Posts tagged with ‘England cricket team’

With Michael Vaughan’s omission from the ECB’s Ashes training squad and the England Lions team to face Australia, it is clear that a number of players are now ahead of him in the England pecking-order

I had this post planned anyway, but the defeat by Holland in the World Twenty20 adds context and relevance. Yesterdays result should act as a huge wakeup call and a slap in the face with a wet kipper for all of English cricket. Likely it will not. Here is why.

England’s second warmup game is underway, and there is still no sign of Rob Key or Graham Napier.

A six wicket win against Scotland is the equivalent of a 2-0 victory over, say, Tunisia in a World Cup warmup match – job done, but never going to set the world alight.

We all knew this several weeks ago really, but now it has been confirmed that Adil Rashid will take Freddie’s place
in the England squad.

This means that Flintoff has six weeks to get himself ready for the Ashes, with the possibility of four championship games for Lancashire to hone his match fitness.

The selectors need to be prepared for the fact that Flintoff’s days as an international cricketer are numbered. Excluding the abandoned test in Antigua, he has been fit for a mere 7 tests out of 28 since the last Ashes series in Australia. That’s just a quarter of all tests in which he could have played – on that ratio, he will break down sometime during the 2nd Ashes test this summer and miss the rest of the series.

Devon Malcolm has said what we are all thinking. Steve Harmison has a bad attitude towards playing for England. So much for the fast bowlers union.

Personally, I think Devon might be on to something here. If players can’t be bothered or are complacent in some way, they should not be selected. Bearing in mind that Harmison has a test average of nearly 45 since he bowled “that” ball in Australia, it shouldn’t be too great a loss.

We thought that it was a new dawn. We felt that a definitive statement had been made about the future direction of the England team. We felt there would be no more passengers or shirkers. We were wrong.

If the 1st Test against West Indies has taught us anything it is that test cricket doesn’t care a damn about reputations. Two of the worlds finest batsmen, Kevin Pietersen and Shiv Chanderpaul, faced just 7 deliveries between them, whilst it was the likes of Swann and Onions who took the limelight.

Ian Bell needs to talk things over with Geoff Miller. He has issues with those mean selectors. He is hurt at his omission from the test squad, as if he has some divine right to be included.