The Irish bowlers dishing up boundaries at the moment..

How come you are not posting in the Ireland/England thread, Baggers?

So Fox is predicting the squad to be

Warner Bancroft Harris Khawaja Smith Head Labuschagne Wade Paine Carey Starc Hazlewood Cummins Pattinson Siddle Lyon Holland (if 17)

Id sitll be having Neser in there instead of Siddle or maybe Carey

I was not aware there was one mate.

Seems Pucovski is only over there  to make up the numbers. All this talk about his mental issues.. why then bring him then let him down by not picking him. That wont help his mental state nor confidence.

Smith has to bat @3 then, Labuchagne then Khawaja. I want Ussie as far away from the new ball as possible.

Carey has to be the backup keeper/batsman.. please dont give that job to Wade.

Pucovski looked fantastic when I've seen him bat live.

He looks a class above most of our other current batters. Shame he has not made some recent big scores.

Do you think Usman is competent enough against spin to be in the lower middle order, Baggers?

Jhye Richardson may yet play a part in the Ashes. He is currently playing his first cricket up in the Territory since injury forced him out of the Ashes. Then there are plans to parachute him into a three-day tour game between the third and forth Tests.

A bit of being stuck between a rock and a hard place DC. He is vulnerable against the new ball thru lazy footwork and spin with his hesitancy to show more intent. The thing we all know is once established Ussie can decimate an attack of both pace and spin. 

Australia's Ashes squad: Tim Paine (c), Cameron Bancroft, Pat Cummins, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitchell Marsh, Michael Neser, James Pattinson, Peter Siddle, Steven Smith, Mitchell Starc, Matthew Wade, David Warner.

No Patterson or Carey. He is a surprise. Wade the backup keeper/batsman. Bancroft can keep as well as Wade.

Hard to explain Patterson's fall from grace after such an auspicious Test debut.

As most keyboard experts predicted Pucovski not selected. A big blow to the talented r/hander. This will not improve his mental issues.

He was out of form at the end of the Shield season scoring a duck and about 14 against Tas at Bellerive. 

Did he make any runs in the Australia A tour of England? 

Ugh, Burns and Patterson dropped, Marsh retained. Selectors in Australia are weirdly bad at their jobs

Worst 11 including automatic selections
Harris
Warner
Smith
Khawaja
Labu
Marsh
Paine
Starc
Cummins
Hazelwood


Best 11

Bancroft
Warner
Smith
Khawaja
Wade
Head
Paine
Pattinson
Cummins
Siddle
Lyon

Agree with your Best side, unfortunately I think they will go with the worst side for the first test, with the exception of Bancroft for Harris

I can easily understand Patterson's non-inclusion, these are his FC scores against the Duke ball recently and in Sheffield Shield 7, 27, 9. 10, 14 , 0, 19 ,76, 4, 32, 38, 2, 0 = 238 runs @ 18.3 average and that's only at FC level and quite a few opportunities to judge, at test level against Anderson and Broad in swinging conditions, no chance. Neser even last scores against Duke 18*, 75*, 0, 13*, 0, 11, 42, 10, 1, 0, 32, 16 = 218 @ 18.2 (not including Not outs which would be av 24.2 with NO stat included) and took nearly 30 wickets in the process, Easily understand Patterson's non-inclusion.

The non-inclusion of Burns with a test average of 40 with 4 centuries under his belt from only 16 tests, and can bat anywhere in the line up is very strange. Bancroft and Harris from 14 tests combined neither have yet to score a century, They only average 31-32 so on paper you can argue that the selectors have gifted England 20 runs per test by not playing him, that could be a significant difference. I can only think that he is in England playing county cricket so he is an easy call up. Labuschagne av 26 Wade av 29 and M Marsh av 26 possibly batting at 6, Burns is a better choice as well, plus he does roll the arm over and has taken wickets in all forms, just like Warner, Smith and Head so to make up a few overs no need for an all-rounder.

