Here it is……..
The International Summer
England’s Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three) –
Best Overseas Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three)
Best Test Innings Of The Summer (Top Three)
Best Bowling Performance (Individual) Of The Summer (Top Three)
The Best Thing About This Test Match Summer
The Worst Thing About This Test Match Summer
Best ODI performance by an England player (New award)
Journalists & Commentators (Bloggers do not count, cricket press and cricinfo)
Best Three Journalists (rank order)
Worst Five Journalists (rank order)
Best Commentator
Best Commentator That Doesn’t Get Test Matches
Oh No! Why He Is On? Worst Three Commentators
Open Space –
Your overall comments on the summer….
You can stick the replies in the comments, or e-mail me on dmitriold@hotmail.co.uk. Entries close on 30 September, with the results announced soon after.
Being Outside Cricket 
Broad
Root
Finn/Anderson
Smith
Rodgers
Hazelwood
Stokes at Lords vs New Zealand (Changed game)
Root at Cardiff vs Aus ( changed game and series)
Wattling New Zealand at Leeds
Broad 8/15 at Nottingham.
Anderson at Birmingham
Aus attack on flat pitch at Lords.
The New Zealand series
The lack of any ashes contest
No particular player just a better al round style of play.
Can’t be bothered to name any journalists. But special mention for Mark Butcher and Geoff Boycott for standing up to the Avalanche of shite that has passed for analyasis.
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Selfey is going to take some beating for the worst journalist award
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I was leaning toward FICJAM for my Number One – but then Selvey pulls it out of the fire again at the last minute!
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In that one tweet he demonstrates that he is a terrible judge, and knows nothing about cricket. You might as well ask the town drunk and crazy person to give his opinion. It won’t be any more ludicrous.
English cricket jounalism has never been more in the toilet. A bunch of smug, self satisfied free loaders.. No wonder he is not bothered with quality in the cricket. It matches the lack of quality in his own industry.
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One could almost call that “cheerleading”.
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Well, I sent my votes by email, and absolutely no regular readers will be surprised by my #1 choice for the worst journalist.
“Parrot”, *and* “bollocks”. Selveyan contempt for different opinions, and those who espouse them, in a convenient nutshell.
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Couldn’t resist a reply to that nonsense. Counting down to being blocked in 6….5…..4….3….2….
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There’s a follow-up in which he says “If we’re going to compare this and any other summer with the greatest series ever played you will never please anyone.”
Funny, I didn’t think it was the sceptics who started parroting bollocks about 2015 v 2005 (hi Nasser et al).
One of the replies is pure gold: “possible to argue 2015 was more exciting because NZ better than Bangladesh.” Meanwhile in all the excitement about the 2015 ODIs no-one seems to remember a triangular tournament that seriously whetted the appetite and ended in a tie….
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Better home summers in 30 years, imo:
Obvious: 2005
Head and shoulders above, shouldn’t even need an argument: 1991, 1995, 1998, 2003
I would also make a case for:
1990 (first England home Test series wins in 5 years; last glimpse of Hadlee; first of Tendulkar; hugely entertaining if bat-dominated series v India; Gooch 1,000 Test runs, still unique)
1994 (first series v South Africa since re-admission, and one of the great Oval Tests)
1997 (spectacular ODI performances, euphoria of Edgbaston, cracking final Test)
2000 (first series win v West Indies in 31 years; last glimpse of Ambrose/Walsh; astonishing Lord’s Test; Alec Stewart making 100 in his 100th Test; unusual dominance of ball)
2004 (England won all seven Tests, but only the very last was as hopelessly one-sided as this Ashes; they won from difficult positions and had many different contributors; huge surge in optimism about the looming Ashes; also last glimpse of Brian Lara and a decent Champions Trophy final)
Might even throw in 2001 as a “when do you think you’ll see a side as good as *that* again in England in your lifetime, then?” curveball.
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England’s Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three) –
Broad, Root. The rest were mostly average, and I don’t want to pollute the poll by picking a bowler who went wicketless for quite a few innings (Anderson, and mostly only bothered to perform under ideal conditions for him), or a batsman who hardly did anything (say Cook – delayed the inevitable twice in the Ashes, did not bother to really contribute in the won Tests – the one exception would be the ton he made against New Zealand).
Best Overseas Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three)
Boult, Rogers, Watling. Not necessarily in that order.
Best Test Innings Of The Summer (Top Three)
Watling 120 at Headingley
Stokes at Lord’s vs. New Zealand
Root at Cardiff vs. Australia
Best Bowling Performance (Individual) Of The Summer (Top Three)
Broad 8/15
Johnson at Lord’s
Boult at Lord’s
The Best Thing About This Test Match Summer
That it is finally over.
The Worst Thing About This Test Match Summer
Dreadful umpiring standards. I am looking at you Ravi. If off-the field performances are included, the mainstream media. Good god, I have seen more intelligence displayed by a herd of teenagers with regards to their favorite boy / girlband. Come to think of it, that includes pre-teen fans of bands who mainly focus on pre-teen children.
