4-0 up, one to go. England have been utterly dominant this series, and more so as it’s gone along, so the interest in this one is whether Australia can gain a consolation win or whether England will whitewash them.
For all England’s problems in red ball cricket, the ODI team really are quite something, especially in the batting division. And given the focus and priority of the ECB over the last few years, it’s entirely deliberate too. There are obvious pluses and minuses in that.
At 1pm any focus on the cricket will switch to the England football team and their World Cup match against Panama, as TV audiences will soar on free to air television as the national team perform. Cricket isn’t football, but the striking difference is always highlighted when there’s an event considered nationally important.
I’ll do a proper review of this series later, but for now, comment away, and here’s some little light reading about the Australian ball tampering affair to be going on with:
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/what-turned-steve-smith-into-a-cheat-20180618-p4zm57.html
Comments on the game below as ever.
Being Outside Cricket 
A dead rubber slogathon in a meaningless ODI series between mismatched teams. I’ll pass, thanks.
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I haven’t heard of Jane Cadzow before but that is a pretty good article. For me the question isn’t “what turned Steve Smith into a cheat” but rather why didn’t anyone question his suitability to be captain.
Smith should never have been captain. He was too intense and far too public in his displays of disapproval with his team mates. The Australian media would often comment on his inability to sleep during test matches but then ignore the obvious question of what effect was this having on his mental state and decision making. Perhaps, as long as the team was winning, no one cared. Immature, spent his life in a bubble, a sense of entitlement and obsessed with winning – no wonder it all went to shit, The amazing thing is that some in the Australian media want him back as captain.
I wish Jim Maxwell would say who his source is for the claim that the Australians had used sandpaper twice before. Sadly, I have no trouble believing it is true.
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The football world cup is once every four years – we play ODIs against Australia all the time – if it were a match in the cricket world cup simultaneously with the soccer, there would be a lot of split screens.
As for today, whilst it would be nice to get a 5-0, I cannot help but agree with the above comment. I am not saying Australia would have won with the three missing bowlers but it would have made a significant difference. In addition, they are, of course, two first-choice batsmen down but that is their fault. They’ll come good for the world cup, they always do.
Under current circumstances, India will be the real test. Despite home advantage, I think we shall struggle to achieve parity. Purely as an aside, living in Hong Kong, UK test matches are a dream. Start at 6pm local time – straight after work and time for a cold one (or two).
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The Smith article explains a lot about modern day cricket. I suspect the same lack of critical thought to be around the England teams. Flower did try to get them out of the hotel and he did succeed to a point. Thankfully we do have players who can think and talk, but no doubt they are subjected to the same nannying. I hope we are different, but I’m not sure by how much.
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I don’t think we’re very different at all, Jenny. The fact that the media go on and on about Cook being able to play musical instruments and hold a sheep’s hoof while it gives birth shows how rare it actually is for the modern player to know anything about anything much outside the sport.
Over here, they get picked out as kids and given a scholarship to a posh private school so they leave all their friends and family behind. They’re intensively coached and left with little time for school work, and they’re also feted and spoiled if they bring credit to the school by playing well ….. and then it just goes on the same way. Win and we love you, here’s lots of money, do as you’re told. You don’t need to read a book, go down to the gym.
The contrast is stark between the women and men players. The women are still living in the old world and most of them have a degree or other qualification because they never expected to live off cricket.
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Even the Aussies are not taking the series seriously. Stoinis at three?
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England are into the tail now…
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Look s like England’s cricketers will have the game wrapped up before the football players even kick off.
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Will be surprised if this lasts more than 45 minutes after the interval.
Pathetic.
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Not the best bit of batting when you’re chasing a modest total. 27/4, and Australia suddenly in with a decent chance. Might be over at my estimated time, but then it would be an Australian win 😮
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So the English football media have managed to achieve something no England football manager could do. No Prime Minister could ever dream of. They have managed to unite the whole county. Problem is, they have united the whole country against themselves. That takes a particular genius or more likely arrogance and stupidity.
Leading the lemmings in the great charge over the credibility cliff is our old chum Ollie Holt. Yesterday Southgate diffused the issue of dispute, and what did the bone headed media do? They threw it back in his face like cretinous children claiming ……”see this proves us right all along.” They have now decided that as Southgate has backed down (only in their moronic eyes)they can go back to calling him a man of class. If he had doubled down he would have been fried.
It’s always about them. ME, ME, ME. Even the increasingly comic figure of Gary Lineker defended the media. Well, he would now wouldn’t he? Gary gets more pompous, and more smug every day. It’s what happens when you have a nice cosy job as a BBC presenter on a ridiculous salary paid for by the tax payer. We don’t get a choice if we pay your wages.
As to Holt, his latest crayon scribblings make the ludicrous claim that it is not a football journalists job to cheerlead, and be a “propagandist.” The lack of self awareness is breathtaking because that is exactly what most English football writers have been doing for years including Holt. The team isn’t England of course, but it’s Manchester United. Holt, the fat Custis, Paul Hayward, Steve Curry, Henry Winter and Sam Wallace have been front line mouth pieces for one club from Manchester for the last two decades. Their fawning of Alex Ferguson through the 1990s was not journalism but full blown propaganda.
