England can beat India "every day of week": Gough

[Shri]

Is this post in jest?

HELL YEAH BABY! LRN2PLAYSPIN!
z

 

[Shri]

Think you might want to learn to count before posting rubbish.

Why are you getting sensitive? You are scottish.

 

[dhillon28]

What I love about this England team is that there are no weak-links. They may not have the star quality of some of the other teams in world cricket, but I've always believed in all team sports that the more you move up the levels, the more it becomes about eliminating (or at least reducing the impact of) weak players and the less it becomes about having star players.

Now that Tremlett's fit and actually being selected, the only thing that could be a termed as a weakness or a worry in England's playing roster is Paul Collingwood's batting form. And given his proven ability in a crisis, his catching and even his occasional bowling, he's contributing quite a bit for the worst player in the team, even if he's not in great batting form. That they don't have a proper fifth bowler is something you could point out but if Anderson can maintain his improved accuracy and consistency and Tremlett can stay fit, they won't need one.

India and South Africa both have real problems with their bowling depth and number six batsman, and South Africa have concerns over Petersen and even Boucher as well. Every other team in world cricket has several points of weakness but England have all but eliminated it which is why I have such confidence in them as a team going forward, even if they don't have a Steyn, a Kallis or a Tendulkar.

if you put sreesanth, ishant on the seamers paradise waca or melbourne in first innings mcg when england bowled i'd reckon u'd think that india's bowling had good strength in depth. Even irfan pathan when he had lost all his zest, performed well at the waca in 08 against a far stronger batting lineup than tremlett ran through. english batters showed their true class at the waca. if bangladesh played defensively against england, they could have easily drawn the lords test. this england team aint all that, they just playing aus at the right time.

also i dont think it's fair to say that india has problems at no.6 because we're struggling to include loads of class young batsmen into the side (pujara, vijay, rahane, mukund, r sharma).......the reason why it may appear that we have a weakness at no.6 is because some dumbass saw something in t20 specialist raina....a selectorial **** up to say the least! But these things happen e.g. steve smith.

 

[Jarquis]

Would Tremlett have played if Broad did not get Injured? Atleast the team management seems to think that Broad is the 2nd choice not?

Personally I think the management were always looking for a way to play Tremlett given the way he was included in the squad and Shahzad was left out despite having played Tests that summer.
It was a plan of Flower to leave Tremlett in the domestic system all summer and then taken him down under if his performances warranted it. There was a lot made of it at the time when he moved to Surrey IIRC and how he was trying to reignite his career etc.
Obviously we couldn't just drop Broad as he wasn't having the worst year, and Finn had blitzed Bangladesh and Pakistan.
Tremlett was always going to feature in this series, though I think originally it was meant to be at the expense of Finn.

 

[Blaze 18]

No, the rankings include games as far as 4(?) years ago.. which is really quite irrelevant when discussion the teams as of now.

I dunno how far back the rankings go, but the recent ones are given far more weight. In any case, performances against other teams are not really relevant when you are talking about how they would fare against each other. Different teams have different weakness etc.

As for your very last question.. I still think you'd struggle hugely. Besides Zaheer and Bhaji your bowlers are genuinely poo.

Since everyone here seems to love averages and statistics (especially Gingerfurball - when it suits his side of the argument), is Sreesanth a superior bowler to Broad ? He averages less than him. Does that make Broad poo as well ? I would agree that England have a better attack, but in helpful conditions, India's attack is quite good.

If the pitches are flat, then India's batsmen will more often than not at least ensure a draw. If the pitches have something in them, then the difference in quality between India's attack and England's attack becomes negligible.

 

[Jarquis]

Maybe India would not win a series comfortably.. But I'm sure England will have to play out of their skins to even draw a series in India. Higly unlikely.

So basically, all things being equal you have India as huge favourites and England have to "play out of their skins" to match that.
lol. Just lol.

 

[Prince EWS]

So do bowling rankings, which is what marcuss posted, and what the post was in reply to.

I think team rankings are a lot less worthy as a predictive too than player rankings though, because team personnel can change completely. If South Africa replaced Kallis with Bosman, their team ranking would still basically be assuming they had Kallis from a predictive sense, but Bosman wouldn't be given Kallis's ranking.

 

[Furball]

HELL YEAH BABY! LRN2PLAYSPIN!
z

England can't play spin.

 

[silentstriker]

I'm with Marcuss. I don't think India would win a series between the two in India anywhere near as comfortably as you're all predicting.

Just want to say...there'd be dustbowls if the series was competitive. To win a series in India, you'd have to beat them on at least one dustbowl. Good luck with that.

 

[Shri]

England can't play spin.

umadbr0?

 

[Prince EWS]

umadbr0?

umadkat?

 

[Bun]

Think you might want to learn to count before posting rubbish.

Lol which part?

 

[silentstriker]

I think team rankings are a lot less worthy as a predictive too than player rankings though, because team personnel can change completely. If South Africa replaced Kallis with Bosman, their team ranking would still basically be assuming they had Kallis from a predictive sense, but Bosman wouldn't be given Kallis's ranking.

I would say it's the other way. Individual players can easily go in and out of form, but team performances are built over a long period of time.

 

[gvenkat]

So basically, all things being equal you have India as huge favourites and England have to "play out of their skins" to match that.
lol. Just lol.

ffs, England could not beat West Indies in West Indies..

 

[Furball]

Lol which part?

"Broad averages more than Ishant."

 

[GIMH]

After me bullying EWS relentlessly for months, I am very thankful for him in this thread. It's probably because he has the neutral perspective but I've agreed with nearly everything he's said here.

