Similar to football in coaches wanting to win at all costs.

If win at all costs attitude is affecting leg spin bowling it is likely to affect batting technique too as you have to be willing to spend a lot of time working on a basic defensive shot and not playing any other shot for a few months making you effectively useless until you learn a few shots

not sure if coaching is different around australia mind u so i can only speak from my experience
there were some players who werent coached properly and would be effective sloggers but would peak earlier

its scandalous telling aussies not to win at all costs

so this problem was averted by playing youngsters against adults where they were unlikely to win. That way we could focus on technique including playing leg spinners and pretending we were aiming to win at all costs

Yep, but they haven't put it in front of the important first class cricket unlike Australia.

-PB

I don't think its about 20/20 cricket as England also play this. England however have worked out that test cricket and 20/20 cricket are very different. This is shown mostly on English wickets where swing and seam is more of an issue. Our best 20/20 players also do well in Australia in the long form of the game as out pitches are hard and flat so attacking batting is rewarded.

We need to learn to select a test team to specifically play in English conditions. This includes selecting more batsmen like Rogers who let the ball come onto the bat rather than using the same team we use in Australia.

Also we need to select bowlers who can swing and seam the ball rather than pacy fast bowlers who rely on bounce.

as is the trend with all world cricket

its always the home team that wins

Expect a 5-0 whitewash next time england is here, and the fellating to continue on websites like news.com.au

I think England batsmen develop a superior technique at a younger age, because they won't survive in English domestic cricket if they don't. Their conditions force them to learn technique first and hard hitting second. They still do ok in T20 because they have a base skill set. Joe Root is a great example of this, his technique is outstanding and so he does well in all forms.

In Australia you can get away with a dodgy technique in our dry, hot conditions and fast pitches, so we don't learn. David Warner is a great example - he destroys bowling attacks for fun in the Southern Hemisphere, but he's all at sea when it starts swinging. So many of our batsmen have a high, wonky backlift and play out in front of their body. In Australia it usually goes for four, in England it swings and you hit it to 2nd slip.

More of our cricketers need to go play a season or two of country cricket, or even Lancashire league, to learn the conditions properly. Rogers has a low backlift and is compact, and he's been the best batsman in the team - unsurprisingly he played five or six county seasons.



Edited by lastbroadcast: 9/8/2015 06:36:24 PM

Test team should be something like

Warner
Bancroft -Is doing well for Australia A.
Burns - Can play anywhere in the order so could be put in at 5 or even open
Smith - Not a number 3, number 4 is perfect for him
Khawaja or Ferguson - both have promised heaps but perhaps not delivered as expected but they are probably the best two options around.
Mitch Marsh - Why was he dropped?
Nevill - Haddin is over the hill and Nevill should be given a longer shot at cementing his place
Johnson - Bowling okay and batting okay, still worth his place and his experience is needed but probably not a long term option given his age
Starc
Pattinson - I am not sure how he is as far as injuries but if fit is one of the best bowlers we have.
Lyon
Fawad Ahmed is probably the best option as the second spinner which will almost certainly be needed in Bangladesh.

I agree. For an Ashes series in England, we should be selecting batsmen who do well in county cricket rather than those that do well in shield cricket.

The different conditions almost make it a different sport, if you know what I mean.

And yes, when they come down here, I suspect (and hope) we will again roll them 5-0 with our hard hitting chin music from our fast bowlers that leave English batsmen screwed.

u4486662 and Sydneycroatia58

I never said England don't play T20 cricket. I said they don't take it as seriously as Australia do. Their T20 competition is a mickey mouse competition compared to the County Championship. Plus, virtually none of their players (or at least their Test prospects) play in the IPL.

Edited by quickflick: 10/8/2015 04:17:10 AM

Yes but not that many Australian players play County cricket. We've gone and selected the two best ones (Rogers and Voges). Rogers' selection has paid off. But the fact remains that those two, and Klinger, are in their mid-late 30s.

