England Tour of India November 9 2016 - Feb 1 2017: 5 Tests, 3 ODIs, 3 T20s

[maniac]

On 11/5/2016 at 2:22 PM, philcric said:

 

Depends on team's requirements. A team which already has strong top order and a good batting all rounder will prefer a proper bowler who can bat decent. Another team might prefer a proper batter who can bowl decent. 

 

Pandya we are still not sure what his stronger suit is as his game is still developing and that's okay. India should be fine either way, a batter who can bowl or a bowler who can bat. 50-50 all rounder like Ben Stokes will probably suit India best.

 

Reg Pandya and Bhuvi ... purely on potential, Bhuvi can be among best 3 pacers and a good No.9 bat and Pandya can be a No.7 bat and the 5th bowler in all conditions. India with its current team make up would benefit from both but definitely from Pandya a little more.

 

Once the late middle order (6-8) is strengthened, India can forget about worrying before each game whether to play with 6 batsmen or 5 batsmen. They can ALWAYS go with 5 batsmen. Ash n Saha are playing well. Now if Pandya's batting can come somewhere around that quality our 6-8 is set. There's no pressure on 1 player to be a genuine all rounder but just be a part of 3-4 player group which contributes to both batting and bowling. Something similar to England (Stokes, Bairstow, Moeen and Woakes), none of them consistently good genuine all rounders but their average cumulative contributions are consistently good. And if Bhuvi can become all conditions bowler and bats at #9, that'd be even better.

 

I'm always looking at how we can be more competitive at away games. In India we probably can win with just 10 players or playing 3 spinners or even 4 spinners and no pacers. But the challenge or the goal is to keep winning games in India and at the same time develop and plan the team in such a way that gives them the best chance to win (or be competitive) when it tours abroad.

 

If things go well, this could be our XI in an year playing in let's say Aus, SA and Eng ....

 

Vijay

Rahul

Pujara

* Kohli

Rahane

Ashwin

Pandya

+ Saha

Bhuvi

Shami

Yadav

 

Plenty of batting and bowling without compromising much on either. That team looks better equipped for away games than any other XI we put on the park abroad in the last 5 years.

 

 

 

I might have accidentally made this into a Bhuvi vs Pandya debate but let me explain again

 

The reason I felt Bhuvi was a good example was because Bhuvi is a very good bowler...can make the team as a bowler alone and has also shown the ability to play dogged innings when required as he did in England...that is how I feel what an allrounder should be....same goes for Ashwin and Jadeja....if Ashwin cannot buy a wicket in the next few games but averages 45-50 with the bat in thsoe games...what good is it going to do?

 

SImilarly let us say Murali Vijay fails with the bat in the next few games but since he has been the preferred 5th bowler,if he takes 2 wickets every innings in those games that he failed in...would that make up for his batting failures?

 

Similarly even someone like Jacques Kallis wouldn't have lasted as long as he did if he was a dud with the bat and had a shade better bowling stats that he ended up with.

 

The great allrounders of all time were special because they could make it to their side as batsman or as a bowler...that is why the list of those type of players is very less....but even in such a case they were brought into the side on 1 primary skill....Likes of Imran,Kapil,Botham fall into this category

 

Now the 2nd category of great allrounders are the ones who always played due to 1 primary ability but were really good and sometimes great in the other skill....Sobers,Kallis,Wasim,Hadlee,Flintoff,Watson and now even Ashwin(too early to call him a great but you get the picture)

 

Watson was still bowling probing spells and getting the odd wickets in the final stages of his career but his flop show with the bat made a lot of fans demand for his ouster.

 

With England these days Stokes is deemed to be good enough to bat at No5....Woakes in the absence of one of Broad/Anderson is their strike bowler or 1st change in presence of both.....Moeen Ali is the main strike spinner.

 

Their  "allround ability" comes into the picture when let us say Ali is competing with Batty for a spot or Woakes with Ball or Stokes with likes of Ballance,Vince etc.....then they would be preferred for their allround skills but they don't get played just because they are allrounders.

 

Mitch Marsh is being groomed to be a middle order bat who can bowl in the Watson mould...if he can hit 140K then good for them.

 

With Pandya he is not at the test level in terms of batting yet and surprisingly when that is pointed out he becomes a world class outswing bowler or vice versa.

 

Look Pandya has good potential and a strong upside given his skills .I think he is ready for ODI cricket and a must in T20's but before we start playing him in tests we need to understand at least  what his primary skill set is.I think he needs to start batting at 4-6 to get a verdict on his batting skills as he is supposed to be a batting allrounder who can hit 140K in the Stokes mould.

 

Or if he bats low down the order,give him quota of 10 overs at the death and at teh start to see his bowling skills.

 

Without either we can't give out a test cap just because someone is at the right place at teh right time.

