England

South Africa v England: 1st Test, Day Four

thelegglance7 Comments

By no stretch of the imagination could this Test be called a classic, for one thing England have been edging ever further ahead in it over the course of the game, but to go into the final day with all results (just about) possible is indicative of a match that has been fascinating throughout.  The most likely outcome remains that England will go 1-0 up some time tomorrow afternoon, but South Africa showed admirable grit in their second innings; had they done so in the first innings, it could be argued they wouldn’t have been in such trouble.  Yet ironically enough, they finished the day with a near identical score to that they had at the close on day two.  Perception is a funny thing.

England appeared relatively untroubled by the loss of wickets in the morning, a lead already approaching 300 tends to limit any sense of panic after all, and it was Bairstow who was the undoubted star of the show.  On a surface that started slow and is edging towards the turgid as we approach the conclusion, fluent run scoring has proved difficult, yet Bairstow merrily thrashed his way to 79 at better than a run a ball.  England do have an abundance of strokemakers, but they also require the latitude to play that way, both in terms of the match situation and the allowance from the captain and management above.  The signs are positive that coach Trevor Bayliss is keen to allow the players to express themselves, a welcome change from the years of rigid game management, but it still requires the groundwork done by others – Compton’s 85 and 49 are not going to win any awards for entertainment, but a team requires different kinds of batsmen who play in their own way to to bring out the best in the others; he did exceptionally well, and while no judgements can be made going forward on the basis of a single game, it can be said he played the role of the perfect number three here.

England’s long batting order also demonstrated its value, as first Moeen Ali and then Chris Woakes provided competent support, with South Africa merely looking to limit the damage.

Indeed the approach from the hosts was quite instructive.  The new ball was already available when Taylor was dismissed to leave England 224-6, 313 ahead.  It wasn’t taken.  What this betrayed was that South Africa didn’t truly believe they could win the game; for a side that did would surely have wanted to grab the new nut, knock over the tail and set off in pursuit of 330, with a belief it was possible.  Sure, England would have been strong favourites to win still, but it would have by no means been out of the question.  Equally of course, the new ball could have gone around the park, but not to take it was extraordinarily defensive given from there South Africa could still have won.  It is hard to credit that the view of Amla and/or the coaching staff was that their best chance of doing so was to retain the old ball, it seemed purely about being content to stay in the field as long as possible to avoid batting, and that is fair enough if the opposition are already 450 ahead, but not when they are only 300 and a bit on, with six wickets down.   A few things about this South Africa outfit seem rather muddled.

The debate then turned to the timing of any declaration.  Once again though, there was so much time left in the game.  As it happened, England were dismissed before it became an issue, but with a target of 416 and the best part of 150 overs remaining, it was by no means a pressing matter.  Put simply, if South Africa batted the remainder of the match – and no rain was or is forecast – they wouldn’t be too far away from that target.  Therefore England weren’t going to be losing potential overs that might be needed to take a last wicket or two.  Had they gone on much longer, then yes, it would have become a topic of debate, but it didn’t arise.

In the customary manner, South Africa batted much better second time around initially.  Van Zyl in particular started off exceptionally positively, to the point one or two who had been questioning England for not setting about 350 actually queried whether they should have (if they could) gone on longer to make the game safe.  Sometimes there is a desire to have it all ways.  For let’s put it simply, if South Africa were to achieve the second highest run chase in Test history, then you simply doff your caps to them and say they deserve it.  If they instead manage to bat out the game for a draw, then you may wonder why they didn’t get close enough to win in the time available, but you still doff that cap.  The target was exceptionally challenging, the time remaining extensive.  England and Cook did nothing wrong, however it turns out tomorrow.

After that strong start by the Proteas, and with a ball that resolutely refused to swing or seam to any great extent, it was Stokes and then Finn who made the difference.  Firstly, patience is always needed in these situations, for the wickets will usually come, and secondly you need to have a strike bowler who takes those wickets.  Earlier in his career Finn was criticised – and then dropped – for leaking runs, but he takes wickets.  His strike rate is the best of any England bowler with 100 Test victims, at an outstanding 47 balls per wicket.  This is a serious weapon.  Who cares if he goes for a few runs when he can do that?  So does Dale Steyn for that matter, and while his economy rate is a little better than Finn’s, it’s hardly impressive either.  Trying to force the square peg of potent strike bowler into the round hole of line and length operator consistently missed the point about the attacking wealth offered by him.  When he comes on to bowl it’s quite clear he will drop the odd one short and get hit to the boundary.  It’s also equally clear there is a decent prospect of sending one or two opponents back to the shed.  Leave him be, let him do what he’s excellent at – England have other bowlers to tie an end up.

And on that particular matter, Broad is becoming nigh on unhittable in Test cricket these days.  Indeed an economy rate in this innings of 2.27 probably represents something of a disappointment to him.  Add to that that he takes wickets, as his record over this calendar year shows only too well, and it is time that it was more widely acknowledged that he’s a fantastic bowler, one of the best England have had in a long time.  Appreciation of his skills (if not his DRS expertise) is overdue.

Standing in the way of England emerging victorious is one AB De Villiers.   England did have a chance to get him, Moeen Ali’s beautifully flighted delivery turning sharply through the gate with De Villiers out of his ground, only for Bairstow to miss the stumping.  England are choosing wicketkeepers who are primarily batsmen, and the reality is that while they do so, stumpings like this are going to be missed.  The same applies when it’s Jos Buttler doing the job.  In both cases they tend to miss the stumpings when the ball goes between bat and pad.  The eyes follow the bat rather than ball, expecting it to make contact, and by the time the ball has passed the bat, it’s far too late to adjust.  This certainly isn’t to excuse an error that Bairstow himself was in despair over, but it is to explain how it happens and why.  The very best wicketkeepers don’t make that kind of mistake because they always follow the line of the ball instinctively.  It’s a much much harder skill than might be supposed.

With Du Plessis and De Villiers at the crease, memories of their monumental match saving rearguard against Australia were well to the fore, but Finn returned just before the end to produce one that lifted just enough to take the shoulder of Du Plessis’ bat, Cook taking an excellent catch, and England will breathe much easier tonight.

There was still time for two items of note – firstly that Dale Steyn came out to bat as nightwatchman.  There are two ways of looking at that, either surprise at taking such a risk with a key player with the Cape Town Test only days away, or that he’s already ruled out and therefore there is little to be lost.  A slight puzzle though.   Secondly, immediately after Du Plessis was out the ball was changed.  It had been looked at earlier in the over, and the change itself was routine, and nothing need be inferred from the decision.  Just as nothing needed to be inferred from the decision to change the ball when South Africa were bowling.  It is unlikely that those who cast aspersions through innuendo and suggestion in that case will do so here – and that says it all.

A further 280 is required from 90 overs tomorrow.  More realistically, England need six more wickets.  It probably won’t be easy, but it probably will happen.  On the basis of the first four days, England deserve it.

 

South Africa v England: 1st Test day three

thelegglance46 Comments

England should wrap this match up at some point on the fifth day barring something special – and something special is always possible in sport, that’s the point of it – so strong is England’s position.

