***Official*** England in Sri Lanka

[FBU]

same was said for vaughn and he did nowt in odi's. dont get me wrong cook will be a fabulous player but maybe odi's arnt his game

At least Cook managed a 100 in his 6th ODI unlike Vaughan who couldn't do it in 86 games.

 

[pasag]

Sangas, what a champ. Classiest bloke in world cricket.

Anyways, good finish to the match but again there are many question marks over England's batting. The no big-name bowling has been keeping the side together for a while now it seems. SL's ODI future doesn't look that flash at the moment and their fans would be rightly annoyed that their excellent side of a few months back wont have too much to show for it.

 

[wpdavid]

Anyways, good finish to the match but again there are many question marks over England's batting. The no big-name bowling has been keeping the side together for a while now it seems.

As you say, England's batting has been atrocious. Even as a non-odi specialist, Cook's been astonishly poor since the 1st India game, and you wonder how long Moores will persist with him. There must be a temptation to have Bell open (where he's done pretty well IIRC) with Mustard and promote Bopara to where he bats for his county at number 3. Not that Bopara's in the best of nick, tbh, but Cook makes so many sub-5 scores that the switch could hardly make things any worse. And Pietersen does himself no favours by repeatedly moaning about his lot in life: you just wish he's shut up & score some runs.

 

[chaminda_00]

Dire

 

[steds]

Hmm, Swann took 4-fer and Built a crucial partnership with Broad, who also chipped in with 2 wickets, and then went on to win the game with Ryan Sidebottom, who had earlier removed both openers and took the last wicket

Sounds like Nottinghamshire won this game, not crappy England

The Broad who's played, what, a whole 0 times for Nottinghamshire?

 

[Nishan]

Dire

yup, not good enough from Sri Lanka, funny how once dropped Dilshan performes, the continuous selection of Tharanga, Mubarak and an underperforming Malinga when you have guys keen to have a go its very short sighted,

One can only start to agree with Marvan Attapatu on the sri lankan selectors.

 

[Treeny]

yup, not good enough from Sri Lanka, funny how once dropped Dilshan performes, the continuous selection of Tharanga, Mubarak and an underperforming Malinga when you have guys keen to have a go its very short sighted,

One can only start to agree with Marvan Attapatu on the sri lankan selectors.

Ye even though Malinga is underpeforming and not the Malinga we saw in the 50 over W/C who would you replace him with?

Plus Murabak will probobly be out of the team now Murali is back.

 

[Beleg]

umm, the selectionf of malinga is NOT short-sighted...it's anythign but that.

you dont dump your strike bowler for underperforming in a couple of tournaments...

well unless your an idiot or a pakistani selector...[non-mutually exclusive]

 

[pup11]

It would be dumb to even think of dropping Malinga, he is a special talent and he could be a very good bowler for the Lankans in the future but he has never been too good on sub-continental tracks in Odi cricket (but having said that he hasn't played too much Odi cricket either) which in a sense is suprising because one would expect him to do well in these conditions where reverse swing comes into play big time.
But still Malinga is young and he is still learning the art of bowling in different conditions and with time he would certainly improve and will become a lot more consistent.

 

[wpdavid]

The Broad who's played, what, a whole 0 times for Nottinghamshire?

Not to mention that Swann & Sidebottom aren't exactly products of the Trent Bridge Academy.

 

[chaminda_00]

Haha Sri Lanka have a couple bad games and there are already calls for people's head, including Malinga's head. Also pretty sure Tom Moody was the main reason for Atapattu non selection at the World Cup, not the head of selectors. Atapattu just looking for someone to blame and De Mel an easy target.

I wouldn't read too much into this series. England have played well to to conditions they have been faced with. But they really aren't Sri Lankan conditions at all, a lot of seam and not a great deal of turn.

 

[SpaceMonkey]

Sri Lanka fans are beginning to sound like the English. A few bad performances and suddenly people arent good enough and should be dumped! Malinga is a world class bowler. Can bowl people out on flat wickets. Yes he's a bit erratic, but so was Brett Lee at times, and now he's one of the best One day bowlers around. Who else have Sri Lanka got that can do that?

England have played well, although like vs India we have a big problem trying to pace an innings at the top. Mustard i think will come good if persisted with. These are hard pitches to really go out and play your shots on. Swann has bowled well in very helpful conditions, lets hope Monty is paying attention to how he loops / varies his pace.