 

 

Edited November 7, 2016 by maniac

[Vilander]

On 11/6/2016 at 8:41 AM, sarchasm said:

The stadium in Rajkot is a MF'ing disgrace with its cheap copy of Lord's media center. I mean do these moon faced gits have no sense of pride in our own architectural heritage to resort to such cheap remake?

its the country of bollywood,kollywood,tollywood,sandalwood,hardwood etc

 

its the country for 'indian's answer' to 'lords'..'dashing' cricket ground.

 

dim wit co^& s$%^&*s. 

[Vilander]

2 hours ago, sandeep said:

Dharamsala looks so picturesque with those painted domes.  Gujarat has so many UNESCO level sites with carvings that would blow your mind.  Go to the 10th century Modhera Sun Temple, or the well preserved step-well in Patan and you would be dazzled.  

 

This BS is the result of a provincial mindset where 'phoren' looking things are considered the standard.  

yeah but you'd need basic high school level intelligence quotient to know about originality, intellectual mileage..basic pride on ones culture.    

[Texy]

RAJKOT

[HippoSucks]

The grass will be trimmed within 2 days.

[MCcricket]

Jadeja to come at 3 and score a triple, his favourite ground lol, will be a slow, spinner n batting wkt, good one to welcome them Pom s

[rkt.india]

2 hours ago, MCcricket said:

Jadeja to come at 3 and score a triple, his favourite ground lol, will be a slow, spinner n batting wkt, good one to welcome them Pom s

this is the not the same ground he scored 3 triple hundreds. It is a new stadium.

[MCcricket]

Oh ok, remember you said that before too, but condition n pitches most probably similar, it's hot so see a flat deck even deteriorate n get harder on 3, 4, 5 th day

[mishra]

1 hour ago, rkt.india said:

this is the not the same ground he scored 3 triple hundreds. It is a new stadium.

Its Gujju Crowd that lifts his spirit

[Mosher]


"I wouldn't play him [Anderson] in India to be honest," said Ganguly, who will be part of ESPNcricinfo Match Day, the analysis show that will be aired both on ESPNcricinfo and on the SONYESPN channel on every day of the five-Test series.


"It's not the same Anderson as 2012," Ganguly said. "I saw him in the Test series in England recently. He has lost a bit of pace. And I think Stuart Broad and Steven Finn and Ben Stokes [will be more effective] because you will need a bit of pace in these conditions to get that ball to reverse. So I don't know whether he will make the side when he comes back. Not in Vizag [Visakhapatnam] where the ball will turn square."


http://www.espncricinfo.com/india-v-england-2016-17/content/story/1065169.html

[tweaker]

Lancashire batsman Haseeb Hameed will become the youngest debutant to open for England in Test cricket, in the first match against India in Rajkot.

 

Hameed, aged 19 and 297 days by the time the game starts, will become England's fifth-youngest Test debutant, and Alastair Cook's tenth opening partner since the 2012.

 

Ben Duckett, who opened the batting in Bangladesh and made a sparky half-century in his final innings of the series, will move down to No. 4 to accommodate Hameed. Gary Ballance, who scored just 24 runs in four innings in Bangladesh, was dropped from the XI for Rajkot.

[mishra]

^ He should have made a debut in Bagladesh itself. He will be Unknown quantity for our bowlers. Still I think our headache will runs scored by English lower middle and tail i.e. Bairstow,Ali,Stokes, Woakes,Rashid, Broad. We must get these guys cheaply.

[tweaker]

Virat Kohli has said he was "thankful" for India's tour of England in 2014, when he totalled 134 runs in five Tests, because it has led to his becoming a "really improved cricketer".

 

"I can put it very simply as that was a phase I didn't perform very well and it happened to be England," Kohli said on the eve the first Test of the home series against England in Rajkot. "Could have been any other country in the world.

 

"I just take it as a setback in my career and not motivate myself in a way that I have to prove people wrong or have to do something special against a particular opposition. For me, I'm playing a cricket ball, be it any game, any opposition, anywhere in the world. Those things do not change for me so I don't put those things in my head"

 

Kohli had seemed an anxious batsman in conditions that assisted sideways movement, and against bowlers capable of troubling him over after over. To complicate matters, a strength that had made him so dominant in one-day cricket became a weakness - his tendency to hit the ball with hard hands. Over 10 innings, never did he last more than 75 balls at the crease.  

 

Upon his return home, Kohli concentrated on managing this weakness. He had a few sessions with Sachin Tendulkar at the Wankhede Stadium to assess flaws in his game. After the Australia tour later that year, he narrowed his stance considerably. The wider stance served him well in Australia, but the new one helped him stay more upright when facing the ball, and better balanced to press forward or push back. Couple that with better judgement outside his off stump, and the result was Kohli's averaging 54.80 in 31 innings since August 2014. He has been able to convert seven out of ten fifty-plus scores into hundreds, including two double-hundreds.

 

This has, in turn, given Kohli the confidence to look back on a tough stage of his career as just that and not think himself weak against a particular opposition. 

