West Indies v England

[E10 Rifle]

Blimey, less than 24 hours before a Caribbean series starts and no thread dedicated to it yet. This tells its own story about the current state of both teams.

So let this be the thread. England will win, but perhaps not as easily as might be predicted. I can see a few frustrating failures to polish off their batting ahead...

[Tubby Isaacs]

West Indies v England

I agree with that. I liked the look of Brendon Nash against NZ. He looked like another tough nut to go with Chanderpaul and balance out the faster scorers. It's hard to see them taking wickets cheaply enough to win even if their batters do improve though.

Around till about 7 on Saturday (if the game lasts that long) but not really on Friday. Feel free to drop in if this in convenient.

[Duncan Gardner]

West Indies v England

Will the Windies have a spinner (other than Gayle)? Juggernaut or Benn? Or a fourth seamer?

[ursus arctos]

West Indies v England

There seems to be a real chance that Jaggernauth will get a chance.

I think I might prefer Juggernaut.

If things go poorly on the batting side, there may well be pressure to pick Lendl Simmons for one of the later tests.

[Tubby Isaacs]

West Indies v England

I like Benn's "big bird" style action. If I'm thinking of the right bowler, that is.

Talking of Windies spinners, ESPN classic are showing bits of the 1976 series at the moment. I had my first ever look at Jumadeen. He featured in the highlights mainly with bad balls, as is the way for bowlers, but was pretty steady. Still, Clive Lloyd clearly hadn't given up on spin completely after Trinidad because he was picked ahead of Wayne Daniel.

[Gangster Octopus]

West Indies v England

Strauss starts lucky, and England win the toss and will bat.

[ursus arctos]

West Indies v England

And Tubby will get his wish to see Mr. Benn.

I feel very badly for Richards, picked for his first cap at 31 and then gets hit on the foot just before the test.

[Duncan Gardner]

West Indies v England

Morning Richie, morning everyone.

Glad to hear Sir Geoffrey is on fine form as ever. He's just issued an edict that Panesar and Sidebottom aren't allowed any appeals referred to the camera umpire.

[ad hoc]

West Indies v England

I can't believe, of all people, ursus has fallen into the "feel badly" grammatical trap. I feel like the world is folding in on itself.

[ursus arctos]

West Indies v England

I still don't feel fully comfortable on cricket threads, and am more than capable of getting caught out.

Rather like Strauss, then.

[Eggchaser]

West Indies v England

Shah batting with a fucking eyepatch would have been a better option than gutless Bell. And a damn sight more rogueish, to boot.

Shithouse England are back! (Did they ever go away?)

[The Purple Cow]

West Indies v England

Oh I dunno, things are not so bad, the ball is turning pretty sharply, especially for yer man Benn.

When you've got two spinners operating together before lunch on day 1 of a Jamaican test, the world has truly turned upside down. It would suggest that this was a very good toss for England to win.

**

Back in the day, Windies groundsmen would spin their rollers on the track to get that hard, shiny, appearance that made the quick balls zoom through at shoulder height. The West Indies board discourages them from doing that these days, mores the pity.

[S. aureus]

West Indies v England

F**king BBC and their f**king can't listen to TMS outside the UK bulls**t.
Anyone know of a way round this?

[Greenlander]

West Indies v England

So you've hit 14 from the first three balls of the over, you've dragged your team out of a slow-bowling induced hole, you're now only three runs from an excellent century.

What shot do you choose?

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

West Indies v England

Pietersen's not been working up a Gillette marketing deal since losing the captaincy, by the looks of things. He's gone for the "out of work and haven't been bothered to shave for three weeks" look. Still, 90-odd is a hell of a knock, so fair play to him.

[Tubby Isaacs]

West Indies v England

A good fightback that. Benn was bowling really well. Even Flintoff, who judging by a couple of excellent leaves could pick him, was lucky to survive a couple of absolute rippers.

Maybe it was tiredness but Benn seemed to get much less out of the pitch later on. I hope the spin hasn't gone because pacewise it looks like a right shirtfront. Windies seemed to be resorting to full tosses late in the day to get the ball up the other end.

[Guest]

West Indies v England

S. aureus wrote:

F**king BBC and their f**king can't listen to TMS outside the UK bulls**t.
Anyone know of a way round this?

Longwave?

[A Doctor Speaks]

West Indies v England

S. aureus wrote:

F**king BBC and their f**king can't listen to TMS outside the UK bulls**t.
Anyone know of a way round this?

Try & get on a British-based proxy server;I'm no geek so don't know how easy?

Or look for another commentary?

[S. aureus]

West Indies v England

I'm no geek, either. I also don't have a longwave radio (unless there's some fancy way of accessing that by computer). Could I get a signal in the US?
Anyone know of another commentary that I can access through my computer?

I still think the BBC are pricks for restricting their broadcast like this, though.

[The Purple Cow]

West Indies v England

Completely agree, I really miss it. If I owned a decent quality conventional radio I could probably pick it up here in A'dam - but I don't.

[ad hoc]

West Indies v England

I presume it's something to do with buying or selling the broadcast rights in different markets. I've always assumed that's why you can't get the World Service over the Internet when they're doing live football commentary. Either the BBC haven't bought that bit of the rights off whoever sells them (ICC? ECB? WICB?), or they have but they are hoping to sell them on and nobody wants to buy them. (Or they've been sold to someone else in Australia, for example, and the BBC can't therefore broadcast them internationally).

But you're right it is fucking infuriating

[Guest]

West Indies v England

It's entirely to do with rights broadcasting. The BBC have the rights to broadcast within Britain, they don't have the right to broadcast abroad and have no remit to buy them for the rest of the world.

It's a bit harsh to call them pricks for that.

[Tubby Isaacs]

West Indies v England

S Aureus could have had a live link to our sitting room last night where he could have heard E10, YATR and I doing a politically correct "lads" version of TMS, except with more references to the 1979 World Cup Final.

[S. aureus]

West Indies v England

That sounds fun.
Maybe they're not pricks, then (the BBC, not Tubby and all).

[Guest]

West Indies v England

So maybe Tubby et al are?