Now I don't know why everyone needs to get so uppity about something Darren Gough said. If it was Jimmy Anderson who'd said it (for example), then, yeah, fair enough. But also, it's clearly just hyperbole from Goughy; he thinks we can win the series in the summer, and guess what? So do I.

Now onto a selection of comments that I took issue with. Sorry for this, but I don't feel much like biting my tongue today.

Put me at six, and I'd still take the Indian batting lineup over the English.
And lol@balldoingabit. This is not Boycott we're talking about - most batting lineups fold when there's proper swing. I'd back Sehwag and Gambhir to do as well as Cook and Strauss in England - in fact, I'd be willing to make a bet on it when the series rolls around. There are plenty of flat pitches in England too.

The bolded statement is such nonsense. Your basically shortening the batting line-up by one versus arguably the longest batting line-up in the world. But sure, India only need five batsmen to be better than England, we don't currently have any batsmen ploughing runs all over the show or anything; we don't have the batsman with the second highest average in the history of Test cricket batting #3 for us after all. Oh wait, we do. Batting may not be our strong suit and obviously India's is fantastic, but you ignore the fundamentals of team sport with such statements.

Me thinks retaining a certain trophy against a #5 side might be getting to people's heads.

Well we don't have the series won yet, but let's jump ahead and assume we will (which is a big assumption, but still). Tell me, if India went to Australia and won, what would you think? You wouldn't see it as a huge achievement if their ranking was low?

Such nonsense, who cares where the Aussies are ranked? They've lost one Test series at home in about fifteen years. Any side would kill to win there. If we finish the deal, it's massive, and yeah, we will make a lot out of it.

If India manage to win in Australia next time you go over there, I'll be sure to check the rankings and bring it up when you all crow about it.

The last time i checked england has not won a series in India for almost 25 years.

England last beat India in a test series in 1996; the last time they beat India in India was in 1984. Exaggeration much, Gough ?

These are true, but it's hardly relevant to who would win a series if it were to be played now, and even more so to a series in England

Yes, but we're comparing Harris to Swann though, not Swann to Steyn. So it's a comparative analysis. Steyn is 'more better' than Anderson, compared to how much Swann is better than Harris.

Possibly your worst ever post SS.

Steyn is the best pacer in the world, pretty much accepted as a consensus. Anderson is second. Perhaps less of a consensus but you've got to clutch straws pretty hard to get away from it. Now this doesn't mean that there isn't a gap between them - there is - but as someone else (Furball?) said - it's the difference between being ATG and world-class.

Swann is the best spinner in the world. Inescapable. Harris is not all that good, really. Not as good as Nathan Hauritz, who is deemed not good enough for Australia's spin slot. That's a big bloody gap.

If you think the gap is bigger between Steyn and Anderson than the spinners, you're either smoking something or you just don't understand and respect spin bowling enough to atcually have a decent opinion on the matter.

And if we are going to get into the "they were just one wicket away from losing" arguments, then England were just one wicket away from losing the series in South Africa 3-1.

Last I heard, one wicket can't lose you two matches at once. Nonetheless, we actually survived those games through batting, not weather. Not like a certain series I've seen India fans bring up ad nauseam in the last three and a half years. It doesn't matter, India beat us 1-0 in 07 and that's that, but if you want to try and go down that route, well, just don't.

 

[dhillon28]

A team is only as strong as its weakest link.

Look at the performances of the bowling attacks all series. Siddle carried the Aussie attack at Brisbane, they were all dire at Adelaide, Johnson and Harris wrecked us at Perth, and only Siddle again stood up at Melbourne. Australia's bowling in virtually every innings has relied on one man being the main wrecking ball - Siddle twice, Johnson and Harris have all claimed 6-for in the series.

Whereas with the exception of the first innings of Brisbane, England have consistently dismissed Australia cheaply without any of their bowlers having a really outstanding series. It's been the theme all tour from the first tour match - all of the bowlers are chipping in to contribute without relying on any one of them pulling a magic spell out of their arse - only Finn, Swann and Tremlett have taken a Michelle.

As PEWS said, the only weak link in the side is Collingwood's batting, and even then, what Collingwood brings in the field to a degree compensates for his batting failures. Compare England to India - there's question marks over both openers in conditions where the ball does a bit, Dravid may or may not be over the hill, Ganguly hasn't been replaced adequately yet at 6, and their bowling attack bar Zaheer is a complete joke.

i think there are greater question marks about the whole english batting line up when the ball does a bit....esp the openers. (wanderers 2009, lords 2010, perth 2010)

 

[Jarquis]

Since everyone here seems to love averages and statistics (especially Gingerfurball - when it suits his side of the argument), is Sreesanth a superior bowler to Broad ? He averages less than him. Does that make Broad poo as well ? I would agree that England have a better attack, but in helpful conditions, India's attack is quite good.

If the pitches are flat, then India's batsmen will more often than not at least ensure a draw. If the pitches have something in them, then the difference in quality between India's attack and England's attack becomes negligible.

In the last 18 months, Broad has 53 @ 32, Ishant has 35 @ 39 and Sree has 24 @ 42.
Broad's career stats don't accurately represent his current level of ability IMHO. I'm not a big Broad fan and I wasn't convinced he deserved his place in England's 2009 Ashes side, but since then he's been a much improved bowler, I've always said in hindsight his coming of age series was the West Indies away.

As for your latter point, I don't know if you're deliberately forgetting the fact that England themselves are more than capable of posting huge totals?

 

[Furball]

ffs, England could not beat West Indies in West Indies..

India could only beat New Zealand 1-0 in India.

 

[Bun]

So basically, all things being equal you have India as huge favourites and England have to "play out of their skins" to match that.
lol. Just lol.

So what's this overwhelming evidence which points to the contrary?

On paper I can call Bangladesh a better side than India, if I pick and choose my arguments as well