I saw a fair bit of today’s game in between the usual weekend errands, visiting mum and dad’s grave to commemorate their wedding anniversary, and dozing off during the Buttler / Bairstow partnership. It’s been one of those days.
England had their foot on the home team’s throat twice, and on both occasions let them wriggle out of it / had the game wrested away. Mahmadullah played very well for his 75, but it was undoubtedly the skipper, Mashrafe Mortaza, who played the key role with a belligerent 44, turning a likely score of 200 into nearer 240 and given the way the wicket played, it looked competitive. I have to say I was quite relaxed about it because I’ve always felt if the tail had made a pitch look easy, then so should a top batting line-up, and England are purported to have one of those.
Jake Ball bowled pretty well again, and that’s nice to see. Rashid was a little more ropey than Friday, but still got both of the key partnership makers with a variety of balls, including a filthy long-hop spanked straight down Moeen’s throat for Mossadek’s dismissal. Rashid will have days like these. As Rufus quoted on the comments, lifting a Geoff (not Keith) Lemon saying “leg-spinners never bowl a bad ball on Youtube”. Woakes is now taken for granted, and he took wickets up front. David Willey bowled tightly up front, but got a little stick later on. It just felt that England had let the hosts off the hook. 239.
I pause this piece to see how Newman managed to shoe-horn Eoin Morgan into his article…
Yet it was still wrong of an England captain to lose his temper in this way and the incident will provide a lesson for Buttler as he gets to grips with captaining the team in the controversial absence of Morgan.
And a snipe at Rashid…
Mahmudullah hit 75 before he was trapped by Adil Rashid, who has recovered well here in the first two one-day internationals from the bad feeling that surrounded his withdrawal from Yorkshire’s championship decider.
As I said, we’re the ones with an agenda. Remember that.
In his post-match interview Jos was disappointed that England hadn’t backed themselves to go at the target, and instead played timidly at the start. That might have had something to do with the way Jason Roy faced the threat of Shakib in the first over, when he looked like he read the bowling with all the success that I had of understanding Finnish on Friday. It was Vince who went first, to another windy drive (checked Michael Vaughan’s twitter feed), and then Duckett, to the obvious disappointment of the media who desperately want one of the newer players to really come off to allow them to knife Morgan more, drove airily and was bowled through the gate. Roy tried to play a positive shot off Mortaza and was nailed plumb in front, and Stokes followed suit. 26 for 4 and dire straits.
Bairstow, who the press are anointing as Morgan’s replacement followed up his run out for a duck with some mature rebuilding while Buttler played assuredly. Things looked to be sound and solid until YJB nicked off after a 79 run partnership. Mooen Ali played an awful shot to get out, but he’s Moeen, so the world will let him off. Then Buttler went – going across his stumps, being given not out, but on the supposed instructions of the dressing room, the decision was reviewed and Buttler went. The immediate aftermath will no doubt be poured over, but it appeared as though there might have been some over-zealous celebrations by the home team (someone on Twitter said he was sent on his way by a Bangla Haka) and Buttler lost it. This is becoming a bit of a trend from England, in that we do seem to become a little upset a little too easily, but Jos’s comment of “grown men acting like that” in the post-match nonsense with Nick Knight gave clear vent to what he thought about it.
England threatened a little thanks to mature batting by Adil Rashid (again) and Jake Ball’s belligerence, but it was always unlikely to win the match and so it proved. England lost by 34 runs and the series is 1-1. Then came the handshakes…
https://twitter.com/benstokes38/status/785178217032351749
This may prove to be a little tastier a tour than imagined before the start. Bangladesh appear to be no-one’s fools on their own patch. It’s taken nearly 20 years, but these guys relish a fight.
On to game three in Chittagong on Wednesday.
We really are not being well served by the appearance of Dominic Cork on commentary. He’s truly woeful, and is there, I presume, to make Nick Knight look statesmanlike. What Nasser (who spouted some woeful old claptrap about captains having passion in the post-match interview) and Rob Key have done to deserve Cork’s company is beyond me. Athar Ali Khan is more than decent as a home commentator, while I really had to look up Jon Kent, to find out he has two more ODI caps than Mark Butcher but contributed the same amount of runs and wickets as Mark in those appearances. He’s OK, he’s not offended me yet. But Dominic Cork? Really?
Elsewhere India have stuck a massive score on New Zealand, with Kohli making another double-hundred and Rahane 188, putting the hosts in total control and New Zealand needing to play for a draw from a long way out. Australia were comfortably beaten on what looked like a snooze of an ODI in Port Elizabeth, on what looked another deadly dull PE pitch. It’s 4-0 to the home team, and the world shrugs its shoulders.
