Third Test: England v India at Trent Bridge, 18-22 August.

[Arthur Crabtree]

I wonder if there wasn't a WC next year if he would be?

[bigfluffylemon]

I'll raise you

1
2
3
4. Root
5.
6. Foakes
7. Stokes*
8 Woakes (in England)
9
10. Broad
11. Anderson

[DiligentDefence]

My preferred England side.

1
2
3
4. Root
5.
6. Stokes*
7. Bairstow
8
9
10. Broad
11. Anderson

*Though in my opinion Stokes should be suspended.

I certainly agree that Root should be at 4. To me he has always looked better at 4. Sky's commentators often rattle on about having the best batsman at 3 but surely your best batsman should be where he produce his best scores.

[bigfluffylemon]

So, place your bets. How long will England last?

We all know how this goes. They all say the right things about 'showing character' and 'making them work for it', then they'll collectively collapse, the majority playing shots against balls they should have left alone. There might be one half-decent partnership along the way to get hopes up, but once that's broken, they'll collapse in a heap.

I think it's a foregone conclusion that they will fail to bat out the day. And surely not even England can lose 10 wickets in a session twice in a test match . So it's probably a question of whether or not they make it to tea.

[Dr Cricket]

Id say in this 96-00 period, it was generally acknowledged everywhere India had the best batting line up around, and sod all bowlers. Id put my mortgage on that point, everyone acknowledged it.

can't really argue with that since they did show signs of their quality at the time, but the batting order was very much like england now and very inconsistent, Away from home Dravid, Ganguly, Laxman etc were very inconsistent and as a group they did get blown away, but like I said I can't really argue with you since all of them did show signs of being a good batsman.
IE laxman scored a gem of an innings in Australia in 1998 or what ever year after being demolish 3-0 with no batsman standing up barring Tendulkar, Ganguly and Dravid did well in england.

Although it is generally been accepted in Indian cricket that 2001 the follow on test was the day that batting order clicked and it generally made sense considering that was the time when the batting group scored runs away from home consistently as well, started winning games in South africa, Australia and England during that time and the Test matches were more competitive because these players started scoring runs.

should be remembered from 1990-2000 india only won 1 Away test match and even lost to Zimbabwe in Zimbabwe.
even with Dravid, laxman, Ganguly etc they still got thumped badly.

[yuppie]

So, place your bets. How long will England last?

We all know how this goes. They all say the right things about 'showing character' and 'making them work for it', then they'll collectively collapse, the majority playing shots against balls they should have left alone. There might be one half-decent partnership along the way to get hopes up, but once that's broken, they'll collapse in a heap.

I think it's a foregone conclusion that they will fail to bat out the day. And surely not even England can lose 10 wickets in a session twice in a test match . So it's probably a question of whether or not they make it to tea.

I give them 75 overs today.

[yuppie]

Of Indias Fab 4, if i could watch one again bat on his day, it would be Laxman.

[Dr Cricket]

Pandya's bowling SR in the series is 25! In comparison, Anderson's is 39.

reading some of the papers and some of the sky commentators, think quite a few want pandya in the team now and admit he would be a good cricketer in the making.
india would be insane to drop him considering at the moment Pandya is in the same stage as Stokes in 2014 where it was obvious he got something about him with the bat and the ball.

not everyday you get a fast bowler that could bowl high 80s and someone that could bat in the top 7 as well.

Of course pandya needs to improve his bowling not great at the moment, he is more of a 5th seam option but he can work on that, plus his batting vulnerable to the moving ball but his someone that could play shots and frankly speaking he should get *modded* loads of runs in the 75% of the games India play, I really don't give a crap if he fails in few countries really, think the all round balance he provides is far better then him failing one or twice every 4 yrs really.

Remember Pandya learning everything in Test cricket, never got a century in First class cricket and only got 1 5fer in first class cricket.

[Dr Cricket]

plus the talk of him being a waste because he bats at 6 or 7 but doesn't really contribute with the ball doesn't really make sense either since he basically interchangeable with Ashwin.
Yes at the moment he is more of a 7.5 in the batting order and he definitely a 5th bowling option and probably won't bowl much but he clearly got the ability to get better at both aspect of the game.
But when you consider india team now in Asia it would be insane depth in Batting and bowling.
Dhawan, Rahul, Pujara, Kohli, Rahane, Pant, Pandya, Ashwin, Jadeja, Shami, Ishant.

Batting till 10 and 5 bowling options.

[yuppie]

Well 10 wickets in a session is on again.

[budgetmeansbudget]

Begger off back to Pontypandy.

[The Professor]

This will be all done by Tea I fear.

[yuppie]

This will be all done by Tea I fear.

Lunch?

[budgetmeansbudget]

Top five will be a mess going into the Rose bowl. Openers hopeless, Root in the worst form of his life and Pope a newbie.

I hope they leave Vincey alone, we need him more, and he'll only fail again as he'll be batting under massive pressure with the two useless openers getting out for sod all.

Go for Ian Bell.

[bigfluffylemon]

Bring back KP...