It's not as simple as just saying, let's pick the best in Div 1 of the County Championship because it's bloody hard for Aussie players to get a contract in a Div 1 side. They can only have one overseas (non-EU) player. And, understandably, sides like Yorkshire and Durham would prefer to have a shitload of Test runs or wickets than a young Aussie kid with precious little f/c experience. In recent years, players like Ricky Ponting and Graeme Smith have played there.

Don't get me wrong, it's not impossible for an Aussie lad to play there.

But the ones we need to be playing County cricket are the young batsmen. Only Joe Burns (who struggled) has done this. We need to see Burns, Lynn, Handscomb, Bancroft, Harris, Silk and Doran to play there. These guys are the future. They need to be playing a full season in the Sheffield Shield and then a full season in the County Championship. For year after year.

Maybe we could have a reciprocal agreement by which more young English players (Bairstow, Taylor, etc.) can play in the Shield while more young Aussie players can play in the County Championship.

Also the Reno Piscopo of cricket is a fella called Sam Hain. He averages over 50 for Warwickshire (Div 1 of the County Championship). He tons up all the time. He was born in HK (to English parents) but grew up almost entirely in Queensland. He was regarded as the most technically correct batsman out of all the young Aussie batsmen. He wants to play for England and he's killing it in the County Championship.

Maybe we can get him back. That would be a massive coup.

There are other things we can do. Stop using the Kookaburra ball in the Sheffield Shield and at grade cricket. Seriously who gives a shit if it means Cricket Australia isn't supporting Australian business. Use the Duke ball at f/c level. It actually swings.

And Shield wickets can't all be roads. Some should be green. Some should spin.

The AFL has fucked things up big time because the drop-in pitches tend to be flatter (not always, but often).

Do these things and Australia can start to make big strides.

Good points.

I like reading about the technical aspects of cricket batting.

What is the alternative to the high back lift that is played out in front of the body?

I don't think T20 is anywhere near as big in England as it is in Australia. Their T20 competition is subordinated well below the County Championship and they don't have many players in the IPL. The Big Bash competition is front and centre because cricket in this country is screaming out for attention.

You're right that India do well at f/c cricket and with the IPL. Maybe we need to look at what they're doing. Of course, it could have something to do with their population base and level of interest in cricket. South Africa I don't know so much about. Maybe they just have a really good Grange at the minute, like the Golden Generation of Socceroos. Golden generations happen by accident. The trick is to have a production line of golden generation. I mean ABdeV, Amla, duPlessis, Steyn, Morkel and they had Smith. That's a seriously talented group.

We've had players skip IPL contracts. But then look at the ones that don't. More importantly, look at who's not in the Test side. Maddinson, Silk, etc. Those fellas are so talented but can't sustain any kind of form in the Shield. As I say, Maddinson has no clue. He'll try and hit a six one delivery, succeed. Then the next delivery try the same shot with even more power. What the fuck's going on there? I reckon T20 has seriously damaged the development of these kind of young players who should be knocking down the door on the basis of Shield runs and maybe even in the side now. It doesn't surprise me that we have to go with Rogers and Voges (who didn't grow up with T20 and basically don't play it).

Agreed on a lot of this, especially the need for young players to play County cricket.

But here's a few things that don't quite ring true. You speak of backlifts. But the Aussies aren't the only ones with high backlifts. Joe Root, the leading run scorer, has a high backlift. Plenty of young English batsmen have high backlifts. Look at Ricky Ponting, he had a high backlift. Look at Lara, his was like a baseball batter's. Viv Richards' was also unusual. Those players are among the most technically gifted in history.

Spot on about them playing the ball in front of their bodies. I attribute this to hard hands and flashing at the ball (something you can get away with and benefit from on flat wickets). If you have hard hands, you're going to play the ball in front of your body. If you have soft hands, it's very difficult to play the ball in front of your body. Think it through logically. Imagine playing the ball half a metre in front of your body with soft hands. It's almost impossible. They need to focus on soft hands and crisp, decisive footwork to get to the pitch of the ball.