At the end of day two there was a feeling that England were the side in the ascendancy but that was on the basis of how the game appeared rather than the raw figures of the score, and from there the game could have gone in any direction. But South Africa couldn’t have had a much worse day that they did, from the collapse in the morning which left them 89 behind to the injury to Steyn and dropped catches as England built a lead.

It could have been worse. Dean Elgar carrying his bat through the innings was the only thing that kept South Africa in the game. The deficit was substantial enough but not insurmountable. What lent a feeling of inevitability to proceedings was the injury to Dale Steyn early in England’s second innings. And here we need to be wary of straying into wise-after-the-event territory.   For South Africa lack an all rounder in this post Kallis/Pollock era, and like most teams in such a position, selected a four man attack to try to balance the side. For injury to take out the spearhead is desperately bad luck, provided of course that there wasn’t that risk going into the game, and that’s the question for the South African selectors rather than the four man attack in itself.  To put it another way, England had a four man attack for a number of years and it was rare that they lost a bowler, the same applies to the great Australian team of the first part of this century; in and of itself it’s not flawed selection, but it appears to be when injury strikes. Certainly Morkel did all he could to make up for the shortfall.

And of course balancing a side with only four bowlers becomes difficult, but you do need a keeper who can bat, hence asking De Villiers to do the job. He’s quite clearly a superb player, the question is how sustainable it is to ask your best batsman to do two jobs and whether that impacts on the primary role.  It’s exacerbated when said batsman has to come in at four rather than later, limiting the amount of rest. De Villiers does have a worse record as batsman when he has kept wicket, but it’s hardly a disastrous one to say the least. Yet it’s a huge ask of him, and perhaps his keeping in the second innings is an indication of that.  For while every keeper can and does drop catches, to come in to a Test match having not done it in a while, and to still have to do the primary role, is going to be exhausting, mentally more than physically, though that plays a part as well.  And then we have to consider the first two Tests are back to back.

For England Stuart Broad has been exceptional, but what has impressed has been the back up.  Moeen Ali was excellent, while Woakes was consistently unlucky and Finn cleaned up the tail expertly.

England’s batting too was purposeful. The third innings can so often be one where the side nominally in front can panic and throw away the advantage. After the loss of Cook, Compton set about building the platform, and he did that extremely well. By the time he was out, those following were able to start to increase the pressure on the reduced attack, circumstances that the likes of Root are ideal at exploiting.

England will doubtless look to accelerate in the morning, and wear the pitch a little more. It may not be the worst thing in the world for England to be bowled out, forcing South Africa to go for the win with time left in the game. The danger of batting on too long is an ever present with England in recent times. Tomorrow is not the time to do it again, for here is a chance to pick up an opening Test win away from home, and that’s not a common experience.

South Africa v England: First Test, day one

thelegglance11 Comments

If the toss is crucial in a game, and you lose said flip of the coin, then perhaps if at the end of the first day you can say you are still in the match then that represents a very good day indeed.

Weather conditions were unfriendly throughout, and the surface looked green, seaming just enough early on to be a real danger to the batsman and als0 (more surprisingly – not least for Joe Root) proving conducive to spin from the start.  Yet the forecast for improved weather for the rest of the game made this first day potentially decisive for the Test, and England will be well pleased that they are not just in the game, but in a reasonable position.

The late loss of Taylor was unquestionably a blow, for without that wicket it could have been said to not just be a good battling performance, but one where England had a chance of getting on top.  Even so, from 49-3 and in terrible trouble, to reach 179-4 is a fine recovery.

Losing early wickets probably shouldn’t be too harshly viewed, for it certainly appeared difficult batting conditions, though the nature of those wickets will grate somewhat – Cook won’t need to be told that was a poor shot – and it didn’t appear to ease greatly for the rest of the play.

For both Taylor and Compton, much praise is warranted.  Although Compton scored slowly, which is what he was criticised for first time around, in these circumstances it was exactly what England needed, and in any event at no time did it feel in any way negative – he put away the bad ball well, and turned over the strike regularly.  One might say that the difference is in a player who is backed to perform rather than failure being pounced upon, but one innings is one innings.  What is interesting is that he is batting at number three, and given the most successful recent exponent of that position for England was Trott, it may yet be a position that suits him.

Taylor has developed from the batsman who first appeared three years ago, though even then that flawed player showed there was no shortage of nerve and bottle in him.

South Africa only have three front line seamers and England must aim to keep them in the field, and put the pressure on Steyn through additional overs he has to bowl.  Certainly he appeared what he is – a class above anyone else.

England do have a deep batting line up, so will hope to capitalise on the hard work done, but they’re in that tough situation where 300 would be a pretty impressive total to reach given conditions, but likely won’t be enough as the track flattens out in the sun.  So while they have done extremely well, they will need to do extremely well again tomorrow as well – perhaps an unfair return for the effort put in.

All in all, decent effort from England – or more specifically decent effort from Compton and Taylor.  On to tomorrow, where we’ll have a better idea of the balance of the game.

 

South Africa v England – A Transitional Arrangement

LordCanisLupus18 Comments
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Messing About With The Software – Cape Town 2005

Cricket goes into overdrive when Christmas ends, with the Boxing Day test between Australia and West Indies appearing a total mismatch, while the South Africa v England game looking much more intriguing. We have a South African team coming off the back of an absolute demolition in India, with the wickets prepared only a partial excuse. England, meanwhile, you could be forgiven for thinking are about to carry all before them the way they are constantly talked up, when, in fact we have a team with doubts at opener, number 3, number 5, wicket-keeper, spinner and now, a replacement for Anderson. Add to that, given the ridiculous amount of time since our last test visit to South Africa (2009-10 for heaven’s sake), the only experience we have in these conditions are Alastair Cook at opener, Broad and Anderson. And one of those is injured.

Despite it being Christmas, and the fact that things have been quiet around here, TLG and I are going to do what we can to bring you the views of the play from South Africa. I had the great pleasure of going to Cape Town in 2005, for a test match we lost, but for an experience I will never forget. It’s an amazing city, I stayed in a brilliant guest house which, unbeknown to us when we booked, was owned by the former manager of the South African cricket team (and Gary Kirsten woke me up one morning), and it was the first time I got to use an ultra-zoom camera at a match. So I have a soft spot for this your and will be green with envy at those lucky enough to be there this time.

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Day 5 – 2005

England are being talked up again, but you can’t escape the fact that on the last two tours this year we’ve lost heavily to Pakistan and drawn against a mediocre West Indies team when we really should have swept the series. This is being largely ignored as we focus on the failings of the home side in India to give us some comfort. I saw some compare it to the 2004-5 tour, but England aren’t the force they were then (off the back of a 3-0 win in the West Indies, and seven straight home test wins) and South Africa still have a formidable bowling attack if and when they are all fit. That series, of course, introduced the world to AB DeVilliers and Dale Steyn…. and was the last tour for Surrey legends Mark Butcher and Graham Thorpe. I’m rambling off piste again….

It’s an interesting proposition because both teams look short of true depth. England’s reserve resources may be stronger than South Africa’s. A number of the home team’s players are the wrong side of 30. There are injury question marks about all of the home pace trio, and Philander is probably going to miss most of the series. We have a great record at Durban and a lousy one in opening tests overseas. There are flaws and question marks, ifs and buts, all sorts of intangibles. It should be a decent old series.

