Ashes 2021-22.

[sussexpob]

The fact England are a shambles. They have taken three batting options to sub in, all of which have been dropped for being woeful in recent times. Lawrence has played 3 innings since his dropping. Bairstow no FC games. Zak Crawley got back in after 7 tests averaging 11 after a handful of games .... so what do we expect? If you drop players, you are saying they are either not good enough, not got form, or need work - none of these three options have played enough to build form or make changes to their games, so you are just basically accepting the same players who werent good enough are just magically going to get better, against in at least two cases, long established horrendous form.

Everything has been done wrongly. The Lions came to Australia, but have already gone home. Why the frigging hell was the point of that? You get them in reserve and send them home before the team is in dire need of a few batters who might show form? So Bairstow will probably play and may keep despite not playing any games, yet Foakes just scored 85 in a game and is now sat at home. Bracey just scored 118, also now sat at home.

When you look at the team:-

Burns has now been poor for a long time. And while he just averages over 30, how many dropped catches does he make? How many net runs when them drops are taken into account does he score? Because he makes so many drops, you at this point could probably get more of a net positive by playing a specialist slip fielder who barely bats, and it would be a positive trend on performance.

Hameed? Sorry, he looks all over the place. Two massive technical issues - doesnt get his front foot forward and is trapped on the crease before he gets set added to his obvious problems with his hands.

Stokes? Ben should be at home. He's had mental health issues, hasnt played, and looked like hes running on empty. Badly needed some cricket under his belt and some form.

Buttler - should be nowhere near the gloves, and his batting is hardly essential.

Pope - Totally shot. He's a player of talent, but his brain is scrambled eggs atm, and it seems the problems he has early in the innings are looking too problematic for him to become a long term viable performer. He just takes too long to set, and is a bunny until he does. Needs luck to get past the first 10-20 runs.

Woakes - In these conditions, he's useless. After last time out that was obvious to everyone .... well, apart from the England management.

Spinners - Of course, when finger spin got inevitably battered like it always does, we left our best wrist spinner at home and took another finger spinner instead - one that the team said wasnt good enough on our last tour. Makes sense, doesnt it.

[sussexpob]

Silverwood had the nerve to suggest the selection was right and he wouldnt change it. Well Wood, Anderson, Robinson all averaged under 30, and while Broad took 2/100 in the last test, his first couple of spells at Adelaide deserved so much more. Woakes and Stokes average 70/75 so far....

You really telling me if Wood, Anderson, Robinson and Broad had played in the first test like they should of, we wouldnt have done better? And why didnt they? What reason was there to rest players in a live series and save them? So we get them all together when the series is already almost dead? This is stupidity beyond comprehension, totally unacceptable on every level.

I wonder what Australia thought of that. I bet they loved it.... I bet they barely believed their luck. The opposition cant even be bothered to throw everything at them.

[sussexpob]

I guess we will get the same b*llocks as usual though. Root giving us the nonsense that all the team are up for it like never before. Stokes giving us the superhero nonsense that "we aint lost yet" when you are being crushed. Everyone saying the cliches, when its flat out obvious we look most of the time like we have turned up to our own executions.

I have to credit Australia, because in modern times they have always come into home series and show excellent intensity. You just get that extra level of effort and application from them when coming to OZ and playing, its combative and they create a tough environment to play... England's most experienced two bowlers werent even playing in the first game. What does that say about intensity and throwing down the gauntlet.

I can take losing. I can take losing badly even..... but this is all so half arsed, and its been like this for a long time. Nothing seems to ever have be done correctly with England. Its so frustrating to see the same failed recipe replicated so often.

Dont give me the nonsense the team are here to play and are up for it like never before..... the team are batting like they dont want to be there.

[Durhamfootman]

Silverwood had the nerve to suggest the selection was right and he wouldnt change it.

I saw that.... staggering really. It was really disappointing to read

Saying stuff like that suggests that bunker mentality has set in. 5-0 seems certain now.... or is that 14-0?

[Durhamfootman]

It's like a bowler on the wrong end of 6 sixes in the over (or 4 sixes in the final over). Once it starts, the bowler goes into a state of shock, his head scrambles and he ends up bowling the same ball over and over again which the batsmen gleefully despatches into the stand every time

Silverwood's response is the coaching equivalent of that, imo

[sussexpob]

Its just plain stupidity, isnt it?

Root is trying to make himself look better by suggesting the bowlers just ignored his demands, and the coach is trying to make himself look better by insisting he got selection right for a match that, at one point, his bloody best averaging seamer ended up bowling spin in desperately trying to exploit the conditions. If you got it so right not picking a spinner and Wood, then why did his replacement do terribly? And why did we use two batsman and a seamer to bowl?

In the end, it shows the ineptitude. Root basically said he has lost control of his team, and Silverwood made himself look mad. We have put 21 chances down in two tests apparently...... Silverwood decided not to take a fielding coach on this tour. I make no joke... he should be sacked on the spot because every decision he has made has been wrong. No one can do worse. Id pilot in Eoin Morgan to finish the job, at least he seems a competent cricketer and solid leader.

Silverwood just looks like a bloke they found down the pub and offered the job to. Totally out of his depth.

[Durhamfootman]

I haven't seen any of the matches, so I can't comment on the 21 number you give. I have read something which said England have dropped 12 chances compared to Australia's 5, but I suspect that Australia made England pay much more dearly for each of the dropped chances than England did for each of theirs

[sussexpob]

The 21 figure is from an independent article today...

[bigfluffylemon]

Couldn't agree more with everything that has been said here. When I said Buttler saved his career, I meant unfortunately in the eyes of the England team and management. Not me. I'd have Foakes in a heartbeat (I've said that for years, as have most of the rest of us). But that knock, pointless as it was, will be used as evidence for the rest of the series that he should be there.

