3rd Test England v New Zealand at Napier - Page 9 - World A-Team Cricket Forum

Navdeep

Quote:

Originally Posted by John

? In the balance of what? New Zealand batting is awful. I have never seen Fleming as a world beater and he is their best batsmen!
Sidebottom is bowling well but he is getting somewhat flattered on this tour.

Nz's batting might have been awful, but they have shown they can produce runs vs this English attack (Hamilton), considering this is a slow, flat pitch, which it is.

Whats to say England wont fold again, which they have also shown they can do, and NZ somehow rise to the occasion and chase down around 300?

Thats why i think its still balanced, it depends on how this next couple of sessions go, whilst KP is batting at the crease with players either under pressure for their selection or just purely out of nick.

Sidebottom is bowling very well, yes he has been flattered by poor shot selection at times but also, when Harmison/Hogg/Monty were getting battered around in test 1, he still produced the goods, showing that consistency, line/length will get you rewards in NZ. Its how their bowlers (Mills/Martin/Southee etc) have picked up wickets thus far.

John

Well history shows that sides like England which are quiet good may give you one big chance in a game but to give you two is unlikely. NZ chance has come and gone anything over 250 and England start to become favourites. NZ have to make all the running.

Ernest

Quote:

Originally Posted by pie_chucker

Exactly, he cant put 2 performances together. If in future he is to play it has to be part of a 5 man attack that way when he has his bad innings at least we will have enough bowling cover!

Well he will bowl worse and get wickets p_c!

I stayed up and the over he was clobbered was not rubbish, no long hops or short deliveries.

He was bowling in my opinion to a plan to buy Flemings wicket by bowing in the slot. You can't set fields to batsmen who just blindly attack - on another day Fleming will be out first ball to the same bowler.

Also bowling at 89mph at times - with that short short boundary the slightest nick goes to hand, or to the boundary.

I think greg should have watched that expensive over, when Anderson had had enough HE decided to change tack, and bowl round the wicket - and sure enough the last two deliveries were dot balls.

Anderson is just one man - look at the rubbish the batsmen other than Pietersen dished up: Before we have bowling changes the batting needs Major surgery IMO.

The bright news is that Strauss has put his head down, shame Vaughan did not in both innings.

Aurelius

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ernest

He was bowling in my opinion to a plan to buy Flemings wicket by bowing in the slot. You can't set fields to batsmen who just blindly attack - on another day Fleming will be out first ball to the same bowler.

I don't know why I seem to be the only one who actually thought Fleming's innings was a good one. He wasn't blindly attacking, rather he was just reeling off a series of crisp, well-executed cover-drives and cuts to balls that were there for the shot. He did give one chance, true, but he didn't give it by playing a particularly reckless or innapropriate shot. Besides, every batsman will give the odd half-chance in their innings.

Quote:

The bright news is that Strauss has put his head down, shame Vaughan did not in both innings.

Yes, hopefully Strauss is safe for a while now. I can't say the same about Vaughan- he hasn't batted particularly well, nor captained brilliantly either. The selectors seem to have this obsession with the Ashes winners, and assume that every one of them is as good as they were two years ago, never mind the fact that Vaughan wasn't actually that good in that series anyhow.

Ernest

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aurelius

He wasn't blindly attacking,[..] rather he was just reeling off a series of crisp, well-executed cover-drives and cuts to balls that were there for the shot[.... ]He did give one chance, true, but he didn't give it by playing a particularly reckless or innapropriate shot. Besides, every batsman will give the odd half-chance in their innings.

Well Aurelius he was attacking and Anderson was bowling at pace, couple that with the short boundary and it's either Anderson gets his man, or he goes for runs.

Anderson was putting the ball there for Fleming to drive, Fleming took him on and the rest is history. Certainly Anderson was not bowling rubbish.

It was noticeable that when he was bowling the bait balls to Fleming, his pace jumped from 84mph to 88-89mph, that suggests he was bowling to a plan.

acker

Quicker right arm bowlers who get a bit more bounce than their slower military medium counterparts are always going to risk going for some runs.
When you combine a slashing batsmen who late in his career who is looking to go out with a bang rather than get pre-occupied worrying about his wicket.
Plus
A ridiculously short square of the wicket boundary, that unless the outer feildsman is within 2-3 meters of the ball, its into the fence for 4.
I think some of the comments about Andersons performance, are getting blown way out of proportion here.
I understand England has not had a "fast" bowler for a long time, and I will just point out to that they do go for more runs (The ball comes off the bat quicker), but if you truly want variety in your attack they are an neccesary evil.