TLG and I will do what we can, and look forward to hearing from you over the next few weeks.

Finally, I’d like to wish you all a brilliant Christmas, and health and happiness for the New Year. I’ve a lot more on the stocks….

Day 5

LordCanisLupus85 Comments

After an almost two month hiatus it’s back to normal. We see the puritanical, pompous muppets firing at the blog and its commenters for the same old reasons. We ain’t cheering hard enough.

Some on here aren’t England fans, if they hadn’t noticed, and a lot of those who comment who are from these shores still feel betrayed. All the paeans to our glorious leader aren’t going to change that. If anything, they exacerbate matters. It’s really not that hard to understand if you try.

Instead we got a load of old twaddle and a promise that the chief muppet won’t comment on here. We can but hope. I offered him a genuine opportunity to write something on his blog about the achievement of Alastair Cook in becoming the highest non-Asian test run scorer in Asia, but he declined and gave me some links to his KP pieces? I’m as confused as I was before.

So, we come to Day 5. I saw something that said the draw was 20/1 on, and I think that’s generous. For England to have won, that lead needed to be 80 or 90 and perhaps have a little dart tonight. I don’t blame them for being cautious, and for grinding Pakistan into the dust of Abu Dhabi, not at all. This is a step up from the capitulations on good batting tracks at the Oval and Lord’s and a necessary one. Root, Bell, Stokes and to some extent Buttler got some batting time under their belts, but we needed a dasher to make a dasher’s hundred on a non-dasher’s pitch and I’m not going to stick forks in them for not doing so.

As for Cook, I’m afraid people who don’t want to understand aren’t going to be persuaded. Back in 2011, when Cook was piling on 294 in much the same way as he did in Abu Dhabi, even some of his staunchest allies complained that it was all a bit too self-serving. I thought that harsh in a game where time was absolutely no issue. I was egging him on to get 300. I’m a fan of triple hundreds. I love the quiz on Sporcle about test 300s, often forgetting Younus Khan, for instance! England haven’t had one since 1990. They haven’t had one away since the 1930s.

Times have changed. If this were Root, if this were Ali, if this were Bell, if this were Bairstow, if this were Stokes, I’d have loved to see 300. But it’s Cook. And I’m afraid I just don’t like him. So while I sit here and say it was an excellent innings, it has pulled England by their bootstraps to a position of total safety, and it is an innings no-one else in the England team of the past 20 years could have played, do I rejoice? No. We all know why, and I’m not going into it. To pretend that I’m joyless, or sour, is to miss the point. Was Cook’s innings a joyful one? No. No-one is going to re-watch it for its aesthetic beauty or languid strokes. You are going to sit back and go “that was some effort. What concentration. What ability” but there’s no joy there. He’s done a magnificent job. I just don’t like him. That’s it. In the same way our critics didn’t like someone else, but we’re not allowed to mention that, because we’re obsessed.

On to the pitch and the utter nonsense being spouted about “pitches like these will kill test cricket”. If every dull game at a World Cup football Finals would lead to these calls, then the internet would blow up. For every good Champions League tie, there are a load of god awful ones. I’ve been to nearly 1000 football matches. I’d say 20% have been shockers. You aren’t guaranteed great entertainment on any surface. Spare me, please.

This pitch is as skewed against bowlers as Trent Bridge was against batsmen this summer. But that doesn’t matter, because England win on the latter, and have a tendency not to on the former. In 2012, South Africa made 600+ for the loss of 2 wickets and Anderson, Broad, Swann et al looked no more likely to get a wicket than they did in Abu Dhabi. But as we got humped on that surface, nothing seemed to get mentioned. If chances were taken in this match, the game would be a fair way more advanced. They weren’t. I’m not saying this is a great wicket – it clearly isn’t – but spare me the “death of test” twaddle. England getting a draw here will be a very, very decent achievement.

If you watched the 2000/01 series in Pakistan we endured 14 days of toil, attritional cricket, lit up at the end by the drama of Karachi. In 2005/6 we saw Pakistan pile on runs and England fail to cope. In 2011/12, we saw a team all at sea against spin. England have piled on well over 500. It’s a very good base to prepare for the next game.

I know the last two months have been slow on here. That’s been because I’ve found more interesting things to do, work has been busy, I got a great trip to Johannesburg, had tons of home media issues to sort (seems to be almost there) and, well, I was knackered. I’m not sure I feel that energised now, but I’m sure as hell not going to be fed a pile of old cack by people who, as usual, wilfully misrepresent what we do here. I’m thrilled so many have returned for these test matches. We’re back to well over four figures a day again, and it’s terrific. TLG will be returning soon, the cricket will keep us going, and the media will make us howl.

Plus ca change, you vile lot. Plumbing the depths. They do make me chuckle.

Comments on Day 5 here. We’ll do a round-up at the end of proceedings. As always, you may not agree with me, but you can disagree here. I won’t take it from those who do it from the sidelines, and I will remain like that. It’s much easier when you are a contented person, and at the moment, life isn’t too bad at all.

UPDATE – Twitter is funny this morning. I mean rib-achingly funny.

The Ashes: A Review

thelegglance45 Comments

This Ashes series was crap.  Bloody awful, one of the worst seen in this country in many years.

There, I’ve said it.  It runs completely counter to the narrative that so much of the media have gone with, whereby for some it was comparable in its wonder to 2005, but sorry it was rubbish.  Not because England won, not for a moment, but because there were five Tests, none of which offered up a contest.

With hindsight, Cardiff was the best of them, and had anyone said after that game that it would prove to be the case, there would have been wringing of hands across the cricketing spectrum.  Yet England’s win by the margin of 169 runs proved to be the closest the sides would be, with every subsequent result being even wider.  Aside from arguably Edgbaston, where the feeling was very much after day one that England had it in the bag, even if the final scorecard didn’t quite reflect that, it’s the only one where the game was in any kind of balance after the first innings were completed.

That England won the series was a welcome surprise, but winning doesn’t mean it was a good series in itself.  The greatest Ashes series of them all is routinely named as 2005, and Australians are as quick to agree about that as the English, even though Australia lost.  Because that series was a slugfest between two teams who fought themselves to a standstill and didn’t give an inch.  This was a series where as soon as one side got on top, the other waved the white flag of surrender and looked to the next match – the lack of fight, the lack of discipline and the lack of gumption was shocking from both teams.  This isn’t good Test cricket, it’s a slaughter.  What made this series a bizarre curiosity was that the slaughter went in both directions, meaning that at the start of every Test the unknown was which team would be wielding the cleaver, and which would be the tethered goat.

Test cricket can be one of the most captivating sports there is, because the timescale involved in each match allows for ebbs and flows, for sides to recover and fight back.  Magnified over a full five match series, it can rise to the heights of the majestic.  Not every five Test series can begin to reach such exalted standards as the very best, and when one side outclasses the other then it can be something of a long haul, even for the victorious supporters, who tend to feel a slight dissatisfaction about the lack of uncertainty about the outcome, but given even a modicum of competition, it is fascinating.

And therein lies the problem.  3-2 looks like it was a good series at first glance, but sport is only ever compelling where there is competition, and in each match there was barely any.  Indeed only one of them had that air of competition beyond the first day.

