It does seem that an awful of batters can do a bit of keeping now, whereas it might be more useful for the team if they could turn their arm over! Root and Malan can contribute some spin, but none of Burns, Hameed, Crawley or Pope can bowl
Indeed in T20 cricket especially, being able to bowl a couple of overs makes you so much more useful. From a Kent perspective, being able to bowl leggies massively helped Denly's career, while both DBD and Blake now contribute with the ball as well.
Which is why its frustrating (to me at least) that neither Jennings or Vince managed to nail down a test spot. Both bowl very good better than part time seamers as good as if not better than the likes of Bopara or Collingwood. Jennings often gets used as 4th seamer in championship games.
Burns and Pope started as keepers (though burns has bowled both spin and medium pace in the CC for Surrey at times). Crawley with his height really should bowl a bit of seam up.
I see Crawley has blamed pitches for his relatively poor CC average and specifically at Canterbury. The difficult track there is confirmed by Billings' statistics:
On another subject, Rashid Khan recorded his best ever figures of 4-0-17-6 in today's Big Bash. There was twice on a hat trick and there was, actually, at team one as a player was run out too. This was his last game before flying off to play for Afghanistan and was his 300th domestic T20. To think he's still only 23!!!
I see Crawley has blamed pitches for his relatively poor CC average and specifically at Canterbury. The difficult track there is confirmed by Billings' statistics:
I see Crawley has blamed pitches for his relatively poor CC average and specifically at Canterbury. The difficult track there is confirmed by Billings' statistics:
Burns Crawley Malan Root Stokes/Pope Bairstow/Lawrence (any two of the above four) Billings Woakes Wood Robinson Broad
Root & Malan have to be prepared to share spin duties. I would be tempted to look at Leach, since not having a front line spinner seemed to hurt us in the last D/N but it will depend very much on the surface.
Burns Crawley Malan Root Stokes/Pope Bairstow/Lawrence (any two of the above four) Billings Woakes Wood Robinson Broad
Root & Malan have to be prepared to share spin duties. I would be tempted to look at Leach, since not having a front line spinner seemed to hurt us in the last D/N but it will depend very much on the surface.
Bairstow surely has to play, if fit, but at 3-0 down I'm not sure what the point of risking Stokes would be, given his injury history.
There must be a string argument for Lawrence to play. England's batting has been hopeless, so it must be utterly damaging to his confidence to be left out of a losing side.
But I don't get the argument for recalling Burns. What has he done since being dropped to address all the issues that caused him to be dropped.
I'd also have Billings keeping wicket even if Bairstow is fit.
Root & Malan have to be prepared to share spin duties. I would be tempted to look at Leach, since not having a front line spinner seemed to hurt us in the last D/N but it will depend very much on the surface.
Which England clearly didn't consider before Brisbane, and to an extent Adelaide. Playing Leach on the green seamer, and leaving him out on the dry, bouncy pitch.
Hopefully Stokes can bat even if he cant bowl. Does mean I'd want Woakes in at 7 and drop Buttler. Probably means Bairstow to keep if fit.
I think Buttler will be delighted if he is dropped. His body language is awful for a keeper and even more so on this tour. He will announce his retirement from Test cricket and make himself even more available to the highest bidders in franchise cricket given that he won't play in the CC either. Don't blame him but if anyone demonstrates the gulf in technique required to play the two very different disciplines it is him.
This is what Mark Ramprakash has just written about Buttler's keeping:
Wicketkeepers are the heartbeat of a team and they need to be bubbly and give energy to the rest of the side, but in the cricket that I have seen on this tour Buttler has looked stony-faced. Of course some players do this more than others, but if you’re in that role and you don’t bring that energy, you’re struggling for runs and you’re dropping catches, then what exactly are you contributing?
And this is what he said about his batting:
I remember working with him in Abu Dhabi when England played Pakistan there in 2015. He was struggling a little bit and after he got left out of the third Test we went to the nets and he unloaded quite a lot of things that were on his mind. What it came down to was a lack of trust in and understanding of first-class cricket and an uncertainty about how to play at No 6 or No 7 when perhaps the scoreboard is not dictating your approach.
In that net session, I suggested I should throw him a few balls and he should play each ball on its merits. He seemed to not quite understand that concept. It led me to think there is so much premeditation in one-day cricket that some players who come through and excel in that format never adapt to the ebb and flow of Test cricket.
The not being able to recognise a good ball is something I've been banging on about for a while and mentioned it in relation to the likes of Hales and Roy too. Buttler might have had that ability at one time but, having not played in the CC for over three years, he does not have it now. Which doesn't matter any more because he will be concentrating on playing nothing but white ball.
But this is replicated everywhere in England - I've previously bemoaned what I have seen happen in age group cricket specifically in terms of how they train and what I heard a County coach say along the lines of a 16 year old not being able to hit 360 would be dropped from the squad even if they were successful playing red ball cricket.
You reap what you sow but the player that can play straight, recognise what a good ball looks like and play 360 will surely end up being King.
Add to that our players all seem absolutely incessant on getting bat on ball( a la short format). Been banging on all series about leaving on length, but where there is this burning desire to get bat on ball it just won’t happen.
Typical that thanks to Covid, Australia end up stronger, finding a way to drop Harris
The only player that might make Australia stronger is Hazlewood but that is debatable given the form of Boland. We'd struggle to name more than half a dozen players as representing our strongest side let alone a whole team.
India are currently 165-6 for a lead of 178 over South Africa. Pant is currently 77* off 93 balls whereas Kohli was out for 29 off 143. Surely he can't have faced that many balls in an innings before for a strike rate of 20.27 can he?
