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Teams that will do well at World Cup 2007

Scaly piscine

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Jono said:
Except every team won a meaningful match except England.

England beat a WI team without their best bowler, and if you reckon they brought their A game to that match well youi're kidding yourself.

I guess you can say that about every England ODI though :ph34r:

Look, you don't have to explain the 'pack' theory to me. Its obvious that other than Australia the other major int'l nations are packed together and anyone can beat anyone on any given day. Generally however, England are at the bottom of the pack, and at the least, those inclusions and changes you mentioned will only bring them into the pack and competitive again. Won't make them a force in ODIs, that's for sure.
Explain then how a full strength England side matched Australia before the Ashes and before KP was available made the final of the CT (after knocking Australia out)?

A full strength England would easily be elevated above the likes of India, Pakistan (now they've players banned), NZ and Sri Lanka in a World Cup.
 

FaaipDeOiad

Hall of Fame Member
Scaly piscine said:
Explain then how a full strength England side matched Australia before the Ashes and before KP was available made the final of the CT (after knocking Australia out)?

A full strength England would easily be elevated above the likes of India, Pakistan (now they've players banned), NZ and Sri Lanka in a World Cup.
They won two matches, you realise? Sure, they played well and everything, but winning 2 games with a tie and three losses doesn't make up for getting hammered by every other nation in the world the rest of the time. Sri Lanka won two matches against Australia last time they played them at home in a five match series. New Zealand tied an ODI series a couple of years back and lost one very narrowly last summer, and South Africa beat Australia 3-2 in an ODI series just this year.

It happens, simple as that. If anything, England have declined as an ODI side since then, while most of the other top sides including Australia have made significant improvements in the leadup to the WC. Certainly there's no way England are in the same league as New Zealand atm, who have a very solid and consistent ODI lineup, or Sri Lanka. India and Pakistan minus Shoaib and Asif are closer calls, but they're still more consistent and have fewer players who simply aren't up to international standard.
 

Scaly piscine

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
FaaipDeOiad said:
They won two matches, you realise? Sure, they played well and everything, but winning 2 games with a tie and three losses doesn't make up for getting hammered by every other nation in the world the rest of the time. Sri Lanka won two matches against Australia last time they played them at home in a five match series. New Zealand tied an ODI series a couple of years back and lost one very narrowly last summer, and South Africa beat Australia 3-2 in an ODI series just this year.

It happens, simple as that. If anything, England have declined as an ODI side since then, while most of the other top sides including Australia have made significant improvements in the leadup to the WC. Certainly there's no way England are in the same league as New Zealand atm, who have a very solid and consistent ODI lineup, or Sri Lanka. India and Pakistan minus Shoaib and Asif are closer calls, but they're still more consistent and have fewer players who simply aren't up to international standard.
England took something off Australia in a final, a full strength Australia at that. They are the only team other than possibly SL in the past 6 years to do that, SL won a game in a best of three against a slightly weakened side but got got completely crushed in the next two games so lost in the end. NZ have only beaten weakened Australia sides in fairly meaningless games (and they're bound to win the odd one because they play each other so much), once Australia wants to win something badly enough NZ are brushed aside like most other sides, especially now they're a real force again. Only England and WI have displayed the mental strength (and talent) to beat them when it counts for something, at high strength.

New Zealand have about as much chance of beating Australia in the World Cup as I have of winning a Nobel peace prize.

England's ODI decline is down to injury and apathy, they will go for it in a World Cup so there's half of their problem gone, whether they'll have a full strength side is another matter.
 

FaaipDeOiad

Hall of Fame Member
Injury and apathy certainly have something to do with it, but so does the fact that they carry a hell of a lot of dead weight in their team. They have no established specialist bowlers (ie: not Flintoff) in the ODI side who are any good, though Anderson has potential, and they have two top class batsmen in Pietersen and Flintoff and a couple of decent ones for support and nothing else. Players like Read/Geraint, Harmison, Vaughan etc are just terrible ODI players and no side that carries players like that will be consistently good, and the likes of Yardy and Dalrymple are hardly the solution.

It's the same sort of problem the Windies have actually with the likes of Wavell Hinds, Dwayne Smith etc weighing down their batting lineup, but at least they have enough high quality players to make up for it. England don't, simply put, and until they can send down 40 odd quality overs and show up with 4 or 5 quality ODI batsmen they won't get anywhere.
 

aussie

Hall of Fame Member
Scaly piscine said:
A full strength England would easily be elevated above the likes of India, Pakistan (now they've players banned), NZ and Sri Lanka in a World Cup.
I'd give you India & Pakistan but NZ & SRI are debatable.
 

tooextracool

International Coach
Scaly piscine said:
Simon Jones would certainly be a big improvement over Mahmood, I don't care what Simon Jones' record is like, he competed alright with Australia when he was fit against them - the best ODI batting lineup he'll face.
and by competing alright against them, you mean his fantastic average of 51.67 @4.74 against Australia. He was so miserable infact that he was supersubbed out instead of Darren Gough during that series.
 

