Boxing Day ashes 3 rd test at the MCG starts at 11pm

S7DiscoDown said:
I fully agree about Foakes. He is widely regarded in the cricket world as one of the best glovemen in the around(in terms of actual wicket keeping). I think he still has more stumpings than Butler despite hardly playing.

That said he's been injured plenty.

Butler gets the nod because of his batting ability. Unfortunately he's bang out of form. Although some of that is due to the fact he comes in with less than a 100 on the board and has to scratch around trying to stay in often against a new ball and fresh bowlers.

The whole thing is pretty shambolic. The bowlers can come home with some ounce of self respect after various decent efforts despite dropped catches and woeful batting.
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I was in Sri Lanka in 2018 for the first test. We were, 164-6 and Foakes came in and scored 107. Steadied the ship and we wont the test. He is also our best wicket keeper. I wonder what would have happened if he was behind the stumps for the two Labuschagne chances that Buttler dropped? Well actually I don't have to wonder
 
Mwelolo said:
I don’t agree.

This was not a great Australian team, by any means and they have humiliated us.

I think there will be changes.
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England have been appalling in this series (and this year as a whole) and I agree that there need to be significant changes. That should include the structure of county cricket, leadership, selection procedures and individual players.

That said, I do think we need to recognise the quality of the opposition. Australia currently have the top ranked batter and bowler in the world. They have 4 batters and 3 bowlers in the top 10.

It pains me to say it, but I can see this Australian side dominating world cricket for the next few years. The most frustrating thing about this series has been the fact that we didn’t make them work for the victories at all.
 
Billy Horner said:
England have been appalling in this series (and this year as a whole) and I agree that there need to be significant changes. That should include the structure of county cricket, leadership, selection procedures and individual players.

That said, I do think we need to recognise the quality of the opposition. Australia currently have the top ranked batter and bowler in the world. They have 4 batters and 3 bowlers in the top 10.

It pains me to say it, but I can see this Australian side dominating world cricket for the next few years. The most frustrating thing about this series has been the fact that we didn’t make them work for the victories at all.
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Billy. They won't dominate and certainly India are a match if not better in terms of batting and spin attack. NZ have a young competitive team and South Africa are improving again in test cricket. Pakistan, West Indies and SriLanka are not at the races in terms of Test cricket.
 
Billy Horner said:
England have been appalling in this series (and this year as a whole) and I agree that there need to be significant changes. That should include the structure of county cricket, leadership, selection procedures and individual players.

That said, I do think we need to recognise the quality of the opposition. Australia currently have the top ranked batter and bowler in the world. They have 4 batters and 3 bowlers in the top 10.

It pains me to say it, but I can see this Australian side dominating world cricket for the next few years. The most frustrating thing about this series has been the fact that we didn’t make them work for the victories at all.
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I think the fact that Australia have 3 bowlers in the top 10 shows that there are not many great bowlers around at the moment, rather than Australia have 3 "worldies."

I don't expect them to dominate, they will continue to do well at home (like most test nations) but will struggle away (like most test nations). For me NZ are India are streets ahead of Australia, who in turn are streets ahead of us.
 
Abel Tasman said:
Billy. They won't dominate and certainly India are a match if not better in terms of batting and spin attack. NZ have a young competitive team and South Africa are improving again in test cricket. Pakistan, West Indies and SriLanka are not at the races in terms of Test cricket.
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Pak_Doo_Ik said:
I think the fact that Australia have 3 bowlers in the top 10 shows that there are not many great bowlers around at the moment, rather than Australia have 3 "worldies."

I don't expect them to dominate, they will continue to do well at home (like most test nations) but will struggle away (like most test nations). For me NZ are India are streets ahead of Australia, who in turn are streets ahead of us.
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India and New Zealand are both very good teams, I'm certainly not disputing that. However, we have to remember that NZ only qualified for the World Test Championship Final because Australia were deducted 4 points for a slow over rate against India. Without that deduction, they would have played India in the final and who knows what the outcome might have been.

If you'd picked me up about their having 4 batters in the top 10 you might have had a point (e.g. Travis Head is currently ranked 10th in the world, which is slightly bizarre). However, I think their bowling line-up is almost on a par with their great teams of the 1990s/2000s era.

Both Hazlewood and Cummins have more than a touch of McGrath about them, Starc is an X Factor bowler and, whilst Lyon is obviously no Shane Warne, you can't ignore the fact that he's taken 400+ test wickets. The performances of Richardson and Green this series also suggest that they've got a decent supply of young, fast bowlers coming through too. Personally, I think they've got an attack that can be successful around the world, not just at home on fast pitches.
 
Billy Horner said:
India and New Zealand are both very good teams, I'm certainly not disputing that. However, we have to remember that NZ only qualified for the World Test Championship Final because Australia were deducted 4 points for a slow over rate against India. Without that deduction, they would have played India in the final and who knows what the outcome might have been.

If you'd picked me up about their having 4 batters in the top 10 you might have had a point (e.g. Travis Head is currently ranked 10th in the world, which is slightly bizarre). However, I think their bowling line-up is almost on a par with their great teams of the 1990s/2000s era.

Both Hazlewood and Cummins have more than a touch of McGrath about them, Starc is an X Factor bowler and, whilst Lyon is obviously no Shane Warne, you can't ignore the fact that he's taken 400+ test wickets. The performances of Richardson and Green this series also suggest that they've got a decent supply of young, fast bowlers coming through too. Personally, I think they've got an attack that can be successful around the world, not just at home on fast pitches.
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Agree with the others that Australia won’t dominate with the likes of India and NZ around. Their strength is the fast bowling attack but on slow pudding wickets away from Australia they wouldn’t be as effective. Don’t get me wrong they are one of the three best countries in test cricket if not top 2 (India still the best) but they are not dominant.
 
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