England A in South Africa 2015.

[backfootpunch]

if there form continues during the world cup i would think replacing morgan and bopara with billings and stokes would be a good idea

unless he has a brilliant world cup ravi should never play for england again, he has played 90 more ODIs than he should have given how little he contributes

[rich1uk]

if there form continues during the world cup i would think replacing morgan and bopara with billings and stokes would be a good idea

and again we are in agreement

morgan is a bit all or nothing atm , either makes a big score or out first ball, or so it feels any way

a top 7 of bell, moeen, taylor, root, stokes, buttler, billings looks quite exciting , maybe even with roy replacing bell if they don't think he is going to be around for the following WC

[Arthur Crabtree]

Mark Robinson is named as the Lions coach.

[Arthur Crabtree]

if there form continues during the world cup i would think replacing morgan and bopara with billings and stokes would be a good idea

and again we are in agreement

morgan is a bit all or nothing atm , either makes a big score or out first ball, or so it feels any way

a top 7 of bell, moeen, taylor, root, stokes, buttler, billings looks quite exciting , maybe even with roy replacing bell if they don't think he is going to be around for the following WC

+ Hales, + Ballance.

Bell will be 37 for the next WC. So not too old. Whether he carries on depends on what sort of WC he has I think. Maybe England will move on a generation.

[KipperJohn]

The Bopara situation does seem a bit odd if he's not going to bowl. I'm not in favour of moving batsmen around at this stage eg Ali to 6 with Hales opening perhaps which I've seen suggested elsewhere.

I'd rather see Ballance come in - good player, very calm under pressure and would bolster a rather fragile batting unit.

Not sure if this is the right thread as it emanates from Stokes' performance.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Bopara might bowl. But the pitches at Perth and Brisbane were seen as pace friendly. I think England thought they could take wickets, rather than just slow down the damage. Wrongly.

[rich1uk]

The Bopara situation does seem a bit odd if he's not going to bowl. I'm not in favour of moving batsmen around at this stage eg Ali to 6 with Hales opening perhaps which I've seen suggested elsewhere.

I'd rather see Ballance come in - good player, very calm under pressure and would bolster a rather fragile batting unit.

Not sure if this is the right thread as it emanates from Stokes' performance.

my problem with ballance replacing bopara is we end up with three quite samey players with him, root and taylor

his list A record was predominantly as lower order hitter but he seems to have changed his game a bit to adapt to playing at #3 in tests and at times looked very limited in his shot selections, played very much within himself and was quite disciplined, and that worked exceptionally well for him and us in tests, but not sure that's what we need in the ODI side

[hopeforthebest]

I think Ravi is in a bad place as his body language shows. When he's in the game bowling and batting OK he has that West Indies swagger and that is not currently visible .

[Aidan11]

Is Flower there. I didn't think he was named among the coaches.

[Making_Splinters]

Huge innings from Stokes today and what a suprise it came batting not at the bottom of the order. Will England take note? Probably not.

As far as Ravi goes, he's yet again being under bowled. If he's in the team as an all rounder he should be bowling a decent number of overs every game.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Ravi always looks like he lacks confidence behind the unconvincing swagger.

The Guardian series review said he is a genius fielder. Which he certainly isn't.

It also said Hales should open as he 'couldn't do any worse' than Moeen! I felt he should have added FACT!

[Making_Splinters]

Ravi always looks like he lacks confidence behind the unconvincing swagger.

The Guardian series review said he is a genius fielder. Which he certainly isn't.

It also said Hales should open as he 'couldn't do any worse' than Moeen! I felt he should have added FACT!

As noted on the other thread, Ali isn't a player who you should be expecting to nail every single innings. He's a pinch hitter, someone who will smash the bowling all over the park every couple of innings.

Hales and Bell doesn't strike me as a good partnership. Hales is a player who needs an agressive opener down at the other end to put the pressure on while he gets his eye in.

[rich1uk]

As far as Ravi goes, he's yet again being under bowled. If he's in the team as an all rounder he should be bowling a decent number of overs every game.

I don't agree with that tbh

you don't bowl him just for the sake of justifying his selection , you bowl him if you think he is going to do better than one of your other options

to me he is getting picked atm as insurance as a 6th bowler and nothing more

[Making_Splinters]

As far as Ravi goes, he's yet again being under bowled. If he's in the team as an all rounder he should be bowling a decent number of overs every game.

I don't agree with that tbh

you don't bowl him just for the sake of justifying his selection , you bowl him if you think he is going to do better than one of your other options

to me he is getting picked atm as insurance as a 6th bowler and nothing more

We've seen over the years that Ravi bowls well when he is given the role of bowling every game. Another thing that England captains seem to never learn.

[Arthur Crabtree]

The risk with Ravi bowling in the middle overs without the likelihood of getting anyone out is that he just facilitates the oppositions progress to the point where they want to kick on in the last fifteen. He goes at five an over, when that's exactly what the opposition wants. It just looks better than it is when compared with the poor sods who had to bowl at the death against batters who are set.