In fact at times you thought they were out doing themselves to get a job as a presenter on MUTV. One even ghost wrote Ferguson’s autobiography. These people, have no clue as to what a journalist is. When England lose, as they will….. the worms will turn. They always do.
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If the England management want to really rub the salt in to the wound they will set a trap for the clueless media by writing down a fake team and carrying it out to the training ground for the Belgium match, and see if the media will fall right into it.
How about painting the teams colours on to their upper bodies instead of shirts. Stop all the shirt pulling. Won’t stop the rugby tackling mind.
In other news England are 27/3. The ball doesn’t seem to be coming on as they like it. Be interested to see if they can just grind this one out.
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If Buttler did enough in the IPL to get his test spot back, has Moen done enough in this series to get his spot back?
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Judging by that shot, the answer would be no.
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2 years ago, Eng were 4-0 up in odi series v Pakistan, had hit a record score at Trent Bridge, opposition were a rabble but lost final rubber to win series 4-1. 12 months later Pakistan won the Champions Trophy.
If Starc, Cummins, Hazlewood, Smith and Warner to return it could happen again.
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Went too soon. What an innings by Buttler! Superb game of cricket
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Well, you may scoff about slogathons and dead rubbers but that was a really exciting finish. Buttler is stunning and Rashid is a treasure.
5-0. Just saying.
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I quite enjoyed that!! In fact from being eight wickets down that was the most engaged cricket I have watched this season. Rashid and Butlers partnership was fun to watch. And they nearly got England home. Ball managed to not get out and so England got over the line.
I still prefer a real contest with drama, and tension to just watching the ball go flying over my head ever other ball. And that was what it was today.
Still have some doubt about whether England can adapt to a different method rather than just blasting scores of 350 every time.
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Needless to say, I wish I had paid more attention to the game now 😉 Low scoring, so not really a slogathon, and it sounds like it took a very good and measured innings by Buttler to get England out of the mire after they’d all but thrown it away. The rest of the batting a little flaky?
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They have a tendency to get a bit ahead of themselves. “Here I am coming in to bat with my attacking mindset and my winning ways, I’ll just take this innings by the scruff of the – oh shit.”
We had a few of those today. I approve of Morgan’s principle that it’ll happen, no blame, somebody else will just step up, but there must be a number of those beyond which it gets dangerous. Just like some day Buttler must run out of partners.
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Yea, I’m not sure it’s flakey, more they can only play in one way. However Seeing the results they have had since the last World Cup you can’t really argue,but in low scoring games they seem unable to just grind out the result. They managed to today, but you are leaving it late when you want nearly 40% of the runs with two wickets left.
The best way to try to beat England is get bowled out for less than 230 and see if they give it away trying to get them in 30 overs.
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Spot the bias here in the media reporting that claims they don’t cheerlead & it’s not their job to be partisan…..
from the Mail online…..
“Raheem Sterling squandered a great chance but showed skill and poise to tee up Jesse Lingard’s brilliant goal… he repaid Southgate’s faith in him.”
Or Lee Clayton
“ I admit I have a soft spot for Jesse Lingard. Has come a long way, grafted for this. This was one of my favourite interviews of the season. “
Or Ollie Holt….
“My guess: Rashford starts on Thursday v Belgium, Sterling rested. If Rashford plays well, interesting decision for Southgate for 2nd round.”
It’s always, always all about Man United. They are not journalists. They are cheerleaders and stenographers for the red side of Manchester. When they Deny it, they are lying.
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In my view Ian Wright is one of the best pundits on tv. Honest, passionate, and thoughtful. oh and funny. Why on earth did the BBC lose him to ITV?
Instead they have the boring three stooges. I’d sack Gary Lineker and give the job to Ian Wright. It would freshen it up, and be must watch tv.
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So a question. Are we seeing Jos finally establishing himself as the player we hoped he could and would be? Or is this a rich vein of form that will end abruptly in a year or so, say the way Ballance fell apart?
I hope it is the former, as I think he’s a great lad and I hope England let him be and don’t try to change him, which could ruin him (like they have done in the past for lots of players, albeit mostly bowlers).
Anyway, great game and great to see Jos doing so well.
Off topic (apologies Dmitri), but I can’t find any balanced articles on England v Panama, all roads now appear to point towards greatness and certain World Cup victory. Were they really that good? Ultimately they beat a team ranked 54th fairly well, perhaps a little better than hoped for, but even so, not enough to warrant ‘we are world beaters’. Where is the realism, these journos are just like the ECB stenographers, one good victory and England are back, ‘the best’……ho hum.
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It’s catering to your audience Rohan. Us cynical sorts watched Colombia last night and thought “if we get them we are in trouble.”
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The think I like about Buttler is that there is none of that “it’s the way I play bullshit” but rather he adjusts his game to the situation. He is a very impressive cricketer.
