England 'A' in the UAE etc

[Arjun]

Thushara can bowl quite fast (once said to be the fastest in SL) and can score a few runs too, while many slower bowlers in SL don't have any accuracy worth mentioning- Gunaratne, Dharshana Gamage, Chamila Gamage and Dinusha Fernando come to mind.

Prasanna can get into the team on his keeping alone- not every keeper has to be a good batsman. Besides, he has one FC century and he opened an innings for an A-team in an ODI- and scored 50. If there were bowlers who scored more runs, you would not need such an unfair evaluation of a wicketkeeper.

 

[chaminda_00]

Thushara can bowl quite fast (once said to be the fastest in SL) and can score a few runs too, while many slower bowlers in SL don't have any accuracy worth mentioning- Gunaratne, Dharshana Gamage, Chamila Gamage and Dinusha Fernando come to mind.

Prasanna can get into the team on his keeping alone- not every keeper has to be a good batsman. Besides, he has one FC century and he opened an innings for an A-team in an ODI- and scored 50. If there were bowlers who scored more runs, you would not need such an unfair evaluation of a wicketkeeper.

Thushara is fast but u have to have accuracy to go with pace. No doubt their are guys who are less accurate then him in SL but proabably why he continues to get selected for the A Team, regardless of the fact his done nothing with the ball for the A Team

Prasanna keeping is second to none but he should not be made to bat any higher then 8 for SL A let alone the full national team. He also might have 100 to his name in FC but he struggles to average anything higher then 20 in FC. The fact that he opened for SL A was an abosultly stupid.

 

[Arjun]

Prasanna may not need to score too many runs and can stay at 8- you have Sanath, who can bowl, so sneak in a sixth batsman. You have Wijekoon, a bowler who scores runs in bulk in SL- no easy place to score in bulk, and has been bowling well, coming in at 7. Sure, he's only medium-pace, but so are some specialists. Why, even Maharoof and Thushara can score runs quickly, so you can get a place to play a specialist wicketkeeper, because Sangakkara's keeping is a risk (flashback- World Cup 2003). As for accuracy, he can work on it himself, but he's an attacking bowler- the man at the other end must be more accurate.

 

[superkingdave]

Another good day for England 'A', be good to roll them over early tomorrow and enforce the follow on. Good to see Sajid in the wickets

 

[chaminda_00]

Prasanna may not need to score too many runs and can stay at 8- you have Sanath, who can bowl, so sneak in a sixth batsman. You have Wijekoon, a bowler who scores runs in bulk in SL- no easy place to score in bulk, and has been bowling well, coming in at 7. Sure, he's only medium-pace, but so are some specialists. Why, even Maharoof and Thushara can score runs quickly, so you can get a place to play a specialist wicketkeeper, because Sangakkara's keeping is a risk (flashback- World Cup 2003). As for accuracy, he can work on it himself, but he's an attacking bowler- the man at the other end must be more accurate.

Until Thursha improves his accuracy their is no need for him in the A Team let along the full national team. We got attacking bowlers in Dilhara and Malinga, who are more accurate then him, which says more about his lack of accuracy then their own accuracy. Also guys like Nissanka, Ruchia and Prasad aren't defences bowlers either and all have better accuarcy then Thursha. His NB, WD and accuracy are massive problems and need to be fixed in domestic cricket and not in the A Team.

As for Prasanna the selectors are never going to bat him at 8 for some stupid reason, just look at this game he batted at 6. Sangakkara has improved his keeping allot and his keeping is less of a risk then Prasanna's batting. Sanagakkara should be given the gloves and moved down to 6, similar to where Gilly bats. You play Daniel at 3 and play Mubrak, Arnold or Dilshan at 7. These days u can't afford to have a keeper who can't bat and until Prasanna improves his batting he should not be in the National Team.

 

[Neil Pickup]

Sri Lanka skittled early on Day three by Alex Gidman of all people, and England racing along at four and a half an over in their second dig. Solid start from Powell and Shah, and some violent acceleration from Rikki and Matt Prior. Time for a declaration, I think.

 

[twctopcat]

Bell is obviously being ultra cautious, though i thought 400 would easily be enough.

 

[chaminda_00]

Bell is obviously being ultra cautious, though i thought 400 would easily be enough.

