The Ashes

[Leyton Gooner]

The England players seemed to take it well. I'd have been fucking livid!

[northbank123]

Absolute farce of an ending. I actually have sympathy with the umpires - it seemed to me like they were desperate to finish the game and weren't going to consult but once Clarke started time-wasting and then badgering them to check the light every ball there was nothing they could do. If they had refused to check the light you can bet Clarke or Lehmann would have come out and slammed them for circumventing the rules to engineer a result (along with the Aussie press) - and they'd be right. It was frustrating to see Clarke doing that because he's won many admirers with his adventurous captaincy and declarations, but you can't pretend England wouldn't have been doing the same if they were 8 or 9 wickets down.

There's no perfect solution and with light decisions there are always going to be judgement calls that favour one side and theatrics from batsman/fielders squinting, waving arms etc. But the rules previously gave the umpires leeway to make calls like Karachi etc based on common sense, entertainment and overall fairness and you have to give the umpires that discretion and trust them to make the right decision.

[Swifty]

Time to reignite this thread don't you think lads? get it - reignite the ashes.....

Anyways you lot are 8 for 91 as I type.....................bwahhahahahaha

[corkbarry]

Time to reignite this thread don't you think lads? get it - reignite the ashes.....

Anyways you lot are 8 for 91 as I type.....................bwahhahahahaha

Poor batting for Englands first innings, gutless wonders on the Day

[northbank123]

Apparently it's the 5th time on the bounce England have scored less than 200 in the first Test of an away series. Some great spells from the Aussie pacers but England were dire. Cook and Trott both owe England a few scores and they both succumbed to the same dismissals as the summer: Cook tentatively pushing at the ball across him and Trott uncomfortable with the slightly shorter ball. Carberry dug in until he got bogged down and worked over and Pietersen was unlucky to pick out the fielder but then Bell and Prior's dismissals were dreadful and Root's was loose.

It's like a throwback to the old days to see England 200 runs down with a part-time spinner toiling away on a second-day road of a Test wicket. A convincing Aussie victory will probably set the series up better for the neutral than the bore draw this pitch might have produced but if England had put 450+ on the board after bowling them out for less than 300 their foot would firmly have been on Aussie throats following on from the summer. As it is the likes of Warner and Watson can play expansive cricket without inhibition and Clarke will be spared the immense pressure he would otherwise be.

I enjoyed watching the first session on Weds night and caught the last half-hour in the morning but definitely regretting getting up a bit earlier this morning hoping to see England cruising into a lead!!! This Test is surely gone but there's a hell of a lot of cricket to be played.

[OneBardGooner]

Cricket Schmiket

[LDB]

Something is not right with our preparations. I know we suffered with rain in our warm up games this time around but it's not just this series, our recent record in opening test matches is shocking.

[corkbarry]

Mummy,those Australian Bounders are bowling very Quick,can we go home now!

[northbank123]

Pathetic. Our fate was sealed on the second day but Warner and Clarke going on to add centuries was another kick in the teeth. The immense pressure has been lifted off Clarke's shoulders now and Warner is a massive confidence player, the impact going into the rest of the series could be massive.

Hopefully Cook and at least one of the middle-order batsman will get big scores so that we can at least take some positives from this game. England can't keep batting like twats and relying on one batsman to score a few hundreds like in recent series, because the pitches will all be fairly similar to this and they can't expect 3 seamers to toil away for days on a flat wicket while Swann gets carted round on a pitch offering no turn to bail out under-par scores.

Anyway, confidence or not Australia are still a very average team - Rogers, Smith and Bailey are not good enough to be international top 6 batsmen, Watson should not be batting that far up the order and their only spinning option is cack. England need to make monumental improvements but they've easily got the capacity to dominate the rest of this series. Trott looks woeful at the moment but Cook, Pietersen, Bell, Prior, Anderson and Broad have all showed that they can perform at high levels throughout a Test series, I don't think Australia have that.

[g88ner]

39-2 - not over yet

Not sure it's worth pulling an all nighter for though

[northbank123]

39-2 - not over yet

Not sure it's worth pulling an all nighter for though

Probably not

Have to start batting properly again - goes without saying really when you struggle to make 300 in two innings on a road of a Test match track. The bowlers were tremendous in the first innings but then giving them barely any rest and asking them to bowl Australia out cheaply again when the pressure was off the batsmen and they have the destructiveness of Watson and Warner and the class of Clarke at the top of the order was ridiculous. As well as being a recipe for a heavy series defeat, you're just asking for Anderson or Broad to break down with a three-man seam attack in those conditions.

[LDB]

Shit decision to play Tremlett ahead of Finn by the way. We needed some fucking pace on that pitch so obviously we dont pick our fastest bowler

[northbank123]

Shit decision to play Tremlett ahead of Finn by the way. We needed some fucking pace on that pitch so obviously we dont pick our fastest bowler

I would have also picked Finn but in fairness England bowled Australia out for about 150 under par in the first innings and even in the second didn't do too badly considering they had no rest and were bowling on a 2nd/3rd day road with no assistance from Swann.

[LDB]

Shit decision to play Tremlett ahead of Finn by the way. We needed some fucking pace on that pitch so obviously we dont pick our fastest bowler

I would have also picked Finn but in fairness England bowled Australia out for about 150 under par in the first innings and even in the second didn't do too badly considering they had no rest and were bowling on a 2nd/3rd day road with no assistance from Swann.

Who can say what a par score is when you've got two average batting sides and two decent bowling attacks? You definitely can't make that call after only one team had batted on it. Obviously the batsmen should take 95% of the blame for that non-showing but the coach/selectors had a real brain fart picking Tremlett who didn't look anywhere near fit enough to cope in a three man pace attack and carried virtually no wicket-taking threat. There was no swing so Anderson looked ordinary, there was nothing for Swann which left Broad as our only likely wicket taker while Australia had Harris and Johnson who were real threats with Siddle holding down an end.

[SteveO 35]

What an absolute fucking disaster - that was the cricketing equivalent of the Spuds roll over and die at the Etihad today