Decentric, I also like to learn about batting technique. I have no talent in that area. But it's fascinating to me (perhaps because I usually struggled to bat against good fast bowling).

I don't think Lastbroadcast means a high back lift that is played out in front of the body. I think he's referring to two separate things. (a) a high backlift before the ball arrives and (b) playing the ball out in front of the body when the ball arrives.

Some players opt for a high backlift. Notably Brian Lara and Ricky Ponting. This means that, when they're in their ready position, their bat is raised quite high. Lara's was like a baseball batter's stance.

Other players, like Chris Rogers and Paul Collingwood, opt for a low, compact backlift. Ricky Ponting suggests that Mark Waugh and Damien Martyn (technically excellent and elegant) had low-ish backlifts.

Imo, there is no correct way to do it. Lara and Ponting were technically immaculate players. I think some of the best players ever have often had high backlifts, but this doesn't mean such a thing should be encouraged or discouraged.

The benefit of a high backlift is that it makes it easier for the player to play expansive cover drives and to get into position nice and early to play the pull shot. Ricky Ponting had one of the best pull shots in history. This was due to the fact that he was made to face grown men bowling super fast and short at him from about the age of ten, eleven on synthetic wickets. But Ponting also had a really high backlift which meant he was able to get into position so early to play the pull shot from high to low and thus to control it. He had the face of the bat facing the point fieldsman. If you think about this, it makes the move from ready position to pull shot utterly natural and allows him to play on instinct.

The benefit for Chris Rogers of having a low backlift is he can work the ball of his hips very easily and cut the ball close to his body. He can still drive and play the pull shot. And he has done that this series and when England toured Australia. But those shots don't happen as naturally for him as when he works the ball off his hips onto the leg side or cuts the ball late. Chris Rogers is a one of the smartest batsmen in the game because he knows his strengths and weaknesses like few others. He scores runs and occupies the crease brilliantly by minimising movements which might get him out and just letting the ball get to him. He minimises risk.

There's no right or wrong way where backlifts are concerned, imo. The most important thing is that a batsman's backlift (high or low) should enable him to be in position very fast to play a forward defensive stroke straight through the line of the ball and with his feet moving to the pitch of the ball. Maybe the thing is that very talented players have the reaction time to have a higher backlift and still be able to get the bat down for a forward defensive stroke. As long as the backlift allows the batsman quickly to play a forward defensive stroke straight through the line of the ball that's the most important thing, beyond that the height of the backlift will depend on the batsman's style of play and strengths (pull shot, cut shot, cover drive, off the hips, etc.)

As for the part about playing the ball in front of the body. As Lastbroadcast is saying (unless I'm mistaken), it's bad to play the ball in front of the body. Textbook batting technique involves waiting for the ball to come to the bat. Geoffrey Boycott says see it early and play it late. Players like Rogers and Ponting alike thrived because they played it late (albeit Ponting could play early and do very well too). For the forward defensive stroke, you're supposed to use your feet to get to the pitch of the delivery. Your toe should point in the direction which the ball is coming from but your front leg shouldn't be in the way. You need to play with a straight bat through the line of the ball, with a bent front leg and straight back leg. Crucially, the bat should be close to your body (which means you're not playing the ball out in front of you), you're playing it under your nose. This means that you have more control. If you have soft hands (not the tightest grip, that means) then you even more control, you can adapt to late movement and any edge is less likely to carry than with harder hands. Also playing with soft hands makes it much harder to play the ball out in front of your body (which is bad).

Lastbroadcast, a bunch of others and I are appalled by how far in front of their bodies the Australian batsmen have played the ball. The side on view of the dismissals were disgraceful. They played the ball so far ahead of them that they had absolutely no control, it meant they weren't moving their feet (because if you play the ball out in front you're not using your feet properly), it meant they couldn't adapt to late movement and it meant that when they edged the ball boy would it carry to the wicketkeeper/slips.

