The Ashes

There were rumblings of discontent early in the summer when Harrison, chief of cricket, got a massive pay rise and shoehorning far too much cricket over the next few years.
I am gutted i didn't lump on a bet for Eng to lose 4-0 and 5-0 as during the summer tests they didnt look good for red ball cricket.
Even during the second test i could not get decent odds, the bookies dont rate them.

Years and years ago what should have happened is that with the popularity of one day cricket along with south africa/bangladesh/sri lanka on the scene as test playing nations, the test series should be spread out over more years, ie play the aussies every three years- although they will object as they take great pride in hammering us

Some of the other test teams are lucky to get a couple of 5 dayers against England and that cannot be right, do they not respect other nations.
India, Pakistan and Aus manage to have a conveyor belt of talent coming through but with our county cricket in such dire straits it is hard to see us sending out scouts to unearth the test stars of tomorrow.

68 all out, damn that is historically bad
The aussies didn't even have to cheat this time
Still at least they are not T20 champions

 

One other point, there is a conveyor belt of young football talent coming through but finding our next cricketers?
Plus footy is pretty much all year round with one tourny or another but if cricket is trying to copy, it is failing as it is a different ball game.

 

They have been for two years

 

I guess which came first the chicken or the egg. Red ball significantly preceded white ball cricket and while the former can in some form continue without the latter, the latter certainly cannot be maintained without the former.

As it stands all one day, crash bang wallop, players come via the Counties. Certainly match day revenue from the white ball games are a material part of the Counties annual income although my understanding is the greater income is the test match allocation and contribution for the host grounds.

Not sure how the 1.1billion TV deal agreed in 2019 was arrived at split between red and white ball games.

It is of course in everyone's interest for both to co-habit and this is the challenge for the adminstrators.

Atherton's suggestion of a smaller, more competive intense red ball format in prime summer to drive up standards is a good one but good luck convincing the counties.

The Hundred is a sticking point and personally i remain to be convinced of the attraction to new watchers to cricket.

 

Cannot see many of those currently sitting comfortably on a central contract justifying selection in the next test series.

https://www.icc-cricket.com/news/2285485

Regardless of their Ashes 'performance' how did some of those justify the award of a central contract prior to the Ashes tour.

 

3 days remaining with rain on the way our best chance of avoiding 4-0.

 

Our only chance.

 

Subject to rain we need to bat out 98 overs in the day.

We have done so twice in 7 innings so far in the series.

Getting the 358 to win seems a long shot

 

Weather doesn’t look great so may be a lot less overs to bay.

 

The loss of 7 overs due to rain in that 2nd innings just about saved us.

At least a 2-3 positives to come out of this one.

Further changes for the final test. Buttler going home, Hameed dropped (surely !), Malan rested (subject to Bairstow's injury). Billings coming in and Stokes to play only as a batter with Robinson returning.

 

As the final day(s) of this series are played out a couple of depressing stats (amongst the many !) in todays papers:

The 2nd innings saw Burns’ eighth duck in his last 22 Test innings. By way of comparison, Sir Alastair Cook registered nine ducks in his entire career of 291 innings.

England’s average opening partnerships in this series are lower than Australia’s tenth-wicket stands !

The tour party for the Carribean will be interesting.

 

I mentioned this on the countdown thread.With their current form and the awful performances of most of our openers Crawley and Burns should have gone out to bat with the mindset of absolutely nothing stupid.No presents to the Aussies even if that meant a very slow scoring rate.Yet what happens with the score on 2.An utterly ridiculous quick single resulting in Burns being run out.
The Aussie quicks are obviously too good for our batters but at least make them earn their wickets.
It must be awful for Malan and Root sat in the changing room knowing that more than likely they are going to have to bat within 5 to 10 overs of the innings starting.
Innings built on sand and consistently scoring under 200 won’t win you test matches.
The bowlers have got them in to some half decent positions but the batters have constantly failed to take advantage of these positions with a mixture of poor concentration and baffling shot choices.
Very frustrating and I’ve even lost a bit of interest in this last test.