All of which makes analysing the series somewhat problematic.  Did England win it or Australia lose it?  Given both sides showed quite exceptional levels of incompetence mixed in with occasional brilliance, drawing conclusions from a little over or under half a series means that a caveat must apply in each instance.

For England, only Root so much as managed a century (two of them) in the whole series.  His batting was so far ahead of the rest of the team that when he failed, so did the team as a whole.  To put it another way, only he could look back on it as a batsman with unalloyed pleasure.  His next test will be to see whether he can replicate this kind of run scoring away from home.  There’s no reason to assume he won’t, but at present he is a player in a rich run of form.  If he carries on in the two difficult tours ahead, then he might really begin to be considered the real deal.

Cook had a real mixed bag with the bat.  Two fifties only in itself is a pretty poor return in a normal series, though in this one only Bell and Root passed fifty more often than him.  Yet both fifties were in defeat, and the second of them rather irrelevant given the match situation.  It’s somewhat ironic that in advance of the series this writer was anything but alone in feeling that for England to win, Cook would have to have a fantastic series.  In reality, his contribution with the bat to victory was absolutely nil.  His captaincy in contrast was fine.  Not outstanding, but decent enough.  The problem with Cook is not with Cook himself, it is how the media respond to him.  Competent captaincy is most welcome, he acknowledged himself that he had learned and changed his approach, good on him.  But it is now at the point where such competence is lauded as being worthy of Brearley, and it’s total nonsense.  Cook had a slightly disappointing series with the bat but captained perfectly well.  It isn’t disloyal or anti-England to state reality and not join in the hagiography.  Cook seems immune from any kind of criticism from sections of the press, and it doesn’t do him any favours.

The one thing which is certainly in his favour batting wise is that although he didn’t get the runs, he looks technically much more sound than he did during his miserable run in 2013/14.  At that time his head was far too far across to the offside, which dragged his feet across to the offside, making him vulnerable to both the straight ball and the edge behind.  That particular failing has been corrected, and he appears much more secure in his technique.  To that extent, his quiet series can be put down to one of those things, but given the poor time he had of it previously, he does need to start scoring heavily again fairly soon.

His batting partner Lyth has probably seen his Test career come and go, and the pain etched on his face with his second innings dismissal tugged at the heartstrings.  England have developed a habit of losing openers not called Cook in the last few years, and both Compton and Carberry must feel considerable irritation that they weren’t persevered with, in the latter case in the face of far better bowling than any of the other hopefuls have had to cope with.

Ballance has responded well to being dropped mid series, and time in county cricket getting his game back in order might be just what he needs.  He has plenty of ability, and he’s hardly the first to suffer a difficult sophomore season.

The middle orders of both sides have performed poorly.  Bell seemed to either have a relative feast or total famine, but in the context of the others, those three fifties represent a reasonable return.  There is a real question mark now over his future.  With the exception of the pleasure that was evident from his contribution at his home ground, he has cut an unhappy, if not a detached figure for a little while.  Some with a poor grasp of grammar might have described it as “disinterested” even.  If that is to be Bell’s last appearance in an England shirt, as seems possible from his comment about deciding his future in a couple of weeks, then it’s a loss to England, and one that smacks of carelessness.  He still has much to offer, and he’s only 33.

Bairstow and Stokes both did OK on occasion, and in the first instance deserves persevering with.  In the second, Stokes tended to show the difficulty faced by so many all rounders over the years of trying to get both disciplines functioning at the same time.  He is a player of immense promise, and at the stage of his career he is at, his ability to bowl wonderful spells as well as play match changing innings is as much as should be expected of him.

The same could be said for Buttler, who after coming into the side as someone who had batting talent but whose keeping needed a lot of work, proceeded to turn that on its head by keeping extremely well throughout (the legside catches standing back were good, the one standing up was outstanding) and being barely able to score a run.  His final innings of the series did appear to show a degree of learning from experience, and in itself that’s a promising sign.  The improvement in his wicketkeeping too implies a player willing to learn.

The final member of the middle order, albeit one who batted as low as nine when a nightwatchman was employed was Moeen Ali.  Like with Bell over the years, there is a predisposition to be both frustrated by him and to make excuses for him.  He is simply unutterably gorgeous to watch; his strokeplay is entirely reminiscent of Gower, and when his batting is flowing, there are few players in world cricket more enjoyable to witness.  His position in the batting order often meant he had to go for his shots at the end of an innings, and that’s probably the best way for him to bat, as his technique isn’t a tight one.  Of course, in his case there is a problem, which is that his primary role in this team is as a bowler – something that may be considered unfair on him.  He didn’t do badly in the series overall, looking back at previous posts in advance of the series, his final average of 45 with the ball was even a prediction for being considered adequate.  There are two issues here though, firstly that he was comprehensively outbowled by Nathan Lyon, and secondly England’s refusal to pick Adil Rashid, seemingly under any circumstances.

It’s doubtful there is a much better finger spinner in English cricket, and having gone with Moeen, he should receive sufficient faith for him to continue working on his game.  He will get better.  However, it is becoming ever more difficult to see a justification for Rashid’s continuing exclusion, and even harder to see why so many of the press are so dead set against him.  Moeen was tried out as being far from the finished product, and given time to develop.  Rashid seems to be expected to be a hundred Test veteran on debut.  Surely he will get his chance in the UAE, and long overdue.

Of all the bowlers, Broad was the clear stand out.  Given his record over the last few years, he’s in serious danger of being consistently underrated.  Barely a series goes by without demands for him to be dropped, yet he’s one of England’s most consistent performers with the ball, even without the stunning spell of 8-15 at Trent Bridge which was truly wonderful.  He even did well in the horror tour of Australia last time.  When he’s not bowling through injury, he’s a serious threat to any side in world cricket.  As long as he’s told to pitch the bloody thing up.

Anderson will most of all benefit from the break enforced by injury.  That he was even considered for the fifth Test is concerning.  He’s an exceptionally fit athlete, and could go on for several more years yet, if properly looked after.

The return of Steven Finn has to be the most welcome sight in the England team.  He’s still not back at the pace he was, no matter how much he tries to deny it.  Perhaps the confidence gained from being an integral part of the attack will allow him to up that pace, because a bowler of that height consistently bowling high eighties is going to be a difficult proposition anywhere.  What happened to him in the past is a matter of deep frustration, but looking forward he is still young, still taking wickets at a truly remarkable strike rate and needs to be allowed to just bowl.  If England have changed one thing in regard to their approach to him, then let it be to focus on his wicket taking ability, not how many runs an over he goes for.

Mark Wood is something of a conundrum.  He clearly has a lot of talent, but his injury record isn’t a good one, and there have to be concerns about managing him properly.  Australia did point the way there with Ryan Harris, who they wrapped in cotton wool and as a result got at least two more years out of him than anyone could have hoped for, including him.  Seam bowlers are almost always carrying some kind of injury, so it isn’t a matter of plucking him out of the team at the first sign of trouble, but it is one of ensuring he doesn’t suffer a major injury.