Being Outside Cricket 
This corner of the world won’t shrug if Australia cop their first ever 5-0 ODI whitewash! 🙂
Second excellent piece of the day. Scuse me for borrowing from the other article BTL at the Guardian (appropriately credited). This time I particularly liked the pause in the middle for ‘a word from our sponsors’!
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Sadly….
On the PE match, it wasn’t much of a contest but there was a very good crowd with plenty of youngsters in and appearing to enjoy themselves.
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As per Sky Sports Cricket Twitter Account,
“Delighted to be working with host Gazi TV who’s comms are Athar Ali Khan, Dominic Cork & John Kent. We’ve sent Nasser, Knight & Rob Key”.
Almost as if they’ve gone out of their way to shift the blame on Cork being there!
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Just watching the highlights on Sky. Why are they pixeling out Butlers mouth at the time of his dispute? Do they think we can all lip read ? Censorship of the worst kind. Pathetic.
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I’m reminded of the South African tour, where the stump microphones were turned up quite loud and the players were heard swearing repeatedly (not maliciously, just in casual conversation) and Sky had to keep running constant apologies across the bottom of the screen for if anyone heard bad language. Even though it’s not entirely clear whether Buttler actually swore or not, or whether he said something else, I think Sky take a pretty thorough stance to swearing even though most viewers don’t really care, to protect against the one prissy person who might ring in to complain.
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Yup I agree. Although they were pretty relaxed when Strauss called KP a C***. But that was a mistake they didn’t know they were on.
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@Mark – Strauss calling KP a c*** didn’t go out on British output. It was streamed to an Australian mobile app, IIRC. The British Sky coverage was in a commercial break when Strauss made the comment. If he had made it ‘on air’ to a British audience, I think they’d have made it into far more of an issue.
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@Nicholas
I suspect Mark is referring to number 7 in this list, as an indicator of how little the general cricket media (not just Sky) would have made of it in the prevailing climate…
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2014/dec/18/cricket-in-2014-10-memorable-moments
Hypothetical, but I suspect he’s right.
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Stokes really is a prat.
Gutted about Selve though. I have no doubt talkSPORT was immeasurably improved by his presence.
Not.
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A few points about the Buttler thing:
1) It was a poor shot by the captain and in-form batsman – trying to work a ball through square leg for one or at most two was hardly on the right side of risk/reward. (Not to lose sight of the fact that the batsmen who didn’t make any runs are more culpable).
2) There almost certainly wouldn’t have been the row if the umpire had given the original decision as he should have done. It was the novice home umpire who didn’t give it and we have those because there are not two elite panel umpires for ODIs.
3) On the next leg of the tour, without DRS, Buttler would have been not out even though the ball was hitting three-quarters of the way up middle. I’ve got some doubts about ball-tracking but it was the ball pitching in line that was the issue here and it escapes me why that part of DRS can’t be used without ball-tracking.
4) I watched two Rugby Championship games over the weekend with mic’ed up referees and it really is a nonsense that other sports don’t do this.
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Nice to see Jimmy Neesham getting some runs after a horrendous spell of back injuries (plus coming across as a genuinely witty bloke on Twitter, wit that’s a million miles away from Lovejoy-esque “bantz”).
It’s probably not going to save NZ from a series’ white-washing, mind.
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Neesham is great. He did an AMA over at Reddit last year (which he sadly to have now deleted apparently due to the media work he’s been doing with an NZ radio station), and his answers were both really funny but also genuinely interesting and intriguing. Here’s a link I found on an archive site if anyone fancies a gander:
https://unreddit.com/r/Cricket/comments/38vecz/i_am_jimmy_neesham_that_sidebar_image_has_made_me/?sort=top
Too much to pick through here, but here’s part of one response I think many people here would enjoy:
“I owe absolutely 100% of the success I had on the tour to West Indies last year (immediately following the IPL) to KP and Gary Kirsten sharing their knowledge on playing spin with me.”
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Hey, I got mentioned in a match report here – private box at Lord’s here I come!
In case anyone’s interested, here’s the article I was paraphrasing from. An interesting take on Australia’s recent struggles in Sri Lanka: http://www.theroar.com.au/2016/08/10/getting-smashed-test-cricket-great-reasons-lost-better/
(Plus the actual quote was this: “We all know that every leg-spinner take wickets all the time. We remember one or two who used to do that. On YouTube they basically do it every ball.”)