Best ODI performance by an England player (New award)
I don’t remember the New Zealand series that much. Over-saturation.
Best Journalist:
Mike Walters has to be up there somewhere. He seems to be about the only newspaper journalist who calls it as it is. Too bad he does not write that often on cricket.
The other two nominations should invariably end up at cricinfo, but as the series wore on, in all its one-sided g(l)ory, I could not be bothered to read them, so dreadful was the cricket at times.
Worst Five Journalists (rank order)
Selfey – for his idiotic remarks about women’s cricket.
Selv3y – for his idiotic remarks about Smith
Selfie – for his idiotic rewriting of cricket history (revisionism with regards to Saker for instance), and bigging up Strauss
S3lv3y – for his vitriolic tweeting
Selvey – for being a generally useless cricket correspondent, to whom nothing is more strange than reality. The Guardian as a newspaper would improve if they left the column inches otherwise occupied by Selvey white.
The others don’t even come close to it. Mr. Pringle merely seems to be simply innumerate by comparison. Incidentally, he still needs 6 wins out of 7 in the UAE and South Africa. Good luck with that Derek.
Other comments: I fear for the future of the game as an actual game. WWE-style scripted entertainment seems ever closer to home. The English cricketing press has betrayed the people, and happily sold out for a few shiny beads. The press are happy about this.
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England’s Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three) –
Root, Broad and Stokes (yes he is inconsistent, but when he was good this summer he was sublime)
Best Overseas Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three)
Rogers, Boult and McCullum
Best Test Innings Of The Summer (Top Three)
Stokes century v NZ Lord’s test, KPs 355, wow what a message to send,shame it fell on deaf ears and Smith’s double century
Best Bowling Performance (Individual) Of The Summer (Top Three)
Finn’s 6 for on his return, Johnson’s spell at Lords (yes only 3 wickets, but truly ferocious and fast; a joy to watch) and……………
The Best Thing About This Test Match Summer
New Zealand’s approach to cricket and the NZ V ENG one day series, a thriller of huge totals
The Worst Thing About This Test Match Summer
The ashes test matches were crammed into too short a time space (sure they used to finish in September!) and not enough tests against NZ
Best ODI performance by an England player (New award)
Morgan, I love his knocks so skilful and inventive
Journalists & Commentators (Bloggers do not count, cricket press and cricinfo)
Best Three Journalists (rank order)
DOAG guys
Most ESPN folks
Nick Hoult
Worst Five Journalists (rank order)
1. FICJAM
2. Selvey
3. A Swann
4. Simon Hughes
5. The football bloke who writes on cricket sometimes – Samuels? Published some horribly vitriolic articles……..
Best Commentator
Boycott
Best Commentator That Doesn’t Get Test Matches
Mark Butcher
Oh No! Why He Is On? Worst Three Commentators
G Swann
Nick Kinght (grrrr)
FICJAM
Open Space –
My thoughts on this summer. NZ here, great, fun, enjoyable; cricket with a buzz. Aus arrive, some good performances by individuals and good emergence of young players, but a lot of joy sucked out of it by some in the MSM with an obvious agenda, which they pedalled regardless of the evidence on the pitch in front of them. Overall, first half joy, second half meh……..
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Don’t want to be picky, but KP’s 355 was not in a test match 🙂
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Sorry, my mistake, I read the question/ heading incorrectly! In my mind I was telling myself it was ‘best innings by an England player’…………trying to be too clever 😉
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England’s best:
1. Broad 2. Root 3. Stokes
Overseas’ best:
1. Boult 2. Rogers 3. Williamson
Best Test innings:
1. Root (Cardiff) 2. Stokes (Lord’s) 3. Watling (Headingley)
None were as good as the Younis Khan and Chandimal tons in SL.
Best bowling:
1. Broad (TB) 2. Finn (Edgbaston) 3. Boult (Lord’s)
Best thing about this summer:
New Zealand
Worst thing:
That NZ series was too short – and there won’t be another for too long.
The way the MSM ignored two excellent series in SL is a close second.
Best England ODI
Buttler/Rashid partnership against NZ.
Best three journos:
1. Nick Hoult 2. Mike Walters 3. Ali Martin
Worst five journos:
1. Selvey
2. FICJAM
3. Andy Bull (for The Spin on DOAG alone)
4. Newman
5. Pringle (only this low because he doesn’t write so much any more)
Best and worst commentators:
I’ve had TV on with the sound turned down virtually all summer so can’t really say. The decline of Nasser Hussain has been one of the worst parts of the summer. I don’t listen to TMS. Russel Arnold has been great on the SL Tests.
Overall:
Second English season running where the best was up first and the rest was soured by the Big Three and MSM.
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Aargh! Can’t believe I forgot Mitch at Lord’s in the bowling. He should be second.
