Hereward Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 No real sign of rain, either. It's all so depressingly familiar. :( Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 Both England's best batsman (Pietersen) and their captain (Strauss) are out within the first hour. Very disappointing for England, considering they didn't bat too badly in the first innings (except for not getting big scores) and the past three days have shown that this pitch isn't necessarily a minefield.Pietersen in particular was disappointing...he was very skittish early on. Didn't look like he was in it for the long haul, and although he was trying to attack - which was good - he was really just all over the place and it looked like just a matter of time.The weather looks ok. England's chances of surviving a draw don't look too good at the moment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
delete this account pls Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 No real sign of rain, either. It's all so depressingly familiar. :(I really am almost nearly sorry. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 I'm not going to call it yet. If they survive to lunch, and then if Collingwood can hang in there, while Prior, Flintoff and Swann score runs, they can start thinking about wiping off the deficit. It's a resilient tail with Flintoff, Swann and Broad still to come, and Anderson not quite a pushover. Surviving the rest of the day entirely is going to be a tall order but if Australia don't mop this up by tea, things will get tense and the Aussies may go off the boil too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 Hauritz is making a mockery of Panesar and Swann. In the past two overs he's had some vociferous LBW shouts (admittedly not heaps close), an edge from Collingwood that didn't go to hand, a play and miss and a ball that almost rolled back onto the stumps. Surely this pitch can't have overnight suddenly turned into a minefield. Swann and Panesar were just bowling badly.Hauritz came into this match as clearly the worst of the three spinners, but he's by far been the best performer with spin. To be fair he has had lots of runs to play with in this second innings, but the first innings performance alone was much better than anything Swann or Panesar had. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maltaran Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 And now Prior's out. 70-5. Geoffrey Boycott has just said England are batting like twerps Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paxter Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 Well, this is definitely going to be a repeat of Adelaide. As was the case in the '07 Ashes, I'm not too sure how England can recover from this. Playing at Lord's won't help matters. My interest in this Ashes series has just plummeted to new lows. Can we have another T20 World Cup? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 My interest in this Ashes series has just plummeted to new lows.Already? No no Pax, you have to at least stay interested until we secure the series. 2005 we won comfortably in the First Test and we all know how that ended up. One little Test victory isn't satisfying enough, it needs to be a comprehensive series defeat! (sorry Hereward and others).My only gripe is that lame people like Michael Clarke have to be involved in winning as well. I've also just been reminded that (good as his innings yesterday was) I shouldn't like Haddin, I still remember when he cheated against New Zealand by claiming a bowled after he had broken the stumps with his own gloves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paxter Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 Already? No no Pax, you have to at least stay interested until we secure the series. 2005 we won comfortably in the First Test and we all know how that ended up. One little Test victory isn't satisfying enough, it needs to be a comprehensive series defeat! (sorry Hereward and others).No thanks. Give me competitive cricket any day - we call them test matches for a reason. Let's hope there is some resistance in the next 70 overs, but I doubt it. And for the record, I have never considered myself part of the "we". Where the Australian cricket team is concerned, I fell victim to tall poppy syndrome long ago ;). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 And for the record, I have never considered myself part of the "we". Where the Australian cricket team is concerned, I fell victim to tall poppy syndrome long ago ;).I have a schizophrenic relationship when associating myself with the Australian cricket team. ;) Sometimes yes, sometimes not...but when it's the Ashes, I do, even if it has prima donnas like Michael Clarke in it. In this case I hope he does badly individually while the team wins. ;)Flintoff is finally out, just when Australia would have been getting worried about the effective resistance. And again it is Mitchell Johnson getting a wicket despite bowling complete rubbish. He's bowled terribly all match but has got wickets out of nowhere...he's either the luckiest and most undeserving bowler in the world or he's a diabolical psychological genius. I'm going to guess the former. ;)Johnson's figures are 2/23 off 15 which looks wonderfully economical. But in truth his bad balls have been so bad that batsmen couldn't have reached them with a ten-foot pole. I've lost count of how many balls have shot down the legside, gone really wide, or just been throwaway bouncers that didn't threaten anyone. His statistics always look good but the on-field reality can be pretty poor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ljkeane Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 Christ this is depressing, even the bloody women's cricket isn't going well. :( Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
williamjm Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 And now Prior's out. 70-5. Geoffrey Boycott has just said England are batting like twerpsI suspect internally he might thinking of some words a bit stronger than 'twerp' ;)Elsewhere in the world, Pakistan are doing a credible impression of England as they are bowled out for 90 by Sri Lanka in their first innings. It's a bit worrying when the closest thing to a real contest in a test match involves Bangladesh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 This is a good innings by Collingwood and a slim chance that it could be rewarded. He's probably one of the few guys in the England lineup who have the stomach for trench warfare. The others (Pietersen, Flintoff) are cavaliers. Very good cavaliers, mind you, but cavaliers all the same, unsuited for this sort of day's play. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paxter Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 The others (Pietersen, Flintoff) are cavaliers. Very good cavaliers, mind you, but cavaliers all the same, unsuited for this sort of day's play.True. Even when Pietersen embarked on his vital 150-odd to save the test (and the series) at The Oval in 2005, it was a fortunate innings from a man ill-suited to a day that demanded stoicism. I'm sure die-hard Aussie fans are still haunted by the sitter dropped by Warne at first slip. Good memories :thumbsup: Oh and BTW, anyone still think Collingwood is out of form? ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 I think form is a rather irrelevant term when referring to Collingwood. ;)I liked this quote from David Lloyd earlier: Oooh, there's Swann practicing a forward defence. I'm not sure that's the right one to be practising.This is dragging on long enough that England are beginning to look a real chance of saving this. 25 overs to go, they're only 40 behind, if they can get some runs and into positive territory, with the innings change and Australia needing to bat that will really eat up some time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maltaran Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 Swann now out. We'll have to hope Jimmy Anderson can stay around for a bit (which he can do, hence him being the preferred night-watchman), because there's only Monty after him, and he's a true number 11. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 This is tense! Collingwood just got out and Australia look to be on top, but right up until that delivery I would have said England were on top. Scores are almost level, 6 runs behind, if England had managed to hold onto Collingwood and then get past the deficit, that would have eliminated 3 overs from the day's play and they would have looked a great deal safer adding on more runs for Australia to chase.Absolutely gutted for Collingwood though. He was so close to single-handedly seeing this whole thing through. England may yet pull off a miracle and save this - but either way, Collingwood's innings (245 balls) deserved to be rewarded. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maltaran Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 Fuck. Does anyone really think Monty can last 10 overs? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maltaran Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 We're ahead! Two boundaries from Anderson, and two overs taken off the total. Five overs to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeor Posted July 12, 2009 Share Posted July 12, 2009 I think England actually have this in the bag now. Leading by 6, with only 5 overs left in the day. The change of innings is 3 overs. So they only need to really survive one more over, and a boundary in this next over will probably settle it.If England do pull this off - which they should - it will be in no small part due to Paul Collingwood.EDITED: And I blame Mitchell Johnson partly for the loss of a potential victory. He bowled absolutely terribly today - so many wide balls I almost wonder whether he's suffering a case of the yips, or has some sort of injury. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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