England v Pakistan

How awful is our batting? The standard of English cricket in the test match arena is very poor atm and that includes County Cricket where no one is holding their hand up to get picked. We need some early wickets tomorrow morning or we'll leave ourselves with too much to do.

 

Cook, Root, Bairstow and Stokes would get in most test sides. Their psyche seems all wrong at the moment, perhaps a hangover from a dreadful winter.

It's fair to say that they're not protecting their wicket and arguably the dominance of one day cricket is the root cause. Cook did ok and he doesn't play it.

I hope test cricket doesn't die on its arse. I love the one day and 20/20 formats but test cricket is still the one for me when done well.

 

At the start of the decade we were the best in the world and a joy to watch, now it's like pulling teeth. Malan and Stoneman aren't good enough, especially to be in the top 4, Strauss as never replaced at the top of the order and an early wicket always seems to create panic. As for the bowlers, Jimmy and Broad's better days are behind them I'm afraid, Stokes is ok but he's no Flintoff and he's very much a batting all rounder for me. The fact a kid who's played 16 games gets in as spinner says it all.

We have improved in limited overs since 2015, but seem to have forgotten what the main format still is.

 

Well they lasted longer than I expected, thought it'd be all over within 3 days but somehow it managed to get into the 4th day just
England are doubly stuffed as a few of their fallback players of the last few years have turned their back on red ball cricket altogether.
Would replacing Bayliss help? I'm not sure, they were discussing his success with the white ball formats and relative lack of it with the test side but who would replace him?

Despite the long winter tour England seemed to come into this game totally underprepared in my opinion.

 

England were an embarrassment. Even Ireland playing their first test match put up a better fight.

 

They get paid handsomely, little pressure from newcomers as the cupboard is bare, cook/anderson and broad would have been replaced by now if aussie/saffer/india etc.
Root just not a captain but they will all just plough on regardless with the crammed fixtures.

Onto Pakistan, probably the most inexperienced team of theirs to come here in a while and lacking a great spinner which usually does for our batters.
Doesn't matter though as they are "up for it" and that attitude does show.
Onto Leeds where they should wrap up the series.
Easily.

 

Another game where money is running the show. There playing far too much cricket, they all need to be sent back to their respective counties to play themself back into form. Let us do what Pakistan have done throw the young players in who are showing some skill. Especially against Pakistan, just to see how they do. We need completely separate players for test and the other limited over cricket. It is nonsense to try and play the same players, different game.

 

Agree. The younger generation don’t know what they are missing by only wanting to watch the limited over game. Don’t get me wrong I love that as well, but nothing beats test match cricket. They need to do more to promote it, and pump money in to attract younger fans.

I knew nothing much about test match cricket. The other half and our two young children used to go and watch the Sunday 40 over games between counties. Near Park Avenue, Headingley, and cant remember what they called Huddesfield ground we had some wonderful memories of sitting on the grass having our picnics. However I was not much interested in Test Match cricket, until my husband explained it all to me, over a period of several months. Field position, the why’s and wherefore of batting, and why you needed a steady approach. I gradually started to appreciate it all, and loved it. About 25 years ago, the two of us decided to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary by going for a holiday in Barbados where England was playing the West Indies. I can’t tell you how much we loved it, 5 days of test match cricket and watching England win for the first time in 40 odd years. It was much more exciting than the one day matches.

 

I see your point but there are players from all sides who excel in all formats. I don't think we've prepared well enough for the longer format. That needs thinking about when they plan the summer fixtures. This series right in the midst of the IPL. Why couldn't we have the one dayers now and the tests a bit later?

 

Agree, but something needs to be done. The players had a torrid time in Australia, they needed some run of the mill cricket before being plunged back into test cricket.

 

Pakistan currently "doing an England" at Headingley 97/7 less than an hour after lunch.
I wonder what odds you'd get on them being back in again before the close of play

 

Shame it wasn't a 3 match series, instead we'll be wasting a full series on Australia just for ODI's not a fan of that sort of set up, but I suppose it's probably preparation for the World Cup next year.

 

It's a strange summer schedule this year, there's no more tests until August I think they said on TMS