2nd Test: India v England at Visakhapatnam on Nov 17-21,

[Dr Cricket]

Lol anyone seen Boycott new article.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/cricket/2016 ... t-as-good/
"James Anderson and Stuart Broad are top class Test bowlers and have given these Indian batsmen plenty of problems even on slow surfaces. That should encourage England in the next three Tests knowing they can make inroads into the opposition batsmen.

Anderson and Broad have caused problems in this match taking nine wickets for 177 runs on a spinning pitch. They bowled with control, discipline and used their cutters cleverly. There has not been much movement but their line and length was so precise all the time. They did not give people easy balls to hit.

They caused problems every time they had the ball and their wickets cost them only 20 runs each. It has been marvellous seam bowling. If they were to take all 20 wickets India would be all out for 200 in each innings, that is how good Anderson and Broad are."

Think boycott missing the point they won't be able to take 20 wickets all the time since for one the new ball loses the effect and two the bowlers will get tired bowling the overs and I doubt Anderson and broad want to bowl at batsman when they are set.
for all the talk of Anderson and broad bowling well india only failed once because of the seam bowlers and they had a lead of 200 on a pitch starting to get difficult to bat on.
didn't see Anderson or broad do much in the first innings of both games so far, got wicket yes and kept it tight not enough to bowl india out cheaply though.

"India’s much vaunted spinners are not special on slow turning pitches. Ravi Ashwin is a good bowler but too many of our batsmen play back to his carrom ball, which goes straight on, expecting because he has a high action, that he will get bounce. It does not do that. It skids on like a top spinner but rarely bounces. Unusual maybe but after watching from the dressing room, plus seeing the video with backroom analysts, and facing him for a few balls, surely they have to be able to work it out."
he does realise ashwin just took 9 wickets cheaply right.

"Ravindra Jadeja and new boy Jayant Yadav are slow spinners who do not look penetrating on slow pitches. The reason for that is the slower someone bowls, the more time you have to watch the ball turn and adjust. "
wouldn't call both these slow considering Jadeja a quick spinner and Yadav beat Stokes on pace in the 2nd innings so both actually quite quick for spinners.

"Joe Root, Ben Stokes and Jonny Bairstow batted superbly and hardly looked in trouble in the first innings. Yes, they will admit they had to work so hard between defending and selective, careful, shot playing but they showed it can be done. "
he does realise england were 255 all out right.

"So going into the third Test we know England’s seamers are far better than India’s. India’s spinners are only marginally better than ours, they are very playable."
Would say both those statement are wrong considering Shami and yadav are a handful and in these condition the gap is probably closer than you think and not sure England spinners are really close to indian spinners.

"India’s batting depends so much on Kohli, Cheteshwar Pujara and Ashwin. Get them out cheaply twice and the rest look vulnerable. "
Clearly never seen Vijay, Rahane or Rahul bat then, surprised he mentioned Ashwin must be getting credit as an all rounder now in india and rest of the world.

must be one of the worst articles ever written by anyone.

[Dr Cricket]

Don't think you can take this innings into account, and I didn't think he was overly defensive in the second innings of the first test.

Sussex is a hard man to please!

The fact is, in the modern day there arent any batsman who have been successful with a SR under 40. And he has a strike rate of 38 in FC cricket. The last person to score over 4000 runs batting under a SR of 40 was Mike Atherton. And his record against the best teams of his age is poor (something like 1 century in 35 matches vs AUS, and 5 odd in 30 vs Windies). After that you are down to players who are probably long dead now. John Wright is there, but he was the only NZ batsman

Its good to have a rigidity to you, but there comes a point where world class bowlers will circle round you like a shark if you arent willing to score.

Nothing wrong with batting rigid, I like it, but if you arent putting away half volleys on a regular basis you are going to run into problems.

Surprising part about Atherton was his ratio of low scores got 20 ducks for england not that great considering he joins Anderson, Broad, panesar and harmison.
for someone that got the hype of being solid did fail a lot against WI and Aus then being a poor starter as well.
for a top batsman can only really think of Attapattu with scoring zeros.

[alfie]

Bit of a thrashing.

My changes:

Woakes for Broad
Batty for Ansari

Crazy. The batters fail, the bowlers get dropped.

You're keeping Duckett , then , Arthur ? I'm not over keen on the alternatives , to be honest ; but I'm wondering if allowing him to be (surely quite probably ) done over again might set him back alarmingly ...and only see him have to be replaced for the fourth match ? Could it be time to consider that an Asian tour might not have been the best place to introduce him to Test Cricket ?