I still feel England will lose this 3-2. Our batting is just too dodgy atm and we cant keep relying on good bowling at the top to save us. But i hope im wrong

 

[aussie]

Haha Sri Lanka have a couple bad games and there are already calls for people's head, including Malinga's head. Also pretty sure Tom Moody was the main reason for Atapattu non selection at the World Cup, not the head of selectors. Atapattu just looking for someone to blame and De Mel an easy target.

I wouldn't read too much into this series. England have played well to to conditions they have been faced with. But they really aren't Sri Lankan conditions at all, a lot of seam and not a great deal of turn.

Ah good point, the fact that England haven't been exposed to the Sri Lankan heat a la Australia back in 2004 which is pretty surprsing has helped the blokes. But if they win the series for this ODI team you would have to take it seriously given that Sri Lanka since the 96 world cup have been virtually invincible at home.

 

[Nishan]

Ah good point, the fact that England haven't been exposed to the Sri Lankan heat a la Australia back in 2004 which is pretty surprsing has helped the blokes. But if they win the series for this ODI team you would have to take it seriously given that Sri Lanka since the 96 world cup have been virtually invincible at home.

It hurts big time, Dambulla is a graveyard for Sri Lanka i remeber NZ putting us out of a home tournument!

anyway i dont want a series loss to the poms, looks like our best bowler Maharoof is out and KP is having fun here
http://content-nz.cricinfo.com/ci/content/image/314706.html

 

[Richard]

Sri Lanka fans are beginning to sound like the English. A few bad performances and suddenly people arent good enough and should be dumped! Malinga is a world class bowler. Can bowl people out on flat wickets. Yes he's a bit erratic, but so was Brett Lee at times, and now he's one of the best One day bowlers around. Who else have Sri Lanka got that can do that?

So was Brett Lee?

 

[Richard]

I wouldn't read too much into this series. England have played well to to conditions they have been faced with. But they really aren't Sri Lankan conditions at all, a lot of seam and not a great deal of turn.

Absolutely. Even though Anderson still can't get a ODI wicket in SL!

England have been extremely fortunate, really - at least, the bowlers have - with the conditions we've had. Dambulla's never yet produced any searing batting pitches and despite the prophecies that it never rains there there's been assistance aplenty for swing too.

That said, there has been a share of bad strokes from the Lankan top-order - no surprise in the case of Tharanga who I'm beginning to wonder why I ever thought anything of, even as a destroyer of weak attacks, nor Mubarak obviously, but something of a disappointment in the other cases.

The Lankan seamers, Maaalinga excepted, have also bowled well, especially Maharoof who's been something of a revelation and easily the leading light. Even if he still turns-out to be a green-top bully, he's done a damn good job of that.

But it was always likely to be a dodgy idea, playing ODIs in SL at this time of year, from so many points of view.

BTW, I hope Cook plays the last 2 games of this series, then gets dropped for a long while if he doesn't do anything in them. Bell opening is worth another go, at the very least, though TBH I don't see it working that well. Nor did I ever see him doing much in ODIs at all until recently, though.

 

[SpaceMonkey]

So was Brett Lee?

Fair point

But they stuck with him and he is one of the best one day bowlers about. If they had just dumped him when he was struggling likes some people want Malinga dumped then he wouldnt be imo.

 

[SpaceMonkey]

Absolutely. Even though Anderson still can't get a ODI wicket in SL!

England have been extremely fortunate, really - at least, the bowlers have - with the conditions we've had. Dambulla's never yet produced any searing batting pitches and despite the prophecies that it never rains there there's been assistance aplenty for swing too.

Maybe the Sri Lankans are repaying the favor of us producing spinning pitches in England for them?

 

[Richard]

Fair point

But they stuck with him and he is one of the best one day bowlers about. If they had just dumped him when he was struggling likes some people want Malinga dumped then he wouldnt be imo.

Lee was left-out a fair bit early on in his career, though, and rightly so, as there were better bowlers around of the time.

Right now, were Murali to come back as part of a four-man specialist attack, I'd be very much in favour of Maaalinga being the one to sling his hook. There's no reason to suspect he wouldn't be back, because he's a talented bowler. Having a spell out of the side - especially as it'd be likely to be no more than a handful of games - really isn't the end of The World.

 

[Richard]

Maybe the Sri Lankans are repaying the favor of us producing spinning pitches in England for them?

We didn't, really, though - all the ODI surfaces were as flat as a pancake, really, especially later on in the series.

It was just that one Test at Trent Bridge that saw SL get the sort of surface we should never, ever have given them, and even so, English ineptitude played plenty a part in the loss of that Test.