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Post by Balladeer on Jul 18, 2019 15:14:51 GMT
Have I mentioned that I bloody hate Elysse Perry?
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Post by Balladeer on Jul 22, 2019 9:03:04 GMT
The WAshes is all but over, so here’s my team for the MAshes: The rest of my squad is Denly, and then Woakes/Wood/Moe/Broad as pretty much swapsies for the last four.
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Post by pierredelafranchesca on Jul 22, 2019 10:19:36 GMT
I thought hard about it, changed a few times and finally came up with this for the 1st test (assuming Archer is injured)
1 Roy (fine, give him a chance) 2 Burns 3 Bairstow 4 Root 5 Ballance (this will be 'popular' but frig it, he's making runs consistently year on year, give him a chance at 5) 6 Stokes 7 Buttler 8 Moeen (preferred to Leach as he has form in England) 9 Woakes 10 Anderson 11 Broad (yep 11. Like being sent to the naughty step, you will bat at 11 until you suck it up and start playing like the 8 you could have been)
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Post by waughandpeace on Jul 22, 2019 20:23:02 GMT
On Moeen, I was having a look at his stats, and he's got remarkable differences with Root and Cook as captain: Under Cook: Batting Avg 35, Bowling Avg 42 - batting allrounder Under Root: Batting Avg 23, Bowling Avg 29 - bowling allrounder In England, those averages are 38 with bat and 32 with ball - proper allrounder Against Australia, it's 28 with bat and 66 with ball - dropped allrounder
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Post by Balladeer on Jul 22, 2019 21:28:13 GMT
Argh don't do this to me. I made my choice but I love Moe so much... yeah go on then, put him back in so his beard can ruffle in the breeze. <3
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Post by Balladeer on Jul 24, 2019 10:41:47 GMT
We’ve all seen the Aus vs. Aus match where Aus bowled Aus out for 105 and now Aus is 120/9 in response, right? Tremendous stuff.
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Post by Balladeer on Jul 26, 2019 11:23:40 GMT
Ozzie squad:
Bancroft Harris Warner Khawaja Smith Labuschagne Head Wade Paine M. Marsh Starc Cummins Pattinson Siddle Neser Hazlewood Lyon
Good picks there, mixture of form and class. Possible weakness in the middle order. The seam attack will be interesting: Starc, Cummins, Pattinson?
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Post by pierredelafranchesca on Jul 26, 2019 11:41:41 GMT
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo I will be lost without Labuschange in my fantasy team. Sob.
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Post by pierredelafranchesca on Jul 27, 2019 10:29:26 GMT
Aaaaaaand mom jack leach is out of the squad, because of course he is.
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Post by waughandpeace on Jul 27, 2019 10:40:17 GMT
Dangerous game doing well as a nightwatchman, just ask Jason Gillespie
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Post by Balladeer on Jul 27, 2019 12:53:47 GMT
Foakes and Curran will know how he feels.
It is still utterly chuffing absurd that Foakes isn’t in the squad. Man of the Series in Sri Lanka if I recall correctly. In fact, I’m going to make a statement:
There is no circumstance in red ball cricket where Johnny Bairstow ought to be picked when Ben Foakes is not.
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Post by pierredelafranchesca on Jul 27, 2019 17:16:08 GMT
Bairstow is in the team on the back of form from 3 years ago and some decent odi performances.
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Post by pierredelafranchesca on Jul 27, 2019 20:35:22 GMT
Saw a stat earlier about Bairstow averaging around 28 since Jan last year in tests whilst they were chatting on the abandoned Essex match this eve, it really is surprising that more isn't being made about his form (maybe journo's are scared of his theatrics and tantrums.....).
There are some understandable mitigating factors, like being dicked around in the batting order (he is so not a 3), playing on a series of pitches where ball has been superior to the bat, but when you look at how the string of openers and no 3s have been treated and jettisoned on similar or even slightly better form it really does smack of favouritism.
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Post by waughandpeace on Jul 28, 2019 12:31:47 GMT
He's been playing tests for 8 years now, and actually only has one year (2016) where he averaged 35+, despite his career average of 36. He's another who has worse batting performances under Root's captaincy, averaging 29.8. Bairstow's last 4 tests in England have yielded 39 runs in 8 innings and 5 ducks.
He averages around 40 batting at 6 or 7, but has spent over a third of his innings out of place and performing worse. He also averages 40 as a keeper and 29 when not keeping. Buttler meanwhile averages 31 when keeping and 40 when not keeping. His higher averages come as a number 5 or 6 - so maybe something like 5 Buttler, 6 Stokes, 7 Bairstow (wk) would be best?
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Post by waughandpeace on Jul 28, 2019 12:43:18 GMT
Of course, if we go too far with stats we end up with Jimmy Anderson coming in at 7 (averages 27) and coming on as 5th bowler (averages 20) - and of course Leach opening! Could be a very funky England team
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