Summer draws to a close on England red ball cricket…
3 May 2019
Summer draws to a close on England red ball cricket...
Now the sun has gone down on the English Cricket season, it’s time to reflect… test wins against South Africa and West Indies, but that does not really tell the whole story. S.A. fielded arguably a weakened side and the W.I. appear to be wishing they were on the beach on there respective islands! Having seen them first hand they fielded, batted and bowled very poorly and just did not look fit or focused enough for test cricket! They collapsed like a pack of cards with no aces at Edgbaston – 19 wickets fell on day 3. It was far more embarrassing for them then it was in 84 for England in the famous Black Wash series. To be honest would you like to face Marshall, Garner or Holding? At least England tried back then like every other team but those W.I. sides were just wonderful. Full of great pace and elegant batsman, not very often would they use a spin bowler, but why would you? Their attack would destroy the best batting line ups in the world! At least they gained a bit of revenge in the 2nd test this year only for it to be on a one sided third test…
At this moment in time, behind the scenes there are meetings discussing who should be selected for Australia. I have my ideas who should go and about batting line-ups like everybody else. I certainly would keep Stoneman, but move Joe Root up the 3, a few have argued Captain Steve Smith bats at 4 so why not leave Root there? Well, my argument is that we always seem to be 32/2 so he is out there well before we would like him to be. So, I would move everyone up one and bring Hales into the team and have him in at 7. All of a sudden it looks like we have a strong side in my opinion a great middle/tail end one of the best currently in world cricket, I would also take Butler, if JB picked up a injury behind the stumps he is the only contender. Foakes at Surrey should be considered but a huge ask to throw him in on an Ashes series in Australia…
I will write another blog as soon as we have more news on that, we still have a few places available for the Ashes if you can make it, if not then what about New Zealand?
Before I close we were at the Village Cup final at Lords on Sunday (we are a sponsor) We had a most enjoyable day climaxing with dinner in the Long Room, Sara was asked to ring the 5 minute bell – an huge accolade, the last time we were at Lords it was rung by the wonderful dear old thing Henry Blofeld!
