How will England approach Lyon ?

[Cow]

I would approach Lyon from the front. I would then offer my hand. Once our hands have met I will pull him towards me and offer him a gentlemanly headbutt, as I believe is custom in these situations.

Bonds of friendship secured, I would then proceed to have drinks with him for the rest of the evening.

 

[oblongballs]

I do not see the mystery in approaching spin bowlers what-so-ever. You do what Younis, Sanga, Yousuf, Dravid and Tendulkar did: get in line with the pitch and play the ball before it turns. It is not rocket science.

 

[Spark]

Sanga was never super great against offspinners IIRC. Had real problems with Swann.

Younis is another matter, but I doubt any of the English batsmen have the game to play the way he did.

 

[cnerd123]

I do not see the mystery in approaching spin bowlers what-so-ever. You do what Younis, Sanga, Yousuf, Dravid and Tendulkar did: get in line with the pitch and play the ball before it turns. It is not rocket science.

Yea guys, it's not rocket science. All you have to do is be one of the greatest batsmen to have ever lived. It's easy.

 

[OverratedSanity]

Sanga was never super great against offspinners IIRC. Had real problems with Swann.

Younis is another matter, but I doubt any of the English batsmen have the game to play the way he did.

Yeah he even played Sehwag pretty unconvincingly when he was pretty much our second spinner for a while, and got thoroughly owned by Ashwin though it was his last series. Weird player, thought he was merely ok against conventional off spin, but when it came to facing the new breed of doosra bowlers he was amazing. Handled Ajmal better than anyone I've ever seen. IIRC he said keeping to Murali for all those years helped him against Ajmal a lot.

 

[Spark]

His main problem IIRC was just the stock standard conventional off-break which drifted, dipped and spun. Mystery bowlers who did less in the air, he didn't have any problems with at all.

 

[Burgey]

Yea guys, it's not rocket science. All you have to do is be one of the greatest batsmen to have ever lived. It's easy.

Steve Smith does indeed play spin well.

 

[oblongballs]

Sanga was never super great against offspinners IIRC. Had real problems with Swann.

Younis is another matter, but I doubt any of the English batsmen have the game to play the way he did.

that is a fair point but Swann was an exceptional offy, Lyon is not. How was Sanga against Ajmal?

Yea guys, it's not rocket science. All you have to do is be one of the greatest batsmen to have ever lived. It's easy.

Haha

Sarcasm aside, my point is that it is a simple enough tactic to play against spin. If you are a world level, professional batsman, you should be able to utilise it. I am not saying you will be great, I am just saying the batsmen can at least look like they have a clue. Maybe do enough to nullify Lyon even. Yet our guys go out there and play as if they did not know spin existed.

 

[Larwood's_boots]

have we factored in the surprise aspect, the idea that none of them thought it would be that tough because a) it's the gabba and b) it's an Aussie off spinner (I watched a bit of the border gavaskar series and was telling poeple the Aussie had an offy who could go toe to toe with the Indians, you should have seen the looks of incredulity I got). Here's hoping a bit of complacency crept in which should be gone from Adelaide, plus a pitch that won't provide as much break might makes things a little less niiiiice Gary.

 

[cnerd123]

The thing that makes Lyon tricky, as has been pointed out before, is the bounce he gets. Top level batsmen don't struggle with playing turn, it's usually trying to figure out if they need to go forward or stay back to deliveries at a good length, and Lyon's ability to extract bounce from the surface makes it very hard to judge correctly.

Add that to spin, drift, accuracy, and it's a potent combination.

 

[oblongballs]

Theres a difference between a good offy or any other type of bowler making a batsman work hard for his runs and the batsman looking all at sea. For 40+ years English batsmen have looked all at sea, even against mediocre spin bowlers.

 

[cnerd123]

Lyons been in God mode for about a year now though. Hard to see any batsman be comfortable against him in his current vein of form.

Even prior to this patch he's hit, the way to play him was usually wait for the one bad ball an over, or for his fingers to get tired and his bowling to lose its zip.

 

[wellAlbidarned]

yeah I find it weird how quickly people dismiss lyon as "not threatening". dude gets more revs than any offie in recent history aside from swann

 

[Julian87]

that is a fair point but Swann was an exceptional offy, Lyon is not. .

This is a very, very odd assertion.

 

[Burgey]

It’s a very, very wrong one too.

 

[Adders]

Yeah no question Lyon > Swann

 

[sledger]

Plus Swann was/is a complete ****.

 

[cnerd123]

Plus Swann was/is a complete ****.

Where's your evidence for that

 

[Gob]

Yeah no question Lyon > Swann

Not yet. It pains me to say this but Swann is probably the best spinner I've seen since the big two.

 

[harsh.ag]

Lyon's better by whiskers. Basically because he's so much better in Australia.