For Australia, this is the end of an era for many of the squad.  Harris finally succumbed to his troublesome body before it even began, and perhaps more than anything that proved to be the ultimate difference between the sides.  He has been an outstandingly good bowler who had an Indian summer to his career.  When he broke down in the 2010/11 series, the sadness was the feeling that would be it, a career over before it had even begun.  He may not have played 80 Tests, but he played a lot more than he had any right to, given his physical problems.

Australia’s top three all had decent enough series, with the proviso that like everyone else, when they were bad, they were very, very bad.  Chris Rogers was outstanding throughout, and probably wishes he could have played his whole Test career against England.  Oh hang, on he more or less did.   Warner in contrast made lots of contributions without ever going on to get a big score.  It means that his figures are decent enough, but lack a match changing or match winning innings.

Smith had a similar series to Bell in some ways, the difference being that when he did get in, he went on to a very big score indeed.  His idiosyncratic technique makes this quite likely, and with him it’s a matter of accepting that, and knowing that when he does get in, he is going to seriously hurt the opposition.  His batting went a fair way to winning two Tests, focusing on his troubles in the other three is somewhat harsh.

Clarke’s retirement at the end of the series broke the last link with the great Australian side of the first decade of this century.  He had a poor series, without question, but very few players call it a day in a blaze of glory, not least because of the need for team mates to do their bit to provide the correct result.  McGrath, Warne et al managed it when they whitewashed England, but that truly great side is an exception.  Few decide to retire because they’ve been playing so well, and Nasser Hussain’s beautifully timed retirement winning a Test match and series with a superb century simply shows he had a sense of timing with his career that wasn’t always present with his batting.

England gave Clarke a guard of honour, and predictably enough (and more than welcome) the English crowd gave him a standing ovation on his approach to the crease.  Sometimes English crowds make you feel quite proud of them.  Clarke deserves it.  He’s been a terrific player, a terrific captain, and for those of us lucky enough not to be Australian, he was our leader in cricket too in the most tragic of circumstances.  His honesty in the face of defeat, and refusal to hide behind platitudes also marked him out.  It has been nothing short of a privilege to watch him play, and to leave the game of cricket having made a positive contribution is as good a cricketing epitaph as there can be.  To lose him in the same week as the peerless Kumar Sangakkara is undoubtedly a blow to the game, and the ICC could do worse than listen to what they say about the future of cricket.  And pigs might fly.

Just like England’s, Australia’s middle order had a woeful time of it.  Ironically enough that failing was just as prevalent in the 5-0 last time, but they were bailed out repeatedly by the lower order.  Not this time, though Johnson and Starc had their moments with the bat.  The jettisoning of Watson was possibly premature, his trials with the lbw law are hardly new, and at Cardiff he was the recipient of a couple of decisions that were fairly questionable, particularly the first innings one.  His replacements didn’t do any better, although his career is now probably at an end, distinguished by being one of the great unfulfilled talents.

Voges made a late bid to extend his Test career, Mitchell Marsh shows a lot of promise as a true all rounder given that bowling was thought to be his weaker discipline (he didn’t bat well), Shaun Marsh showed again – and probably for the final time – that he simply isn’t quite good enough at the very highest level and Brad Haddin also reached the end of the road.  The manner of the conclusion to his Test career seemed to cause some discord in the Australian camp amongst the senior players.  It’s a difficult one.  His batting and keeping had both deteriorated to the point his place should have been in jeopardy even if it wasn’t.  Perhaps it should just be put down to being one of those terribly unfortunate instances where they were faced with two wrong choices, and went for the better cricketing one.

Peter Nevill looks a decent enough replacement anyway, although he didn’t contribute with the bat too much more than the rest of that middle order.  His first class batting record is a very good one though, and he looks a perfectly competent gloveman.

Of the bowlers, given the loss of Harris, Siddle did seem the obvious replacement.  With hindsight.  It is all too easy to look at his performance in the final Test and say he should have been there all along, but there weren’t many calls for him to be in the side at the expense of anyone else, and in advance it was felt that Johnson and Starc’s pace would be more than good enough for England anyway.  Both were intermittently major threats, and the rest of the time expensive.   Ironically enough, it was Josh Hazlewood who made way for Siddle, despite having a better record than either of them, and for reasons hard to fathom bore the brunt of the criticism of the seam bowling selection that saw Siddle called up.

Nathan Lyon too had a good series, and showed what he is – a very fine orthodox finger spinner.  He’s every bit the equal of Graeme Swann, and perhaps at long last Australia will be content with their lot in the spinning department rather than harking back to the days of Warne.

Given how the series unfolded, in this one perhaps more than any other, it can be said that 3-2 was a fair result.  Three times England hammered Australia, twice Australia hammered England.  If there was a sixth Test, it could have gone either way, probably with a hammering.

The England players will rightly look back on the achievement with great pleasure, for they were the underdogs in the eyes of everyone.  The win is there to be enjoyed, but these are two teams who are very much at the crossroads.  Australia will largely need a new one, and will have to spend quite some time rebuilding and finding the right combinations.  England are at least playing a much more positive style of cricket, but they look a deeply flawed side at this stage.  There are plenty of players in that side in the early stages of their careers, and there will be ups and downs in their own performances.  What is more worrying is the collective implosions they seem so prone to.  They have two very difficult tours ahead, and as a young side may well rise to the challenge.  But they are going to have to, because otherwise they are in trouble.

This wasn’t an especially enjoyable series.  When third day tickets become something of a risky purchase not through it being a poor pitch, but because either of the sides are incapable of lasting that long, then there is both something wrong with them, and something extremely wrong with the series.  Some of the batting was genuinely second rate, in shot selection and execution.  It is to be hoped this is something of an aberration, because more of the same is going to pall very quickly.  Recent history around the world suggests winning away is becoming ever more rare, in which case England will face both the next 9 months and the next Ashes series with considerable trepidation.

The most damning indictment of this Ashes series is that the two Test version against New Zealand offered far more entertainment, far more sporting hazard, far more tension that anything the five subsequent games did.  England won, and to that extent it was great.  But Test cricket supporters have always had one eye on the team and one eye on the wider game.  The game itself in this series was dreadfully poor.  Pointing to the other eye and ignoring that is simply refusing to see evil.

@BlueEarthMngmnt

The Ashes: Fifth Test preview

thelegglance77 Comments

And so, barely moments after the home international Test summer began, it’s nearly over.  If anyone had said that the Oval Test will begin with nothing riding on it, it would hardly have been a surprise.  That it is a dead rubber because England have already won, well that is more of a surprise.

And as a result, when the dust settled on the hammering handed out at Trent Bridge, the focus has been more on Australia than an England team justifiably enjoying the moment.  It has been a peculiar and somewhat subdued build up.

Australia themselves will be saying goodbye to at least two players, in Rogers and Clarke.  In reality, even though they are unlikely to play, Haddin and Watson can be added to that list, for it is hard to see how they will be selected again.  There’s every chance Voges is playing his final match as well, while Shaun Marsh must be a considerable doubt for the future given he’s failed to take his chance at the highest level.  Since Australia lost Ryan Harris before the series began, it amounts to a quite extraordinary end of an era for the Australian team.  Of the squad of seventeen first chosen for the series, you can make a case that seven or even eight (depending on what future Fawad has) will be gone from the Test team by this time next week.