Nice to see Neser with a call up but I don't think he will play. If we go Pattinson, Cummins, and Siddle and Lyon there will be no need to play an all-rounder in M Marsh and we can have the extra batsman at 6 like your Best team suggests, those bowlers will get the job done and efficiently. As soon as they select Starc and Hazlewood, it means they will play an all-rounder @ 6, as they have always done in the past, and I probably prefer Marsh over Neser, and Australia will gift England more runs per test. Whether we win or lose will depend on the bowling attack we chose as that governs the batting line up. That's why they've selected so many bowlers, at the expense of Holland as back up spinner, too bad if they produce dead wickets if they go a test up on us only one spinner in the tour party. That's the problem when they protect certain players CA contracts.

Hazlewood will play. Starc will not. Pattinson will. My choice for bowler of the series.

I can only think that he is in England playing county cricket so he is an easy call up.
Rubbish. CA said county as well as tour runs will count towards Ashes selection. Bancroft has been getting  plenty of runs.. two red ball centuries and is skippering his county side to a rise up the ladder. He was heading for a century in the all Aussie game on a deck that made the others look like lame ducks. 

Did not pass 50 in seven games. I am baffled as to his sudden drop in form. Must be the Dukes ball. Patterson is not the only one. Most of our batsmen grew up on decks that have nothing but pace and bounce. They come up against a deck where the the ball moves and havnt a clue how to play it. CA must address this glaring problem by telling curators to leave grass on Shield decks instead of talk of canning the Dukes ball. Blessed with brains.

Reading our Murdoch tabloid, I was gobsmacked with suggestions Starc will miss out because of his lack of form with the red ball.  

White ball ODI and 20/20 bowling is different.

The contention is that the Test pace attack will comprise Cummins, Patterson and Hazlewood.

Late last season I thought Dukes ball cricket was good to watch.

The best Dukes exponent I saw live in the Shiled was Trent Copeland.

Why gobsmacked? He was atrocious last summer until last game.

Copes would have been potent on Pommie decks. Why omit the best using the Dukes ball like Copeland and pick others. Any wonder we have not won in England since 2001 with poor selectors we keep getting saddled with. 

I suppose if we have cummins and pattinson it may not matter too much who are 3rd bowler is. I'd drop mcgrath for pattinson at the moment his bowling is that good

hope he can deliver on a bigger stage

His sheer pace and I thought he had the status of being undroppable from selectors. 

Starc destroyed Sri L. 

Hazlewood also struggled last year to take  Test wickets compared to his earlier Test career. 

Admittedly, I only saw Copeland in one game at Bellerive. He was superb though. 

I didn’t see him bowl with the Kookaburra either. 

You are a patriotic and biased Queenslander from your posts on this board, Mike. 

I like the way you back up your opinions  with stats all the time. Viewing these figures, I didnt realise Patterson deteriorated against the Dukes balls that were used in the latter part of the last Shield season. Also, it seems like he hasn't done the business in England. Patterson might have bombed out in the nets too.

In this case Neser has obviously performed well in England, whilst Burns hasn't. Dukes balls have been used. There is is also a case of some players dominating at lower levels in familiar conditions, but who struggle in unfamiliar conditions at a higher level.

Even though Burns may have scored test 4 tons, he must have got a lot of low scores too. He might also have been struggling in the nets.

Not at all, I for one don't think Labachagne, a Qlder, should be anywhere near the Australian side. After watching him for a few years now, and I've said to Baggers, I don't know where this all-rounder tag has come from. Outside the test arena Labuschagne has taken 38 wickets @ 74 at first class level, that a batsman who roll the arm over. Currently he is in England playing Div 2 county cricket, which is equivalent to club level IMO, you expect runs to be scored by sheffield shield players, so his performances should be taken with a grain of salt. Last year Labuchagne only averaged 24 at shield level, so he shouldn't be near the team IMO.

