The Ashes: Perth.

[Dr Cricket]

A crap cook is far better than no cook or the current openers england got.
Bhogle or manjreker made a good point couple of weeks ago regarding dhoni in white ball cricket and the same applies to cook.
Don’t judge them on their past record but on the replacements.
Can the new player average more than crap cook, the answer is a big no.
If the answer is yes than drop him, if no then keep up but be mindful he won’t be able to average what he did in his past and his likely to average less or fail more often.

Issue is their generally compare to their peak years or performances.
Cook is expected to score hundreds or average 50 plus because he did that before, but the problem is he not that player anymore, he still is England best opener, just not good enough to average 40 consistenly anymore.

[sussexpob]

The only people I see coming back from that list are Hameed. Cant see Duckett coming back after this incident, Robson went back and scored runs before and wasnt even mentioned, and Jennings should have got more time if they really thought he was something, but he didnt even get on this tour.

[bigfluffylemon]

Personally I think Robson was hard done by, first time around and in being overlooked for Australia, especially since he has experience on Australian wickets, given that he was born and learned his cricket in Sydney. He's probably among the better of the Strauss replacements that have been tried. I'd rather have had him at 3 than Vince, but he didn't do himself any favours with his late season form. Still, it is what it is.

There is little doubt that Hameed has an England future, it's probably a question of when, not if.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Cook is a long way off getting dropped. But he might retire soon. He hasn't sounded committed to carrying on for over a year now.

Best England openers in my time were Gooch and Boycott. They were certainly better bad pitch openers than Cook. Cook has the best record in Asia though.

Vaughan would be in the discussion. For three years he was the most brilliant England bat I've ever seen. And easily the most artistic.

My cricket mate's got Tresco in his team though.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Personally I think Robson was hard done by, first time around and in being overlooked for Australia, especially since he has experience on Australian wickets, given that he was born and learned his cricket in Sydney. He's probably among the better of the Strauss replacements that have been tried. I'd rather have had him at 3 than Vince, but he didn't do himself any favours with his late season form. Still, it is what it is.

There is little doubt that Hameed has an England future, it's probably a question of when, not if.

It feels like there would have been more merit in slotting a CC opener into the Ashes side at three, rather than Vince. Vince feels like a weird choice, particularly given his county form since being dropped. Surely more of a one day player.

[sussexpob]

Personally I think Robson was hard done by, first time around and in being overlooked for Australia, especially since he has experience on Australian wickets, given that he was born and learned his cricket in Sydney. He's probably among the better of the Strauss replacements that have been tried. I'd rather have had him at 3 than Vince, but he didn't do himself any favours with his late season form. Still, it is what it is.

There is little doubt that Hameed has an England future, it's probably a question of when, not if.

I wouldnt have dropped him to begin with, like Compton before, and hed be in my team for this series..... but its apparent to me they dont want to go back to him

[KipperJohn]

and he's only 33... could have 4 or 5 years in him yet and break pretty much every batting record going

Bell was about the same age when he was dropped after his overall Test average fell from 46+ to 42. He is still joint 3rd in the number of Test centuries scored with 22 and is not far short of 8,000 Test runs.

Apart from Root and perhaps Bairstow I doubt if any of the current squad will pass that, and many will say, perhaps rightly, that Bell never really fulfilled his talent.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Still a bit of a mystery what happened to Bell. After an obvious peak in 2013, he faded away.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Cook might well be the best opener to play in Asia but not from Asia. Though playing a significant number of games in Asia is a fairly modern phenomenon.

According to stats, he's the obvious pick, with Haydos.

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine ... pe=batting

[Arthur Crabtree]

Still a bit of a mystery what happened to Bell. After an obvious peak in 2013, he faded away.

And it still seems like he's had nothing to say about that most turbulent time.

[Dr Cricket]

That probably because of India becoming a major team in the last 20 years.
Athers only played one test in Asia or something like that.
England never toured pak in the 90s and only had one tour of india in the 90.
Believe it was a 9 yr gap between India tours in the 93 and 2001.
India vs England didn’t really become a main test fixture till 2011 either before that test were 2-3 test in lengths.
With India being a major team now, teams will play more often in Asia now.

[bigfluffylemon]

Still a bit of a mystery what happened to Bell. After an obvious peak in 2013, he faded away.

Many England players do - drift out of the side through a combination of declining form or increasing injury problems, or both, while never being formally ruled out. Then one day there is a headline that 'XXX retires from international cricket', and you wonder what the heck happened to the player, and why he hasn't really been picked for the last year or so.

[yuppie]

Still a bit of a mystery what happened to Bell. After an obvious peak in 2013, he faded away.

Many England players do - drift out of the side through a combination of declining form or increasing injury problems, or both, while never being formally ruled out. Then one day there is a headline that 'XXX retires from international cricket', and you wonder what the heck happened to the player, and why he hasn't really been picked for the last year or so.

Has bell officially retired from international cricket?

[Arthur Crabtree]

England unchanged, but JB will bat at six.

[sussexpob]

Still a bit of a mystery what happened to Bell. After an obvious peak in 2013, he faded away.

Many England players do - drift out of the side through a combination of declining form or increasing injury problems, or both, while never being formally ruled out. Then one day there is a headline that 'XXX retires from international cricket', and you wonder what the heck happened to the player, and why he hasn't really been picked for the last year or so.

Has bell officially retired from international cricket?

Quite the opposite foe tests, he's been vocal.about wanting to get back in, but he did retire from odi.