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I don’t think there was ever any doubt about Butler as a one day player. The question is over his Test selection, and whether England can have a batsman only number seven in the Test team.
As to the football, the media backed themselves into a corner over “team sheet gate” so I think they are now trying to row back a little…. without admitting it of course.
Yes, I don’t think England are as good as some are saying. And if they lose to Columbia certain well known suspects will relish jumping on. Their pens are already being dipped in the deepest poison. The media has a wafer thin skin, and they don’t like or deal with criticism well.
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I honestly don’t think many believe the football team are suddenly world beaters – most of the “it’s coming home” comments are ironic self-mockery.
That said, this England team are playing with a plan, and actually playing football. Equally, only England seem to dismiss a win by pointing to the inadequacy of the opposition to explain it away. Colombia were woeful in their first game, albeit with ten men, and Poland were awful yesterday. Belgium struggled against Panama for 60 minutes while England battered them.
England aren’t suddenly amazing, but they are a decent team, not as talented individually as some we’ve had in the past, but they’re both likeable and may actually be underrated.
Put it this way, before the World Cup I suggested that I thought they’d do ok, and quarter finalists was quite possible. Every person I said that to sneered and said they’d be lucky to get out of the group. I get the negativity over the last 20 years, but bloody hell, this is a young team playing with a joie de vivre and a certain degree of style. Welcome that and appreciate it.
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They’re also not managed by Roy Hodgson. Which helps a lot with this observer.
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I was quite confident England would get out of the group because I thought we had a good draw, (it could have been a lot worse.) I thought we would win the first two matches. (Didn’t expect the first one to be so close or the second we would score 6 mind.)
I think if This team had exactly the same young players as we have now. With exactly the same manager, with his theory of picking fit players in form, and a manner that the players had bought into, but the only differrence was they WEREN’T called England…… we would do well.
It’s the baggage that goes with England that always pulls us down. If we were called Poland with this set up, we would be fine.
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Fair enough, fans may not, but pundits, TV, journos and online articles were certainly ‘ratcheting’ it up, of that there is no denying. Look I’m not trying to be down on the team, but I just dislike the way the press seem to interpret a good win (in a lot of sports concerning England) as wow, aren’t we great now, world beaters, instead of, ‘that was good this could be interesting for the round of 16, let’s see how things go’. I’m all for optimistic realism me!
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Rohan, I think I’m quite a bit older than you. Trust me, the English football media have been over hyping England for fifty years. I lived through the 1970s when England failed to qualify in both 1974 and 1978. You would have thought it was a national tragedy. I’m not joking.
The media went into almost every World Cup writing as if we were favourites to win. England managers who failed were tarred and feathered. It began to lessen a bit under Roy Hodgson. After the last World Cup when we failed to get out of the group there was hardly any media calling for the sack, unheard off in the previous forty years.
I think the media have latched onto the feeling that many fans quite like Southgate and his approach of picking only players who are fit (not something we have tried before) and the fact many are quite young and are smiling and seem to be having fun. I don’t think many fans believe we will win. But they just want to enjoy it.
If England fail to reach the quarter finals I think the media will turn, especially those media outlets who got a lot of push back from the fans over the leaking of the team.
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Mrs Q pointed out something I think something most people are missing about England’s chances – the haircuts. Particularly Stones, McGuire and Kane, these are proper haircuts. Haircuts that came home from the Great War. Haircuts you can imagine climbing out of a Spitfire. I can’t remember a World Cup campaign where England have been so well situated.
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So it ended up being the one game in the year, where the batting prowess of #10 proved to be decisive.
This could well be a foreboding of how England crash out in the World Cup next year.
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Thought I posted yesterday but it hasn’t appeared, any ideas?
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It was flagged as spam by WordPress, it seems. I just rescued it, no idea why it happened though…
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Have zero interest in this series. Watched one. Fell asleep. So have been watching tennis and, yes, even football
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More on how Scotland are likely to be shafted by the ICC / ECB, in the next few days.
http://www.cricbuzz.com/cricket-news/102768/associates-wait-anxiously-future-of-world-cricket-league-and-intercontinental-cup
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I know it’s not trendy, but the sheer quality of England’s batting totally captured me in this series. I completely agree with everyone’s take on it in general, but honestly, we’ve just seen the best batting in a series possibly ever, let alone by England. And yes, the last match fits wit that too, given a top oder failure and a lower order rescue, pivoting around a ludicrously talented world class player – who we have the luxury of batting anywhere from 4 -7 as we feel like at the time.
Honestly, quite aside from breaking records, the brilliance of our play (and it was brilliant) I found truly thrilling. I’ve just never seen that many shots of such absolutes take the breath away quality played over and over again by so many different players in the same line up in the same series.
Of course I understand why so many were turned off by this pointless series, but still. Perhaps it isn’t the worst advice to even in such circumstances to be open to seeing (and getting the due pleasure from) batting like we’ve never seen before.
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