Patterson has the typical problem that all tall batsmen have. Movement, ball staying down etc see them undone, especially against quality bowlers. He will do well at the Gabba and WA where his height allows him to get over the ball, but those pitches are very few in the world. Batting paradises such as Sydney grounds, remember NSW hardly play out of SCG at shield level, they should be but for some reason don't, and MCG are stat building grounds, and NSWmen play half their games at these venues. When you look at Adelaide and Hobart where the ball does move and they do have good bowlers, he has struggled but he only plays there once a year. In SA these are his last 3 years scores 17, 12, 14, 0, 0, 7 (av 8.33) and against Tas 14, 0, 22, 17, 100, 4. (av 26.16 even with the century 3 years ago that is still poor). When the bowlers use the Duke ball it moves more and Patterson is undone. Even one day tournaments are played out of Sydney, so a player like Patterson is not getting enough experience on the variety of grounds, I don't think he has ever played county cricket during the off season, and tall batsmen rarely do well. I can only think of Hayden and Greg Chappell for Australia maybe G Smith for SA maybe there are others but none spring to mind. 

Honestly I don't really want to see Neser play as a front line bowler for Australia, though a good bowler that shows up our batsmen I don't think he offers anything that England haven't seen before. England don't like attacking bowlers that's why Cummins and Pattinson need to play and have to open the bowling, play Hazlewood by all means but he should only be No 3 bowler getting maybe 15 overs per 80, that's all. Hazlewood may do Ok against this particular England side as they may chase his deliveries and get edges, but quality test batsmen like SA and India will just let him pass through to the keeper, that's why he has performed so poorly in recent times.

I don't have a problem with Joe Burns non-inclusion and IMO I do think since he is in England playing County Cricket, he is an easy call up, and CA don't have to pay his way, he's there anyway. What I do have a problem with is in his initial tests of only 16 tests 28 innings (his last 4 tests of which he has been in and out of the side) he has been more productive, in not only scoring centuries and they are big match winning centuries, then Warner or Smith at the same point in their careers, yet for some reason certain players are not given the same opportunities as others. When you drop someone from the side you replace them with someone better and Burns was dropped after 12 tests with an average of 42 and 3 centuries all of which contributed to the winning of the particular tests. Can you say Bancroft, Harris, Finch, Renshaw, S Marsh have been better, I don't see many big scores from them and we have lost a lot of tests in that time, so much so Khawaja had to open on a few occasions they were poorly performing. IMO a line has been drawn with regards to expectations so if Bancroft plays the first 4 England tests which takes him to 12 tests is it wrong for me to say I expect 3 centuries and his average to climb from 31 to 42 otherwise he should be dropped, that's a lot of pressure, but this is the same pressure Burns has received from the all important selectors, makes you think about the "fairness" with regards to certain players and the states they represent.

I agree about labu, would rather 0 all rounders personally. Head is good enough to give the bowlers a break!

Labu has been picked not due to his part time spin.. it is his batting. His 41 on that green monster was worth a century and he has been doing similar things for Glamorgan in county. At last count he had 5 tons for the season.. some 1100 runs in all and the season still has another month to run. Those ill informed who say English county Div 2 is akin to our grade cricket need to talk to a Pommie bloke I post with on another forum. He says English players not selected often ply their trade in Div 2. 

I am fine with Hazlewood at first change. He bowls as well with the older ball.. reckon he just may be better suited there. With Pattinson surely playing at Edgbaston..hopefully at Starc's expense.. having he and Cummins use the new ball at their extra pace will give the Pommie openers a few nervy moments. 

Meanwhile, England has named their squad:

Joe Root (capt)
Moeen Ali
Jimmy Anderson
Jofra Archer
Jonny Bairstow
Stuart Broad
Rory Burns
Jos Buttler
Sam Curran
Joe Denly
Jason Roy
Ben Stokes (vc)
Olly Stone
Chris Woakes

Where are their specialist bats? Aussies bring a gun bowling attack which could cause a lot of problems for a bunch of all rounders. Their attack does provide some balance with leftie Sam Curran picked.

One, two, three of Burns (out of form completely), Roy (loose shot always just round the corner) & Denly (untested at this level). Oh dear.