of those early games. I’m even more struggling to understand why pace and movement are an either/or thing.
About the future – “I haven’t been to the Indian Premier League. That’s because I want to play for England and I want to keep on doing that in all forms”. Hear that dog whistle? Nice assumption that all Broad would have to do to get into the IPL is want to play there by the way.
LikeLike
Broad’s pace is actually the key mystery of the England enigma.
For all his faults as a spokesman, I’ve never seen any reason to doubt that Broad bowls as fast as he can, when he can. The real question is, what have the coaches and medical team done to him?
LikeLike
LikeLike
Terrific blogspot on the bowler of what Steve Waugh described as “the most awkward and nastiest spell” he ever faced:
http://goo.gl/ww4Rg3
LikeLike
111/0 after 20.4 overs. Not looking good for Ireland. At all.
Looks like Ireland may end up eliminated by their results against the UAE and Zimbabwe – too small boosts for their NRR, certainly compared to the West Indies. The West Indies, incidentally also suffered the worst defeat among the top 5 teams in this group, by a mere 257 runs.
Shame.
LikeLike
Nice. Enjoyed that. Just lost 30mins reading up on all his contemporaries.
LikeLike
This is all rather boring now.
Lots of positioning and lots of deflection from the ‘reality’ of England cricket. Not sure I believe any of the Pietersen reclaimation job. It runs well in the press and proves there are lots of people out there who are interested. Doesn’t mean it is any good for the future of England cricket though. After all the pillorying would you just go ‘okay, I’ll play again’??? No apologies, no reassurances? No public recognition of talent?? No sackings??? FFS, what it all been about then???? There’s a good chance it’s all bollocks.
When you look around at the state of the nation it is not difficult to understand the position of Team ECB and it will remain so despite any ‘cosmetic’ changes that may occur to appease and entertain an unthinking majority who will support England irrespective of the ECB and its structures. Totally mad to waste time and energy on them. A very middle class calamity.
LikeLike
A very good summery of the mess that is English cricket. At the risk of boring everybody silly I will again mention once again the cosy relationship between the ECB and the cricket media. When the 4 th Estate turns itself into the PR division of English cricket rather then holding them to account you get decay. The ECB is rotten to the core. But they are protected by a giant pot of gold that comes from Sky. (And is really generated by football supporters) and a cringing cricket media.
In some ways it isn’t any different to many other English institutions.The way politics is covered, the way business is covered. I remember in 2008 on the eve of the banking crises so called Financial journalists going on the BBC business shows to eulogise about Northern Rock. (One even said its the best run bank in the UK) never mind they were giving out 125% mortgages.
The cricket media went into last years Ashes with the same arrogant attitude. And when it fell apart they needed a scape goat. The fact they found a non English one was even more convenient. It is always reactive in England. Never proactive. Mainly because the establishment
wants little change. Too many people have cushy, well paid jobs. Cricket is no different. The counties were quite happy to support Giles Clarke for years. Only in the last year have they decided he must be cast away. They are not producing enough talent. Are they looking in the right places? Are they creating the best pitches to encourage good players? Are they happy cricket has disappeared from terrestrial TV? (Yes if the sky money comes in) never mind the sport is dying.
LikeLike
I see John Etheridge has a pretty nasty Tweet about KP. He sways with the wind doesn’t he? One day he wanting to talk to everyone on here and next he is joining in with the worst polemical writers MS & PN. What is wrong with him.
LikeLike
He plays both sides against the middle. Which is the number one skill needed to be a Murdoch apparatchik.
Murdoch through Sky money has huge power over English cricket. It’s one of the reasons I believe KP will not play for England again. If they put their foot down Graves will not want to start his new job being attacked constantly by the Murdoch machine of papers and TV.
LikeLike
I tweeted that I believe Kevin Pietersen has one per cent chance of playing for England. That’s neither nasty nor swaying with the wind. It is just my opinion.
What percentage chance do you think Kevin has of playing for England again?
LikeLike
John
Do think KP should be selectable on merit?
LikeLike
Are you saying that you may perhaps know something that others don’t?
