General cricket chat

Hameed looked like he could become a proper old school test batsman, can’t see him recovering from what’s happened in this series though. At the other end of the scale there’s Pope (and Crawley to some extent) who seemingly has all the shots, but you just know that it’ll just be a cameo rather than an innings of substance.
 
Very interesting summary from the Telegraph Cricket correspondent:


It makes for absolutely hair-raising reading and suggests the basic management structure of the England set up is shambolic to put it mildly.

Why Joe Root continues to support Chris Silverwood is a complete mystery; it's the only conclusion you can draw after reading the article.
 
I miss Geoff Boycott doing commentary as well as his batting, just want to hear him talking about "creekeeet" and the "weeekeeeet" and "deeezizions" ;) :D
 
I've been meaning to read that are you enjoying it?
That would make a lot of sense such changes, but I really can't imagine the counties buying into it.
Hardly anyone attends County matches but fans tend to flock to T20 games.
I m not into this 100 nonsense at all, it is just another nail into Test Cricket & the
' its cricket... but not cricket' tag line.

I've read a few of his books and enjoyed them all :)
 
Note to self must buy Bumble’s autobiography.

He has a point, but in the era of instant gratification, t20 and the 100 are always going to attract more people to watch it. People want things now, boom, 4 hours, result, I can go home now.
I find myself agreeing.
I can watch & enjoy T20, but it's the McDonald's of cricket. Look back & just how many T20s can you actually really remember?
I enjoy quite a few different sports. Yet There is something absolutely thrilling about a Test match that goes the distance.
I still remember with fondness, disbelief & awe Bothams Ashes in'81. Stokes at Hedingley & the amazing atmosphere as he bashed the Aussies all over rthe Park. The cock up of the run out & Paine blowing his reviews.To me it ranks as one of the most incredible moments in the history of sport.
Test match cricket is the daddy.
 

Interesting suggestion from Aggers about how to reshape domestic cricket - very radical though, can’t see anything like this happening

Perhaps five regional teams North, South East, South West, London and Midlands. Home games split between the various counties in that region. It’s not like the counties make much money from the four day game anyway. Keep the counties for one day, 20/20, and The 100.

The 100 is unfortunately here to stay because if for nothing else it gives th3 Women’s Game their biggest payday and exposure. Any attempt to cancel it will result in much stamping of feet and “patriarchy”. We can’t expect the women to pull in crowd s on their own merits can we 😈
 
Perhaps five regional teams North, South East, South West, London and Midlands. Home games split between the various counties in that region. It’s not like the counties make much money from the four day game anyway. Keep the counties for one day, 20/20, and The 100.

The 100 is unfortunately here to stay because if for nothing else it gives th3 Women’s Game their biggest payday and exposure. Any attempt to cancel it will result in much stamping of feet and “patriarchy”. We can’t expect the women to pull in crowd s on their own merits can we 😈
Are the women's 100 games played before or after the men's games, same day same venue?
 
Interesting article about potential replacements, from which I can only draw the conclusion that the cupboard is bare.


Based on raw average so alone I would say only Bohannon and Parkinson are worth a shot. Of the others none of the batters average over 40 in first class and none of the bowlers average under 30. Are Phil Salt, averaging just 30 with the bat, and Mason Crane averaging over 40 with the ball, actually even “in the conversation”? Because as a rule of thumb I say take 10 off the batting average and add 10 to the bowling average for tests to get a more realistic picture of test match potential.
 
I’m 54 and have been watching test cricket for a long number of years. I dip in to t20 and tried the 100 (which was awful), but I’m quite happy to plonk myself on the couch and not move for the duration of a test match.

I used to say that Test Match Cricket is even better at 77, because you can doze off for half an hour, confident that you won't have missed anything!

With the current England team batting, I'd wake up and find Australia batting! :eek:
 
The demise of the test team looks very much like what happened to the West Indies team. Towards the end of his career Lara ended up being their only quality player just like Root is rapidly heading to being ours (I say heading as Stokes is still just about a quality player, for now).
 
The South African supply line isn't producing for England either.
 
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Much better from England tonight…. Mind you we were shocking last night!
 
Blimey! We were running away with the game, miles ahead all the way through but still nearly managed to grasp defeat from the jaws of victory!

They needed 61 runs off the last 3 overs and were 8 wickets down but only lost by 1 run in the end. Topley bowled very well even with his last over, which was a good job because both Jordan and Mahmood were very poor in their last 2 overs.
 
Well done Joe Root for picking up ICC Test Cricketer of the year.

I know the shine has come off his recent batting records after all the mess down under and questions around his captaincy at times but lets just appreciate what an outstanding player he is and terrific year he had, here’s hoping more of the same this year (+ some from his team mates please!).
 
Some very ill judged comments here from Middlesex chairman

 
I can see what he meant to say but it didn't come across the right way. In this day and age there does seem to be a media frenzy trying to prove everyone is racist!

I think all these chaps should run it by someone younger first before saying things in the public domain.
 
I can see what he meant to say but it didn't come across the right way. In this day and age there does seem to be a media frenzy trying to prove everyone is racist!

I think all these chaps should run it by someone younger first before saying things in the public domain.

Seems to me that he said exactly what he meant to say - black kids prefer football and that at a certain point Asian kids prioritise education over sport. How many times are we going to keep hearing this? Where’s the evidence that this actually happens?

Apparently 60% of youth team cricketers at Middlesex are black or asian, yet there’s currently only two on the main playing staff. Why the drop off? How come this is never explained?
 
One explanation I've seen was on the basis of the poorer kids can't afford to go to the next level of cricket. It was during the BBC interview with with the cricket board cheif and the question was asked not on a matter of race but on a matter of the kids from better off families are the ones getting the better facilities and better access to coaching. It explains why the England team still has a higher percentage of players who had private education playing for them.

These privately educated kids have far better facilities and far better coaching. Also, the person asking the questions said that when youngsters go to counties for trials and days where the county team looks for new talent, the next stage in that process if someone is deemed good enough requires some form of payment from the parents. This means only the better off people get to go to the next stage on the whole.

The whole system needs a shake up (as we've all said before!) and not just on the question of race but on the question of poorer and working class children also. I was lucky in the 1970s in that my comprehensive school had very good cricket facilities and they took it seriously but i doubt it's the same now.
 
The cricketing facilities in my school were an absolute joke, a Middlesex comprehensive. We had maybe 4 sets of pads, some bat's & a few balls. The whole sorry lot lot look like they had seen action during the first Ashes series.
 
The cricketing facilities in my school were an absolute joke, a Middlesex comprehensive. We had maybe 4 sets of pads, some bat's & a few balls. The whole sorry lot lot look like they had seen action during the first Ashes series.

“Cricket” at my school tended to involve the PE teacher lobbing an underarm tennis ball at someone who would swing the bat agriculturally as hard as possible to hit the ball as far as possible out to a field of about 25 players. Kind of like a embryonic 20-20 I suppose.
 
As I've said several times, I was lucky to have been educated back in the '50s, when an 11+ pass meant an education at the local grammar school that my working class parents could not possibly have paid for.

Today it's an independent grammar school with £thousands fees each term.

Not only are the sports facilities second to none, but the 1st eleven cricket team have just returned from a tour of the Caribbean!

It's hardly surprising that these kids stand a much better chance of getting into the county side rather than those from the local comprehensive who just play other comprehensives in the area.
 
We’re going to be chasing a big score here if it carries on like this! 140 for 2 after 14 overs.
 
224 for 5 in the end.… some great batting from WI. We’ll need to be on top form to get close to this
 

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