To telling only lies.
I can’t believe the bull coming out of the England camp following the meek, piss poor, handing over of the Ashes this morning, especially from captain & coach.
I don’t think we were ill-prepared at all captain Andrew Flintoff
We believe we were in the best possible shape before the tour.
As for selection, it’s always judged in hindsight. coach Duncan Fletcher
Riiight, well prepared and in the best shape possible, yeah that’s right, Harmison looked so well prepared in the first two games didn’t he and it was obvious at all that he finally found his rhythm three tests in and those who hadn’t played for a year, Giles & Anderson were well in form and at their peak.
Yeah those couple of hardly bother warm up matches really did the job of getting them ready for the tests, that’s when they could be bothered turning up unlike Harmison. Ah there wasn’t enough time to fit more matches in as the players had to go home after the ICC Trophy in India for a week with their families.
Oh poor didums having to spend a week away from their families, it’s not as if they wouldn’t be seeing them soon as they’re out in Australia now. Quite frankly the ICC Tin Pot Trophy should have been given the elbow, it’s meaningless waste of time and effort I’d rather we still had the Ashes than that or the World Cup. They should have been over in Australia well before, getting some good hard games in against state sides who would give them a test and enable those that need to work into form the chance.
Selection done after the fact, that’ll be Monty & Read v Giles & Jones then hm I don’t think there was much 20/20 hindsight used with this nearly everyone said Monty should play and everyone was bloody well right. But no Fletch has his mates and Ashley is certainly one of them and that’s why he was there as there’s no other reason for a player getting in after a year of not playing replacing a guy who has shown to be a far better bowler. Ah but Giles bats better, did he? No, Monty has shown he can be quite handy with the bat. Fletcher is obsessed with bowlers being able to bat like a one day team, ironic as the one day teams under him have been crap, not understanding it doesn’t matter how many runs you make if you can’t get 20 wickets.
Jones and Read, again Read was the man in possession and had done nothing wrong in the previous tests this year to be removed from the starting XI. Will Jones be dropped even now after another failure with the bat, after all his batting is why he’s in there in the first place.
The other choice that was obvious before it went wrong was Flintoff as captain, just what we needed with a half injured out of form team our best player, the best all rounder in the game hampered by the captaincy. It was no coincidence that his form with the bat has been rotten and to be honest his bowling wasn’t what it can be, it’s also no coincidence that Strauss’ form wasn’t what it was. Strauss played far better more sensible innings when running things, it concentrated his mind it over took Freddie’s. For all Fletch’s going on about needing the wicket keeper and number 8 to bat we went in without our number 6 batsman.
This isn’t a great Australian team, they know how to get the likes of Langer, Hayden, Ponting, Gilchrist out early and they’ve shown even on this tour that they can play Warne & co. See off McGrath’s early spell then he doesn’t appear for the rest of the day, Brett Lee did he actually get an English batsman out or were they all bad shots to bad balls, Clark looks not bad but if he was that great he would have been in before now to replace Gillespie and Kasprowicz.
They could and should have retained the Ashes the fact they didn’t is down to Graveney, who I heard being described quite aptly as the Geoff Hoon of English cricket today and Duncan Fletcher who instead of coming out with the usual line in bullshit should be honest about what’s gone wrong but as they aren’t, they’re trying to take us for idiots and for that…I Blame You.
All seems fair enough and well-put.
This Aussie team has done what it needed to do, and done it ruthlessly. Unfortunately, they’ve added Hussey, who on current form and averages is pretty much monstrous to face.
Hopefully the utter fiasco this tour has become will lead to the utterly necessary decisions now actually being made – Jones’ time is up (though, who knows, he may remain on the selection committee, wonderful stuff… 🙁 ), Monty picked automatically and maybe pushed up a place in the batting order… and no more sloppiness in preparations, in persisting with too many too-obviously-unfit players, arranging enough warm-up games (and then actually batting in one or two of them, Freddie), picking bowlers you’re actually likely to want to use when out on the pitch… and, well, everything else we haven’t done this time out…
For an amazingly long time, I was able to listen to the XTC song “In Another Life”, when Andy Partridge is listing unlikely events like pigs flying, “when beer tastes good in tins” and “Test matches we might win”, and scoffing at him, aware of how things had changed…
Well, maybe they’ve changed back again.
Nah, there’s enough top quality in this squad, Pieterson, Bell, Panesar, Harmison (hopefully) and Freddie of course… And Cook can only become better in such circumstances.
But, oh, it hurts…
I think being replaced by Nixon might have just done for Jones’ time in the England set up.
At least they didn’t call up Foster so he can sit on his arse and watch them lose the one-dayers, far better learning out there playing club cricket as he’s doing.
Think Broad’s son will be a good choice sooner rather than later.