Looking at the Hobart weather forecast, there seems to be a chance of light rain later in the evening. Nothing heavy, but enough to make Steve Smith run off the park
0900 - 1100/30 So the question is what time do I get up
6.15am for me.
Saturdays are killers for me because Seb's games are live streamed and start at midnight our time. Last week I made the mistake of staying up to watch his team field - fixed camera and with Seb fielding, alternate overs, on the cover/midwicket boundaries, the only time I got to see him was when the team came together following a wicket. Too tired to wait to see him bat so went to bed at 3.30am and watched his innings when I got up. Didn't take long to do that - one run off 10 balls as he knicked off to a fellow DLCA player who is in the Hants Academy. It was like watching an England batsman!
So will try to go to bed early Friday night and get up at 3.45am. They are playing a side that is coached and captained by former Sussex cricketer and Brighton footballer, Joe Gatting (also nephew of Mike and son of our former player, Steve). If Seb's lot bat first and he repeats last week's performance I should be able to concentrate on the Ashes!
0900 - 1100/30 So the question is what time do I get up
6.15am for me.
Saturdays are killers for me because Seb's games are live streamed and start at midnight our time. Last week I made the mistake of staying up to watch his team field - fixed camera and with Seb fielding, alternate overs, on the cover/midwicket boundaries, the only time I got to see him was when the team came together following a wicket. Too tired to wait to see him bat so went to bed at 3.30am and watched his innings when I got up. Didn't take long to do that - one run off 10 balls as he knicked off to a fellow DLCA player who is in the Hants Academy. It was like watching an England batsman!
So will try to go to bed early Friday night and get up at 3.45am. They are playing a side that is coached and captained by former Sussex cricketer and Brighton footballer, Joe Gatting (also nephew of Mike and son of our former player, Steve). If Seb's lot bat first and he repeats last week's performance I should be able to concentrate on the Ashes!
Weird that the younger generation of Gatting who became a player and coach is the son of the footballer Steve Gatting, rather than the former England cricket captain Mike!
Mike Gatting wasn't a bad footballer, and Steve wasn't a bad cricketer.
Comments
Burns and Pope started as keepers (though burns has bowled both spin and medium pace in the CC for Surrey at times). Crawley with his height really should bowl a bit of seam up.
Burns
Crawley
Malan
Root
Stokes/Pope
Bairstow/Lawrence (any two of the above four)
Billings
Woakes
Wood
Robinson
Broad
Root & Malan have to be prepared to share spin duties. I would be tempted to look at Leach, since not having a front line spinner seemed to hurt us in the last D/N but it will depend very much on the surface.
There must be a string argument for Lawrence to play. England's batting has been hopeless, so it must be utterly damaging to his confidence to be left out of a losing side.
But I don't get the argument for recalling Burns. What has he done since being dropped to address all the issues that caused him to be dropped.
I'd also have Billings keeping wicket even if Bairstow is fit.
This is what Mark Ramprakash has just written about Buttler's keeping:
Wicketkeepers are the heartbeat of a team and they need to be bubbly and give energy to the rest of the side, but in the cricket that I have seen on this tour Buttler has looked stony-faced. Of course some players do this more than others, but if you’re in that role and you don’t bring that energy, you’re struggling for runs and you’re dropping catches, then what exactly are you contributing?
And this is what he said about his batting:
I remember working with him in Abu Dhabi when England played Pakistan there in 2015. He was struggling a little bit and after he got left out of the third Test we went to the nets and he unloaded quite a lot of things that were on his mind. What it came down to was a lack of trust in and understanding of first-class cricket and an uncertainty about how to play at No 6 or No 7 when perhaps the scoreboard is not dictating your approach.
In that net session, I suggested I should throw him a few balls and he should play each ball on its merits. He seemed to not quite understand that concept. It led me to think there is so much premeditation in one-day cricket that some players who come through and excel in that format never adapt to the ebb and flow of Test cricket.
The not being able to recognise a good ball is something I've been banging on about for a while and mentioned it in relation to the likes of Hales and Roy too. Buttler might have had that ability at one time but, having not played in the CC for over three years, he does not have it now. Which doesn't matter any more because he will be concentrating on playing nothing but white ball.
But this is replicated everywhere in England - I've previously bemoaned what I have seen happen in age group cricket specifically in terms of how they train and what I heard a County coach say along the lines of a 16 year old not being able to hit 360 would be dropped from the squad even if they were successful playing red ball cricket.
You reap what you sow but the player that can play straight, recognise what a good ball looks like and play 360 will surely end up being King.
So the question is what time do I get up
Saturdays are killers for me because Seb's games are live streamed and start at midnight our time. Last week I made the mistake of staying up to watch his team field - fixed camera and with Seb fielding, alternate overs, on the cover/midwicket boundaries, the only time I got to see him was when the team came together following a wicket. Too tired to wait to see him bat so went to bed at 3.30am and watched his innings when I got up. Didn't take long to do that - one run off 10 balls as he knicked off to a fellow DLCA player who is in the Hants Academy. It was like watching an England batsman!
So will try to go to bed early Friday night and get up at 3.45am. They are playing a side that is coached and captained by former Sussex cricketer and Brighton footballer, Joe Gatting (also nephew of Mike and son of our former player, Steve). If Seb's lot bat first and he repeats last week's performance I should be able to concentrate on the Ashes!
Mike Gatting wasn't a bad footballer, and Steve wasn't a bad cricketer.