remember ian bell?

[Flem274*]

i do

i miss him. he made so many people angry. i think he actually has a pretty good test record, but he's primarily known for being a weakling. this is harsh, because england is naturally weak so it is unfair for him to be singled out.

he might be the statistically best player to be kind of bad. in 30 years nerds will pick him in their draft teams and push his case for some obscure but higher than you'd expect spot on a batting rankings list.

i just remember the rage he inspired. it was great.

remember mal loye? and paul nixon? i do, back when english cricketers were interesting and weird. mal loye had like one shot, and paul nixon talked a lot and played weird shots. now england just have bog standard mercenaries like jofra archer.

but mostly i just want to see ian bell downhill ski a ton against australia one more time then get out hilariously next game when england are 30/3.

 

[Flem274*]

i was just remembering when everyone expected mal loyes only shot to get him killed but instead glenn mcgrath broke kps rib cage.

that was really good.

 

[Spikey]

remember matt prior

 

[Bijed]

but he's primarily known for being a weakling.

Wasn't as unfair accusation for the first part of his career, but for the later part he was on the whole no worse than anyone in this regard imo and he'll always have the 2013 Ashes to his name. Anyway, now that we can't even kick on from good positions as a team, even Bell Mk.1 would be a big boost to our current batting lineup.

Tbh, the last few years have shown that, whatever flaws he had, were were seriously lucky to have had him for as long as we did. People just loved to hate him

 

[Spintolose]

Ronald (some would say strangely) went on to have a barnstorming T20 career for Birmingham Bears.

He should have got a test recall that 2016 tour to Bangladesh and India (though I suspect that Batty's OMG pick was sufficient for the selectors).

I think Ronald is still playing a part for Warwickshire - even though his eyes are supposedly gone.

 

[Xuhaib]

Bell is interesting. Stats wise he is not dissimilar to Mark Waugh, Richie Richardson and Arvinda Desilva but was he as good as them or these guys played in a tougher era?

 

[andruid]

He was also elegant, so he got bashed for not knuckling down and scoring big runs like Collingwood. I remember during England's early modern-day lollapses posters like Scaly would skewer him more than the rest of the team for ending up 49* as the innings went up in flames around him.

 

[Bijed]

He was also elegant, so he got bashed for not knuckling down and scoring big runs

Yeah, it's not specific to Bell, but being an attractive player to watch generally makes people overestimate a player's ability, whilst also leading them to criticse a higher proportion of dismissals as "soft".

Not that some of Bell's dismissals weren't a little bit rubbish...:

 

[Uppercut]

He was genuinely good for a while. That year or two under Andy Flower when the whole XI just peaked at exactly the same time.

 

[GIMH]

His 2013 Ashes was legit great. Tonned up a few times coming in with us **** all for three against a good attack.

His time was up when he was dropped and tbh our woes since are more top order where he never really thrived.

Had an international career to be proud of I would say.

 

[Cabinet96]

The way his international career ended was a bit sad. I remember him saying when he was in his prime that he wanted to keep playing till late in his 30s, and when he got dropped he clearly really wanted to go back to Warwickshire and get enough runs to earn a recall. Shame it turned out he was genuinely just finished.

If even regular old Bell (i.e. not the one that averaged 89 for two years in 2010 and 2011) played today he'd comfortably be England's second best batsmen whether he was batting at 3 or batting behind Root and strengthening the middle order.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

A poor man's Ramnaresh Sarwan

 

[morgieb]

Did Ian Bell get injured? Was scoring heaps of runs at county level last season, hasn't played for Warwickshire this season. Wonder if he would've been a chance for an Ashes callup otherwise.

I do feel like his stats probably overstate his ability, but he was a fine batsman, and that 2013 Ashes was a brilliant series. Shame everything after that was poor.

 

[Heboric]

A true English cricketer

 

[Bijed]

His 2013 Ashes was legit great. Tonned up a few times coming in with us **** all for three against a good attack.

His time was up when he was dropped and tbh our woes since are more top order where he never really thrived.

Had an international career to be proud of I would say.

Yeah, in hindsight he may, even with his top-order record being worse than in the middle order, have done better than many we've tried since he was dropped. But it would have been a marginal improvement at best and it was right to get rid of him (possibly even slightly overdue tbh), even though no-one since has been more than slightly ok on the whole.

 

[Lillian Thomson]

If he was around now he'd get a 10 year central contract.

 

[Maximas]

He was good in the 2010-11 ashes win too, post 2010 his career was as up there with the best middle order players of the time I'd have thought, pre-2010 he was soft though

 

[Spark]

He was a pretty solid player. Australia at least would kill to have a batsman of that calibre now, at least in the middle of his career.

Nowhere near as good to watch as often claimed though.

 

[Spark]

Re: his dismissals, he definitely did seem to get out caught in the ring a fair bit, which is never ideal as a batsman. And obviously he didn't fare too well against Warne in 05, which I think helped build his negative reputation.

 

[Bijed]

Re: his dismissals, he definitely did seem to get out caught in the ring a fair bit, which is never ideal as a batsman. And obviously he didn't fare too well against Warne in 05, which I think helped build his negative reputation.

Can't find footage of it, but his first-baller in India in 2012 was pretty hilarious. And undeniably awful as he mostly was during 05, it did hang over him reputation-wise more that it should have imo - a novice test batsman getting owned by arguably the GOAT spinner is hardly the most unforgivable black mark on your record