Moreover, Australia have lost little time in moving on, Smith has already been announced as the next captain, with Warner as his deputy – which is an interesting choice in itself given his brushes with authority over the last few years.  It could be the making of him.  Likewise, Smith has been talking about moving to number four in future, all of which suggests that Australia just want this over with and to move forward.

It’s a rather sad way for Clarke to finish.  The last real link to the great Australian team of the noughties, he is going out with a whimper rather than a bang, captaining a side who have already moved on, in a series already lost, with a team comprised of many who will saying their own farewells.  Sport can be a cruel business, and few get to time their departures perfectly.   As both player and captain, there’s a temptation to believe that Clarke is more honoured abroad than he is at home, and a warm reception when he walks out to bat for the final two times is guaranteed.  And thoroughly deserved.

For England, it is the chance to deliver four Test wins in a series against Australia for the first time since 1978, and in circumstances that few would have expected.  Given England’s inconsistency, and the end-of-era nature of the Australian team, it’s as hard to call as any of the previous Tests.  The series has been so unpredictable that it would be a brave person to make the call on what will happen this time.   Perhaps what most fans of both sides would like more than anything would be a close match.  There hasn’t been a truly close game between these sides since the Trent Bridge Test of 2013 – even the Oval last time which ended up tight was down to a contrivance more than genuine competition.  That Oval Test incidentally was only the third time since five Test series became the norm that the Oval Test was a dead rubber in England’s favour.  That this is the fourth instance one series later says a lot about recent series.

To that end, what does this say about England’s win?  It’s fourteen years since Australia won in England, and in that time England are 10-3 up in Tests.  Yet since England won that first series in years in 2005, England are 11-3 down in Australia.  Each side is being well beaten away from home, with few close matches, that has to be a concern.

For England, there seems little point in risking Anderson – there would have been little point even if the series was on the line – so the debate surrounds the question of the pitch and whether a second spinner is needed.  If so, then there is at least the possibility that Moeen could be moved up to open to create space for Adil Rashid.  If that is how England go, then Lyth too could be facing the chop as far as his Test career is concerned.  Lyth has hardly been a stellar success in this series, but then neither has his opening partner, one innings excepted.  It would be a sour note were England to continue to go through openers not called Cook at a rate of knots.  That is of course making the point before it even happens, and England may well retain Lyth to give him the chance to cement his place.  A score of any sort would probably do that.

Of course, if Lyth does keep his place, then it seems hard to see how Rashid could be given the nod.  Wood is troubled by his ankle, but the indications are that Plunkett is favoured if he doesn’t make it.  There is of course no point selecting someone for the sake of it – that is what happened two years ago when Kerrigan and Woakes were called into the side and promptly discarded for the following series – more understandably in the case of Kerrigan, whose handling can still be questioned.  Yet with the series in the UAE coming up, Rashid will certainly be required.

In all, this is a subdued build up to the final Test match.  At the end of it, Alastair Cook will be presented with the urn, and all will be well with England cricket.  Of course, the reality is some way from that, the previous 18 months has created a schism amongst cricket lovers like little seen in living memory.  The win has papered over the cracks, but failed to resolve them.  The ECB have a big job on their hands to re-create love for England, but if they do intend to try and do so, then this is no bad platform on which to build.  It is now up to them.

@BlueEarthMngmnt

Reflections

thelegglance137 Comments

It took as little time as anticipated for England to wrap up the fourth Test, and with it the series and the Ashes.  It has been an extraordinary win, all the more so for being so unexpected.  Yet in that sense it isn’t quite so different to last time, when Australia won 5-0, a result no one (apart from Glenn McGrath, who always forecasts that) expected either.

England are rightly celebrating, they thoroughly deserve to as well.  With the exception of Lords, which looks ever more peculiar in retrospect, they have battered Australia.  England did something in response to that defeat that much of the media failed to, which was to accept the pinch and move on.  England’s resilience following that hammering is something that they can rightly take pride in, and is the sign of a good team, or at least one that might become a good team.

Yet the danger in responding to this victory is in being wise after the event.  It isn’t vindication of the last two years because England didn’t play how they’d played over the last two years.  Cook is to be thoroughly praised for his captaincy because he didn’t captain the side how he’d done so up to this point.  That isn’t proof that those backing him as captain previously were right in any way, but it is a recognition that for whatever reason, he seems to have dramatically improved – something those supporting him didn’t demand he do.   And that is a fascinating development.  Cook was dreadful in Australia, he was worse against Sri Lanka, desperate against India, and a disaster as one day captain before his more than slightly hamfisted sacking.  In his interview after the game’s conclusion, he acknowledged that, admitting to being stubborn (not necessarily a bad thing), and to having made an effort to be more proactive and positive in this series.

Trevor Bayliss too chose his words carefully, saying that Cook had been excellent in this series, with a fairly clear implication when talking about how this had been done that he didn’t think he had been previously.  And that is about right – the only rational way to to respond to any situation is to adapt a view as the facts change.  Cook has been really good as skipper this series, and it is immensely to his credit that he has been prepared to take input from outside and learn.  After having been captain in the same rather plodding and defensive manner for quite a long time, that is perhaps the most welcome and unexpected development.  Being wise after the event means refusing to admit that no one saw this coming – and no one did.

Bayliss himself had come into the England set up at the start of this series, but he wasn’t present for the New Zealand one, which gave the first hint at Cook’s England adopting a different approach.  It was such a sudden switch after the West Indies series and the miserable World Cup that the removal of Peter Moores would seem to point to that being the major change.   Yet it is probably a little more than that – Moores’ style of coaching was similar to Andy Flower’s in one area, that it was prescriptive, with the coach directing the team rather than the captain.  That was seen time and again where England would come in after a session, and resume with entirely different tactics – the captain was the cipher for a coach telling them what to do.

The appointment of Bayliss, and the retention of Farbrace, indicated that this type of coach was not how Strauss saw the best interests of England – and that decision was a wise one.  Whatever anyone thought of Cook’s captaincy, it was frustrating to see him not actually captain the side himself.   It is therefore a possibility that the change in coaching set up allowed Cook for the first time to captain the side how he wanted to.  England have been the only side where the coach has been given such power, and Bayliss and Farbrace are more in the Fletcher model, where the coach stands in the background to support the players and the captain runs the team.

It’s no coincidence that England players have quickly felt the freedom to back their own ability under this kind of structure, nor that the previously rigid set up limited that freedom.  Playing without fear is an easy thing to say, but it requires a system where players aren’t berated for their failures.  England under Moores and Flower certainly had success, but the team became ever more hidebound, negative and restricted, terrified of making a mistake – and it was that attitude that Australia pounced on in 2013/14.

Equally, the early season series against New Zealand may have acted as the dropping of the scales in front of English eyes; if that is the case, then England may well owe a debt of gratitude to Brendon McCullum, though perhaps Australia would have been equally well advised to have had a chat to Kane Williamson about how to play the moving ball.  The one day series too, with England playing scintillating cricket, showed a break with the shambles of the past, in intent if nothing else – which is why no one greatly cared if England lost that final match, they were far too wowed by the style of play.  The point is that it is easy to blame Moores, but he was simply continuing an approach that he himself started and Andy Flower continued.  It worked for a while too, but signs of problems were there long before the implosion in Australia if only some had paid attention to those pointing them out.

