Australia's run rate is insane here

It would be interesting to know the averages of all LHBs - Warner, Harris, Usman, Head and Wade?

Well they showed Warner to Broad.
87 deliveries, 32 runs, 5 wickets, 6.4 average

Warners averaging 11.28 
Harris 13.33
Khawaja 20.33
Wade 25.16 (and thats with the 100)
Head 32

Looking at the struggles of the openers and of lefties, not picking Joe Burns has to be considered a huge mistake

Shocking! 

In hindsight yes.

Usman was unlucky to be demoted instead of Warner based on these figures.

Thanks, RK.

Geoff Boycott is pontificating on ABC radio that Stokes' innings in the last Test is one of the greatest of all time.

Boycott considers the Aus opening attack of Cummins and Hazlewood as one of the best he has seen in any era - and he opines Lyon is one of the greatest off spinners in history with his record. 

Let us hope we get Stokes early in both innings in this Test.

A further bad stat. Our opening stands have been 2, 13, 11, 13, 12, 10, 1

Agree DC. Broad has Warner in a vicelike grip.

A typical Smith led recovery after another abysmal start. I like Labuchagne. The man has character. He also has the best first day batting conditions possibly of the series. So needs to convert this 49 into a big 100.

I just can't believe it is true!

It obviously is, but it is appalling!

Have they been worse in any other series? 

Open with Wade and Burns. Drop Hopeless Harris. Bat Warner at 6.

The coach and selectors seem a bit slow. Warner is past it as an.opener. Plus in pommy land never scored a 100. Much better suited at 6. Otherwise drop him.

Wade bats 1 in one day games and shows more fight. Burns right handed is steady.

They can't keep failed openers.

With the rain delay, given the two early openers’ wickets, 2-98 with Labuschagne and Smith Not Out, looks like a decent recovery. 

Both right handers played some quality shots and scored at a decent clip. 

Nothing beats the sight  of Pommy fielders chasing leather! 

Welcome to the forum, Gogos.

Interesting idea,  but I think Wade would struggle as a Test opener too.

3-173 isn't a bad return for Australia  from  a rain interrupted day and losing two early wickets.

I didn't see Labu's dismissal for  67, but he has done very well for Australia as an injury replacement for Smith.

The strike rate of Smith, Labu and Head indicates they scored at a reasonable rate.

Welcome to the cricket forum in Inside Sport, Jay Ess.

It also seems from the averages that the English bowlers have worked out most of the Aussie left hand batters.

I think only Head is averaging 30 of the lefties. The rest are all way below.

Poms have bowled better to lefties for 15 years. Amazing the selectors havent noticed. Harris isnt up to test standard and Warner is past it. Not picking Burns was dumb. He has test 100s. Bancroft and Harris have none.

Warner has to drop to 6 or be dropped.

My Wade idea is temporary. They need someone else.

3 extra run lol

Overton bowled a cracking off cutter to get Lasagne out. Apart from putting his body behind it couldnt do much. Getting outside the line would save an lbw.

Khawaja should be dumped for good. In 10 years he's not improved one bit. Learnt nothing about leaving the ball outside off. Too many chances. Time to move on.

Tim Tam
Speaking 7/10
Keeping 4/10
Batting 2/10
Drs 0/10

Awful series.
Needs to be axed.

Need these two to go big here

300 plus is so important on this pitch

Yes and how. Bring him back to earth and his moderate batting average with it.. Also deflate the Pommies somewhat.
Reckon Boycs may be overgushing here. From the precarious point Stokes came from.. yes it was an exceptional effort. Aided it must be said by poor umpiring and a massive amount of luck. How many miss hits landed tantalisingly close to fielders? On another day he would have been out cheaply and we'd have the little urn already locked away.

What can you say about Steven Smith. Are they sufficient superlatives? He is the Baggies boulder.. Labu the team pebble fast becoming the rock.

Head, Wade and Paine need sizeable contributions so we can lock out the Poms as this will be a rain affected match and runs on the board are paramount.