I hasten to add that I hadn't seen him play prior to the Bangladesh series so do not know ; but he really hasn't looked too comfortable against spin bowling on subcontinental pitches ...Obviously he has talent , and has earned his place ; so I don't want to destroy him if he is potentially a number four in home conditions.

And more to the point : needing a win to get back in this series - he doesn't inspire confidence at the moment. Once again I do question the balance of this squad . Think there should have been another middle order batsman (assuming Duckett was the reserve opener). As it is we're looking at Ballance or Buttler

[Arthur Crabtree]

Feels a bit hasty to drop Duckett, though his T20-ready technique might not be up to the job. If they had an appealing alternative, it would be harder to be patient. After Mohali, it might be time to freshen up the squad with the players with the Lions squad.

With the final two Tests on grounds with big reputations for spin, Mohali does feel like a must win game. So it's understandable if England shelve long term planning and go for instant solutions though. I just saw a headline that seemed to be suggesting Mohali would be a pace bowlers dream! Which is more than fanciful. But it'll be the nearest they get to one on this tour.

Press are creating expectation there will be four seamers at Mohali. Presumably they are happy one of them will be Finn (who was only allowed 11 overs in Dhaka) or Ball (of whom the hype has cooled), as Broad doesn't sound like he's expecting to play.

I think Rashid is top wicket taker on either side, so that's an unexpected positive to take to the Punjab. And Mo is third highest. India have problems of their own which are not being fretted over having won so heavily. England can apply a little pressure back. If the tour ends up being a case of looking for positives in the context of a lost series, avoiding defeat in Mohali would at least show an ability to compete in slightly more neutral conditions.

[backfootpunch]

Duckett has to be pulled out of the firing line before irreparable damage is done

He clearly has a massive technical flaw and won't score runs in this series

Stick buttler at 7, move bairstow to 4/5 he's wasted at 7

Hameed
cook
root
moeen
bairstow
stokes
buttler
woakes
rashid
batty
anderson

Bairstow keeps the gloves for now

Having a walking wicket batting 4 means moeen is always coming to the crease under pressure on the back of two quick dismissals

[backfootpunch]

Feels a bit hasty to drop Duckett, though his T20-ready technique might not be up to the job. If they had an appealing alternative, it would be harder to be patient. After Mohali, it might be time to freshen up the squad with the players with the Lions squad.

With the final two Tests on grounds with big reputations for spin, Mohali does feel like a must win game. So it's understandable if England shelve long term planning and go for instant solutions though. I just saw a headline that seemed to be suggesting Mohali would be a pace bowlers dream! Which is more than fanciful. But it'll be the nearest they get to one on this tour.

Press are creating expectation there will be four seamers at Mohali. Presumably they are happy one of them will be Finn (who was only allowed 11 overs in Dhaka) or Ball (of whom the hype has cooled), as Broad doesn't sound like he's expecting to play.

I think Rashid is top wicket taker on either side, so that's an unexpected positive to take to the Punjab. And Mo is third highest. India have problems of their own which are not being fretted over having won so heavily. England can apply a little pressure back. If the tour ends up being a case of looking for positives in the context of a lost series, avoiding defeat in Mohali would at least show an ability to compete in slightly more neutral conditions.

Rashids bowling and Stokes batting are two big positives so far

If we can win a few more tosses we might even win a game

A 2-1 loss wold be a very good result for a side with quite a few players who are inexperienced in these conditions

[meninblue]

Duckett's stance, his footwork, how easily he gets tempted to play attacking strokes so frequently is a difficult challenge for him self in playing quality test innings.

[backfootpunch]

Duckett's stance, his footwork, how easily he gets tempted to play attacking strokes so frequently is a difficult challenge for him self in playing quality test innings.

He won't score runs against a half decent off spinner playing like he is

[Dr Cricket]

not sure they can bring anyone from the lions squad, since they will be in a middle of games and even if they did it would be harsh with the guys playing no meaningful cricket since the summer and it would be a clear sign england picked the wrong squad.
https://www.ecb.co.uk/news/138759
reading this the lions are still in england.
https://www.ecb.co.uk/news/138076
first game for lions is the 8th dec against Afghanistan, surprised the game not played in india, could have just played the game in Delhi where Afghanistan got a stadium in and BCCI can't do anything about it lol.
apart from that 3 poor odi games against UAE.
they left for UAE on 17 of November.
games on 1st dec, 3rd dec and 5th dec.