Hopefully the guys can bat with some brains and make a game of it, unlikey though. It seems that all our batsmen apart from Daniel just go out for a smack and hope for the best. Very dispionting performance by the Sri Lanka, but i guess it can only get better from here, or could it get worse.

 

[Richard]

You're right! How could i doubt anyone with a first class economy of over 4?

Please refer to his batting record.

 

[Richard]

Small observation, when I saw 272-4 off 90 overs on Sky Sports News just now I thought "Oh, slow scoring chaps", but it's actually still over 3 per over.

The Oz batting of the last five years has really effected a sea-change in cricket.

Amazing how poor the general standard of bowling is, really.
3-an-over is a more than acceptible rate, once you go over that you're scoring quickly.

 

[Richard]

Yeah, but when mahmood played for the full england side he was crap. Whereas bell has already made a name for himself. the "a" team is full of rejects. Dawson, Shah, Mahmood etc.

That Shah is a reject shows yet again the stupidity of picking players for ODIs "in preparation" for Tests.
Any fool can see that Shah is nowhere near ODI-class. So he was always going to do poorly.
And that supposedly means something as to his Test-credentials.

 

[Richard]

To be fair to the big fella he averages over 54 in FC cricket, over 10 runs more than IRB.

Bell had an extremely productive 2004 & has certainly the more classic technique of the two, but KP has been the model of consistency for Notts for the past 4 years. KP has a wristy technique & goes aerial maybe more than is sometimes prudent early in his innings, but I think Gilly has proved (to most reasonable observers anyway!) that you can play your shots & still be v effective in tests.

Against Bangladesh I don't think it would actually be too fanciful to see both Bell & Pietersen playing. Fred certainly won't be risked. The only other option I see would be Collingwood & he's extremely unlikely to feature in The Ashes.

If Collingwood plays Test-cricket in the near future we're in the ****!
I certainly hope Flintoff doesn't play against Bangladesh - I'd imagine Pietersen would probably get that slot due to the "like-for-like" rubbish that usually exists around selection tables.
If you look carefully at the Test-match Gilchrist you'll see that, against the seamers at any rate, he rarely hazards an unconventional stroke. Pietersen's short ODI career thus far has been full of them, but of course Gilchrist, too, uses a totally different style in ODIs. I remain to be convinced of Pietersen in Test-cricket: I've never seen him bat in First-Class cricket and I've often thought he simply scores too fast. Whether he simply does that because the bowling's poor or because he can't hold himself back I don't know, and we'll only find-out once he faces some accurate bowling. What worries me is the state he's going to be in after batting on some Rose Bowl puddings early in the season.
As for Bell, in 2004 he finally managed to reproduce his 2001 form. Hopefully 2002 and 2003 were just blips - hopefully. We'll see at the start of 2005.

 

[Richard]

Mahmood is 23 and notice the word "future" in my statement, jeez.

He'll have to make some serious improvements if he's going to be a good part of the future. Last season and before he was nothing short of rubbish.

 

[Richard]

Agreed but he's only had 19 FC matches, so judge him at the end of next season if he gets a full one at lancashire. Thankfully the academy seem to have more insight than you and have obviously spotted something in him that can be developed for the future.

If you look deep enough you can spot something in any player.
Thing is, there are some things you can teach, some you can't. Accuracy, the most important thing, is something you can teach only to a small extent.

 

[Richard]

Sri Lanka skittled early on Day three by Alex Gidman of all people, and England racing along at four and a half an over in their second dig. Solid start from Powell and Shah, and some violent acceleration from Rikki and Matt Prior. Time for a declaration, I think.

What I don't understand is why the hell the Glamorgan Michael J Powell is opening the batting. The Warwicks one is an opener - but the Glam one is a middle-order bat.
I couldn't believe my eyes when I opened the player page and found out which one it was.

 

[twctopcat]

He'll have to make some serious improvements if he's going to be a good part of the future. Last season and before he was nothing short of rubbish.

That he will, that he will.

 

[Richard]

Well, he might, but even you can't say for certs that he will.

 

[twctopcat]

Would i ever make such a rash prediction like that??
I was merely agreeing with you that he will need to improve to succeed.

 

[Richard]

'N'ah, ha.
Good on yer, in that case.

 

[tooextracool]

but they ALWAYS do poorly

well they must be doing something in some form of cricket, otherwise they wouldnt get picked.