Sunday, November 26, 2006

T1D4: Australia 602-9d (Ponting 196) & 202-1 (Langer 100*) v England 157 (Bell 50, McGrath 6-50) & 293-5 (C'wood 96, Pietersen 92*)

Ok. That was... like an improving curate's egg. Better in parts.

Some responsible batting by England, dragging them back from the depths of 36-2, particularly from KP, who did what he does best: consolidate, then start farming the bowling. Warne in particular got slapped through mid-on for several exquisite shots.

On the downside:

Strauss needs to either stop hooking or get a lot better at his shot selection: twice in two innings, straight down the throat of long/fine leg. 'Injuducious' doesn't begin to cover it.

Collingwood was doing so well, until he had a rush of blood to the head: charging Warne? Not the best move unless you are really seeing it like a football and you need to score runs. All he needed to do was Not Get Out. Muppet.

And as for the skipper? Freddie... Freddie. KP has his eye in: slapping him through mid-on when you're past 50 and seeing it well is one thing, hoicking him straight down Lander's throat when you've only just got in... quite another.

So, realistically? We're looking at Jones and Gilo 50s, an hour of Hoggy being his obdurate self, while KP sticks around for a double ton, and the forecast rain to turn up early...

For small values of 'realistically'.

Saturday, November 25, 2006

T1D3: Australia 602-9d (Ponting 196) & 181-1 (Langer 88*) v England 157 (Bell 50, McGrath 6-50)

Some days, it's better staying in bed with the radio off.

Hard to find any plus points about day 3 - the one bright spot has to be Bell's fifty, which considering he was a practical non-participant with the bat last summer, can only be a good thing. Kind of a shame no-one else was around to support him.

The other intriguing thing? Ponting didn't enforce the follow-on. Why? I can't see England winning if he did. In fact, the only /small/ chance England have is if Australia bat on too long tomorrow, and they manage to get their act considerably more together than it was in the first innings.

Somehow, though, I can't see it. Ponting probably just wanted to rub England's noses in it even more than he already has :)

Friday, November 24, 2006

T1D2 - Australia 603/9d (Ponting 196), England 53/3

Well, if it's any consolation, we bowled better. Both Harmison and Anderson managed to get wickets, though the former was thanks to Warne gloving an awful strangle down the leg side to Jones. Flintoff continues where he left off yesterday, Boys' Own hero again, finishing up with four wickets. It'd have been a lot better if the tail, specifically Stuart Clark and Brett Lee, hadn't wagged quite so successfully, but even so, 600 was never that unlikely on this track.

Strauss will be kicking himself, getting out hooking: Brett Lee copped a raking from Hussey's studs as they both went for the catch, so you /could/ claim first blood for England there. :) Cook out next ball won't have helped Strauss' mood - or Fletcher's - nor will Collingwood getting foxed by a genuinely good ball not that long later.

53/3.

It could be a long summer. But then, we probably thought that at the end of the Lords' test last summer.

Thursday, November 23, 2006

T1D1 - Australia 346-3 (Ponting 137*, Langer 82, Martyn 63*)

Not, as they say, the best of starts. Harmison's first ball, described by one paper as 'not so much wide as obese', slanted across into the hands not of the keeper, or first slip, but the huge paws of skipper Flintoff at second. It didn't improve much from there, sadly.

On the plus side, Flintoff, looking like he'd never been away, trying in his typical Boys' Own manner to wrest the game back from Ponting's men single-handed. Surprisingly, too, a leaner, meaner looking Ashley Giles, who only the most heartless could describe as a wheelie bin this time round. And Pietersen, making up for a home Ashes series in which five catches came his way and not one stuck, pouching the first chance he got, Langer's slash at point.

More mystifying, though? Pietersen bowling offspin. Better than one might expect, to be fair, but if England were that desperate, where in God's name was Panesar? Monty definitely looks like he might have taken a wicket or two on a pitch where KP could turn it square. To cap it off, Bell bowling. And Harmison so out of sorts he didn't turn his arm over at all from the middle of the afternoon session on, to the extent that Freddie and Hoggard took the new ball.

