ODIs in England

Now that we're in the middle of the footy season, cricket it seems is a distant memory given our position in the sin bin.

Last night we snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in the 5 - 0 whitewash inflicted by the Poms.

My opinion is that our second tier bowlers are a long way off our (injured) first tier bowlers.
As we head toward a World Cup in 12 months, I think the selectors need to identify who are now able to deliver in a new era Aussie side. Smith and Warner re likely to be available by then, but will have had little match preparation and particularly witht he latter would you want him to potentially disrupt the new culture of the team?

Personally I think good players adapt (as we saw with Shaun Marsh in this series) and maybe the Test v ODI selection policy needs to be reviewed.

This series saw some mixed form from our batters but if you look at it, Smith and Warner have been our backbone for some time. The rest have not been anywhere near as consistent. And this series echoed that, March notwithstanding. Our bowlers are a different story. All, save Lyon are newish-comers at this level. This series was a steep learning curve for them and I guess the next 12 months will show whether they can get their mojo going or fall by the wayside.

Added to this, Paine is still very much learning the ropes tactically and will need some fairly quick help to get the skippering at a level that the players can rise to. Otherwise I foresee us in the doldrums like we were pre-Wauch / latter Border.

I love watching cricket on the telly in England. I will sit up and watch it with more interest than a lot of what we have here (Tests exlcuded). I've just come back form the UK and visited the hallowed turf of the home of cricket, Lords. Wonderful place, but save for the old Pavilion, it is virtually all new stands and not as "od-world" as you might think. Personally, I think the much vaunted, Long Room sucks as a place to watch cricket. The view is terrible out of thickly surrounded windows and a sight-screen which obscures part of the ground. The tour guide wasn't that interested when I said I could bring the little urn back with me to save on freight. However, I managed to catch a one day county game between Middlesex and Surrey which was great. Lords only holds about 25,000 spectators even with a brand new stand which has just gone up.

Interestingly, Cameron Bancroft was supposed to play for Surrey this season until his indiscretion. I think Matt Renshaw took his place. However, forget ball tampering, bail tempering was the thing in the late 19th century. According to the tour guide, WG Grace was the biggest cheat in English cricket history. It was not uncommon when he was batting to accidentally dislodge the bails and replace them whilst turning to the umpire saying "windy day isn't it?" People paid to see him and if he was out early, spectators, patrons (early form of sponsors) and others were not happy.

The bowlers were not up to it.

I hope Justin Langer is not going to continue with his pick WA players first mentality. Half the side was from WA and they underperformed. Just because they perform for the scorchers in the Big Bash doesn't mean that they are Test of International 50 over quality.