Edited by quickflick: 10/8/2015 02:54:28 AM

Lastbroadcast, Decentric, grazorblade and anyone else interested

The issue about a lack of technique among young Australian batsmen is interesting.

If you've got ten minutes to spare at some point, have a look at this video. It's of Marcus Harris batting in one innings in the Sheffield Shield a few years ago. He's a young WA opener.The first 2 and half minutes are him talking about mental preparation. Then it's footage of cricket. It's great footage because it shows him leaving the ball as much as it shows him playing. My English correspondents (who understand far more about batting technique than I do and have played at a good level) think that he's got excellent technique. Very compact, which is what you (correctly) think we miss. They also explained things, very technical about direction and stuff, which are telltale marks of good technique and and so on.

Marcus Harris has the talent, technique and temperament to be a Test opener. This footage attests to that. He would probably be well-suited to English conditions, based on this footage. But he has only scored 3 first-class centuries at an average of 29. What is going? There's something amiss if this lad can't crack on.

Cricket Australia need to find a way to get this lad to build form in the Shield and, hopefully, to play County cricket too. I think it's just mentoring. He seems to be doing slightly better recently with Justin Langer as coach. Hopefully, he goes from strength to strength. He's the kind of talent that can win Ashes series away.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fqyH_yOOaY

I'd be interested to hear what you think of his technique. Also what you think of his suitability for Test cricket and trying to reconcile this with ideas of technique among young Aussie cricketers.

Edited by quickflick: 10/8/2015 03:05:39 AM

Decentric

I think you'll find this extremely interesting.

It's a Ricky Ponting masterclass on Sky Sports. It goes for about 8 minutes. The first few minutes are Ricky talking about his tactical game, sort of then. Then it becomes about how the technical side of his batting worked with the tactical side.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rb6nFAeM2FM

Former Pommy Great, Geoff Boycott, says Aussies are useless

Boycs said:

I cannot believe that, before this series started, I picked Australia to win 2-1. If I had seen how badly Australia bat against the moving ball, I would have been running to the bookies to put money on England.

They are so bad it is unbelievable. They do not learn. When I went to Australia to play, I knew it would be on hard, bouncy pitches so I practised in the nets to replicate the challenge. I had people bowling off 20 metres, banging it in hard with a Chingford ball that zipped through and bounced.



Australia should have done their homework on the lateral movement you get in England from good seam bowlers such as Stuart Broad and James Anderson.

It is not as if Australia do not know it would seam and swing in England. Bob Massie bowled us out at Lord's in 1972 with 16 wickets. That fella Terry Alderman took buckets full of wickets here down the years.



Glenn McGrath was lethal with the Duke ball on English pitches, so they should have known what to expect and prepared for it.

You cannot just turn up in England and expect pitches to be exactly like Australia, hope the sun is going to shine at 32 degrees and you will bat under blue skies. That does not happen.

There are times in England when you have to graft and work hard for your runs. You do not have long periods where you can cream the ball to all parts.

I have no sympathy for them. They came here cock-a-hoop and gloating after beating us 5-0. They derided England and some of their players slagged us off whenever they could in the newspapers.

But the last laugh is on them. They have been so poor in batting that maybe we should play four or five of our second-teamers at the Oval so we can give them some experience and see how they go against this second-class Australian team. Obviously England will not do that, but this lot are so bad I think we would still win if they did.

Just look at how they have performed away from the flat pitch of Lord's.

Australia's most prolific batsman over the past 12 months, Steve Smith, has played like a novice. He is a flat-track bully on easy batting pitches but, in six innings on the three Test-match pitches where the ball has moved laterally, he has shown bad technique, poor shot selection and an inability to graft or work for runs. In those six innings he has scored 92 runs. Pathetic.

His second-innings dismissal here was unbelievably stupid. He was caught at cover point trying to smash a good-length ball on the up, having just come to the crease after a failure in the first innings and with his team trying to battle for credibility.

As the vice-captain and the next leader of the team, what sort of message does that send to your teammates?