Probably should have bumped Pringle for Martin Samuels as well.
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Less than 24 hours up and 11 of my 13 “International Summer” choices (players rather than things) have been nominated by at least one other person.
Can’t believe no-one’s gone for the other two yet 😉
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what? Corbyn at left back and Osborne at outside right – who cares. See Compton is apparently talking to Bayliss to replace Cook and open with Lyth in UAE – dramatic or just, plain made up?
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http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/922169.html
Just when you thought it was safe…. FICJAM returns
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Apologies for lateness, been away and off line for a bit and am catching up with articles by your good selves and TFT.
Here are my survey results.
The International Summer
England’s Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three) –
Root, Broad, Stokes
Best Overseas Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three)
Smith, Williamson, Boult
Best Test Innings Of The Summer (Top Three)
Root at Cardiff
Stokes v NZ at Lord’s
BJ Watling Headingley
Best Bowling Performance (Individual) Of The Summer (Top Three)
Broad at Trent Bidge (No brainer)
Johnson/Starc in tandem at Lord’s
Finn at Edgbaston
The Best Thing About This Test Match Summer
The whole of the NZ series
The Worst Thing About This Test Match Summer
Five ‘non-testing’ test matches
Best ODI performance by an England player (New award)
Eoin Morgan (consistent throughout)
Journalists & Commentators (Bloggers do not count, cricket press and cricinfo)
Best Three Journalists (rank order)
Equal 1st Jarrod Kimber/Sam Collins (for obvious reasons)
Tim Wigmore
Gideon Haigh
Ali Martin, Nick Hoult and Mike Walters also warrant a mention
Worst Five Journalists (rank order)
Where do you start?
1) FICJAM (haven’t got half way through any of his pieces without losing the will to live)
2) Martin Samuels
3) Paul Newman
4) Simon Hughes
5) Jim Holden/Oliver Holt (for one shocking article each)
Blimey, can’t find room for Selfey
Best Commentator
Bumble/Geoff Boycott
Best Commentator That Doesn’t Get Test Matches
Liked what I have heard of Tom Moody on the verdict and in the ODI’s
Oh No! Why He Is On? Worst Three Commentators
Graeme Swann
Dominic Cork
David Gower (for his simpering fawning interview with old-chum Strussy)
Open Space –
Your overall comments on the summer….
The starters outshone the main course. Pleasant surprise to win the Ashes and to win 5 out of 10 ODI’s. Not bad for what I thought was going to be a car-crash summer. It was memorable for roller-coaster drama and piss-poor standard of cricket. Off field matters continue to leave me depressed and worried about over state of the game.
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I’ve deferred from adding my ‘votes’ for a while now….not because I haven’t had the time, nor because I didn’t want to. Let me explain…This summer is the first for 40 years where I haven’t seen a single moment of live International cricket – either on TV (having cancelled Sky 2 years ago) or at a match (I just won’t/now can’t pay the prices to be herded and treated like cattle or a cash cow/mug). It also coincided with the first summer where I don’t think I missed a single ball (via TMS) because I’d been made redundant after 33 years of continuous employment. Oh the irony of it.
So, having thought about it, and only having caught the occasional C5 highlights (I hate highlights as a rule) I will not answer most of the questions re individual performances
I also feel that I’ve lost something in my love of the game this year, I’m still working out exactly what, maybe that’ll be another post for a later date or maybe I’ll rediscover it?
It also, and my apologies here, has meant I haven’t been enthused to produce my promised book review(s) yet.
Anyway – here goes….
England’s Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three) – Broad, Moeen, Root
Best Overseas Test Player Of The Summer (Top Three)- Williamson, Boult, McCullum
Best Test Innings Of The Summer (Top Three)
Best Bowling Performance (Individual) Of The Summer (Top Three) Broad…erm
The Best Thing About This Test Match Summer – it’s over
The Worst Thing About This Test Match Summer – the puffery from the press, the poor skill application
Best ODI performance by an England player (New award) nothing sticks in my mind
Journalists & Commentators (Bloggers do not count, cricket press and cricinfo)
Best Three Journalists (rank order) DOAG team, Haigh, Vic Marks
Worst Five Journalists (rank order) Selvey, FICJAM, Stocks, Newman, Dobell (going downhill rapidly)
Best Commentator – Boycott
Best Commentator That Doesn’t Get Test Matches
-Lizzy Ammon
Oh No! Why Is He/She On? Worst Three Commentators
Lovejoy, FICJAM, Ebony Rainford-Brent
note: some of the BBC county commentary this summer has been excellent – long may it continue
Open Space –
Your overall comments on the summer….
as per my opening waffle.. and with added annoyance at MSM ineptitude, laziness and puffery…
I won’t even mention ECB/ICC….
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I know exactly what you mean Bogfather. Really couldn’t care less this summer. The clue is how desperate they try to sell it as the greatest of all time.
I’m thinking of dumping Sky too. Money is pouring into English sport and we are not very good.
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