Despite these abysmal figures and the general batting we are still "up to our eyeballs" in this series as Tim Paine so eloquently puts it.

Going viral

"Best batsman in the world performing as expected. Smith doing well too"

Labu has come from nowhere
First class average very ordinary but looks mentally tough and technically sound.

Let's hope both can go big

Solid start, i hope Labu is actually our long term answer at 3 and that this isn't a temporary run of form for him. But for the first time in a while we actually look solid from 3-6

Good to see you back posting, CS.

Labu would be a very useful long term number 3 for us as he can bowl reasonable leggies too and is a good fielder.

Boycott said Smith can't bat 7 or 8 years ago. He said was merely County standard.

Stokes got very lucky. Day 4 pitch was best of match. Bowlers were tired. Poor umpiring. Short rope.

Seen many better innings from Lara or Sachin. Even Smith's knocks in test 1 were better. Much tougher conditions, better bowling, not played for 18 months.

Scoring 135 on a good pitch against tired bowlers with heaps of luck doesn't rate in the top 10.

Waugh 200 against the Windies in the 90s against a great attack far better.

The current Aussie attack isnt that good.Lyon averages over 30. Hazelwood is mostly a new ball bowling. Struggles after. Cummins is hot and cold. Pattinson is no Ambrose.

Boycott is full of it.

I find Lyon interesting

Boycott still has a responsibility to sell the game, as much as be critical. Nathan Lyon is going to become an interesting case, though about where he stands. Cos he will end up being the second highest wicket taker for a finger spinner. Clearly he no Murali. And I don't think he rates too well with Laker, Underwood, Gibbs, or doosra inventer Mushtaq. That's before considering any of the famous Indian spinners. But Lyon is going to clear all these guys by hundreds and hundreds of wickets if he remains in the team till non-injury retirement. 

Lyon unfortunately, and it looked like Cook would till until retiring young, really display that the career tallies now of India, Aus and Eng, is only a  3 way current contest, and the past greats of those 3 countries, and all countries, are not in the running. SL do typpically play more tests than anyone not in the Rich 3, though. Hence Herath and Murali getting the chances they did. 

Current FTP cycle:

• India (203): 51 Tests, 83 ODIs, 69 T20Is
• West Indies (186): 43 Tests, 75 ODIs, 68 T20Is
• England (175): 59 Tests, 66 ODIs, 50T20Is
• Australia (174): 47 Tests, 68 ODIs, 59 T20Is
• Pakistan (164): 40 Tests, 61 ODIs, 63 T20Is
• South Africa (160): 38 Tests, 66 ODIs, 56 T20Is
• Sri Lanka (160): 43 Tests, 71 ODIs, 66 T20Is
• Bangladesh (160): 44 Tests, 59 ODIs, 57 T20Is
• New Zealand (159): 38 Tests, 62 ODIs, 59 T20Is
• Ireland (142): 13 Tests, 64 ODIs, 65 T20Is
• Zimbabwe (130): 21 Tests, 59 ODIs, 50 T20Is
• Afghanistan (109): 13 Tests, 51 ODIs, 45 T20Is
• The Netherlands (33): 24 ODIs, 9 T20Is

The saddest part of this list to me is Safrica and NZ. How on earth we get so many less games than WI, Bangladesh is just beyond me. Rabada will never get to rival Broad and Anderson. Kane Williamson may never get to rival Alastair Cook. All seems a lil odd to me. 

You can see from this list, Joe Root should end up scoring more test runs than Smith, Kohli and Williamson, despite having an averge under 50.

But it is interesting that Australia is allowing a game to grow to them and Ind/Eng. If CA care about this, at some point, CA is going to have to take on AFL, and League, and look to share all of March. An obvious difference is England will play a test series before hoisting the Ashes, or this year an entire world cup and an Irish test, where as Australia will just play 5 tests. England normally play about 7, even if hosting ICC events likr Champions Trophy! They just let football be football. 

But you guys share grounds. It could be time to look at some smaller intl grounds for lesser tours.