Its Summer! - the Fever Cricket Thread. (Part 2)

Of course we were going to give the chase a go with the bat. It's more that our bowlers conceded over 400 runs. To England. 

I too hope we bounce back. I'll be at the Oval on Friday.

That's ODI cricket.  Can't get to upset about it really.

On the discussion from the last week or so - this from Jimmy Neesham on a Reddit AMA:

McCullum admitted bowling first was a poor decision yesterday.

This is turning into a great series. Wish it was on at a better time so I could watch a bit more of it.

How good was that Southee/Boult catch though?!

It's got to the point that we've come to expect that sort of brilliance in the field from those two. Our strike bowlers are two of our better fielders, not many sides can say that - even in history

I'd say it's more that we don't have any liabilities in the field... if Rosco Taylor is (arguably) your weakest short-form fielder, things are going pretty well (and yes, he's an awesome slipper, I"m talking about outfielding).

I was just saying felding as a general thing. Southee is actually one of our better slip fielders yet he can do the job on the boundary too, Trent is dynamite at square leg and point and also good on the boundary. They are all round pretty good fielders for fast bowlers, often making a big impact in the field when as plenty of others don't and some are hidden.

Kane and Rosco in great touch. Bowling is becoming a bit of a worry though especially with Trent going home. Back injuries on fast bowlers are never any good.

From an England perspective I'm pleased we're at least competitive. Expected more of the sort of humiliations we had in the world cup but at least we've got close in the last 2 matches. Can't ask for much more than that at this stage.

England were actually on for another big score for a bit there but got rolled at the end.

Would've been nice to watch Kane and Ross bat! Very solid win.

I'm not sure I enjoy a world where watching us chase down 300 wasn't that exciting. We cruised that. Williamson and Taylor were phenomenal. At the same age only Tendulkar and Kohli have more international centuries than Kane.

And I bet they both would have played a stack more games than Kane at that age too

The thing about Kane's form up until now is that he's got better every season. If that trend continues who knows how good he might get

Why the fudge do we keep bowling it short? IT'S NOT WORKING. 

England just cruising to 350. Crazy. You've got to worry about our bowling attack. Get well soon trent!

Great stuff. Root and Morgan in incredible form.

quote=ajc28]

Great stuff. Root and Morgan in incredible form.

[ quote]

Looks like we're the only two cricket fans left...

Absolutely batshark crazy series. They absolutely cruised to 350, walked it home. Credit to the English. Our bowling was pretty poor it must be said.

Losing Anderson/Neesham has really upset the balance of this side. Given you can't play N McCullum at 6 and you need a bowling option there, they've had to pick Santner who probably isn't quite there yet. That's then meant that McCullum can't really bat 8 as you need a quick option. If the bowling thing wasn't an issue they could have played Latham at 6.

So the ODI series came down to a reduced overs lottery. Unfortunate. Sounds like a couple of dropped catches cost us the result. Shame really, as we have been super tight in the field.

Has been an incredibly entertaining tour, both teams deserve a lot of credit.

Results wise though, I think our boys will be very disappointed. Fifth day collapse in the first test and letting it slip last night, that's the difference between a very successful series and not.

Great stuff. 45-5 would traditionally mean 60 all out for us so can't believe we managed to win from there. Really pleased for Bairstow who had been kind of thrown on the scrap heap after the Ashes disaster. He's been the form English batsman in the domestic season and gets an unexpected chance due to injury and wins the game like that.

Bairstow is a very talented guy who's been mucked around by the selectors. He's explosive with the bat, pretty good at keeping and an excellent outfielder to boot. His problem is going on tours with England and carrying the drinks endlessly until someone suffers a last minute injury. Then he's pitch forked into the team, without having had any games to get in form. As a result he fails/get bitsy scores, and everyone says " that Bairstow's not up to it ". It's must be so frustating for him. Jimmy Anderson had the same problem early in his career.

