England 2021-22 Ashes Tour

We need a couple of guys who can open the innings as well.
Where are the Boycotts, Gouchs, Athertons and even the Vaughans.

The good news is as this match is just on BT Sport no one will know the result.

^^ Haseeb Hameed, was given the nickname Baby-Boycott 5 or 6 years back, he deserves a run in the side, but needs to kick-on after getting into the 20's in both innings. Burns, tries hard but he isn't Test class & he drops far too many catches. Rob Yates will be the next opener England try, currently playing for England Loins v Australia A, but we look 2nd best in that contest.
Most of the successful openers are from the sub-continent where they get to play on flat pitches. There's a decent crop of opening bowlers around now & few openers that average in the 40's. As long as we play on seaming bowler friendly pitches, England will struggle to produce decent openers.
Australia still haven't got a partner for Warner, Harris has a worse Test record than Hameed, despite a superior First-Class record. Will Pucovski is their future star, but has been plagued by a series of concussions, & mental-health issues.

Malan, Root and Pope gone already . Game over.

Meanwhile it has been announced that The Bellerive Oval in Hobart will host the fifth Ashes Test.

Delighted at that news.
It is a lovely ground .

1st Test Brisbane Dec 8-11 2021
ENG won the toss & elected to bat
ENG 147 (50.1 overs) Buttler 39 Pope 35 Hameed 25 Woakes 21 Cummins 5-38 Starc 2-35 Hazlewood 2-42
AUS 425 (104.3 overs) Head 152 Warner 94 Labuschagne 74 Starc 35 Robinson 3-58 Wood 385 Wpakes 2-76
ENG 297 (103 overs) Root 89 Malan 82 Hameed 27 Buttler 213 Lyon 4-91 Green 2-23 Cummins 2-51
AUS 21-1 (5.1 overs) Carey 9 Harris 9 no Robinson 1-13
Australia won by 9 wickets

After a spirited recovery from England on Day 3, Malan & Root were unable to progress their partnership much further. Lyon removed Malan, his 400th Test Match wicket, breaking a stand of 162. Root soon followed, & Pope, to a poor shot. All this before the 2nd new ball was available, which looked the key at the start of the session, it was vital for the overnight pair to negotiate the 10 overs, before the real test of the day came. In all England lost 8-74. Stokes & Buttler hung around for an hour, until the were both dismissed in close succession, & & it was left to Woakes to bat with the lower order & at least prevent an innings loss.
A 10 wicket defeat was also avoided when the impressive Robinson dismissed Carey, who opened instead of Warner, who was nursing bruised ribs, after taking a blow from the bowling of Stokes on the second day.

The big question isn’t if England will win the series or if they can win one game, it’s will they make 400 in an innings this series?

Sadly becoming a normal for England batting collapses. Think changes will be needed Burns looks shellshocked and I've said it before Pope looks out of his depth might even suggest if a spinner plays swapping leach,who i agree with Tufnell was thrown under a bus with Bess who is in the England A team and bats better but they too look like getting stuffed.
Might be better to just come home now.

(11-12-2021 14:59 )baywatcher Wrote:  Sadly becoming a normal for England batting collapses. Think changes will be needed Burns looks shellshocked and I've said it before Pope looks out of his depth might even suggest if a spinner plays swapping leach,who i agree with Tufnell was thrown under a bus with Bess who is in the England A team and bats better but they too look like getting stuffed.
Might be better to just come home now.

To be honest I’m not sure Bess is a better spinner than Root! Best spinners I’ve seen in county game recently are Parkinson and Virdi. But they don’t bat so apparently they can’t play for England lol We’d be the only team that wouldn’t have picked Murali!

Woakes again … outside of England he carries very little threat to top players. I know his record isn’t great but I’d play Bairstow, he’s got grit and we are going to need that! Burns is what he is … just the latest in a long line of average openers. I totally am not buying the excuse that it’s impossible for openers to get good records in England! Most times Root is in before 5 overs have been bowled and he copes! Burns, Sibley, Robson, that guy from Lancashire whose name escapes me all have awful techniques!

^^ I have to agree about Bess, he's an average spinner. have seen enough of Virdi, but Parkinson has improved a lot now he's actually playing First-Class Cricket, but both have only play 30 or 40 matches, 2 or 3 seasons worth, it takes longer for spinners to learn their trade, Swann wasn't really at their age.
Burns was ignored by the selectors, for years, I think because of his odd technique, they picked him eventually after trying the rest, & his record did looked good. With this squad you could do a lot worse than throw Bairstow in to open instead of Burns, he's batted in most positions in the top 7, but has underachieved. He does know how to get to 3 figures, even though it's ben a while.
It's not impossible to have a decent record as an opener in England but it is harder, not many overseas openers have good record either. Cook struggled in his last few International seasons, & also now a County level, he had a great International career, despite having a technique with a lot of moving parts.

I know he’s had a couple of chances already but Crawley has a technique that could work in Australia. Tall guy, elegant, if he could leave better he’d have a chance. He could end up a Vaughan type batter or just another Vince.