Mr Kiwi

Well NZ very deeply in the pooh here. Looks like Strauss is suffering a reasonably serious attack of the nervous nineties - for his sake I hope it's not terminal, though NZ need a wicket (NZ need about four wickets but anyhoo...).

south beds mikey

A century for Strauss. Always nice to see a player fighting through a very difficult patch; I don't think he's out of the woods form wise by any means but maybe this will be the start of his rehabilitation. Bell playing with all the usual fluency he displays when he comes in with his side well on top. It appears that Shah will get his seventh consecutive 12th man appearance come May

.

NZ in desperate need of a breakthrough; vital they make the most of this new ball.

Rachael · 09:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bulletin

Andrew Strauss guaranteed himself a place in England's Test side for the foreseeable future [ed: maybe] with a career-best 173 on the third day in Napier [...] When he resumed on his overnight 42 it was still a struggle and he had to bide his time early on. One streaky edge flew through gully rather than the covers, but the shot with which he moved to his fifty was a much classier blow - a flowing straight drive that burst through Martin's hands in his follow through. Occasionally there was a glimpse of vintage Strauss including a strong back-foot drive against Martin and two late cuts off Daniel Vettori, and once past his hundred he became more expansive [...]

Unlike Strauss, who took a long time to find his groove, Bell was into his stride as soon as he replaced Pietersen, who fell to an outstanding slip catch by Ross Taylor. Bell's innings was precisely what England were crying out for in the situation, where the lead was already healthy, and was the commanding performance he needed to produce to silence his doubters. His post-lunch acceleration with Strauss, which brought 135 runs in the afternoon, was perfectly timed as runs started to flow at four an over. He flicked Patel over midwicket for six and tucked into the gentle offerings of Grant Elliott as Vettori tried to race through to the new ball.

Bell's cover-driving was the highlight of his innings and a scorching shot carried him into the 90s. He brought up his hundred from a brisk 150 deliveries, his first since the first Test against West Indies at Lord's last May, and the 187-run stand was the best by England since Bell and Matt Prior added 190 in that same Test.

The two most criticised batsmen on tour have let their bats do the talking: their 187 partnership has set up what looks likely to be a successful end to a good England tour. I'm not sure it will save his career if he fails to sort his technical problems over the next month or two... but at least he's had some encouragement.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jonathan Agnew

The best innings of the day came from Ian Bell, who looked in glorious form as he scored his seventh Test century. I can’t remember seeing a better innings than this for a long time.

Not a surprise: I'd not expect anything else.

ps. whilst it doesn't bother me much... those who questioned each player might note that Bell's first 50 came up at more than 3.5 / over... and his second at 4.5 / over... and once he'd passed 100, Strauss was also scoring at more than 4 an over.

TopperHarley

But have we learned anything new about Ian bell?

we all knew he was technically-correct, aesthetically appealing, and posessing of gorgeous off, on, straight and cover-drives, textbook defence, both forward and back, quick feet and exceptional grace in his strokeplay.

he showed that today. I believe this was his 7th test match hundred. I believe a player with his quality should be averaging around 48+ and have ten to twelve hundreds by now. He got a gimmee against a poor bangladesh attack. failed in the ashes of 2005. recovered on tour to pakistan with a glorious hundred, hit three consecutive ones against pakistan, and was superb in doing so...and then seemed to lose his way. Since summer 06 he has hit one hundred, against a poor Windies side, until today, against a poor NZ attack on a pancake.

granted he played beautifully, and its not him who picks the NZ bowlers. But i want to see him dig in and dominate games in the first innings. he needs to scorme more early singles, like KP does, and Thorpe was a master of, to stop himself getting bogged down like he did in the first innings here, and having to look for a silly shot to relieve the tension.

he has more talent than any english batsman i've seen since ramps was a nipper. But I still have question-marks over his bottle when the going gets tough.

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