England can play Patel AND Panesar

What's your views on the balance of the England side?   It's interesting to see that today, the majority of wickets fell to medium pacers, although of course that's not accounting for the "real" wickets as some that were out were given not out, and some that were not out were given out.

In retrospect I'd have picked Panesar, but I can see why England picked Bresnan given that the ball has been reverse swinging a lot in the warm up games.   The other factors to take into account is that just because England's top order look pretty inept against spin, doesn't mean that England's spinners will automatically take lots of wickets - the Indian batsmen are sadly far better at playing spin so Panesar won't necessarily run throgh them. And of course, Bresnan can bat and his batting could yet prove crucial if England are to pull off a miraculous escape on day 5.

 

Having picked the side they picked, what really disappointed me was the lack of bowling Cook gave Patel on day 1.   (Yes, I know it's not the done thing to criticise Cook, sorry!).   Patel and Swann have sometimes bowled together brilliantly for Nottinghamshire, and it would have been great to see them in tandem far more - Patel will bowl bad balls but he's proven he can also bowl some great ones.   He may be inferior to Panesar but he's still well worth a long bowl in those conditions.

 

Patel's in danger of losing his chance for England and I feel very sorry for him.   He's the right man for number 6 in India in my opinion (as he's a far better player of spin than Bairstow and Morgan) irrespective of his bowling.   But he's been unlucky on several counts - he's had some shocking LBW decisions (including one in the first innings in his favour when he should have been given), he's starting to get negative press purely because he's seen by some as keeping Panesar out of the side (compare his press with, for example Bairstow when he came into the side and the commentators raved about his classy 16 on debut), and of course Patel hasn't played a home Test yet. Readers of Cricket Burble may remember that it's been statistically proven you're less likely to succeed as a player if you make your debut away.

 

Assuming the wicket is much the same as this one for the next Test, I'd want Panesar in the side, but I wouldn't be dropping Patel.   My preference would be to drop Broad for Panesar (which means that Broad will now take 5 for because every time he's gone a few games without doing anything that seems to happen!), and England would then need to select between Anderson and Finn.   The alternative would be to bat Prior and Patel and 5 and 6 (who goes in first doesn't really matter to me but I'm not sure I agree with those wanting Prior up the order - given England's top order batting if he bats 5 he'll be in within a few overs which won't be helpful if he's been keeping for 5 sessions).   I'd like to keep Bresnan in the side in that scenario because he's an excellent reverse swing bowler, and of course he's the only bowler who tries to bat properly.

 

It will be interesting to see what happens if England can get through the first session tomorrow without a wicket falling - a huge ask, but if they could it may be an exciting Test match.   With Sehwag opening and the likes of Kohli, Yuvraj and Dhoni in the Indian side they can easily chase down 200 in a session, so it's crucial England are still batting at tea if they want to pull off a miracle draw.

 

Selection issues for England

 

Unusually for England over the last decade there doesn't seem to be much consistency in selection lately.   In Tests, Jonny Bairstow had the first chance of the summer before Ravi Bopara came in and when Bopara was unavailable for personal reasons, James Taylor was given a chance ahead of Nick Compton, who was also overlooked when Pietersen was left out with Bairstow preferred.   Now the Test touring squad for the winter includes neither Bopara or Taylor, but includes Bairstow and Compton...and Eoin Morgan who hadn't featured all summer.

 

Then in the Twenty20 they're all over the place.   The late selection of Luke Wright over Bopara at 3 has proved a huge success, but they continue to chop and change with Patel and Briggs, Bresnan and Dernbach, while also changing their keeper to Bairstow today.   Whatever happens in the rest of the tournament I find it hard to work out a circumstance in which Dernbach should be picked over Bresnan on merit.   And I felt Patel had every right to be annoyed, which he apparently was, when he was left out of the New Zealand match....Briggs then performed fine and was dropped for Patel today.

 

It's not brilliant tactical thinking...it's a muddled strategy and, although Twenty20 is to a certain extent a lottery, it would be a huge surprise if England qualify for the semi-finals, let alone get further than that.   If that leads to Broad's removal as captain then that would at least be one change that - in my opinion - would increase England's Twenty20 prospects moving forwards.   Anyone (else) who can keep a level-head under pressure would be good!

England miss Colly

I told you we'd miss Colly! Morgan a quality fielder so he seems the prime candidate to try to take up where Collingwood left off....

1st Test of the summer

Typically after weeks of sunshine it looks like it might rain today in Cardiff, but if it doesn't I think it will be a good contest. England playing at home go into it as favourites, but I expect Sri Lanka to play well. Maharoof probably playing strengthens their team I reckon.



For England Morgan can now cement his place in the team and all credit to him for claiming the one chance he had to make the team in the Lions match. I'm sure Bopara was lined up prior to that innings and would have made the team more balanced, but Morgan took his chance superbly. Let's hope he can show the same kind of form in the Tests.

With a bit of cloud cover I'm also hoping that James Anderson is back to his lethal best...fingers crossed!

Door opens for Morgan and Hussey

I previously questioned why squads had to be limited in number and said it wasn't good for the World Cup that Eoin Morgan and Mike Hussey wouldn't be gracing the latter stages of the tournament. Well, it seems fate has conspired to allow them both their chance and Hussey describes it as "a dream come true".