To be fair? It's a belter of a batting track, and 300+ for 3 is about where an on-form England would be expected to be about now. Ponting's looking an ominously good bet for top scorer of the series, though, and England need quick wickets before the Aussie first innings total gets to the kind of daunting where the follow-on target looks dicey. And it may turn for Warney by day 3.

Still, as the irrepressible Phil Tufnell would undoubtedly say, it's early doors yet. It is only day one of the first Test, and, if last summer's anything to go by? It's going to be a long series.

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

The Eve of the Ashes

Here we go.

00:00 GMT, November 23rd, 2006 it all kicks off. And, unlike last summer's abortive attempt, this year I'm going to try and blog every day for the duration of the series - certainly every day there's play. We'll see how it goes.

A few last minute scares for England - Bell getting cracked on the wrist by Anderson had everyone's hearts in their mouths, but he does seem to be fit, and will be batting at 3 after Cook and Strauss. Let's hope his performance there against South Australia carries on, rather than the dismal showing last summer - you felt for him watching some of the post Ashes interviews, clearly conscious he hadn't contributed with the bat.

Then of course there's the three big choices: Anderson or Mahmood? Jones or Read? and Panesar or Giles?

The easy one to dismiss is the 'keeper. Like it or lump it, it's Jones. My view on this is that it paves the way for a slightly longer tail, if that's what Fletcher's worried about: Read is, without a doubt, the better keeper, and I personally don't think the batting is as clear-cut as Fletcher does, but the decision's made, for better or for worse.

On to the quicks: Mahmood or Anderson? Both of them suffer from radar issues early on - if it goes wrong for them, it does tend to quite dramatically pearshaped, unlike, say, Hoggy, who can pull himself back after a couple of dud balls. I plump for Anderson, mostly because, on his day, he can produce truly unplayable deliveries (as Yousouf Youhana can attest from the '03 World Cup), and if he gets the line and length right he can tie an end down (Australia themselves can attest to this, with a performance against them of something like 10-4-0-12, if I remember rightly. Admittedly that was in a one-dayer.). He does, I think, have self-belief issues, but I think Fletcher and Flintoff can motivate him for this one. Mahmood may be quicker, but my money's on Anderson for pulling out the magic. The only justification for Mahmood I can see is that on present form with the bat, he does shorten the tail.

And then the toughie. Monty or Gilo? You could probably fill a complete issue of the Telegraph with the column inches that have been expended on this one. Two spinners, alike in... actually, the fact they're both left arm orthodox, and would run through a brick wall for England. Otherwise, on the one hand, you have Monty, the youthful, aggressive, patka-wearing Sikh, blessed with prodigious amounts of talent and turn, last to leave the practice ground, legendary (and not in a good way), fielder, boyish love for the game evident every time he takes a wicket, the man in possession. And Gilo, grizzled veteran (and one of the few left) of the darker days of England's Test history, dour, defensive, doesn't turn it as much, solid number 8, unsung fielding hero with an arm several Aussies learned about the hard way, the previous incumbent, just back from a long layoff.

On paper, looking at that, there's not much contest, at least in my view. It should be Panesar, purely and simply because we want to win, to go out there and seize the First Test by the scruff, and Monty adds another string to our bow. Fletcher, though, is expected to incline towards Giles, for the batting alone. One could, though, make the point that Monty never gets the chance, stuck down at number 11 with lesser lights like Harmison ahead of him, and that he could pick Mahmood to shorten the tail if he wanted. And Fletcher did pick Panesar for the last warmup game. Who knows?

My preferred England lineup?: Strauss, Cook, Bell, Pietersen, Flintoff, Collingwood, Jones, Harmison, Hoggard, Anderson, Panesar. Seven players who saw Ashes action in 2005. I have a gut feeling we'll see Giles, though.