LikeLike
Bit of a wobble from Pakistan with second wicket going down to a comedy run out.
The tie is on! Wouldn’t be at all controversial….
LikeLike
Wobble off. Even Sarfraz can’t run out enough colleagues from here.
And, as I’m typing that, Misbah chops on….
LikeLike
Or treads on his wicket to be more precise.
LikeLike
I see the ever-tedious westcorkthinktank is yet again dominating a Guardian thread on a subject he professes not to care about, with arguments so selective as to make shooting fish in a barrel look like something of a challenge…
LikeLike
Retired schoolteacher, obviously at a loss what to do without a regular captive audience of children to tell off, patronise and explain the world according to westcork. So he tries to make the comment threads into a classroom. It’s quite sad really.
LikeLike
I expected bad. I expected prejudice. I expected extreme subjectivity and cherry picking of evidence.
This exceeded this. If it had any lower IQ it would need watering.
LikeLike
C’mon Ireland. Two quick wickets.
LikeLike
OMG (as the kids like to say apparently), think you’ve read and heard some bilge about England? Try this one –
http://www1.skysports.com/cricket/news/12123/9758343/englands-world-cup-exit-alastair-cooks-absence-did-him-no-harm
And it comes from a source most of us usually have some time for. Total and utter despair.
(If that isn’t bad enough, there is a link to Downton on the Verdict if anyone hasn’t seen it and wants to. It appears as an option in the second video box when the headline video finishes).
LikeLike
“”They are going to play a weakened West Indies team because a lot of their players will be in the IPL, so England should have enough to beat them.””
That is actually a rather painful assessment – I mean, if the weakening of WI by IPL is mentioned as a valid explanation on why England should beat be able to beat them, that is not setting the bar too high. In fact, that is setting the bar ridiculously low.
As for no open slots in the middle order or elsewhere, we’ll see about that when Boult, Southee, Harris, Johnson, Starc, Pattinson (if he comes in) are done. Roach and J. Taylor may ask questions too, but given the ease at which the selectors write off the obvious, don’t expect any changes before the Ashes are (virtually) decided.
LikeLike
I wouldn’t accept that level of analysis from Will Jackson (the guy who wrote the ECB review of last summer), never mind Atherton. To be scrupulously fair, the worst bit is the depressingly familiar “Cook led the charge with 95 and 70 not out”, for which Atherton isn’t responsible. Ballance’s 156 and Bell’s 167 in the same match must be the least heralded 150+ scores in England’s Test history by now.
And Cook has 25 hundreds, not 26. You might regard this correction as pedantry, but when you keep hearing people add a year to Pietersen’s age, or add 3-4 runs to Cook’s Test average, it really starts to irritate.
LikeLike
I’ve never been a huge fan of Atherton. When push comes to shove, he’s establishment. He gets by on that Sky team because he doesn’t court controversy.
He said much the same sort of stuff about county cricket in his day that KP said recently, but we all forget that…. yes, that seems to go against my accusation above, but he said it as captain of England and that was OK.
LikeLike
Atherton doesn’t pay much attention to county cricket. I remember him going on about Hales being one of the next Test debutants for ages, years ago before he became an international, mainly because he couldn’t name another player!
LikeLike
Atherton has been one of a number of former captains parading across the media (Vaughan, Strauss and Hussain the others) discussing the woes of English one-day cricket while scarcely ever acknowledging their contribution to said woes.
On Test cricket, a couple of them have views of often considerable insight. On ODIs and T20, they are more part of the problem than part of the solution.
LikeLike
5 overs to go in a very comfortable chase for Pakistan. Looks like Ireland will be eliminated on NRR due to their “poor” wins against Zimbabwe and the UAE.
LikeLike
We’ve talked about NRR on here before – but it bears repeating, it’s an ugly way to make the decision. Far too often it simply rewards the team that won a few of the tosses.
Still, as I wrote on the G, Ireland rather played down to the level of the UAE team and that is a big part of what cost them. (Zim are better, no shame in winning a tight game there.)
LikeLike
Who’d be a bowler these days:
Most underrated bowler of the tournament: Mohammad Shami.
LikeLike