"You can quote me on this........"

[Maison]

yeh he got me angry aswell, doubt he's blind though.

 

[marc71178]

How SA failed to win both at Kingsmead and The Wanderers is beyond me, and obviously they shot themselves in the foot by hitting the ground stumbling in several ways at PE. And, of course, they lost-out to the weather at Centurion.

The Wanderers: they were never on top of England - Vaughan declared twice to set up a chance of a result, and SA never actually got close to it.

Kingsmead: They were very lucky to get away with a draw with the bad light, yet you wonder how they failed to win?

 

[marc71178]

yeh he got me angry aswell, doubt he's blind though.

I meant to what happened on the pitch.

 

[Swervy]

Whaaat? Most people thought a SA win would be most likely? In SA they were natural pessimists - as usual - and in England they were falling over backwards to deride SA, just as they were in 2003.

and yet those people were correct in there predictions

 

[Pothas]

If he really impressed you by getting out for less than 50 EVERY SINGLE INNINGS (even if the copious amounts of dropped catches and no-ball dismissals let him off) then I dread to think how easy it must be to impress you.
Vaughan was perfectly consistent last summer and would almost certainly have scored a lot more in South Africa had he not got so many good deliveries.

Quite unbelievable. How was Vaughan cositant this summer excactly? he played one brilliant ingings. In case you didnt know beind dropped isnt actualy out . Trescothiks 90 at edgbaston was superb and was backed up by a number of good half centuries.

 

[Maison]

^^^

nevermind Richard his opinions are far behind the eight-ball...


anywho, will Gilchrist bat well in next weeks 'super-duper-six-day-test' ?

 

[tooextracool]

Rubbish, he was nowhere near as accurate in The Ashes as he was in the 2nd half of the SA series, in WI and at home to NZ.
Did you not see the countless graphs comparing him to Flintoff? His line, especially, was all over the place. No surprise, of course - aside from that short spell he's never been very accurate and I don't really expect that to change..

rubbish, he bowled a bit too short occasionally but he did that during the summer of last year too. fact is he was always just as accurate as he always was which is why his ER wasnt too much dissimilar from flintoffs.

Which, sadly, is looking possible ATM...
If Harmison went back to WI in the same conditions he'd get far less wickets if they batted better. Same true of NZ at home. If Anderson did indeed bowl superbly in a couple of games early on in ODIs (10-12-1, 10-29-4) he also benefited from countless poor strokes to rubbish deliveries and if he faced the same sides again in the same conditions I'd hope they'd do better 2nd time around.

WI couldnt play him too much better no matter how well they played because when theres seam movement harmison is a very dangerous bowler, and we saw that at Lords this summer too.

 

[tooextracool]

That's as maybe, I don't expect much from either.
I do, however, expect South Africa to massacre Lee, Tait and MacGill if he plays. And I also expect Warne to bowl less well than he did in The Ashes.

and i can see shane warne causing them all sorts of problems, particularly kallis and gibbs who've never looked anything more than ordinary against him.

 

[tooextracool]

No, their results aren't too bad over the last 2 years. They were much the better team in England, managed to lose a brutally fought series in Pakistan that they probably should have drawn, hammered West Indies as you'd expect anyone to, failed to beat New Zealand as they should have done, lost twice in Sri Lanka and India like most people do, just managed to lose at home to England in a somewhat untidy series (even though their catching was superb) and won in West Indies as you'd expect them to.
South Africa are a team lots of people love to dismiss as "not a good enough 'team' " but the reality is they're perfectly good at the small amounts of teamwork that come into cricket.

indeed, those are brilliant results for any side. managing only to beat the WI.

 

[Richard]

As for the first part of the post, oh my god. nah the australian bowling lineup isn't strong at all (pleeeeease!)

Either you are completely stupid or either you have a short memory, which works at the same rate of a (friggin) gold-fish (i'd say the first one though )

No, you're more stupid if you think the Australian bowling-attack minus a firing Gillespie and Kasprowicz is especially strong.
Lee is poor and we've known that for ages, Tait so far has demonstrated only that he too is very poor. We also know that MacGill hasn't been much good for a number of years.

So Warne wont do well again? Why not? "oh you dont know" ? stuff'ya.

Err, what the blazes are you on about? Where "in the blue hell" did I say Warne won't bowl well again? I said I doubt Warne will bowl as well as he bowled in the Tests in England for quite a while, and I do.