The hardest part of coaching is being able to keep out of the way.  Bayliss, when responding to questions about Cook’s captaincy, demurred at the idea he’d given instructions, saying all he had done was to offer options, and it was up to Cook to then choose – and that he chose wisely.

What happens next is the key, because harder challenges lie ahead, in the UAE and South Africa.  At the start of this series the feeling was that this would be Cook’s last as captain – the appointment of Root as his deputy and the end of cycle feel about Ashes series indicated that win or lose, it might be time to move on.  The nature of England’s win has changed that somewhat, though Cook may still feel that he could go out on a high by doing so. Yet the change is that he now can choose himself, rather than circumstances dictating.  It isn’t the win that has done that, it’s the way England won, and the way he himself led the side.  Let’s make no bones about it – it was quite impressive, and all the more so for being so unexpected.

There has been a clear shift in so many other ways too.  The England players made a point of going around the ground after each win and meeting the supporters, posing for selfies, signing autographs.  The interviews have been much more open and honest – all things that have been areas of deep criticism for the England of the last 18 months and beyond.  There is not a chance of the ECB ever apologising for anything that they’ve done, but this at least is a start and a move in the right direction.  Whether it is mere lip service or something more, is down to the ECB.

One of the most striking things about this England side is the clear joie de vivre that the young players have brought to the team.  There has been a changing of the guard in many ways beyond the obvious, a recognition that in order to get the best out of them, letting them free to do their thing is the way to do it.  Stokes, Root, Moeen and Wood have been the most evident examples, and even the grumpy old curmudgeons like Broad (OK, that’s a touch unfair on him) and Anderson have bought into it.  The England dressing room appears a much better place to be than it has been for quite a long time.  The idea that this win is a put down of all those who have been calling for exactly this is somewhat bizarre.  This is not the England team approach that received so much criticism.  It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that one particular player would have thrived in such an environment, given it is exactly what he wanted to see in the first place.

Certainly Joe Root has benefitted, and has gone to number one in the Test player rankings as a result.  It may be that it is a purple patch of form and nothing more, but there are signs that he may be becoming a genuinely fantastic batsman.  He scores so quickly, without apparent effort.  Technically, he is getting out to the ball much better than he did when he was dropped in Australia, where he hung back in the crease.  His weight distribution now comes forward into the ball, hence the glorious drives – but more than anything, his approach is one where he is first and foremost looking to score runs.  This too is an expression of a change of mentality in the side, and one in which he’s thriving.  That England now have a set up that is seeking to get the best from their players rather than berate them and keep them in line, amazingly enough seems to work.

The bowlers too have performed admirably.  Broad has been underrated for quite a while; yet his record in recent years has been very good, even in the Ashes meltdown of 2013/14 where he along with Stokes was pretty much the only player who could hold his head up high; the biggest issue with him is when England insisted on playing him through injury.  He is now number two in the bowling rankings, with Anderson just behind him.  Yet those two are a known quantity, what is welcome is seeing how the support bowlers have performed.  They’ve not always got the results that might mark them out as being special, but they have shown immense promise.  Stokes blows hot and cold, as young players tend to do, Wood looks like he has pace and the ability to move the ball.  They have potential, if correctly managed.  As for Finn, one fine match and one quiet one is fine as long as he continues the upward trajectory.  He too is indicative of a different approach from the England side, allowing him to bowl rather than micro-managing him.  Again, it is to be greatly welcomed, and with a degree of luck, the results should follow, and the pace return.

All of the others contributed.  Lyth may not have had a great series to date, but the way he set about the small target at Edgbaston extinguished Australian hopes early, while his catching was very good.  He won’t be content with his series, and nor should he be, the Oval may signal a last chance for him, but he has had an effect on the outcome.  Bell batted superbly at Edgbaston but has had a quiet series outside of that.  The jury remains out for Bairstow, but he did bat well at Trent Bridge, while Buttler has had a poor series with the bat, but kept extremely well.

And Moeen, well Moeen has bowled just about adequately, but batted very well indeed.  Which probably shouldn’t come as a surprise given he’s a batsman first and foremost.  Two spinners will be needed in the UAE, and while Moeen might well be the best off spinner England have (depending on whether Panesar can continue his rehabilitation), the Oval could well be the opportunity to introduce Adil Rashid.

For Australia, the big news was the announcement of Michael Clarke’s retirement.  At many times he has been a prophet not honoured in his own land, but the warmth of the reception he got from the Nottingham crowd showed the esteem in which he is held.  He has had a year of unimagined highs and tragic lows, and perhaps that finally proved too much for him, in which case that would be completely understandable.  He has been a fantastic player and an often inspirational captain.  But over the last year, what he proved more than anything else was that he was a leader with whom few could compare.  When Phillip Hughes was tragically killed, Clarke managed to speak not just for a nation in shock, but the whole cricketing world.  He became everyone’s captain, one who all who have picked up a bat would have followed to the ends of the earth.  In terrible circumstances, he stood tall.

Sport is cruel, and doesn’t often allow fairytale endings.  But Clarke will undoubtedly receive a standing ovation on both his last visits to the crease in international cricket, and few England supporters would begrudge him a century if the cricketing gods were to smile just once more on this supremely talented player.  There is so much more that can be said about him, but one must defer to Jarrod Kimber, whose article captured it perfectly.  It is outstanding:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/the-ashes-2015/content/story/908005.html

In this series, Clarke himself was a paradigm for the batting woes of his team.  Apart from Chris Rogers, and to some extent David Warner, they all struggled.  Steve Smith had one fabulous Test, but apart from that looked horrifically out of form, demonstrating how quickly confidence can turn to despair in a batsman.  The middle order has had a calamitous series, with only Adam Voges’ unbeaten half century in heavy defeat offering up any kind of contribution.  He did enough to save his career for a further Test, but beyond that, given his age, he may not have much further to go.

Rogers will finish at the Oval, and with Clarke going too, plus Haddin’s and Watson’s careers being likely over, there will be major changes to the Australian team after this series.  Shaun Marsh has yet to look a Test cricketer, and is 32, while Mitchell Johnson absolutely is a Test cricketer but is nearly 34.   And perhaps that was always likely to be the case even if they had won.  Right at the start of this series, this blog made the argument that you never know if it is one tour too many until it actually happens.  This has indeed turned out to be one tour too many, yet although that possibility was acknowledged pre-series, there wasn’t much in the way of evidence that it would happen, more a feeling that there was the potential for it, and nothing stronger than that.

With so many players likely to move on, the management of that shift is going to be critical.  The reason for including Johnson in the above list is that it would be criminal to lose him at the same time as all that experience elsewhere.  He is bowling quickly and well, and has shown little sign of age catching up with him.

The home summer coming up for them comprises New Zealand and the West Indies.  It’s going to be a tough first half for a new team.  The blow of losing Ryan Harris on the eve of the series perhaps did more than anything to wreck the plans for a last hurrah for the older generation.