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Nobody banned after the ODI kerfuffle but three players on warnings. Curiously, Mahmudullah isn’t one of them despite being identified by the English MSM as the player involved. Obviously we can’t expect paid professionals to be able to identify opposition players accurately. Sabbir seems to have been the culprit – and he has some previous.
Meanwhile, fans of Guardian sports’ writers might enjoy the piece about Lewis Hamilton being petulant and humourless. It’s by Barry Glendenning – who was presumably looking in the mirror….
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The man who sulked like a toddler while being paid to report from Rio, and whose idea of humour was top-grade Zika bantz about buying small hats in Mothercare?
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“prone to brooding introspection, temper tantrums and sulks….[lacking] a modicum of wit….bottomless reserves of childishness….. utterly charmless……. fit of pique …. petulance……. entitled whine……the childishness of a paranoid brat….. a surly git”.
Glendenning filed his C.V. by mistake perhaps?
Post something like this about one of their precious journalists and we all know what will happen. It’s the web we want.
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I wonder if the halo that our media friends wished to place on the head of Buttler might have slipped a little after yesterday?
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Not at all. He’s like one of those footballers that get red carded for a horrendous foul, but the media and his manager then come out and tell you he’s “not that type of player.”
Buttler doesn’t lose his cool, ergo the Bangladesh players must have been really out of order in what they said. Not his fault at all. Still better than the Irish interloper, what ho, and all that.
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I doubt it. Acting like a prat is not a problem as long as your face fits with the management in Team ECB. They are as happy as Larry with Jimmy Anderson even though he goes around calling batsman all kinds of stuff. The media acted as his own defense council in his dispute with India at Old Trafford. And Strauss was elevated to hero status after he called KP a C***
England seem to have a bigger problem with so called “respect” issues. They tend to come across as a bit precious in my opinion. There was all that fuss about how Pakistan celebrated their win at Lords with the press up celebration. Most people understood and liked it. Not so prissy England who said it was insulting.
Then there was the Mankad incident which is perfectly legal ( except in Newman’s mind and most of the English media) Wasn’t Butler involved in that? Even though he was warned before for taking liberties being out of his crease.
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Yes, the Mankad is interesting because it doesn’t go with the rest of Buttler’s public persona. He was basically gambling on SL not daring to run him out, even though they’d told him they would. So it was either quite stupid or rather arrogant, or both.
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from memory I think Buttler came out and said that SL where perfectly entitled to Mankad him and he didn’t have an issue with the dismissal (apart from the fact he got himself out).
It was Skipper (cook?) / ECB / Media who had conniptions at the whole thing
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I think you’re probably right Andy. Cook certainly trough the toys out of the pram, and the media are obliged to follow his lead.
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Nasser Hussain’s reaction for those who missed the post-match stuff:
http://www.skysports.com/cricket/news/12080/10611612/jos-buttler-incident-will-fire-england-up-for-series-decider-says-nasser-hussain
The decline in Hussain is one of my greatest disappointments in recent years. He really was a superb commentator initially. Now he seems to have the role of cheerleader for the ODI/T20 team. Frankly, they should give him pom-poms the way he carries on.
Just to take one bit of nonsense here – England will be “fired up”? Doesn’t playing for their country, playing in the format identified as our “priority” and in some cases earning nearly a million quid a year fire them up enough? How have England done when “fired up”? They lost the SL ODI series after the Buttler Mankad, they lost the Bridgetown Test after the Samuels-Stokes send-off , they lost the Australia ODI series after the Stokes handled the ball…..
Maybe England play better cricket with clear heads rather than the red mist? Who’d have guessed it?
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Just watched the replay of the buttler wicket. How did the ump not give that, hit him on off and was hitting two thirds up middle.
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My fault, all of hit. Horrific jinxing on a previous thread.
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Late entry for the “WTF List of the Year”, giving the Power List a run for its money. And the Top 80 still to come…
http://www.skysports.com/cricket/news/12172/10594147/100-greatest-cricketers-benedict-bermanges-honourable-mentions
If you need a trailer to whet your appetite, try this one: Mahela Jayawardene is NOT in the Top 100 cricketers of all-time, but Phil Mead is at no.98, just the one place below AB de Villiers, who in turn finishes one place below Charlie Parker.
Or this: there are 86 greater cricketers than Rahul Dravid.
This is what happens when you spend your life buried in stats.
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Not so much stats – though quite a few players were selected on their county careers. Sorry, but taking 200 wickets a season was relatively easy 100 years ago (you still had to have skill of course), but you need to take approximately 63% of all available wickets nowadays just to get there in the county championship. In say the South African domestic competition you merely have to take all the available wickets in an entire domestic season.
