England Test Summer 2023

[Admin]

Australia 295 and 135 for 0 (Khawaja 69*, Warner 58) need another 249 runs to beat England 283 and 395 (Root 91, Bairstow 78, Crawley 73, Starc 4-100, Murphy 4-110)

As Des says Bazball can be entertaining however if your bowlers struggle you don't win games, it's the last ay of the Test Summer although it's the end of July but from tomorrow every ball counts competition starts described by venerable Aussie Commentator Jim Maxwell yesterday as just balls suspect Jim will not be returning in 2027

[sillypoint]

Rain stopped play, yet Carol Kirkwood this morning confidently predicted it would be dry for the test match. And we're relying on the predictions of these people for what will happen over the next 20+ years?

[MickeyG]

Aussies on the ropes, lost 4 wickets in 19 balls for 11 runs.

[Dave Towers]

Well that’s a blow for the Bazball haters!

[Admin]

Interestingly Jimmy didn’t bowl in that last session now has to rely on getting selected

[sillypoint]

Better Jimmy retires than gets retired.

[Phil]

Jul 31, 2023 17:35:12 GMT Admin said:

Interestingly Jimmy didn’t bowl in that last session now has to rely on getting selected

He's missed out on a grand farewell like Broad, not sure he will be selected again. India away maybe not, and he will be nearly 42 when the next home tests come around.

[man in the stand]

An exciting series right down to the last day with England's hare approach vs Australia's tortoise though the latter didn't always win. Good to have more results than draws and to see the extensive coverage in the papers even on the front pages compared to the usual approach.

Pity that the series was crammed such a short period with so limited a rest and recovery time due, I guess, the Hundread...

I wonder how Jimmy is feeling.....

[lancsdes]

Good post MITS as we expect from you. . Don’t think the “ more results than draws” can be attributed to Bazball. We’ve had that in Test cricket in England for quite a few years now, weather allowing, not that you said it was Bazball.

Very difficult series to sum up, such were the swings. I tend to think that England’s maximum was better than Australia’s and that just a couple of hours of brainless cricket threw series victory away. As I’ve often said on here, I think cricket should be attacking and entertaining but I don’t think it has to be attack everything. There is still time for some pragmatism.

Steve James in The Times  suggests that the batting will be fine for the next Ashes away. I really don’t think it should all be focused around Ashes but assuming it is, I think Pope has a technical fault to work on that Bumrah, Cummings and Starc have exposed but in general agree. We need young fast bowlers and Tongue , if he stays injury free should be up to it. Woakes was my Man of Series but don’t see him being up to it next time. Will Wood be able to manage two or three? Archer? Stone? Steve James mentions Saqib but I’ve virtually written him off . Hope I’m wrong. Jamie Overton could be a possibility . 

I subscribe to The Times mainly for Michael Atherton and really enjoyed its coverage of the series . Sometimes wonder, however, if we really need five articles about every day and same can be said for The Cricket Paper . 40 years ago in The Guardian we would have had John Arlott on the Test and lots more reports on County Cricket and Telegraph would cover every county game. I would gladly go back to that. But yes, good to see it on the front pages.

I saw a view somewhere that Broad had upstaged Anderson’s farewell and that it was disrespectful to the series to announce retirement at the time he did. I think Jimmy should have announced he was going at the end. Maybe , he didn’t want to take away from Broad.  

[Admin]

One thing to remember Aussies also had the extra joy of playing the Test Championship the week before the series started and to be fair to them 6 Tests in 8 weeks is stupid as is 5 in 7 for us