South Africa Tour of England

England announced an unchanged squad for the deciding 3rd & Final Test of the series at the Oval, starting next Thursday, September 8th.

It's been painful to watch Crawley & his struggles, & admirable that he's been backed, but I just wonder how helpful it has been throwing him to the lions again, & again in what has t be the toughest job in Test cricket. He was praised, & rightly so for his battling 2nd innings 38, yet instead of building on the confidence of at least making a start, if not a sizable innings, he played a frantic innings in the Hundred comp, & potentially he could play again today & tomorrow if his side progresses. Looking at his white-ball form in the Blast he batted 4 times making 57 runs with a top score of 40 with a strike-rate of 114, in the Hundred, 95 runs from 4 innings, highest score 41, strike-rate 110. In the shortest form, strike-rate is all important, more so than average, & he opens in this format as well.
I was disappointed to read that his opening partner was actually under more pressure, despite the fact that he has at least scored 2 half-centuries, & played only 9 Tests (av 23.5) against 27 (av 26) for Crawley. Take out his Test best 267, & his average drops to 21. Lees would benefit from an opening partner who could help him, & not put more pressure on him with his own poor form.
In the Championship Lees has scored 651 runs from 13 innings, 2-50's, 2-100's, av 59 Crawley has 388 runs from 16 innings, 3-50's, av 24.
This season has seen an avalanche of runs, Crawley has the 12th best average at Kent with Compton averaging 62, Bell-Drummond 51.8, & 4 others 40+.
You wonder why Key hasn't yet appointed a head selector, he's coached/mentored Crawley, but is he biased.
Consider if Root had still been captain, would he have had some influence over selection. I remember his being behind a failed recall for Ballance in the past. After batting with Brooks this season, root had remarked that he had been made to look ordinary by comparison, & that's from the World No.1 Test batsman, coming off one of the best years in Test history. what has happened since, is that by his non-selection, he's been played out of form, England 12th man, driving around the country playing the odd game, different formats, totally wasted an opportunity to play a man in the form of his life. at one point he had a run were his lowest score was a 40, which is about Crawley's 4th best all year.
Gough spoke recently, about Brook being happy to open, & he is better equipped than his early efforts for Yorkshire.
The sign of a great batsman is when the look to have time to play a shot, even to quick bowling, Brook has always had that, & he's very still at the crease, Crawley's movements just look completely out of sync. But ow much longer do have to wait before he's out of the team.

BREAKING NEWS - Bairstow out of 3rd Test with leg injury. Ben Duckett called into the squad.

^^ Just realized that after bemoaning that Brooks hasn't been picked, that somehow subconsciously got him into the team, at the expense of his Yorkshire teammate.

Brook in for Bairstow, for the Oval Test, in an otherwise unchanged side.

After two crazy test matches the final English test at home of 2022 may it be more of the same either a exciting run chase or some gritty wicket feast

The start of the test & the toss has been delayed due to a wet out field.

Update England have won the toss and have elected to bowl.

England v South Africa 3rd Test The Oval Day 1
England elected to field
No Play

South Africa make 4 changes, Zondo, Rickelton, Mulder, & Jansen come in, replacing, Markram, van der Dussen, Harmer, & Ngidi.

Re-scheduled start 11.30 but more rain has caused further delay.

Fridays day 2 play is to be suspended, as a mark of respect, following the queens death.