Cricket 36: Ashes to Ashes, Warner to Dust...

[Jeor]

So we've supposedly got quite a flat Lords wicket coming up. Which, now that I think about it, isn't that much of a surprise. England want some help for their batting, blunt the Australian attack, and they will trust their seamers to still produce results. The problem for them is if the wicket is quite flat and dry, that could help Nathan Lyon in the last couple of days.

Question is whether Australia will go for Starc and/or Hazlewood. On paper, Starc would be a good choice for a flat, dry wicket - he has enough pace to still keep it interesting, and the dryness might help him get some reverse.

[Paxter]

Flat and dry? I wonder what the odds are on Smith scoring another two centuries...

[Jeor]

If the reports are correct (flat and dry) I suppose England are only thinking about making a positive difference to their own batting. They could reason that Smith is probably going to score regardless of the pitch...

[Jeor]

Well this is a bit rubbish. Pitch won't be dry after all this rain!

I think England would be happier of the two sides about the rain. Their record at Lords is not good, and the rain gives them a chance to blunt the Australian momentum. Although Australia already hold the Ashes, so a drawn series doesn't do them any good.

In the slow news day I trawled through some stats...interestingly David Warner's overall Test record is quite skewed home/away. His home batting average is 59.64 and away batting average 35.82. With over 30+ Tests home and away each, that's a distinct pattern. Average in England is a pretty unimpressive 33.29.

[Paxter]

2 hours ago, Jeor said:

Well this is a bit rubbish. Pitch won't be dry after all this rain!

I think England would be happier of the two sides about the rain. Their record at Lords is not good, and the rain gives them a chance to blunt the Australian momentum. Although Australia already hold the Ashes, so a drawn series doesn't do them any good.

In the slow news day I trawled through some stats...interestingly David Warner's overall Test record is quite skewed home/away. His home batting average is 59.64 and away batting average 35.82. With over 30+ Tests home and away each, that's a distinct pattern. Average in England is a pretty unimpressive 33.29.

Yes, I think you could mount a reasonable case that Warner is a "flat-track bully". He's got a whopping 15 centuries on familiar tracks in Australia, three in similar conditions in South Africa and a total of three on slow turners in the UAE and Bangladesh. The flip side of that is zero test hundreds in the West Indies, England, India, NZ and Sri Lanka across 27 test matches, which is not what you'd expect from a player of his calibre. Even Glen Maxwell managed a test century in India!

I guess this is why, for all that he is one of the best test openers going around the modern game, he doesn't appear on the pantheon of Virat, Smith and Kane (and Root, at a stretch!)

I think a draw here would help England. They have managed to beat Australia at Lord's a couple of times in the 2000s (2009 and 2013), but overall their Ashes record at the ground is pretty horrible for a home venue. 

[ljkeane]

Looks like we might get some play today.

Scratch that, in the 30 seconds since I started writing this post it appears the clouds have rolled in.

[Paxter]

Vintage Gayle in an ODI against India today! A lazy 72 off 41 deliveries. 

[Jeor]

So Hazlewood included instead of Pattinson. He gets the nod ahead of Starc due to his economy rate, and supposedly Pattinson pulled up a bit stiff after the First Test.

With extended play on all four days it looks like we'll still get most of the overs in, of course there might still be some rain though...

[Jeor]

Australia bowl first, probably the best option. With a shortened game you need to give yourselves as much time to get 20 wickets and batting first would have made it hard to actually go and win the match. You'd only have about 3 days to get 20 wickets with another one of your own batting innings in between.

That being said the sun is out, so England could get a good total on the board - if they do it will have draw all over it unless they can get Australia to follow on.

[Paxter]

I think the team is stronger in English conditions with Hazlewood included. Starc potentially weakens the team because of the number of four balls on offer.

Just cheeky speculation but...will Root be under pressure for the captaincy if England lose this series badly? Defeats to the West Indies and Australia would not be a good look, plus his batting is clearly suffering.

[Jeor]

Hazlewood justifies his selection instantly. In the first session he takes two wickets in his first spell and gets 2/14 off 10 overs. I really don't understand why he wasn't included at the start of the series, he was always going to be good in English conditions. Root falls LBW again - I think he is rapidly falling out of contention from the Big Four of batsmen. Smith/Kohli/Williamson are clearly better and more consistent players, it's really a Big Three now.

England probably won't be that unhappy to be only 2 down, it could have been 3 wickets if Khawaja held onto that dropped catch and then Australia would have been on top. As it is, Australia have continued with largely controlling the run rate, keeping it to under 3 per over.

If Roy falls cheaply again in the second innings his place might be in danger, although they'll probably give him three Tests to prove himself.

[ljkeane]

4 minutes ago, Jeor said:

If Roy falls cheaply again in the second innings his place might be in danger, although they'll probably give him three Tests to prove himself.

I think it probably depends how Denly does. If he’s struggling too I’d expect them to drop Denly, move Roy down to 4, which he’s probably more suited to, and bring in another opener.

[Jeor]

6 minutes ago, ljkeane said:

I think it probably depends how Denly does. If he’s struggling too I’d expect them to drop Denly, move Roy down to 4, which he’s probably more suited to, and bring in another opener. 

