I'm not expecting to hunt out the highlights tomorrow...
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Ashes to Ashes
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I should say I had a great day at Edgbaston on Saturday, which seems a very long time ago now. I've been running around too much since to post about it. The ground is very pleasingly seventies looking ( especially as I was sitting in the South Stand, the most modern one, so couldn't see it) with the crowd pretty close to the action. Very little space around it and every break between session was chaos, even compared to The Oval.
It was a pretty eventful day to see ; seven wickets going down, England building a lead, Australia's openers going cheaply then Smith starting another astounding innings aided by Kawaja and Head. I did ponder going back yesterday but had other plans and it would have been an organisational nightmare. Would have been nice to see the rest of Smith's innings but I think I saw the livelier day overall.
The famed Hollies Stand wasn't exactly raucous and intimidating, perhaps because Australia got on top during the game and the crowd's atmosphere followed England's performance rather than inspired it. I'll admit a couple of the fancy dress group get-ups were amusing but having a stag party that tends towards the boorish going on for eight hours at a sporting event leaves me cold. I'm still mystified by TMS's constant talking up of and commentary on the "Barmy Army" during a day's play too.
Don't think I'll see another day of The Ashes until the Sunday of the last test now, will be fascinating to see how it develops before then.Last edited by Ray de Galles; 05-08-2019, 12:14.
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Ah, he did get it - that was worrying me ;
Which reminds me, what was the gold sun-like logo on the Aussie's collars?
Last edited by Ray de Galles; 05-08-2019, 15:07.
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England woeful. Australia has Langer, Ponting and Waugh (S) burying egos to assist their team. England has an Australian coach who was hired to win the world cup and is now counting down the days to the end of his contract. Not getting Smith out is understandable. Allowing Siddle and Lyon to hang around so long isn't. Why is Foakes not in the side? Bairstow has been mince for quite a while in test cricket.
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England have had long-standing problems with their Test batting for a while, which flattering wins over South Africa and India in recent home summers concealed. The only new batsman in the side over the past three years who's really looked as if he had the right stuff was Hameed in India, but his career's stalled horribly since.
On a more general point, are there any teams in world cricket that currently have a better Test team than white-ball team? SA maybe? Beyond that, it's hard not to conclude that this is a worryingly un-vintage era for the Test game.
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There have been some worryingly frank interviews with Lancashire Director of Cricket Paul Allott about Hameed, where he actually says things like he is hanging by his fingertips at the county, and his form is a complete and utter mystery. I wonder what place Hameed is in psychologically, especially with your boss saying that kind of stuff.
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Time to turn to the real issue of this test, the squad numbers. I'm not necessarily against the idea but the execution of it is really haphazard. The two very differing fonts that England and Australia used was really annoying (though I didn't mind that they were differing colours, matching the caps) and the failure to put numbers on the back of the jumpers too was very silly.
One other issue is that, given that the players largely seem to have carried on their numbers from white ball cricket, we have a lot of seemingly random high numbers; Smith's 49, Warner's 31 (as ugly in cricket as it is for an outfield player in football*), Stokes' 55 and Bairstow's 51. Again, I'm not necessarily against this but I'd like to see it made compulsory that we get a short paragraph from the player explaining their choice of number. Not necessary for players like Root obviously but most of the choices seem cryptic and opaque.
I'm surprised that opening batsmen don't routinely choose the 1 shirt (especially with English ones as they seem to be drafted straight in to the side in that position rather than work their way up the order) or players like Smith and Root don't stamp their position with a 4 shirt. Though clearly that policy would lose it's cachet once you get to 9-11.
* I'm forced to ponder if I'd find 31 acceptable for a wicket-keeper as I do with goalkeepers and I think I would.Last edited by Ray de Galles; 06-08-2019, 10:07.
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Did they have the players numbers on the scorebaords, as opposed to the number in the batting line up? If not I can't really see the point as it doesn't help with player identification. As Ray says not having them on jumpers is one issue, but another is that often you only see a player from the front when they're fielding. For obvious reasons inumbers are unnecessary when a team is batting.
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On styles, given that England are outfitted by New Balance and Australia by Asics, I would find it strange if the style was identical. I don't think it should be a matter for ICC diktat.
I like the idea of players explaining their choice of number, though I am also inclined to think that numbers should be the same across all formats.
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