England v West Indies 2017

With the benefit of hindsight it seems England's declaration last night was a little too generous.

West Indies win by 5 wickets.

After the defeat in bangladesh i did not think the team could sink any lower but then they go and lose to the worst west indian team ever to play the game, an appalling fielding display and a shocking bowling performance has brought a new level of shame to english cricket.

There is no excuse for losing to that load of rubbish masquerading as a cricket team, it was an incompetent, inept and gutless performance. Not one of the windies players rates more than 5 out of 10 and thats being generous, none of them would get in the england team.

Roland Jones 14 wickets in 3 games ... including Amla 3 times .... and dropped from team.

It was a great test match and well done to the West Indies for bouncing back so emphatically after what happened in the first match.

(29-08-2017 19:45 )lancealot790 Wrote:  There is no excuse for losing to that load of rubbish masquerading as a cricket team, it was an incompetent, inept and gutless performance. Not one of the windies players rates more than 5 out of 10 and thats being generous, none of them would get in the england team.

I think Kraigg Brathwaite would as Cook's opening partner and that's not just based on this particular test match. Stoneman's unproven still having only played 2 tests. Brathwaite's got 6 test hundreds to his name including a century v NZ (against Boult and Southee), a double hundred (admittedly at home v Bangladesh), 106 against SA, in SA facing Steyn, Philander, Morne Morkel and Imran Tahir and an unbeaten 142 v Pakistan with Yasir Shah and Mohammad Amir bowling. All that and he's still only 24 years old.
I take your point pretty much about the rest of the team with maybe the exception of Shai Hope. It'll be interesting to see how Malan and Westley's (if his has anywhere to progress to) test careers progress compared to Hope's.
Overall though, with you 100% about losing to this West Indian team. Their winning a test in England today was a shocking result for England after their dominance in the first test. And I think Root's being a little fibber when he says that the England team "wasn't complacent at all". They were exactly that -complacent plus arrogant, blase and flippant - especially in their first innings batting performance - and ended up getting exactly what their performance deserved. Nothing.

This is the first time that I've seen the Headley pitch become so flat and lifeless.
Root made a few errors, he should have had more of an attacking field in the first hour of the day when the batsmen were new to the crease and the ball still moved a bit.

I reckon this West indies will grow in confidence and may yet emulate the great West Indies teams of the past I think they are starting to work together as a test team after so many years
re - building

(30-08-2017 11:23 )babelover48 Wrote:  I reckon this West indies will grow in confidence and may yet emulate the great West Indies teams of the past

That's a wild statement. I think they have a long way to go before they can even be considered a good test side. Let's see if they can perform consistently.

Nevertheless I congratulate them on the win at Headingley. It was truly brilliant by them, especially after the ridicule they got following the previous test.

Toby Roland-Jones has been recalled to replace Chris Woakes in the third Test starting tomorrow.