English spinners

[Tom Halsey]

I don't think I am alone in rating Schofield, for once.

Plus he can definitely bat, so he could get a spot as an allrounder.

 

[PommieMacGill]

Funny you should speak of Michael Davies, he played as a Professional for my Club a couple of years ago, bowled about 120 more overs than the next guy!

Took a lot of wickets as well, about 67. He now, as someone said before, doesnt play any Cricket at all now which is such a shame. I met the guy a few times as i was the Spinner in the Seconds, he was a really nice guy.

As for English prospects in the Spin Department the cupboard is pretty bare. I still rate Chris Schofield, he still has a lot of talent bowling wise and his batting is coming on leaps and bounds, last year his made 210 in a Second Team game. His fieldings brilliant and he has a safe pair of hands. I know what he's going through with the ball, me' being a Leg Spinner i can kind of relate to his situation. It's a hard art and you are going to get smashed about a bit but on the other side of the coin you are going to bamboozle batsmen and i think the good outweighs the bad.

So for me Schofield is still a good prospect he just needs to be worked with and not to be put on the scrapheap and never looked at again. Shaftab Khalid seems a good prospect as well, and theres me play for Leicestershire Under-17's and played for the Midlands Under-16's last year. Also attented a few England Trials in the past

You never know....

Kind Regards,

Lee Ball

 

[chris.hinton]

My View on English Spinners

Giles- Got Ability and when he flight it up he is Dangerous can be a World class Spinner if he contiunes to attack and not defend

Batty- no really test class but i will keep faith with him and he can develop into a good team player but is already 26 needs to catch the boat?

Croft- Never rated him

Schofield- England Blooded him to early and he has Suffered is not in the best 5 leg spinners in the country

Salisbury- I rate him he was destroyed by england coaches in the early 90s when he needed Jenner and could have been a world class player Shame really?

Jason Brown- cant bat but a good spinner of the ball should have been given a chance for England

Keedy- already 26 needs to play in India to have any chance of making the england test team

the dury is out on young spinner such as

Khalid,Mcmahon,Munday,Lawson

 

[Bazza]

India has got 6 players who can play for England right now and are much better than a certain Gareth Batty-

Anil Kumble
Bhajji
Sarandeep Singh
Ramesh Powar
Rajesh Pawar
Amit Mishra

I would say Utpal Chatterjee could also fancy coming out of retirement at 38 if he got a chance to play tests in England :duh:

Interesting you don't mention Murali Karthik, who is playing for India at the moment...

 

[marc71178]

Schofield- England Blooded him to early and he has Suffered is not in the best 5 leg spinners in the country

I'd like to see you name 5 better (unless you count the overseas professionals)

Salisbury- I rate him he was destroyed by england coaches in the early 90s

Not so much as he was destroyed by opposition batsmen.

 

[Richard]

England & NZ have the same problem - pitches not very supportive to finger spin, and yet a dearth of wrist spin....must be something to do with wrist spin being that much harder to master / control etc or something.....glad to read that England at least have a wrist acadamy - can't say the same for NZ tho'........

I don't think pitches not very responsive to fingerspin is especially a problem. It's just a fact of cricket nowadays, not a bad one IMO. The subcontinent is now the place to bowl fingerspin. In the days of uncovered wickets, that applied to England too.
Quality wristspinners have always been rare, though there have been more in the last 10 years than there were in the previous 50 (Benaud weighted against Abdul Qadir, Mushtaq, Warne and Kumble, with Danish and Mohammed hopefuls to join the group). Possibly this suggests the psyche is being better understood. Hopefully it will spread beyond Australia and Pakistan.
Fingerspin, meanwhile, will hopefully continue to be effective in the subcontinent.

 

[Richard]

Well, it's not that hard to be better than Gareth Batty, so that doesn't say much...

Besides, I rate Schofield, and with experience, he could be better than all your "brilliant" Indians...

Hmm...
Better than Bhajji, Sarandeep and the P*wars, maybe, but I somehow don't think he is quite in the Kumble league. Never seen Mishra either, but purely on the fact that he plays in more helpful conditions more regularly he's got a better chance.

 

[Richard]

More chance of Exeter going up, mate :P

City were looking good in the early part of the season but going down to the Conferance and going straight back up is a very rare thing nowadays.
I wouldn't rate our chances of beating RM quite as highly as halsey, but still I'd say we've got a better chance than City have of going up.

 

[Pratters]

By Bazza -

Interesting you don't mention Murali Karthik, who is playing for India at the moment...

Make that 7 then

 

[Richard]

But the fact he was a leg spinner had a great hand in his call-up?

It was a time when Warne was at his best, and "I'm a leg-spinner, get me in there" was flavour of the month.

How else did he get one of the original Central Contracts based on nothing?

I have always thought he had potential but I am most relieved he played as little in Tests as he did.
He shouldn't have been picked as picking for international cricket on potential is never a good idea, it very, very seldom works - the best idea is to pick the best players at the present time.

 

[Richard]

My View on English Spinners

Giles- Got Ability and when he flight it up he is Dangerous can be a World class Spinner if he contiunes to attack and not defend

Batty- no really test class but i will keep faith with him and he can develop into a good team player but is already 26 needs to catch the boat?

Croft- Never rated him

Schofield- England Blooded him to early and he has Suffered is not in the best 5 leg spinners in the country

Salisbury- I rate him he was destroyed by england coaches in the early 90s when he needed Jenner and could have been a world class player Shame really?