And I am sorry, but if the likes of Roberts, Walsh, and Garner miss out, who will be included? Broad and Anderson? Don’t make me laugh. That Tom Goddard made it betrays hopeless bias towards the county game.
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Who could reasonably draw any other conclusion?
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Hardly. With one exception (Pakistan), teams just cash in on playing at home. And in some cases happily doctoring pitches to suit their strengths, and neutralize the opposition’s strengths. Or are we suddenly to be impressed by the away records of India, Pakistan and Australia? Pakistan did wel to draw in England, but other than a series win in Sri Lanka, have not been too hot on the road anywhere else.
Not that the ICC cares one iota about fixing – as long as it is done by the constituent powerful boards it is okay. Not that the ICC cares one iota about fixture-fixing. See the upcoming bilateral talks to redo the “draw” for the Champions Trophy, which as rumour has it is a multi-lateral event.
Honestly, I would not be surprised if someone uncovered that the ICC made ten percent of its annual budget on betting on fixtures it officially sanctions.
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Moeen Ali –
“They are a good side with some very good players, But we know that if we put them under pressure – like we saw in the first game – they can crack a bit more than the bigger sides. Hopefully, we can do that again. We saw in the World Cup when they played India, they messed that up as well. We know it will take them a bit more time to get over that kind of stuff.”
Anyone remember Moeen running himself out in the WC match against Bangladesh?
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It’s our priority, except when it isn’t –
http://www.espncricinfo.com/bangladesh-v-england-2016-17/content/story/1061305.html
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Typical churlish ECB. Makes all Newmans claptrap about helping Banlidesh cricket seem cretinous. I wonder if it’s payback for the shit hitting the fan in the middle the other day? Whatever the reason, it’s pathetic. Once again England come across as a bunch of aloof bullshiters.
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A nice bit of clickbait from our favourite cricket analyst that I missed yesterday – https://mobile.twitter.com/TheCricketerMag/status/785532869393481730
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Better talk to his distributors. Because my copy still hasn’t turned up.
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Oliver Holt has landed:
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Ah. One got a little bite from Mr Sanctimony. He never bothered after the first response.
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It’s mind blowing how Oliver Holt has progressed from Hold the back page, Alex Ferguson bag carrier to reporter without portfolio. In other words, Jack of all trades master of none. If you want a moronic opinion on almost any topic from The New York Giants, English cricket, The Premiership, (as long as it’s how great United are) Tyson Furry or The Olympics you send for Holt. Light the blue touch paper, and then piss your self laughing. Talk about wasted air miles at The Daily Mail.
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Oh yes. Oh yes.
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Newman –
“England privately feel Bangladesh were out of order in the way they goaded Jos Buttler after his reviewed dismissal and then provoked Jonny Bairstow with their actions and Jason Roy with their words afterwards”.
Privately in the pages of the Daily Mail, that is.
Can he get another Morgan reference in?
“this represents the biggest test yet of England’s one-day improvement and the mettle of a side without three of their leading batsmen in Eoin Morgan and Alex Hales — who both controversially withdrew from the tour due to safety concerns — and the rested Joe Root”.
Immediately followed by –
“The standings of Buttler and his deputy, Stokes, were certainly enhanced in the eyes of their young team by the way they stood up for them all in Dhaka”.
What could he be hinting?
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Jos was extremely private as he mouthed what looked to be “bunch of fuckers” as he walked off.
Newman is amazing. Never ceases to surprise.
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Once again how does he know this? Is Newman being leaked to ……Again? Or is he pulling shit out of his rear end?
As I said before, thug like behaviour by ENGLAND players will always be defended by the in house media blow hards if it is done in the name and cause of team ECB. There is nothing you can’t do, however illegal or thug like as long as it is defending team ECB. When Strauss talks about “trust” what he really means is blind obedience. And Newman can always be relied upon to report with blind obiedience to his bosses at ECB Central.
If on the other hand you show any independent thought from blind obidence you will be viewed as suspect. (They are even writing the good egg doctrine it into their contracts now,) Even when you take personal, quite rational positions like not touring on family grounds. That will be attacked, besmirched by media pygmies whos craven loyalty to all things ECB makes them a joke as journalists.
I honestly belive if Cook was to punch someone in the face out in the middle most of the ECB media would support him.
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It hasn’t dared rain on Oliver Holt and they’re starting on time.
England won the toss (3 out of 3 there – make Buttler captain forever!) and unsurprisingly will bowl.