tooextracool

International Coach
irfan said:
Yep. Agree with Jono here

1. Australia
2. daylight
3. SAf, NZ,Pak, IND, WI, SL
4. ENG
5. BAN
6. ZIM + others
disagree. Australia maybe number 1, but WI and NZ at least are not very far behind. WI are 2-2 with Australia in the last year and you could argue that they should be 3-1 against them if they hadnt had that horrible collapse in the DLF cup.
 

tooextracool

International Coach
Scaly piscine said:
England took something off Australia in a final, a full strength Australia at that. They are the only team other than possibly SL in the past 6 years to do that, SL won a game in a best of three against a slightly weakened side but got got completely crushed in the next two games so lost in the end. NZ have only beaten weakened Australia sides in fairly meaningless games (and they're bound to win the odd one because they play each other so much), once Australia wants to win something badly enough NZ are brushed aside like most other sides, especially now they're a real force again. Only England and WI have displayed the mental strength (and talent) to beat them when it counts for something, at high strength.
I presume high strength for you, is when Australia includes a woefully out of form Gillespie and Kaspa, as well as an out of touch Ponting. You do realise there was a reason why this "high strength" Australia side lost to Bangladesh in the same series right? Could it be because half of them were actually quite rusty? Once they actually started to get their groove back, England could only manage 1 win in a conditions affected game.
 

Dick Rockett

International Vice-Captain
I think we've basically confirmed in this thread what we already knew. SP massively overrates England and cannot stand the idea that little old inbred, backward New Zealand might be better than them.

Why bother arguing? :p
 

Anil

Hall of Fame Member
aussie said:
I'd give you India & Pakistan but NZ & SRI are debatable.
india is playing pathetically poor one day cricket at the moment but they are still easily better than england...i would think they'd struggle to beat a pakistan even sans akhtar & asif as well...
 

Scaly piscine

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
16 tins of Spam said:
I think we've basically confirmed in this thread what we already knew. SP massively overrates England and cannot stand the idea that little old inbred, backward New Zealand might be better than them.

Why bother arguing? :p
What we've confirmed is most people over-rate NZ, a team that has no chance whatsoever of winning the World Cup unless someone knocks Australia out for them or Australia lose about 20 players to injury in the Ashes.

England when and if they have all their players fit can compete with any team at any format. Tho no doubt I've put that in big writing for you lot most of you will manage to miss it, again, and come up with some rubbish about how I rate the present England ODI side.
 

_Ed_

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Scaly piscine said:
England when and if they have all their players fit can compete with any team.
So can NZ. I removed your "in any format", because we play nowhere near enough tests to be a competitive team in that form of the game, and we're rubbish anyway. But I mean in ODIs.
 

Mr Mxyzptlk

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Scaly piscine said:
England when and if they have all their players fit can compete with any team at any format.
When has the England team had all their players fit?
 

Mr Mxyzptlk

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_Ed_ said:
So can NZ. I removed your "in any format", because we play nowhere near enough tests to be a competitive team in that form of the game, and we're rubbish anyway. But I mean in ODIs.
Indeed, because Shane Bond is leagues better than any English bowler. For that matter, Kyle Mills is a better ODI bowler than any English bowler.
 

Scaly piscine

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
_Ed_ said:
So can NZ. I removed your "in any format", because we play nowhere near enough tests to be a competitive team in that form of the game, and we're rubbish anyway. But I mean in ODIs.
So that explains why Australia keep beating you then, even with weakened sides - think it is now 2 wins out of the last 18 against them now for you lot and one of those wins involved one of the worst Australian sides for a decade or so (the other was a dead rubber).

Then add in NZ's inability to raise their game whenever it means something, such as in a World Cup. They've no realistic chance of winning the World Cup and no realistic chance of beating a high strength Australia when they're up for it.
 
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Langeveldt

Soutie
16 tins of Spam said:
That's only because England won last time. When they lose them again the sporting public will revert to not giving a toss about cricket at all.
Too true, where are all the bandwagon jumping rugby union fans from a few years back? It only needs England to win a World Cup and lose the Ashes for it to all suddenly change importance..
 

Mr Mxyzptlk

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Scaly piscine said:
Then add in NZ's inability to raise their game whenever it means something, such as in a World Cup. They've no realistic chance of winning the World Cup and no realistic chance of beating a high strength Australia when they're up for it.
When last has England risen to win something meaningful (in ODI cricket)?!
 

grecian

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Mr Mxyzptlk said:
When last has England risen to win something meaningful (in ODI cricket)?!
I think you'll find thats never, which shows a scary consistency, all you other nations that blot your record with wins should quake.
 

Scaly piscine

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Mr Mxyzptlk said:
When last has England risen to win something meaningful (in ODI cricket)?!
The hadn't won the Ashes for two decades either til last year.

As for not rising to an occasion in ODIs just look at the stuff I've already mentioned.
 

tooextracool

International Coach
Mr Mxyzptlk said:
Indeed, because Shane Bond is leagues better than any English bowler. For that matter, Kyle Mills is a better ODI bowler than any English bowler.
Id love to hear your argument as to how Kyle Mills is a better bowler than Flintoff. Actually whether Kyle Mills is a better bowler than Jon Lewis is debateable.
 

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