Who the hell in their right mind would expect McGrath to 'bowl well' and make an impact after his injuries in the Ashes? Obviously Richard did, although last time I checked, if one comes into a match after injury woes its highly unlikely theyll bowl like they would normally ('ala Lords..... oh that.... McGrath sure is poor, he'll be 'downright poor' all year I reckon, even in australia! watch it West Indies, McGrath has gone hero to zero in 1 month!!!)

I don't really understand what the hell you're on about here.

and on the subject of no-balls? I don't see us bowling 'too many' in the super series? maybe i'm blind.

No, nor do I. There were far, far too many in The Ashes, though.

Perform miracles to win the home series? I think not sir.

No, perform miracles to whitewash a reasonable team.

Warne looked pretty bald and senile in the Ashes, maybe he should retire, he's not good anymore, he dropped one catch too many *tsk tsk*. Whoopsie he got 40 wickets.....

So... where exactly did I say any of that utter bullshiiyt?

 

[Richard]

Have SA brought in a completely new team then?

No.
They are, however, much stronger than they were in The First Test against England in 2004\05.

 

[Richard]

No, he didn't, he got 3 half centuries in his 431 runs @ 43.10.

And in all 3 of the half-centuries he got early let-offs and his first-chance average was in the early 30s.

 

[Richard]

Even though 2-1 greatly flattered them against an England side only playing at about 75%

No, 2-1 flattered a pretty average England side that had some overrated players who the South Africans - even with 1 or 2 players not at their best or missing - managed to expose.

 

[Richard]

If they're "perfectly good" at teamwork, what does that make this current England side?

Equally good.
England have had more success recently - the team spirit is always more noticable in the successful sides.

 

[Richard]

You are the most blind person on this forum.

SA were lucky to get away with 2-1 against an England side that was nowhere near its best.

No, England were lucky to get away with the series win against a SA side that wasn't quite at it's best.

They played something like that in the Ashes and beat Australia 2-1 (again a scoreline that in all honesty didn't reflect the performances) - yet it's England who are over-rated, and SA the decent side

No, England aren't overrated - they were a much better side in The Ashes than they were in SA.

 

[Richard]

The Wanderers: they were never on top of England - Vaughan declared twice to set up a chance of a result, and SA never actually got close to it.

Yet they were just 1 wicket (Trescothick's on the final morning) away from it.

Kingsmead: They were very lucky to get away with a draw with the bad light, yet you wonder how they failed to win?

No, England somehow managed to escape from a near-dead position. South Africa should have won the game on the fourth-day.

 

[Richard]

and yet those people were correct in there predictions

So?
You said SA were favourites - almost no-one backed them.

 

[Richard]

Quite unbelievable. How was Vaughan cositant this summer excactly? he played one brilliant ingings.

He wasn't this summer, he was very poor. He was pretty good last summer, though.

In case you didnt know beind dropped isnt actualy out .

In case you didn't know there's no difference as far as the batsman's ability is concerned.

Trescothiks 90 at edgbaston was superb and was backed up by a number of good half centuries.

No, none of Trescothick's innings in the Australia Tests last summer were either superb or good.

 

[Richard]

rubbish, he bowled a bit too short occasionally but he did that during the summer of last year too. fact is he was always just as accurate as he always was which is why his ER wasnt too much dissimilar from flintoffs.

And how many times? ER in the limitless-over game isn't always a good reflection of accuracy - Flintoff after Lord's was extremely accurate, Harmison was rarely so, and the pitch-maps of the two demonstrated that clearly.

WI couldnt play him too much better no matter how well they played because when theres seam movement harmison is a very dangerous bowler, and we saw that at Lords this summer too.

Yes, we saw Harmison bowl so brilliantly at Lord's, dismissing 6 tail-enders, Katich with the tail twice and just 2 top-order batsmen with good, seaming deliveries.
Nor did the seam-movement actually make much difference in West Indies - it was almost all poor strokes. And Chanderpaul and Gayle, especially, were utterly out of sorts in that series, as was Lara in the first 2 Tests.

 

[Richard]

and i can see shane warne causing them all sorts of problems, particularly kallis and gibbs who've never looked anything more than ordinary against him.

Gibbs has looked ordinary against plenty of bowlers who move the ball. Nonetheless he's still made the odd decent score against Warne.
I wouldn't be amazed to see Kallis score less runs against Warne than he has against other attacks, but I'd still back him to batter the rest.