One day.... GOOD
3 day... OK
5 day...zzzzzzzzz
Hah! And Cook's team are now so inept at batting (at least in unfriendly conditions) that they've lost a test-match to Bangladesh. To Bangladesh. (Although at least Cook himself managed a semi-respectable knock in the second innings.)
At this point, perhaps Cook needs to ask the selectors if they could kindly give him some of the members of the England women's squad, as far as the batting goes, since the current all-male test line-up seems to be failing so predictably...
Ooooh! Have they at last (Cook's team) found a proper opening batsman (Haseeb Hameed)???
Excitement!
Meanwhile, probably best not to mention the recent Australia-South Africa series as far as Australians go. Was that an Australian side bowled out for 85 at home in the Hobart test?
But the bowling in the England match... wasn't to exciting, at least a draw was a fair result.
And Cook's Clowns do their best to resume what for them is usual service; five wickets down for not many runs.
Looks like the first test may have been a case of 'win the toss; match is almost impossible to lose'.
And this time (second test) Cook failed to win the toss, and let India get a total (400+) currently being made to look like Mount Everest by Cook's batting lineup.
Still, at least Hameed got into double figures on the scorecard (unlike Cook, Duckett, or Moeen).
Stokes and Bairstow, after a 50 from Root, being left to try to dig Cook's side out of the hole of avoiding a potential follow-on.
Nope. Cook's team back on best match-losing form. Something for the Australian men to look at and console themselves with the thought of, as they (I would guess) start to rebuild.
And Cook's team lose the series 0-4 in the end; next big question: do the selectors replace Cook (despite the protests from the players that they love him as captain, he's a great bloke) or do they hand the Australians a potential series victory when Cook leads a team 'down under' next winter (assuming the Australians can get their acts together)?
Because a lovable 'great bloke' who is useful with the bat does not necessarily make a great leader, and (unless it was down to fatigue and/or lack of warm up games) Cook has managed to lead his team to a series tie with Bangladesh and to a spectacular series loss to India in the past few months; and one of the things that it seems to me that the selectors at the EWCB ought to be considering right now is that maybe the problem is with Cook being captain?
Well: they managed to replace Cook with Root as test captain, thereby beginning the process of wrecking Root's batting - and the team Root led lost to Australia 0-4, down under, anyway, and then could only manage to scrape a drawn series at home in England, earlier this year (2019).
And Root's team has just been absolutely thrashed by a good New Zealand team, losing a test in New Zealand a short while before this post by an innings.
Can we have Root's team removed from the test rankings, please, and give someone else like Afghanistan the place and a chance please? Root's lot are worse than the teams Atherton and Stewart led to defeats in the 1990's.
And with the assistance of what the BBC website is currently calling 'possibly the worst-ever drop in Test Cricket' Root's team has managed not to win the last test, and thereby have lost the series.
Root quoted afterwards as saying he is proud of the way '...England learned lessons quickly...' and that he feels like '...we're a more rounded team for being out here...'
Come back, The 8th Dwarf! Your comments about the squads the EWCB seems to be sending out to play the men's test format are more than justified! :)
Another Ashes series, another England match loss...
Not sure if Stokes (now England men's captain) is either over-confident-arrogant or is corrupt, but that declaration on day 1 by him instead of grinding out as many runs as possible just handed Australia the win on day 5.
An Australia win despite rain.
The declaration wasn't the problem, the missed stumping, several dropped catches and too many no balls were the problems.
Should have picked a wicket keeper.
But the England wicket keeper is there to score runs, not to keep wicket, in the new Stokes 'positive batting' order of things! :D
Edit:
Anyway, on to the next test...
Two one up to the Australian men by now; the Australian women have all but clinched their series now - only a slight hope of a tie for the England women.
So you DO know what a crumpet is...
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