Yes, there was talk of Denly potentially being dropped for this match, so it seems he is the one on the chopping block. You might be right, Roy could find it better at 4 against the old ball. There's no doubt he's got talent (we saw that in the World Cup) but he wouldn't be the first to find it hard to make the transition from ODIs to Tests where a bit more patience and watchfulness is required, especially against the new ball on Test pitches that aren't the ODI roads.

[Paxter]

I’m not a fan of putting inexperienced players (at least at test level) at the key number four spot. The way that Australia used to blood top order batsmen is still the best model to my mind: guys like Ponting, Hussey, S Waugh starting their careers at numbers five or six, then when they were ready moved up the order.

Recent English selections in the number three and four spots (Pope, Denly, Vince, Malan) are just setting players up to fail IMO. They need to bite the bullet and get YJB or Stokes up the order. Buttler should be keeping and batting at 7.

[The Winged Shadow]

England need to stop dropping players constantly. Give them a couple of series rather than a couple of tests. It's clear they don't have an outstanding crop of batters at the moment, so they need to be patient and let these new players develop. They will get better over many series and years, not over a couple of innings! They need to stop reacting to pundits and fans and pick the best that they have and stick by them. Give them time to develop in the international stage. Otherwise all they will do is destroy the confidence of these young players. I feel awful for Hales/Vince et al. Constantly picked and dropped. Fucking drop the selectors since they obviously don't know wtf they are doing! 

Edit: a decent example is Head. Who is thoroughly average. But Australia stuck by him and he is starting to show his development.

[Jeor]

Burns dropped twice with what would be considered quite catchable opportunities, and then Bancroft takes an absolute screamer.

Poor Peter Siddle - he should've had Burns twice and now Cummins gets the wicket instead.

[ljkeane]

34 minutes ago, The Winged Shadow said:

 It's clear they don't have an outstanding crop of batters at the moment, so they need to be patient and let these new players develop. They will get better over many series and years, not over a couple of innings! They need to stop reacting to pundits and fans and pick the best that they have and stick by them.

I disagree actually. I think this England batting lineup is probably the strongest I can remember in terms of raw talent; Root, Bairstow, Buttler and Stokes are extravagantly gifted batsmen. Of course natural talent doesn't guarantee performance at test level but the fact that none of them seem to be significantly improving in the England set up, Root and Bairstow are getting worse, is a bit of an indictment of Bayliss and the England coaching group. 

Vince has been given plenty of chances and hasn't taken them and Hales has given up red ball cricket so what are the selectors going to do?

And Buttler gone. England need it to start raining again.

[Jeor]

21 minutes ago, ljkeane said:

And Buttler gone. England need it to start raining again.

And Stokes, too. Apparently there's rain forecast towards the end of the Test so they've still got a decent chance, plus we're assuming Australia will score in the first innings - they might not.

22 minutes ago, ljkeane said:

I disagree actually. I think this England batting lineup is probably the strongest I can remember in terms of raw talent; Root, Bairstow, Buttler and Stokes are extravagantly gifted batsmen. Of course natural talent doesn't guarantee performance at test level but the fact that none of them seem to be significantly improving in the England set up, Root and Bairstow are getting worse, is a bit of an indictment of Bayliss and the England coaching group.

I agree the England lineup has a lot of talent, but they've all been coached (particularly Bairstow, Buttler and Stokes) to be aggressive as England concentrated on the ODI team and winning the World Cup. This has left them with some pretty significant deficiencies in defensive technique. Other batsmen around the world seem to manage the ODI/Test divide but for whatever reason Test skills seem to have fallen pretty far down the pecking order in the coaching setup.

[The Winged Shadow]

6 minutes ago, ljkeane said:

I disagree actually. I think this England batting lineup is probably the strongest I can remember in terms of raw talent; Root, Bairstow, Buttler and Stokes are extravagantly gifted batsmen. Of course natural talent doesn't guarantee performance at test level but the fact that none of them seem to be significantly improving in the England set up, Root and Bairstow are getting worse, is a bit of an indictment of Bayliss and the England coaching group. 

Vince has been given plenty of chances and hasn't taken them and Hales has given up red ball cricket so what are the selectors going to do?

And Buttler gone. England need it to start raining again.

I should've been more clear, i am talking about the top order gap that England has been trying to fill over the last couple of years. Paxs post has the list of names i was thinking of. Your list i don't disagree with at all, they are really good batters and they will develop with time to adapt to test. I think that middle order is set. Just may need to move Stokes up if anything. To me Burns is now set, and if they believe in Roy as opener then they need to stick to those two. Denly I'm not sure about yet but this innings he looked ok. But just stick with them unless there are outstanding county players knocking down the door (which i doubt, as that will beg the question why they weren't picked to begin with). Vince got dropped so much i don't know why they keep picking him. Better off rolling the dice on a youngster like Australia did with Renshaw. 

Australia did the same thing with equally poor result. It's the one they stuck with even when shit (head, khawaja) and the ones that got dropped long term (wade)  that have shown improvement. The ones that kept getting dropped and re picked are still shit (marsh and handscombe). The real good news were the random youngsters (renshaw, Labuschagne etc) which might be worth a shot for England.

[The Winged Shadow]

I think pax might be onto something with Bairstow and Butler. England might be better off letting Bairstow be a full-time batsmen and  focus on his batting, while letting Butler be the keeper and not have to change his explosive batting style, which should allow him and Bairstow to swap batting spots.