Exactly. Always been a fan of Anderson since he first broke into the side as a youngster in Australia. In the middle of the usual disaster of an Ashes tour he impressed in the ODIs (which for some reason started in the middle of the test series) and he was a real chance to play the next test but I think had to return home due to a family death or illness. Then I think he had about 3 years of touring and being 12th man, occasionally coming in for the final test in a series and not doing that well. And always touring like that meant he barely got to play a first class game either. The turning point for him was on that tour here when they finally dumped Harmison and Hoggard, probably a year or two too late, after the first test and brought him and Broad in then he took 5 wickets on the first day of the 2nd test. They have both led the bowling attack ever since.

Wonder if Bairstow could follow a similar path for us to Steve Smith. There was an article on Cricinfo last week talking about Smith and whether England believed in someone's talent and could stick with them until they came good and I immediately thought of Bairstow. They have had similar kind of starts - batting in various different positions with different roles in the team (in Smith's case seeing if he could be the side's spinner, for Bairstow seeing if he can keep wicket), obvious talent but not really getting big scores to begin with etc. Think it took Smith 4 or 5 years (though not always in the side) to make his first hundred and look at him now. There probably are 1 or 2 batting places up for grabs in the test team so Bairstow will have got his name back into discussions. I imagine Eoin Morgan will be eyeing up a test recall too, certainly hasn't done himself much harm.

So the shortest day is past us. My cricket team is losing 3 or 4 of our more talented players this year and I'm keen to start recruiting.

We play 4th grade in Wellington (mostly on grass pitches but the odd artificial). Team has been around for about 15 years with 4 or 5 of the original core still in place.

Great bunch of lads, very competitive bunch but social as well. If you like banter and inappropriate jokes, let me know.

We're after an opening bat, a #3 and maybe an opening or first drop pace bowler. I've got my out and out pace guy, I need someone with a bit of smarts!

Let me know if you're keen. 

- UK Private Eye, latest.

Best news I've heard all day...

https://www.hauraki.co.nz/news/sport/brendon-mccullum-recommits-to-black-caps/

Just saw that Kumar Sangakkara is finally retiring from tests. 12,000 runs (5th highest of all time), 38 centuries, 11 double-centuries (2nd only to Bradman), all at an average of 58. He was the fastest player to 8,000, 9,000, 11,000 and 12,000 test runs, and joint fastest to 10,000. 

What an absolute legend of the game.

Incredibly underrated because he doesn't play for Australia, England or India. 

Highest average in the 10,000 run club, whilst keeping for most of it too! Legend.

I'm a  bit gutted he didn't keep going until he passed Ponting. Man I hate that guy.

See: Steyn, Dale

Kallis too

Day/night test against Aussie confirmed.

I don't know why they don't just get rid of tests and ODIs, cut T20s down to T10s, only allow 3 fielders, and make all boundaries 30 metres. That way we could get to see more DLF Maximums, and they could fit heaps of pyrotechnics and cheerleaders in the gap between the boundary rope and the stands. Oh, and Danny Morrison could commentate every game. That's assuming that 20 overs of cricket wouldn't be too much for the croud attention spans of course.

I get that they want to bring crouds back test cricket but I think there's bigger issues. they should institute the test championship idea in some form for a start, and make all test series at least 3 matches.

We could call it Softball.

Being the curtain-raiser of the Aussie summer to the fudgeing West Indies really stinks too. No idea how they came to that decision. Their two showpiece Tests are going to be one sided uncompetitive bores.

Because Future Tours Programme.

FTP is stupid.

the anger in you is strong

Yeah, I just think test cricket is great for what it is and that ODIs and T20s are  the gateway drugs to the game. Let limited overs games be all razzle dazzle and showy but try to keep the long form of the game as pure as possible. In this particular case, who knows, it may work, but aside from issues with the ball and lights, there's just the feeling that the ICC/Big 3 are throwing the baby out with bath water. Is there really anything wrong with limited overseas cricket subsidising test matches? Is the game a revenue generating exercise or a sport? Does attempting to change one of the world's most complicated and weirdest sports risk destroying the very intricacies and depth that make it appeal to its fans?

I guess my rant is more at the state of the game as a whole, it just happened to be his which brought it out.

We were told that we were making concessions with accepting the day night test, and dropping the third home test this year, to aid our negotiating position with them.  We get a few ODI's and no test series after this one until 2021.  Even then, we still only have a two test away series. 

Great work David White, really great work!  If I had of had any faith left in him prior to this, it would certainly be completely gone now.