England Cricket 2024

cantersaddick said:

Pope's at 25, will get get out before 30 or get a ton? nothing in between with him

🤦🏻‍♂️ Unfortunately the former !

90 overs of spin from Pakistan and they finally bowl their first maiden over of the series. 

sillav nitram said:

Is it fair to say, Crawley always follows a good score with a bad one?

Can't recall he him producing back to back good scores at International level?

76 and 73 v India in Feb 2024 
42 and 60 v India in Feb 2024 (followed by a 79 in the next innings) 
44 in the second innings at Leeds followed by 189 in the first innings in Manchester last year v Australia 
69*, 122 and 50 in consecutive innings v S Africa, and Pakistan in 2022 
53 and 267 v Pakistan in Southampton in 2020  

sillav nitram said:

Chizz said:

sillav nitram said:

Is it fair to say, Crawley always follows a good score with a bad one?

Can't recall he him producing back to back good scores at International level?

76 and 73 v India in Feb 2024 
42 and 60 v India in Feb 2024 (followed by a 79 in the next innings) 
44 in the second innings at Leeds followed by 189 in the first innings in Manchester last year v Australia 
69*, 122 and 50 in consecutive innings v S Africa, and Pakistan in 2022 
53 and 267 v Pakistan in Southampton in 2020  

Clearly, I’ve been proved wrong. 

Not completely!  I think Crawley would want many more consecutive significant scores.  In fact, the fact he's done it a few times should mean that he's able to do it more often.  

With Crawley, I think the current England set up (ie McCullum, Stokes and, to an extent, Key) are tolerant of a number of "failures" as long as he produces significant winning scores from time to time. 

soapboxsam said:

Leuth said:

Addick Addict said:

Leuth said:

Leuth said:

Can I add, Alex Hartley is maybe the worst cricket commentator of all time. I say this as someone who's usually in favour of there being more women commentators (Urooj Mumtaz in the Test earlier being excellent for example) 

Oh that's Lydia Greenway lmao. I was thinking she didn't sound quite right. She's also bad 

You were right to question yourself - one's a Lancastrian and the other's from, down the road, Orpington!

Fine. When I spotted some semi-articulate magnanimity towards the WI, I realised it couldn't be Hartley actually

Alex Hartley can be quite flippant when doing live commentary but when being serious she hasn't held back with her criticism of the English women players for their fitness and despite beating the Windies 14 times in a row before yesterday they panic when Sophie Ecclestone isn't on her top spinning game or in crunch games against the Aussies who she says have a higher level of fitness.

Back to the men's game and Brydon Carse deserved that wicket.

I've just read the BBC write-up of their interview with Alex Hartley. She really went in two-footed on the current England team, basically saying they're carrying too many players who aren't up to international fitness levels.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/articles/cpw5l84z4w4o

Which may be slightly unfair, as Australia are really the only women's team who show the fitness levels she's looking for. The women's game is still catching up rapidly with the men and has quite a way to go.

A point made by one of the BBC's online text-commentators, who suggests the issue is that England don't face pressure situations often enough, as they're so much better than most other teams, but that performance under pressure was one of the things the Hundred was supposed to bring to the team and it clearly isn't working yet.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/articles/c93p425jndlo

Personally, although the shambles yesterday was spectacular and one player in particular clearly went to pieces, they would still have gone through if it hadn't been for the unimpressive nature of the win over Bangladesh. And that wasn't pressure, so perhaps Alex Hartley has a point about fitness.

Will we get a single figure Stokes innings or a nice long one?

KBslittlesis said:

How comes there’s no bugger there?
sorry if already been asked.

late change of venue, poor recent form and the fact that outside of England tests are generally poorly attended worldwide anyway. Most of the people there for the first test were admitted for free 

Brook bowled for 9. Sajid is on a roll here 

This seven day pitch is suddenly a lion after being a pussy cat. 

Well done to Smith and Carse for surviving. Interesting to see what news I wake up to tomorrow!

These aren't the conditions to Bazball at full tilt tomorrow, but equally we can't just sit there and defend to the spinners, as we need to put pressure on them and force Pakistan to plug gaps in the field.