Ashes 2017-2018

[Clint]

Anything to read into these spot fixing allegations? Appear to be serious. Assume that there must be English or Aussie players involved if true ????

 

[Clint]

Starc gets Cook. LBW. You beauty

 

[manlyfan76]

Can cook continue after this test?
Father time is calling him home me thinks.

 

[Chip and Chase]

Cook is like Punter when he gave up captaincy. Just going through the motions collecting a pay cheque

Bit of life in the old WACA too.

 

[manlyfan76]

New ball is looking good.

 

[Chip and Chase]

Bit of a collapse from the Poms there at the end after a good partnership to get them back in the game. Still 400 runs is above par for first innings so they should be happy with that - they will have to try hard to lose from here.

 

[manlyfan76]

2/164 and Peter overton is struggling
We have a game.

 

[Fluffy]

Very amusing hearing the commentators who have been bagging England mercilessly in every area now have a bit of nervousness in their voice as England get the target down to 200 with 7 in the bank !!! Smith looking extremely nervous out there at the moment

Can't believe all the rubbish Anderson has been copping so far this series prior to today, the guy has 500+ test wickets, so I'd say he can bowl a bit lol

Very amusing hearing the commentators who have been bagging England mercilessly in every area now have a bit of nervousness in their voice as England get the target down to 200 with 7 in the bank !!! Smith looking extremely nervous out there at the moment

Can't believe all the rubbish Anderson has been copping so far this series prior to today, the guy has 500+ test wickets, so I'd say he can bowl a bit lol

Very amusing hearing the commentators who have been bagging England mercilessly in every area now have a bit of nervousness in their voice as England get the target down to 200 with 7 in the bank !!! Smith looking extremely nervous out there at the moment

Can't believe all the rubbish Anderson has been copping so far this series prior to today, the guy has 500+ test wickets, so I'd say he can bowl a bit lol

Great bowler with the Duke at home, pretty average away. not uncommon but he would probably the worst for 400 wicket club

 

[Fluffy]

Smith just killing it again everyone getting starts.

4th highest average now (the 2 above him have 23 and 20 games) second fastest to 22 centuries, averaging 73 as captain.

 

[Kiwi Eagle]

Great bowler with the Duke at home, pretty average away. not uncommon but he would probably the worst for 400 wicket club

Fair, is a guy that can look innocuous when conditions aren't in his favour

 

[manlyfan76]

Anderson's 5 for seems a long way away.
I called a Smith double late yeasterday and its looking good at 173 not, just surviving an lbw from Jimmy's front foot.

 

[Chip and Chase]

Selectors looking like geniuses with the Mitch Marsh call.

How good is Smith ? 4 years in a row he has scored 1000+ test runs. He now has the second highest test average all time. Unorthodox but very very effective - eye like a dead fish. It's one hell of a purple patch.

 

[manlyfan76]

Selectors looking like geniuses with the Mitch Marsh call.

How good is Smith ? 4 years in a row he has scored 1000+ test runs. He now has the second highest test average all time. Unorthodox but very very effective - eye like a dead fish. It's one hell of a purple patch.

Ill admit i was not for Mitchell's selection, BUT he has batted well on this pitch.

We win the Ashes by lunch on day 5.

 

[manlyfan76]

And that's 4 hundreds for England, bowlers in this innings.

 

[Fluffy]

Fair, is a guy that can look innocuous when conditions aren't in his favour

Looked it up, Average in Aus is 37.88 so pretty poor over here. Not much better over your way 18@36 from 5 tests, I would have expected him to be good there.

Only place where he has been ok is the West Indies and UAE.

2/3 of his wickets are at home.

 

[Kiwi Eagle]

Looked it up, Average in Aus is 37.88 so pretty poor over here. Not much better over your way 18@36 from 5 tests, I would have expected him to be good there.

Only place where he has been ok is the West Indies and UAE.

2/3 of his wickets are at home.

His last tour here was interesting, Southee and Boult were swinging it around corners while the Poms couldn't move it off the straight and they weren't happy about it

Haven't watched much of this current test at all, it was on at the pub the other night so saw a ball or 2. Poms scoring 400 was about 250 short, the WACA pitch is a bit flat and boring these days, remember growing up in the 90s seeing Curtly hitting the huge cracks and it was great cricket to watch, having said that though high chance the Poms will fold and we get a result

Most of the Aussie pitches are way too flat these days and have lost much of the character that they used to have which made the cricket great viewing on all sorts of pitches

 

[Fluffy]

Agree - too much about trying to get all tests to be 5 days for the $$$.

Need to get back to a bit more character.

 

[manlyfan76]

Drop in pitches have dulled the matches somewhat. Nothing wrong with a pitch that is going to fall apart on day five. But they won't even have a green top on day one now even when they know days 2,3,4 will be a road to bat on. My worry is that while day night tests have been great, that due to the ball potentially swinging at night they will make the pitch flatter and flatter to avoid three day tests.

 

[Kiwi Eagle]

Our ones over here are all too flat now as well, although we seem to get results most of the time the spectacle isn't that great

Have always enjoyed test matches more when the 1st innings of each side are around 250-300 with the batsman working hard for their runs

The pink ball mentioned earlier, everyone enjoys those tests and they are normally good viewing because the bowlers have a chance

I absolutely despise the experiment being carried out with 4 day tests and I hope it is an absolute failure

 

[globaleagle]

rain rain go away!