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Scratch that, it’s drizzling.
Roy out injured with Billings coming in. Willey dropped for Plunkett.
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Scratch the scratch – play’s started.
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What is the point of Holt jetting in for the last game? If only to be able to claim he risked life and limb and faced down the terrorsits? He can then write even mor pompus clap trap about how he marched to the ECB drum, and Morgan is a turncoat. These are the new keyboard warriors.
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Kind of disappointed he didn’t Tweet some footage of himself singing the national anthem.
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Well, who’s surprised?
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I was watching the football last night and so embarrassed am I with that dirge that I stuck my finger in my ears so I could not have to hear it. I am unpatriotic in any case if I have to have any belief in what the Daily Mail says so **** em.
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England chasing 278 to win. Hostage to fortune time but I think the Bangas have got more than enough if the ball continues to turn. Very sloppy bowling and fielding display by England who have been lucky to have been gifted so many wickets.
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If D/L comes into play, that will really aid England. Otherwise 277 should be enough to defend for the Bangladeshis. Bangladesh are quite a decent ODI side at home these days – and they have injuries to deal with as well, so the standard excuses that Team ECB will offer are just as applicable to the home team.
Can’t say anything about Bangladesh’s ODI performances on the road, since no one seems to bother to even contemplating inviting them. English audiences are really dying to see the approximate 27252 ODIs scheduled this decade between England and Australia …
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If you were going to post one negative tweet about an England bowler, which one would it be?
The guy who took 4/43 out of 277/6, obviously.
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England favourites at the thirty over mark. Can Bangladesh grab a couple of wickets so that we can see if England can hold their nerves in a chase against Bangladesh for the first time in 6 years?
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Well, it was obvious that there was no pressure on Moeen Ali whatsoever as he played that shot …
236/6 – 42 needed from 42 balls, with Stokes there, and the bowlers to come.
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Humiliating series loss for England, as many had predicted. Could have been worse, of course. But for that incredible collapse in the first ODI, England would’ve been whitewashed 3-0.
Roll on the tests. Won’t be surprised if Bangla win at least one test match.
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Jinxing 101
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Wow didn’t think England had it in them to chase down 277 here! Pleasantly surprised.
Yet another cracking game of cricket. All 3 games have been superb. Probably the most entertaining and closely fought ODI series I have seen in last 12 months.
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To be fair, I was surprised too. Happy for the team. Annoyed for the hangers on around them.
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Would this be what is known as a reverse jinx? Or merely a pessimistic triple salko?
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Yes, great series, all with an edge. A new side to Stokes with a very impressive and mature innings. Thought it was not easy for Billings to step in as opener but he led the way. Good luck picking the side with everyone available…
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Elsewhere it seems that Australia will be whitewashed.
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Horrible second-ball blob for Steve Smith.
Phehlukwayo looks promising.
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Whitewash!
A batsman who scores 173 off 136 in an ODI and ends up on the losing side is probably entitled to ask a few questions about what everyone else was doing.
A batsman who top scores in an ODI series for batsmen on both sides and ends up on the losing side of a 5-0 whitewash is probably entitled to ask a few questions as well.
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Holt, rapidly elevating himself to Selvey’s level. The Daily Fail just can’t help themselves can they? Agenda, what agenda – https://mobile.twitter.com/OllieHolt22/status/786243781968273409
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Without at least some instructive writing on cricket on some occasions that Selvey did have. The Steve Finn analysis some time back was actually good. The silly defences of Saker, far less so.
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I am genuinely disturbed that people like this get high profile jobs doing something they are manifestly temperamentally unfit for. I’m guessing the job advert for Chief Sports Writer was something like:
“Wanted: Narrow minded buffoon to reinforce prejudices of brain dead readership. Ability to write and/or think a contraindication of success”
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You are talking about Emily Bishop’s son there, sir.
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For some who might enjoy short, pithy responses about the value of singing the national anthem should visit Mark Butcher’s timeline on twitter. I would suggest he is somewaht umimpressed with Mr Holt!
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See Ian Ward’s response as well.
Meanwhile, mention of “narrow-minded buffoons” made me think of someone for some reason and he doesn’t disappoint:
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And I suspect there won’t be too many mentions of far from spectacular series performances from the likes of Vince and Bairstow. I’m not a huge fan of Morgan by any means, as to me he has long periods where he simply doesn’t produce and that often coincides with big tournaments. Yet I am disgusted by his treatment over the anthem and of his decision (and Hales), not to tour Bangladesh.
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