Jason Brown- cant bat but a good spinner of the ball should have been given a chance for England

Keedy- already 26 needs to play in India to have any chance of making the england test team

the dury is out on young spinner such as

Khalid,Mcmahon,Munday,Lawson

My take on them:
Salisbury can be a brilliant bowler as shown especially by his figures in 1999 and 2000, but since then he's been poor, all 3 seasons have returned economy-rates over 3 and averages well over 30. His international career is long over, but it's still disappointing that he should under-perform for Surrey.
Schofield - still has the time, but he has now had 5 full seasons at the First-Class level, and never been a regular. 2002 was his best season, he needs more of them. It may help that he can now basically hold down a place as a specialist batsman.
Gary Keedy - don't make a rash judgement on one season. Never rated him that much - him and Yates (now second-team coach) are both accurate and little else.
Croft, Giles, Brown - not much between them. All likely to be effective in conditions akin to most subcontinent grounds, and also Sophia Gardens and Wantage Road. But, significantly, not at any of the English Test grounds.
Dawson, Batty - wouldn't even select them in my first-choice Worcs and Yorks Championship sides. In the League and C&G, yes, but not in First-Class. That either have got anywhere near Test-cricket shows-up the flawed selection policies - and they're mainly the fault of the media, not the selectors.
Swann - always rated him close to the Croft, Giles, Brown bracket. Not quite in it, always thought he could join it. Again, though, he's played 6 seasons now.
Wouldn't select any other English spinners in my first-choice Championship XIs.

 

[anzac]

I don't think pitches not very responsive to fingerspin is especially a problem. It's just a fact of cricket nowadays, not a bad one IMO. The subcontinent is now the place to bowl fingerspin. In the days of uncovered wickets, that applied to England too.
Quality wristspinners have always been rare, though there have been more in the last 10 years than there were in the previous 50 (Benaud weighted against Abdul Qadir, Mushtaq, Warne and Kumble, with Danish and Mohammed hopefuls to join the group). Possibly this suggests the psyche is being better understood. Hopefully it will spread beyond Australia and Pakistan.
Fingerspin, meanwhile, will hopefully continue to be effective in the subcontinent.

agreed - which begs the original point / question as to why NZ & ENG have persisted in finger spin & not put more into developing wrist spin which is more effective on modern pitches.......

NZ seems to have had an upsurge in left arm orthodox with Vettori, M Hart, B Martin & another all having their moments in domestic comp, but none able to stamp their mark on the comp.......

so far as I'm aware Brooke Walker is still the only wrist spinner who is a regular in any side...........

at least England have their spin acadamy...........

 

[raju]

Dawson, Batty - wouldn't even select them in my first-choice Worcs and Yorks Championship sides. In the League and C&G, yes, but not in First-Class. That either have got anywhere near Test-cricket shows-up the flawed selection policies - and they're mainly the fault of the media, not the selectors.

Interesting that you wouldn't have Batty in a Worcs. CC XI. Surely his record in his 2 years there would suggest that he more than merits his spot. He has a far better record than Croft in the same period. If Khalid is as good as some reports suggest he may not get in as Worcs. don't play 2 spinners.
Maybe he'll get in on his batting/fielding.

 

[Richard]

What I have observed from fairly careful studies is that Batty gets lots of tail-enders out - an expert in turning 2 for 80 into 5 or 6 for 90 or 100.
Dawson hasn't benefited from that, and as far as I'm aware wickets at New Road don't tend to offer much to fingerspin, so it's likely to have been mostly poor batting anyway.

 

[Shane Warne]

My take on them:
Salisbury can be a brilliant bowler as shown especially by his figures in 1999 and 2000, but since then he's been poor, all 3 seasons have returned economy-rates over 3 and averages well over 30. His international career is long over, but it's still disappointing that he should under-perform for Surrey.
Schofield - still has the time, but he has now had 5 full seasons at the First-Class level, and never been a regular. 2002 was his best season, he needs more of them. It may help that he can now basically hold down a place as a specialist batsman.
Gary Keedy - don't make a rash judgement on one season. Never rated him that much - him and Yates (now second-team coach) are both accurate and little else.
Croft, Giles, Brown - not much between them. All likely to be effective in conditions akin to most subcontinent grounds, and also Sophia Gardens and Wantage Road. But, significantly, not at any of the English Test grounds.
Dawson, Batty - wouldn't even select them in my first-choice Worcs and Yorks Championship sides. In the League and C&G, yes, but not in First-Class. That either have got anywhere near Test-cricket shows-up the flawed selection policies - and they're mainly the fault of the media, not the selectors.
Swann - always rated him close to the Croft, Giles, Brown bracket. Not quite in it, always thought he could join it. Again, though, he's played 6 seasons now.
Wouldn't select any other English spinners in my first-choice Championship XIs.

my take on them is more to the point, they all suck

 

[raju]

What I have observed from fairly careful studies is that Batty gets lots of tail-enders out - an expert in turning 2 for 80 into 5 or 6 for 90 or 100.
Dawson hasn't benefited from that, and as far as I'm aware wickets at New Road don't tend to offer much to fingerspin, so it's likely to have been mostly poor batting anyway.

What careful studies are these?
I'm a Worcs. member and saw most cricket down there last summer and what you have just said is absolute drivel. Asssumptions made just to fit with how highly you rate a player.

 

[Shane Warne]

What careful studies are these?
I'm a Worcs. and saw most cricket down there last summer and what you have just said is absolute drivel. Asssumptions made just to fit with how highly you rate a player.

batty is the lesser of the two evils

 

[Neil Pickup]

City were looking good in the early part of the season but going down to the Conferance and going straight back up is a very rare thing nowadays.
I wouldn't rate our chances of beating RM quite as highly as halsey, but still I'd say we've got a better chance than City have of going up.

I take it you won't be coming to the promotion party then?

 

[marc71178]

my take on them is more to the point, they all suck

Such constructive posts!

You'll fit in well here!

 

[marc71178]

Asssumptions made just to fit with how highly you rate a player.

Coming from Richard, I must say I find that highly unlikely(!)