Morgan is getting his chance following Pietersen's withdrawal due to a hernia. Pietersen isn't everyone's cup of tea, but I think his withdrawal is a huge blow. His batting is good enough that in the latter stages of the tournament he would have had the capability to win the game single-handedly, as Adam Gilchrist did in the 2007 final. But on top of that, his bowling should always have been a key part of England's strategy in this World Cup and he's being replaced by a non-bowler. Pietersen's bowling was quality yesterday and he was extremely unlucky not to have wickets to add to his economy rate of 3.75 in 8 overs, particularly the missed stumping.

England's best team now is: Strauss, Bopara, Trott, Bell, Morgan, Prior, Collingwood, Bresnan, Swann, Broad, Anderson. And Bopara needs to bowl.

Irish cricket going in the right direction

It seems things are going well in Ireland with Connacht becoming the fifth provincial cricket union in the country. It's going to be overseen by President Jody Morgan, father of Eoin...I assume he has some credentials for the job over and above being Eion's father, although the piece doesn't mention them if he has!

And on top of that Ed Joyce has been cleared to play in the World Cup - great news for Ireland.

A little bit of cockiness can go a long way...

At the PCA player of the year awards Eoin Morgan won ODI player of the summer and when collecting his award was asked by Nasser Hussain "Are you as cool as you make out, or are there some butterflies going on within?"

Morgan's reply: "No, I'm as cool as I make out."

Nice!

Any thoughts on the use of the UDRS?

I see that Rudi Koertzen has called for the UDRS to be used in every Test and it seems that in the England v Pakistan Test they're using every piece of technology available finally. And they're showing the use of that technology at the ground which I suspect came about in an attempt to keep Test crowds high.

But it seems that it wasn't without the odd...."issue"....such as Eoin Morgan being "out" LBW to Shoaib Malik, the appeal being turned down, and Malik not being able to refer it as Pakistan were out of referrals, despite seeing the replay on the big screen before he bowled the next ball and knowing it was out. Of course, Morgan went on to play a stunning innings and score his first Test century.

Any thoughts from Cricket Burble readers out there on the success - or otherwise - of the UDRS today?

Jaguar and cricket

It's always good to see company's backing cricket so it's good to see Jaguar's involvement, although they perhaps need to think about the wording of press releases in this cynical age. They've signed up to be the "naming rights partner" for the premium hospitality lounge at Edgbaston over the next 3 years, for use by their premium Jaguar Club of which there are only 100 members.

They may need to rethink their press release copy though, if they want us to believe what the England captain is meant to have said about the Jaguar XJ having test driven it for the brand along with Alastair Cook and Eoin Morgan, while getting tips from Martin Brundle. Apparently he said:

“Taking the cars out today has been great fun and it was really useful to pick up a few tips from Martin and the boys. Professional cricketers do a lot of driving during the summer going from venue to venue, so after a hard day play it’s very reassuring to jump into a car as comfortable as the Jaguar XJ. It’s got everything I need: superb performance, a luxury interior, sleek design and with all that boot space, I can fit my cricket bag in without any problems too!”

Ignoring the typo (hard day play), I can just see the Jaguar client telling their PR agency that they want to get in some comments about the car's selling points, which sadly led to that completely unbelievable last sentence. Of course we know he didn't say any of it, but best to keep it at least vaguely sincere Jaguar, so that cricket fans think he could have said it!!

England rest players for Bangladesh Tests

I don't disagree with Andy Flower's stated aim of having fresh and fit players to compete for the Ashes come November, but I do disagree with when they're rested. There's no England Test match between 9th June - 28th July so that would seem like an ideal time to rest them if necessary.

I'd be particularly annoyed if I was Collingwood as he's 2 days off his 34th birthday and he hasn't got limitless Tests ahead of him like Broad should have. Not only does Collingwood miss out on another couple of caps v Bangladesh, but he misses out on the chance to make stacks of runs and up his career average, while instead (in all likelihood) watching Morgan get the runs he would have got which will raise questions about Collingwood's place in the team.

So good idea, but I disagree on the details of when the players are being rested. Rest who you like during Twenty20s and ODIs, but if home Tests aren't being played by 1st XIs then they really shouldn't be given the status of Tests.

Twitter Pressure

I know I'm meant to be a Twitter advocate because of my job as a digital marketer, but I stuggle with it as it's a blog with a very small limit on number of characters. Why wouldn't I just post a few words on this blog if I wanted to publish a very short post?

But I felt I had to for work purposes. So I registered on Twitter as Cricket Burble and then (of course) worked 70+ hour weeks and left the account completely dormant. That meant that I got various strange people trying to follow me while I did nothing, but all of a sudden the ECB have now decided to follow me on Twitter.

I'm not sure what to do now. I feel under pressure to talk very knowledgably about cricket in a rediculously small number of characters. "Great India v South Africa match - isn't test cricket brilliant" was my first thought. Then "Is Eion Morgan a Test player?" after today's performance. Perhaps "England will win the next Ashes" would be good. I don't know. I have in the end opted for a dignified silence. The ECB will have to wait for my prophetic offerings. Perhaps "We need less professional cricket teams in England" may get their attention?

Watch the IPL on YouTube

This article is a little out in terms of cricketing facts, suggesting that Swann and Trott will be playing in the 2010 IPL, but it also says that YouTube will show the IPL games.

Some of the England players didn't have a hope - Anthony McGrath for example!! - but interesting that only Eion Morgan made the grade.

If I have time I'll be watching YouTube....

The reverse reverse sweep

It seems that Eoin Morgan has caused a stir with the way he tried to revert back to a "normal" shot having set himself for a reverse sweep the other day - it's been termed a "reverse reverse sweep"! Anyone fancy trying it on Saturday?