India vs England Test series
- Thread starter Santino
- Start date
jonnyd1978
Handsome lads are playing chess in your area
Wow, what a run chase! Not there yet but surely just a matter of time. I was worried we'd not left enought time to bowl them out and never thought they'd chase this score down! I think the previous highest 4th innings winning score in India is about 250 and on this ground it's 155!
david dissadent
New Member
How did England lose that?
TrippyLondoner
Well-Known Member
Cause that's how good India are at home.
rapattaque
At fighting weight
Bloody amazing stuff from India, they made the run chase look easy. Not sure Monty can hack it in Asia mind.
can he really hack it at international cricket? has he developed at all? he still has that wide-eyed innocence. successful internationals are a lot more ruthless.
Monty definitely needs to improve, but England can't afford to drop him without a serious replacement lined up. With any luck Adil Rashid will either replace him or make him up his game. If Swann can handle batting a bit at Test level he will be a useful back-up for a while.
Apparently Sehwag's 92 runs in 2 innings are better than two centuries. Huh.
tangerinedream
Density of Sound
Such a shame it's only a two test series. 4 Tests would have been really great. That was a corker and I think it goes to show just how good they are. I mean, they've just beat Aus pretty easily, it was obviously all going a bit to well for us. I agree Shah probably deserves a knock, but I'm not sure about reshuffling the bowlers, I mean, you bring in Broad, you don't bring in Broad, I can't see him winning the next match with the ball tbf.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Yep, I agree with that. Harmison and Anderson shouldn't both play. But I don't rate Broad unfortunately. Oh for Simon Jones.
Even though England lost, India are the team I least mind us losing to. They're such a fanatically cricket-obsessed country. When you go there, the game is played everywhere. Really, it's actually quite shocking that they aren't much more dominant than they tend to be, when you take into account their size, population, the money in the country at the top end, the number of people who play it, etc. They should constantly just spank everyone else.
waterloowelshy
Well-Known Member
without his aggressive 92 then India would not have had a chance of winning the match. Sehwag's innings completely changed the complexion of the game. Until he came in and did what he did India would have been playing out for a draw. His aggression totally changed everything. So Man of the match is fair enough as his performance was the difference between India winning or not. Strauss innings were great, but ultimately had little impact on the outcome of the game.
Tendulkar's century was just as important for India winning. It just seems to me that Test cricket should recognise sustained performances rather than half an hour of hitting. I don't begrudge Sehwag, it was an awesome performance, but two centuries in a match is proper record book stuff.
TrippyLondoner
Well-Known Member
Exactly my thoughts.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Not sure I agree with that. Didn't see any of the action, and obviously, if Tendulkar and Yuvraj hadn't made the runs, someone else would have had to. But England were in a totally dominant position at lunch yesterday. Over 300 ahead with just 3 wickets down. They lost their way in the afternoon, then Sehwag siezed the initiative. Momentum is crucial in test matches, and it was Sehwag, not Tendulkar, who affected that.
As for Strauss, he was very unlucky to be on the losing side, but I think it's always a little odd when a player from the losing side is named man of the match.
Man of the Match should be about more than the match though. Hang on, that sounds wrong. It should be exactly about the match. I've gone and confused myself now.
Paulie Tandoori
shut it you egg!
beautiful, snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in the most magnificent manner. well played lads 
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
I think the game was lost in the last two sessions yesterday. After playing really well and dominating the match, two hours of clueless batting followed by an hour of clueless bowling undid all the good work.
Of course we should congratulate India too. Can anyone who watched comment on how Panesar bowled? 0-100 on a wearing final-day wicket is obviously no good. Did he bowl badly? Was he unlucky? Or was it largely down to the excellence of Tendulkar and Yuvraj?
Of course we should congratulate India too. Can anyone who watched comment on how Panesar bowled? 0-100 on a wearing final-day wicket is obviously no good. Did he bowl badly? Was he unlucky? Or was it largely down to the excellence of Tendulkar and Yuvraj?
waterloowelshy
Well-Known Member
He bowled rather boringly, without variation. He didnt change his flight or pace but kept bowling the same ball, ball after ball. I was a big supporter of Monty but i think he has been found out at the top level. The pitch was offering enough to keep the spinners interested, but he didnt have the variation or know how to get the best out of the pitch. He could and perhaps should have been the difference. I can see Rashid waiting in the wings for his time, maybe ahead of the Ashes.
mattie
missing in inaction
I vaguely remember one of the contributors to Wisden making that point when we played Sri Lanka - he bowled identical balls, even when getting milked via the same shot, for overs on end. Even Warnie said that Monty seems like he's still playing his first test, he hasn't changed his approach at all despite a good few years of experience.
When the pitch has good bounce and turn he's a handful, as there's no riskfree way of playing spin on those surfaces, but when it's a bit slower/lower he can't seem to think his way through.
jonnyd1978
Handsome lads are playing chess in your area
Yeah, Monty needs to start varying the pace and the flight of the ball. We had enough runs on the board for him to let loose a bit and really give the ball some air and slow it down. He'd go for a few but he'd have more chance of a wicket by varying it a bit.
