Look on the bright side. The one good thing to come out of this debacle is that it will, for now, silence all those (like my wife and, to a lesser degree, myself) who do not understand the finer points of test cricket or the game in general and ridicule it . How many times must I have heard... "How can you have a sport where matches are played over 5 days and sometimes you don't even get a winner" ? Well there is bugger all chance of that scenario being played out with the current England team. In fact why not reduce the final two Tests to 3 days to save pointlessly printing and selling tickets for two days that no-one will need?
There are those of us who think that the First Class County game and Test Cricket are the pinnacle, purest and most entertaining form of the game. Unfortunately the ECB have decided that the game should be whatever puts the most number of bums on seats and flogs the most in tv rights even if it means bastardising the sport beyond recognition. Cash is king and the game has become secondary.
Its only cricket.. Thankfully fast becoming a minority sport. On the world stage only 3 countries take it seriously
Ashley Giles set to be in Sydney for the fifth test and will shortly be making a decision on Silverwood's position ahead of the West Indies tour early next year. Sorry but Giles position should also be under threat.
Was way too optimistic there what was I thinking. Expecting English batsmen to reach double figures I must have been at the Whiskey last night(thanks to my cousin) Even allowing for dodgy decisions on Mallan and Bairstow it’s all a bit poor Not sure where we go from here but changes are needed somewhere
I’d given up and was in bed long before 2am so missed the interview you refer to. But this whole post is spot on. The cricket I grew up with is dying in this country all focus now is on 1 hour each side slogfests which is a totally different game. Where are batsmen going to learn to build an innings in a 20 over or 100 ball slog. Where are spinners going to learn their craft. Test cricket is broken in this country and is several years away from being fixed even if the ESB (English Slogit Board) had any desire to fix it
Good article here... https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.da...rickets-mess-problems-run-far-deeper-ECB.html
Its only a matter of time before this disregard for batting technique starts to affect the white ball teams, particularly in ODIs. Bairstow, Roy, Root, Buttler and Stokes will eventually be replaced by players that aren’t as good. On top of having to replace the captain soon. Sadly, I’m not sure who could’ve done any better out of the batters available, particularly in the top order. Cook is probably still our best opener, and Burns is probably the next best
Bravo to this England team who never failed to hit new levels of embarrassment over the last couple of weeks.
https://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/e...batting_average.html?id=13821;type=tournament Take your pick for the replacements.
After our incredible performance in The Ashes, it’s clear that shorter-form cricket isn’t having a detrimental effect on the Test game. Therefore, after the recent success of The Hundred, I am proposing a new annual event at Lords called One Ball Megablast Death Chuck. The format is simple - instead of building teams based on counties or cities, just two squads are put together according to players’ preferred method of making tea. On the one side, you would have the Milk First Megalodons, and they would face off against the Milk Second Megamegas. Each team would be expanded to 75 players, but only 69 of them would be on the field at any one time. For the match itself, each team only faces one delivery, but the ball has that binary liquid explosive filling that was made famous in Die Hard With A Vengeance. Therefore, the viewing public are guaranteed two major explosions per match and multiple casualties - players score double, triple or quadruple runs respectively if they successfully reach the other end of the wicket while one or more limbs cross the boundary. The fielding team gets twenty bonus points for a successful LBW dismissal - leg behind wicket, like fifty metres behind. In spite of both teams only having one delivery, each broadcast lasts for two hours to satisfy Sky Sports by having Sir Geoff Boycott and Jonathan Agnew sat around a table trying to talk each other into a boredom coma.
Can I nominate BT Sport for optimistic broadcaster of the year, they not only allowed programming for all 5 days but are putting together a highlights package of the series so far ! Like anybody would want to sit through that again!
Just looked at the 2nd innings scorecard!!!! Extras scored more/same as 8 of our players. That's just pure embarrassment. ..