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*Official* Australia Tour of West Indies 2025

govinda indian fan

govinda indian fan

International Debutant
Molehill said:
I fear it's more like a 2007 vibe, an all time great bowling line up heading into retirement looking for one last hurrah. Aussies will be shite once they go, but until then, almost impossible to beat at home even with that Top 7.
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India beat same attack at home in 18/19 &20/21. in 24/25 two matches played by trio one was won by india by 300 runs and second drawn
 
andruid

andruid

International Coach
With hindsight I am wondering: Taking on this Aussie pace battery, at Sabina Park, and giving them the pink ball, isn't that just asking for trouble?
 
Beamer

Beamer

International Captain
andruid said:
With hindsight I am wondering: Taking on this Aussie pace battery, at Sabina Park, and giving them the pink ball, isn't that just asking for trouble?
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Like playing Bangladesh in Guyana and South Africa in St Lucia, the fastest pitch in the Caribbean? We don't do home advantage, we do tourism....
 
TheJediBrah

TheJediBrah

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andruid said:
With hindsight I am wondering: Taking on this Aussie pace battery, at Sabina Park, and giving them the pink ball, isn't that just asking for trouble?
Click to expand...
Conversely, it helped the West Indian bowlers look world class in the same manner

I'm going to against the grain and say that, despite all out 27 looking horrendous, the bowler-friendly conditions in the series actually made it a closer contest than it otherwise would have been
 
Beamer

Beamer

International Captain
Starfighter said:
Looking at batting averages in WI:

Since 2017: WI 23.01, visitors 24.87
2010-2016: WI 27.00, visitors 30.16
2000s: WI 30.85, visitors 33.74
1990s: WI 29.62, visitors 25.16
1980s: WI 37.94, visitors 23.37
1970s: WI 35.10, visitors 33.80
1960s: WI 35.34, visitors 30.84
1950s: WI 39.05, visitors 37.13

I've held the belief for sometime that overall best cricket (of course you need variety) is produced by good balls - by which I mean ones which move, like the late 2010s Dukes - on good pitches - ones that have even bounce, good pace and some, but not a lot of seam movement.

Currently the WI Dukes ball, which has more lacquer and wears slower than the English version, exaggerates the poor quality of the pitches. I do think some of the lower average is simply from both teams often being crap, but even then it's a stark difference.

There's actually a parallel here in Australia, where belated efforts to improve the Kookaburra ball arrived at the same time as what on average have been the greenest pitches ever prepared in this country. And it's made batting a lot more difficult both in the Shield and in tests. Being someone who likes swing bowling, I'd much rather see them improve the pitches, but that will take some learning.

I think the biggest issue is the apparent loss of knowledge on how to create the traditional pitches at Kingston and Bridgetown, as well as generally poor ones elsewhere. I once watched video of a 'mirror' pitch at Sabina Park around 2008-ish, but since then they've been bad surfaces. The recent test pitches have often been very grassy, when previously WI pitches were known for being bare.

I suspect WI's test season being shoved into June-August by the IPL doesn't help, the weather being less favourable. But a lot of the WI pitches I see, though grassy, are dry underneath, with the grass being the main thing holding it together. It brings to mind a late sixties Wisden article about poor English domestic pitches, that they could use more watering and rolling.
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Excellent post, thank you. Very clear data demonstrating the difficulty of batting in the Caribbean.

I like our dukes ball tbh, I would keep it but produce significantly flatter pitches to compensate for the swing and pronounced seam of the ball (if we even know how to anymore).

I think pink ball tests have potential in the Caribbean, at times the atmosphere at Sabina was really good. Maybe we use the kookaburra pink ball for those though, as the swing on offer with the pink dukes was insane.
 
Beamer

Beamer

International Captain
TheJediBrah said:
Conversely, it helped the West Indian bowlers look world class in the same manner

I'm going to against the grain and say that, despite all out 27 looking horrendous, the bowler-friendly conditions in the series actually made it a closer contest than it otherwise would have been
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Our bowling is genuinely world class and Seales and Joseph have taken wickets in unfavourable conditions as well, tbf.

But I agree that if we had less helpful surfaces and the Aussies were able to score a couple of 350 to 400s, we would still get bowled out for 200ish and have lost by even more, it just wouldn't have looked as dramatic as the 27 all out.
 
the big bambino

the big bambino

Cricketer Of The Year
andruid said:
With hindsight I am wondering: Taking on this Aussie pace battery, at Sabina Park, and giving them the pink ball, isn't that just asking for trouble?
Click to expand...
Not just in hindsight but when Beamer described the conditions at Sabina Park. Throughout this series I expected to wake up to a batting debacle so wasn't really surprised when I checked cricinfo on the morning of the 27 AO.
 
SillyCowCorner1

SillyCowCorner1

Moooo
27 all out was our OceanGate implosion moment.

The warning signs were there but we ignored them and gave the captaincy to one of the most inadequate player…add to that the selection of the vice-captain (who was dropped for the second test)

I don’t think there is going to be any rebuilding. We are dead.
 
social

social

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@Beamer this must be one of the biggest mysteries in the world of cricket


How can Shai Hope literally average DOUBLE in ODIs to tests

My gut feeling is that there must be something terribly wrong in the WI TEST dressing room for a guy to go from genuine world class in one format to a plodder in a relatively similar one

T20 v tests is possible because they’re totally different games
 
Chin Music

Chin Music

State Captain
Beamer said:
Our bowling is genuinely world class and Seales and Joseph have taken wickets in unfavourable conditions as well, tbf.

But I agree that if we had less helpful surfaces and the Aussies were able to score a couple of 350 to 400s, we would still get bowled out for 200ish and have lost by even more, it just wouldn't have looked as dramatic as the 27 all out.
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But isn't the bottom line that you have something to ensure that batting has something to work with? Pitches don't have to be the roads, but ensure that it is even, good orthodox batting can develop? This is probably something away from the test scene that needs to happen, and I guess has been discussed above, but even so having very helpful conditions for bowlers is not going to help confidence in batters.
 
TheJediBrah

TheJediBrah

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social said:
@Beamer this must be one of the biggest mysteries in the world of cricket


How can Shai Hope literally average DOUBLE in ODIs to tests

My gut feeling is that there must be something terribly wrong in the WI TEST dressing room for a guy to go from genuine world class in one format to a plodder in a relatively similar one

T20 v tests is possible because they’re totally different games
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ODIs and Tests are also very different games. Not sure how much you've played with both but the white ball alone makes a big difference. Then I would assume that the ODI pitches he's playing on are probably flatter on average. Could be a fitness issue too as people get tired playing 5 day Tests and that does affect your batting. But yeah double is a big difference lol
 
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