Michael Clarke has moved down to No.5 because of a lack of runs and the fact that the short ball is playing tricks with his mind. There is no doubt that the shot he played to get out in the second innings was because he just had a bouncer the ball before and had played it badly.

You cannot play Test cricket thinking all the time about the next short ball that is going to be aimed at your head. I question whether he is ever going to come back from this. He looks shot mentally.

Then we have Shaun Marsh. He made a mistake going hard at the ball in the first innings. That is human. It happens.

But to make the same mistake going hard at the ball in the second innings is brainless. He has played 15 Test matches, had 28 innings and scored eight ducks. No wonder. Playing like that shows that he is neither smart nor a good learner.

The wicketkeeper Peter Nevill stays on the crease poking around without good footwork. If we had held our catches and not bowled no balls, it would have been over much quicker.

But Australia's terrible cricket should not take away from the performances of Broad and Ben Stokes.

Broad has bowled fantastically well. Before lunch, David Warner played and missed at four balls in an over that could have brought Broad four wickets.

The way he is bowling at the moment reminds me of Brian Statham. Statham used to ask questions continually around off stump, but probably bowled a bit quicker than Broad. Statham did not try to swing the ball. He bowled seam up and, if it swung occasionally, it was just by pure chance.

Every batsman knows that, when you face a tall man with a high action, you will have problems playing him if he bowls it around off stump at pace. It just needs a little lateral movement with a bit of bounce and you are in trouble. You do not know which ball will bounce awkwardly. It is a guessing game sometimes.

If Broad keeps bowling this well, he will take 500 Test wickets, and he is only 29. But if England want to be the best Test-match team in the world, they have to think seriously of taking Broad and Anderson out of one-day cricket. They did not play earlier in the summer against New Zealand. They were rested. Look how fresh and good they have been ever since.

Yes, Anderson is injured now. But that happens and who knows whether all that one-day cricket in Australia last winter caught up with him eventually. He does not need to play at the Oval in the fifth Test and risk hurting himself again. Wait and come back in the United Arab Emirates against Pakistan.

Mark Wood has good energy and pace. He is a good young bowler who can get swing and lift from a short, explosive run-up. If he can harness all that with patience and discipline, he will give international batsmen fewer balls to score off and that will put them under more pressure, making him a better and more dangerous bowler. At the moment, he is trying too many different deliveries.

He needs to have a "go-to" ball he can deliver and repeat at will around off stump. By trying to vary every delivery, he loses control and becomes too expensive, going at seven an over. He needs to create the pressure that leads to wickets.

In the afternoon Steven Finn saw the ball swing and got sucked into trying to pitch it up and get nicks. But he was floating balls up at 132km/hr that were easily hittable. He is best suited to hitting the deck on a length at as close to 145km/hr as possible.

When Finn bowled much quicker after tea, he started to look dangerous again.

Finn is 201cm tall, and the ball will occasionally bounce high from a good length and that becomes disconcerting for a batsman. He should not sacrifice his pace for swing. Never do that. When it is quicker, he is more dangerous.

We saw in the afternoon there were periods of play where we needed a top-class spinner. Graeme Swann in his pomp would have bowled at one end and the seamers alternated in short spells at the other. England have to find somebody.

There will be pitches in the future, probably in the UAE in October, where Moeen Ali's bowling will not be good enough. He has batted wonderfully well all series and we can get away with his occasional spin bowling at home because the ball moves around in England.

That may not happen in places such as the UAE, India and Sri Lanka. The runs he scores will not offset the lack of quality spin but, against Australia, that has not mattered because they cannot bat against a seaming ball.




Edited by Decentric: 10/8/2015 11:09:50 PM

Thanks.:)

Apparently only 4 out of the last 26 test series have been won by the touring team including 2 against west indies

the practice of doctoring pitches to the home sides advantage has made cricket predictable

saying we have a technical problem because we cant adapt to english pitches is like saying england have a technical problem because they struggle to win in Australia

in this day and age it takes a truly special side to win away from home

Saw the stat the other day, since 2002 just 1 Ashes series has been won by the away side.