For England, it has the potential to be a firm base from which to build.  The talent has always been there, it’s how it was harnessed, and the reality is that it was harnessed extremely badly for much of the preceding 18 months.  That they have managed to get a basic grip on it now is to the credit of all those behind it.  But it doesn’t excuse those 18 months, and it certainly doesn’t excuse the ECB for their wider failings.  If used properly from here, they could genuinely reclaim their position in the hearts of all England fans, but it would be a mistake to think this Ashes win will do it and make everything in the garden rosy.  Cricket in this country is in trouble.  Cricket in the world is in trouble.  The alignment of England’s undoubtedly rousing victory with the release of Death of a Gentleman makes it foolish to believe that this solves everything, because it doesn’t.  But it could be a first step used wisely.  The doubt is whether that wisdom exists, that it will be used as a smokescreen to cover all the other issues that exist.  England have won, but those Outside Cricket have been merely waved at from the ivory towers.

For now, let us appreciate the return of the urn, and the efforts of an England team who have surpassed expectations.  For a Sunday, that is more than enough.  But the wider issues will not go away.

@BlueEarthMngmnt

Ashes 4th Test, Day two review

thelegglance64 Comments

And that is pretty much that. Still 90 runs adrift, only three wickets left, short of a cricketing miracle for Australia, or the arrival of a freak hurricane, England will go 3-1 up sometime tomorrow, probably in the morning and regain the Ashes.  After the carnage of day one, to all intents and purposes the game was already up.

Being bowled out for 60 more or less guarantees defeat anyway, so today was in some ways a fairly normal panning out of the situation as expected from the end of day one.  Australia did bowl a little bit better, though that’s not especially unusual when a day has been as bad as that, it would be hard to imagine Australia could do any worse. Yet such was the total dominance of England’s position, they could happily play their shots safe in the knowledge that it mattered little.

Mitchell Starc got just rewards for a bowling performance that was a cut above those of his colleagues, but with the game already pretty much gone, it will hardly be a successful set of figures he will look back on with too much pleasure. Once again, Moeen and Broad showed they like batting together. Moeen is simply gorgeous to watch when in full flow, reminiscent of David Gower, to the point you want him to succeed simply because of that. His batting this series has been a major plus point, the debate over him will certainly continue, but his performances at key times with the willow have been the least of the issues.

As for Broad, some time ago it started to look as though he was just beginning to get his batting back. It’s not entirely there yet, but he is staying in line, and looking to play shots, rather than desperately slogging. A Broad who plays like that is a serious asset in the lower order.

Australia couldn’t possibly have batted as badly as they did in the first innings, and the opening stand from Warner and Rogers restored both a little respect and a fair degree of sanity to proceedings. Yet the problems were still there, Rogers never looked entirely comfortable, while Warner was consistently squared up.  England have clearly identified that his strength to the short ball is also his weakness when he’s cramped for room, hence coming around the wicket. His arms don’t extend and the ball can only go up. Other teams will be watching.

From a promising start, Australia collapsed horribly yet again. In each case it was a grim shot, even allowing for the two lives provided when England bowlers overstepped; Smith looks completely at sea at present, which is remarkable when only four innings ago he looked imperious at Lords. His idiosyncratic technique was always going to be examined in conditions where the ball moves in the air and off the pitch. He’s more than good enough to work that out, but it’s far too late for this series, and not alone in having serious difficulty against the moving ball. Clarke too was hopelessly out of touch, while Marsh’s dreadful shot did little to change the minds of those who simply don’t think he’s good enough for Test cricket.

As previously mentioned, it is never quite evident that a team has lost it until it actually happens, any more than anyone expected England’s hammering last time out. The signs were there after the first Test of a team showing signs of distress, and only a pitch that couldn’t have been better prepared to entirely nullify England’s bowlers got Australia back into it. Yet the abject, spineless capitulation of Australia’s batting in the last two Tests has been every bit as shambolic as anything England produced in 2013/14.

Well as England have bowled, time and again players have been dismissed playing attacking shots that are exceptionally high risk, with no evidence of a willingness to graft in less than perfect batting conditions. These are not bad players, to be getting out in this way repeatedly betrays minds that are completely shot, a team that has no idea how to arrest the slide. There is always a temptation when England win to limit the praise to them by pointing out the faults of the opposition. Yet in just the same way as the most recent 5-0 said more about England’s abysmal surrender than it did a great Australian side, so this almost certain series victory is less about England being outstanding than Australia being dire.

That doesn’t mean that there aren’t plenty of things to praise England for, the catching has been excellent, the on field direction has simply been far better than anyone could possibly have expected from the captain given his performance to date, while Joe Root in particular is starting to look the real deal, and Ben Stokes might still be inconsistent but is a major talent in the making with both bat and ball. Yet when Australia keep being bowled out to self inflicted calamity rather than England brilliance, that praise does need to be tempered by a recognition that England haven’t suddenly become a great side.

Future opponents will not be anything like so meek. That isn’t meant to be grudging, more a reflection on an astounding collapse in morale and stomach for the fight from Australia. England can certainly take pleasure from the way they have pressurised Australia – unforced errors are rarely entirely unforced when it afflicts the whole team – but there can have been few tours where Australia have been so appallingly inept on such a regular basis.

This has been a truly bizarre series, no match has even had the resemblance of a close contest, and this fourth match has been even more one sided than the three previous.  Australia are shot to pieces.   Quite why that is, will be a debate for the future. For now, they deserve every bit of the kicking they are getting from their own media who at least seem to recognise a team shambles when they see one.

@BlueEarthMngmnt

Ashes: 4th Test Preview

thelegglance61 Comments

A bit busy this week and travelling the country, so the posts will be much briefer than normal.  I’ll try and get reflections on the play up as and when I can at the end of each day, but it might not be so detailed, or indeed so argumentative!  Thursday is the day that will represent the biggest challenge, so bear with me.

As for this forthcoming Test, I’ve got to confess, I haven’t got a clue.  This series has been thoroughly ridiculous and making predictions is guaranteed to leave egg on faces.  You would think that England have the upper hand, and you would think that Australia are showing signs of distress.  But given the Lords hammering they dished out, that’s a dangerous belief to hold.

Of the items of side interest, Michael Clarke’s form is a concern for Australia, but it so often tends to be the case that the moment the media notice is just about the time a huge century is about to be delivered.  He’s clearly more than got the class to do it.

For England, it’s about how they cope with the absence of Anderson.  Broad looks more than capable of stepping up, the expectation is that if fit Wood will return, and he has made a decent enough start to his career, while Finn will be looking to show his performance in Birmingham wasn’t a one off.  The assumption is that the Trent Bridge pitch will offer something to the seamers, but previous pitches there have been dreadfully slow and low, not just two years ago.  For the sake of the game, let’s hope it’s not that.

The batting line ups of both teams looks as brittle as ever, so we arrive into the match having no real idea what is going to happen.  And actually, that’s a very good thing, because sport is always at its best when there is uncertainty, even if that uncertainty here is based on the flawed teams rather than excellence in both parties.

So having gone through all that, and having thought deeply….we’re no closer to having any idea what will happen.  Probably a tie.

@blueearthmngmnt

UPDATE FROM LCL – Do go over to The Full Toss and listen to James Morgan’s interview with Jarrod Kimber if you haven’t already done so, and not just because our humble little blog gets a mention (oh well, just because it gets a mention). Seriously, very interesting stuff, and well done to James for getting Jarrod to speak to you on all things blogging and film making.