"Alsop (Hampshire), Bell-Drummond (Kent), Clarke (Worcestershire), S Curran (Surrey), T Curran (Surrey), Foakes (Surrey), Fuller (Middlesex), Gubbins (Middlesex), Jennings (Durham), Leach (Somerset), Livingstone (Lancashire), Meaker (Surrey), C Overton (Somerset), Rayner (Middlesex), Roland-Jones (Middlesex), Westley (Essex)

*Since the squad was selected in September, Jake Ball has been diverted to India with the senior England team, and Liam Dawson is playing in the Bangladesh Premier League."
from that squad can only imagine Curran brother, leach and Rayner being considered for a call up and even then the Curran brother are not needed since if they getting picked why pick Finn or ball in the first place.
not sure if any of the batsman should get called up unless england are suffering injuries, sadly buttler and the rest of the batsman will have to finish the tour even if anymore struggle with the bat.
the only bright point being india are being generous and produce fair wicket so batsman are scoring runs, Think many were expecting the worse 2 months ago with the wickets being unplayable for the english batsman so very unlikely any english batsman apart from Duckett having a stinker.

[Dr Cricket]

Doubt england would win a test with that Spin attack they would need Broad, Anderson, woakes to get wicket at a quick rate and bowl all day plus hope the ball reversing so they are threatening at all times.
hard to see how Rashid, Ansari, Ali and Batty will win a game in india.
hard to see them restricting India in first innings and then taking wickets in the 2nd innings to win games.
But yes would be very nice indeed if England win the tosses, would be good news for me and india can finally kill the myth they can't win batting second.

[Dr Cricket]

Anyway Telegraph reporting Broad misses mohali and Duckett dropped.
so england to make 3 changes.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/cricket/2016 ... d-injured/

also how convenient that Ansari had a back injury.

Cook confirmed Zafar Ansari was carrying a back injury which is why he did not bowl in the second innings but he too looks likely to follow Duckett out of the side with three changes likely for the third Test, which starts on Saturday.

more like Ansari was under the weather and Cook didn't trust him to bowl.
hard to see him playing for england again in this tour and actually hard to see him playing test again really not much of a batsman or a bowler.

[Arthur Crabtree]

England have already been thinking of calling up one of the Currans, apparently. Can't remember which. So it is possible changes could be made.

[backfootpunch]

Doubt england would win a test with that Spin attack they would need Broad, Anderson, woakes to get wicket at a quick rate and bowl all day plus hope the ball reversing so they are threatening at all times.
hard to see how Rashid, Ansari, Ali and Batty will win a game in india.
hard to see them restricting India in first innings and then taking wickets in the 2nd innings to win games.
But yes would be very nice indeed if England win the tosses, would be good news for me and india can finally kill the myth they can't win batting second.

On two pitches that haven't exactly ragged rashid has taken more wickets than ashwin

And he's been bowling to Indian batsmen not English ones

If shaun udal can bowl england to victory in india I don't see why rashid can't, he's bowled very well in the second innings of both games

If we win the toss we have a chance

Surely kohli can't score runs in every game

[Dr Cricket]

England have already been thinking of calling up one of the Currans, apparently. Can't remember which. So it is possible changes could be made.

Yeah sam curran but not sure why since he won't be playing and they said for experience.
So Curran get picked for a tour where he hardly got a chance of playing and doing well so they can see him in the nets but leach and Rayner don't get picked where they need the experience and the coached need to see them bowl in the nets in conditions suited to spin.
far better for england if leach and Rayner bowl the net overs than some awful crap 12 year old from india.

if England make any addition it should be to beef up the spin stocks and maybe an batsman if someone struggling badly or an injury scare happens but a fast bowler is the last thing they need with Woakes, Anderson, broad, Finn, ball available and they only playing 2 or 3 of them in a test so got 3 or 2 fast bowlers in the bench.
Why they need Curran there is crazy.

[Gingerfinch]

Duckett has to be pulled out of the firing line before irreparable damage is done

He clearly has a massive technical flaw and won't score runs in this series

Stick buttler at 7, move bairstow to 4/5 he's wasted at 7

Hameed
cook
root
moeen
bairstow
stokes
buttler
woakes
rashid
batty
anderson

Bairstow keeps the gloves for now

Having a walking wicket batting 4 means moeen is always coming to the crease under pressure on the back of two quick dismissals

Bringing a batsman to bat at seven behind the all-rounders doesn't sound quite right. If you're going to pick Buttler then he has to bat where the batsmen bat!