With respect, I disagree with you for the most part on that.

New Zealand drew with England in the series in England just before Australia arrived and, with a third Test, would have been an excellent chance of taking the series.

How can you suggest we don't have technical problems? Did you see the side-on dismissals of most of our batsmen? Most of them had their hands well and truly in front of the ball, flashing at it with hard hands and absolutely no footwork.

60 all out is shocking no matter how good the wicket is for bowling.

There's no excuse for the kind of technique we saw from most of our batsmen. The batsmen need to start getting their feet moving and playing the ball late with a straight bat. We didn't see anything like that.

There are huge technical issues here that need to be addressed. T20 isn't helping but that's not the only problem.

This line just doesn't sit well with me.

I look at all the teams going around from the last 5 years to now and they all seem to be going through massive changes.

There hasn't been a 'good' test side going round let alone a truly special one so it shouldn't be surprising that these teams aren't winning away when they are all virtually reliant on two or three players for success.

look I'm not going to object if anyone tries to improve our technique at a development level. This is always a good practice. My point is that there are mitigating factors
1. Statistically away form across the world is getting worse due to the practice of pitch doctoring. A lot of talk in the media has been somewhat asymmetric when it comes to critique (Australia lack technique because they can't play in English conditions but no mention of Englands alleged lack of technique after getting smashed 5-0 in Australian conditions against a weak aussie side)
2. We play a style that is very aggressive. It works well but when the team fails they look silly
3. The technical flaws you mention are common at the start of the innings. Some of our best technicians in the past have gotten out without moving their feet early in the innings. These guys are arguably some of the stronger technicians we have had since once they get their eye in they can play a wider range of offensive and defensive shots in a text book fashion than a lot of previous generations
4. The main problems I have seen has been innings management. At different stages the following has been lacking
a. The willingness to leave balls early in the innings to get your eye in. If a ball isn't hitting the stumps you should use it as an opportunity to practice picking up the pace bounce and flight of the ball and stepping forward or backwards (this is called picking up the length). A dozen or so balls of this and you are ready to play shots. The odd thing is that aussie batters have done this well at times except when collapses have happened or wickets have played in clumps. This suggests something is mentally wrong
b. Rotating the strike. If a bowler can get into a rhthym against you they can enforce their plans, build pressure and you can have lapses of concentration or have your technical flaws found out. I always felt that even if I was hit for consecutive boundaries I was in the game. But if the batters rotate it saps the opposition venom because I have to adjust to a new plan and a change in the ideal line and length. The more you rotate the strike the poorer you will get. It can sap a bowler mentally if they get hit for a four and then get off strike because you can't get revenge. This is our aggressive style. But the art of rotating the strike has been missing. England have found it too easy to bowl to plans
c. I don't think our selection has been good. Shaun marsh isn't a great choice his FC average is too low. Vogues is too old since it takes about 20 tests to find your feet (Rogers has just found his feet and he is about to retire). Watson should not be in the side unless he is bowling frequently

another way to look at things is to ask the question

over a ten test period do we have a higher than normal amount of players getting out before getting a start or a higher than normal amount of players getting out after getting a start.
We have been collapse prone but even still I think that prestart dismissals are at a normal rate. The rate of "not going on with it" is higher than normal I suspect. A lot of these dismissals where players don't get on with it after a start come from a lapse in concentration or an aggressive stroke gone wrong. This is a strike rotation problem

Top post.

Yep that's exactly what I'm talking about.

If you look at the way Chris Rogers bats, his backlift rarely gets beyond the horizontal. (As in when his backlift goes back behind him, the bat is roughly parallel to the ground). This means he has enough time to bring his bat down in the right place if it's full and swinging.

