Jofra Archer

Before the debate starts let say my piece.
WORDS FAIL ME!

 

Prefer Woakes and Curran for the stability to the batting line up. Archer is raw pace and nothing else. Hope the lad Robinson measures up.

 

Should gave been a team bus organised No excues though, why is it so hard to stick to the rules!?

 

He's the media darling and superstar.

 

Pure habit, Helen. Aidan and Donnacha O'Brien have been banned from Irish racecourses for two weeks for breaching Covid protocol at The Curragh. And the snooker players keep instinctively trying to replace their personal sanitised rests under the lip of the table!

 

Muppet

 

The rest thing is a bit different, that's just habit. It sounds as though Jofra went somewhere he shouldn't between the test grounds?

 

The higher up someone thinks they are the more exempt they become. I work at NHS and am only a band 2. However, band 7's think they're immune because they swan round to their meetings without masks on.

 

Good point.

 

Ahem!! Dominic Cummings!!

 

You're not wrong.
When we were at our worst on the ward with high infection rates we constantly saw band 7's walk onto the ward with no mask nor any attempt to socially distance. At one point a "modern matron" walked on with 2 others who I had never seen before with no masks and continued to walk round the ward side by side with each other.

 

It's happening all the time mate. I had the chief exec asking why there weren't any face masks at outpatients the other day. I answered "nobody is supplying me". I wanted to ask "you tell me" lol. Luckily outpatients had a delivery of 5000 face masks for staff and I'm allowed to issue them to patients. There isn't any set procedure in place and it became compulsory on the 15th June.

At the minute if I want to issue the re-usable patient masks I have to get kitted up in PPE and go to the stores in the A and E leaving my post. Guess what I'm not allowed to leave my post. I have told this to the matron lol

 

I hear you....
I tell the chief exec though.
They loathe me

 

Think Archer is a bit more than that. He's also a very skilful bowler, and showed that at Headingley last year. Where he's struggled so far is with a Kookaburra ball overseas, and sometimes struggles to be on it from ball 1, but he's got 33 wickets in only 8 tests, including 3 fivefors. For context, consider how long it took Broad and Anderson to find any sort of consistency.

If we have an attack of Woakes, Broad and Curran then we could be in for some long days in the field unless conditions are favourable. Not seen anything of Robinson, but the numbers suggest he's earned a chance.

I think he's actually come in for some overly harsh criticism at times, for having the audacity to not bowl at 96mph every ball of every game. Probably a result of unrealistic expectations on him.

I don't know what he's done, so can't really comment, but he's come out and apologised, which is more than certain senior figures in the country have done after their blatant rule breaking.

 

Our batting lets our bowlers down. That's why I'd have Curran and Woakes in there. They give us more runs. Even if it's just 20's and 30's during cameo's. 33 wickets in 8 tests isn't that many really if 15 of them came in three innings.

 

I like Curran but he's very much a 'conditions' bowler. Hopefully he will up his speed a touch over the next couple of years: he's still a young lad. Archer then... I like him too but I feel he needs to be used in short bursts, 3 overs max. It doesn't appear he has the stamina to consistently run in and bowl fast. Holding, Stein, Lee and quite a few more managed to bowl flat out and for much longer.

 

4 wickets per test is strong. As for 15 in three innings, you wouldn't criticise a batsman based on what his average would be if you took away his centuries.

 

A strike bowlers only job is to bowl though. A batsmen can hold an end up even if he's not scoring. There's only Joe Root and Marcus Laburchegne faced more deliveries than Joe Denly this year. (Granted Denly has now been dropped).

 

I'd rather Archer performs likes he's performed. 5 wickets 3 times means he is affecting games. I would rather he did that than taking 2-60 every innings and averaging 4 wickets per test that way.

 

Holding up an end, is normally a term you would associate with a bowler trying to keep the run rate down during a defensive period. Generally, the bowler's job is to take wickets and batsman's job is to score runs, how they do it is up to them.

Archer has shown that he can take wickets, but had a difficult winter (not helped by the fact he was playing with an injury for a lot of it). It's easy to forget he's only played 8 tests. Stuart Broad's record in his first 20 or so tests before his breakthrough spell in the 09 ashes, was pretty dismal.

A lot made of Denly taking up deliveries, but the problem is, once he's got to 20 odd off 70 balls, he should be the best placed person to cash in because he's got himself in. Still think that Burns, Sibley and Crawley are competing for two opening spots and England will want to find room for Lawrence in the team.