We have noted for years there are massive structural problems in the English game, and until those get fixed and we start turning out batters who can put a price on their wicket and spinners who can at the very least control an end, this is going to continue. This is the coming home to roost of years of mismanagement. The terrible decisions happening on this tour are just a microcosm of that.

One can make excuses for covid, injury etc. but look at what happened to Australia - their two best bowlers just got sidelined, and the rest of the side, including the subs, continued to perform as if nothing had happened. So did India last year. Heck, England's white ball side manages to perform (I don't blame them too much for the T20 - sometimes in T20 you just get unlucky). The test side seems to fall apart at the slightest breath of wind. It was the same last time. England just looked shell-shocked. And they're dropping chances that village sides would take. Inexcusable.

The schedule doesn't help, to be sure, with five back-to-back tests and next to no warm-up time (and warm ups washed out). But again, that's mismanagement. If the ICC wants tours to be genuinely competitive, rather than insanely advantageous to the home side, they have to build time into the schedule. But that means fewer white ball games, and fewer tours overall. So ain't gonna happen. Long term cricket suffers for short term $. Where have we heard that before?

You do have to hand it to Australia. They make touring a nightmare. Nearly every side that comes here, no matter how high their hopes, gets torn apart mentally after the first couple of games. India and South Africa have been the only sides in the last few years able to absorb that pressure and put it back on Australia. And I doubt South Africa would get very far now without Steyn, Amla, de Villiers, du Plessis and Morkel.

England are going to end the year with a record of five series, four losses. P15 W4 D2 L9. For the amount of money and effort thrown at the game, that is simply unacceptable, before you even look at the manner of most of the defeats.

As a result, I can't remember having less interest in an Ashes series. Even in 2013 I watched to the bitter end (we actually had a chance in Melbourne, before Johnson happened again). Now I don't care. England are not only crap, they are no longer entertaining. Just a hot mess. Maybe if die-hard cricket fans like us are starting to switch off, the schedulers might take notice. But I doubt it.

[Arthur Crabtree]

We're starting to get overlapping series of Tests and limited overs so potentially that will free up a lot of time, if it becomes accepted that they put out separate squads. That is happening again in the summer. But clearly that time will not be used to extend first class fixtures in loss making tours.

It felt like the England side had similarly lost the public in the late nineties before Duncan Fletcher arrived. But it's difficult to imagine that there is now a first class structure in place to improve. You can't even reasonably pick the player topping the averages anymore, as the season is so fragmented and personnel so transitory.

Maybe things will look different if England win at home next summer. But I've got a slight suspicion that some of the top players will think of walking away from Tests before long. Much like has happened with WI and SA.

[Durhamfootman]

I doubt it too.

still.... there's always the Hundred

[Arthur Crabtree]

My interest took a fatal blow back in the Fletcher v KP wars. But if international cricket returned to terrestrial tv, I think could be drawn back in.

[alfie]

One unlikely possible idea : Buttler averages 5 points higher when he doesn't keep. For Bairstow this is reversed. Let YJB keep and bat at 7 ; Buttler concentrates on batting in his favourite (on figures) position of 6. I know they won't ; but the data suggests it would be worth a try.

Meaningless stat, because it follows the trend of Bairstow's career irrespective of whether he takes the gloves. Since 2019, he averages 18 with the gloves.... his averages with/without the gloves are different solely because he kept more in the only really standout year in his career....

He hasnt played a long format game since being dropped. His form in the T20 world cup was abysmal, he's been rubbish for years, and his keeping is also below standard.....

Case for reselection is unjustified on every single metric. Re-picking him would be a total lottery.... in fact, the chances of success are close to the odds of winning a lottery.

With respect , Sussex : you are rather missing my point. Buttler (who by the way , has I agree been overpraised for his brave but essentially too little too late application in the second innings) probably has a better chance of making runs when he is not burdened with the gloves : I imagine you'd agree he has been struggling behind the stumps in this series ?
The fact that Bairstow's record as keeper batsman is better than his overall is indeed partly down to a stellar period around 2016/17 : but it really isn't quite as simple as that. I would suggest his figures fell off a cliff largely because he was pushed up the order in the face of his own good form and the inability of the top order bats to perform...but it doesn't really matter. We aren't talking about him suddenly reproducing 2016 form but just hopefully doing a bit better than Pope : not a huge stretch at present.

We are not at present talking about some miraculous "best possible result" in rejigging the batting order. More the "best result possible" with the current underwhelming resources available. And I would contend that this switch would actually be at least as likely as any to get a (slightly better) result ; though it is of course your right to disagree.

Of course it really doesn't matter what any of us have to say on here as we have no influence on what actually is done by the management ! But I do sometimes feel that for all their shortcomings they could hardly do much worse than the host of armchair experts who have nothing to offer but relentless condemnation of everyone and everything in and around the team. Sometimes seems to be almost a football mentality of "sack 'em all" developing on here ; which while understandable in the face of continued disappointing results doesn't really offer any constructive ideas for addressing the problems...

(I am fine by the way with ideas for moving forward after this is all done and dusted : we will have plenty of time for that in the New Year. But at the moment the next game in Melbourne is all there is to worry about , no ?)

[yuppie]

Wouldn't it be easier for you English supporters to start supporting Australia? Save you a lot of angst and you can be happy again;)

Much easier talking about selection issues. A variety of bowlers to talk about and a successful spinner in the team. Occasionally some off field controversy to keep you entertained.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Does it mean I have to like Wee Davie and the Bleached Bradman?!