Your backlift should also go straight up, rather than the bat pointing to first or second slip. If your bat isn't straight, it won't come through straight when you try to block it. It'll come through wonky. This means you are likely to leave a big gap between bat and pad and you'll get bowled or LBW. The best example of this in the last test was Neville's dismissal to Finn. Yes, it was a good swinging ball, but the bat came across his body from 1st slip to mid on rather than straight down the pitch and he got bowled through a huge gap.

The other thing Chris Rogers does well is he waits until the ball has basically reached his front leg before playing the stroke. A lot of coaches will say to "play it under your eyes" or to "watch the ball onto bat". you play a front foot shot, your knee should bend and your body should move forward. If you draw a straight vertical line from your head to the ground, that's roughly where you should hit the ball.

The reason why you should do this is balance - if your bat is in front of your body, you have probably gone through with the stroke and the bat is beginning to angle upwards. You are also likely to be off balance because your centre of gravity is in the wrong place. This will cause one of two things to happen:

- your bat will be "hanging" out in front of you. If your bat is "hanging"in the wrong place, you can edge it behind. When the ball swings this is very likely. OR


- if you do actually connect with the shot properly, the ball will travel in an upward trajectory straight and you could get caught at mid off or mid on (or by the bowler).

in Australia, because our pitches are fast and the ball rarely swings, many batsmen get away with high backlifts and poor follow throughs. On pitches where it spins or seams, we struggle. David Warner often gets out to off spin bowlers caught at slip because he goes at it with such hard hands.










Personally I think all players should lower their backlift slightly when in England. You don't need a high backlift to play the pull shot there because most pitches are slower and not as bouncy. If you are in Perth it's of course another story.

Ponting got away with a high backlift and playing in front of his body because he had an incredible eye. But he usually struggled against spin bowling in India. And later in Ponting's career he regularly got caught edging it to the slips or leading edges to cover and point. It was because his bat was out in front of his body. He never actually fixed that problem in his technique.

Lara actually rarely played the ball out in front of himself. He had a huge backlift and very fast hands which gave him massive power - but he almost always played the ball at or under his Eye line. Go and watch some footage of him. He was a freak.



Agree totally. They were all pushing at the ball because they wanted to attack and get the big booming drive in. The moment there was just a slight bit of swing or seam movement from Broad their bat was hanging in the wrong place and they edged it. It's just horrible technique that will rarely serve you well on any surface. The worst thing is there are so many repeat offenders - Shaun Marsh being the worst example. It really is a basic bit of batting technique but do many of our batsmen do it. It's pretty astounding.

Edited by lastbroadcast: 12/8/2015 11:23:57 PM

Edited by lastbroadcast: 12/8/2015 11:29:36 PM

The key phrase here is leaving the ball. None of our players seem capable of it, they habitually slash at terrible balls a long way from their body and just dangle their bat at balls in the corridor of uncertainty that offer no upside. When dismissed for 60 only eight of the deliveries were on the stumps. The innings would have lasted longer if we sent nobody out to bat. The time has come for wholesale sackings, send 7 or 8 players back to shield cricket with the clear message that they won't be back until they learn some discipline.

This. back when I did play I don't anymore due to family commitments, But my game was based on time. I am not the biggest person nor the strongest. But on many occasions I would either be opening or 1st drop. We would play over 2 days 80 overs I think it was, So to me the first 15 would be leave anything outside off and defend on middle. Wear the bowlers down and don't give them any confidence early. IF you get a horrible delivery punish it, But for 15 overs it was look for your 1s and 2s, After 15 you would see off the openers and the shine from the ball would come off a bit so swing would die, With you eye in you can start to push harder and harder look for some bigger shots in the gaps . It seems in test matches these days nobody wants to grind out a long innings it has to be almost who can score the quickest 100

Edited by cityslicker10: 13/8/2015 07:50:46 AM

Gee, cricket is a technical game.

Fascinating comments about batting, Lastbroadcast.

I've played a lot of sports, but I thought cricket was the one where I had far less chance of progressing to a decent level. I just find the skills required to be almost humanly impossible.

And the courage. I was never taught to catch a cricket ball, which most of us are terrified of.