 

While Kohli has not often faced conditions where the ball jags around as much as it does in England, those statistics indicate he has not only been careful to start well - avoiding playing away from his body - but also trust in his ability once he got set. The cover drive is a richly productive stroke for him and Kohli has not abandoned it because it could get him out; during the 200 in Antigua, he understood the pitch was good enough to hit through the line and began doing so quite early.

 

Kohli's skill and quickness in addressing an issue - whether it was gaining strength to hit sixes in limited-overs cricket or pacing himself to bat long in Tests - has made him a fierce adversary. He expects the same from his team-mates as well.

 

"On the field, the one thing that we always maintain is the intensity has to be high all the time because you want to make the opposition feel as if you can't afford to make a mistake rather than giving them an opportunity to get into the game," he said. "Those are the things we focus on, pretty small targets. We don't focus on things too far into the future."

 

India face England after whitewashing New Zealand 3-0 and reclaiming the No. 1 ranking in Tests. They allowed Kane Williamson only one score of fifty or more. They robbed Ross Taylor of confidence. They had the resources to exploit a turning track in Kanpur, a seaming track in Kolkata, and a basic subcontinent track in Indore. India coach Anil Kumble was particularly pleased that barring one innings, his bowlers have been able to take 20 wickets in every Test since the Caribbean tour. While that was praise of the players' ability, Kohli spoke about the mind-set the team has adopted.

 

"The mind set is not to compete anymore, we want to win series, win Test matches, and for that we need to be at our A-game all the time," he said. "And even keep improving on your A-game as well. The guys are ready for the challenge. I think these kind of matches and series are something you play for, against top sides, it tests your character, it tests your skill and you come out as a better cricketer regardless of the result.

 

"This team has bought into the idea that a collective team performance is far better than an individual standing out and team not winning. That's one thing that's really been pleasing as captain in this particular team. Everyone is really selfless, they play for the side, they play for what the team demands in different situations and that's the best quality of the side."

 

Source espncricinfo

[Bigg Brother]

Didnt know that Haseeb Hameed is of Indian origin.

His parents are from Bharuch(Gujarat)..Good luck to him.

[express bowling]

4 hours ago, tweaker said:

 

Upon his return home, Kohli concentrated on managing this weakness. He had a few sessions with Sachin Tendulkar at the Wankhede Stadium to assess flaws in his game. After the Australia tour later that year, he narrowed his stance considerably. The wider stance served him well in Australia, but the new one helped him stay more upright when facing the ball, and better balanced to press forward or push back. Couple that with better judgement outside his off stump, and the result was Kohli's averaging 54.80 in 31 innings since August 2014. He has been able to convert seven out of ten fifty-plus scores into hundreds, including two double-hundreds.

 

 those statistics indicate he has not only been careful to start well - avoiding playing away from his body - but also trust in his ability once he got set. 

 

Kohli's skill and quickness in addressing an issue - whether it was gaining strength to hit sixes in limited-overs cricket or pacing himself to bat long in Tests - has made him a fierce adversary. He expects the same from his team-mates as well.

 

"On the field, the one thing that we always maintain is the intensity has to be high all the time because you want to make the opposition feel as if you can't afford to make a mistake rather than giving them an opportunity to get into the game," he said. "Those are the things we focus on, pretty small targets. We don't focus on things too far into the future."

 

 India coach Anil Kumble was particularly pleased that barring one innings, his bowlers have been able to take 20 wickets in every Test since the Caribbean tour. While that was praise of the players' ability, Kohli spoke about the mind-set the team has adopted.

 

"This team has bought into the idea that a collective team performance is far better than an individual standing out and team not winning. That's one thing that's really been pleasing as captain in this particular team. Everyone is really selfless, they play for the side, they play for what the team demands in different situations and that's the best quality of the side."

 

Source espncricinfo

 

 

 

Very important points ....the ones in bold....and they have contributed to our test team's success in the last one year as well as Kohli's tremendous improvement as a  player.

[Cricket_Hacker]

Tuk...tuk..tuk.. looks like no one wants to score runs anymore

[Cricketics]

14 minutes ago, Cricket_Hacker said:

Tuk...tuk..tuk.. looks like no one wants to score runs anymore

Abey sahi khel rahe hai yaar. Only going after bad balls. Remember we are still trailing by 200 some runs, so important to clear that first and score of bad balls. 

[msplash9]

KL Rahul played a 70 odd innings in Ranji today. Can we call him up for next test ? 
Also the Ranji match is being played at Andhra where the next match is going to take place

[sandeep]

3 hours ago, msplash9 said:

KL Rahul played a 70 odd innings in Ranji today. Can we call him up for next test ? 
Also the Ranji match is being played at Andhra where the next match is going to take place

He'll be back for T3.  Doubt they will issue an SOS for him at this point.  

[Laaloo]

4 hours ago, sandeep said:

He'll be back for T3.  Doubt they will issue an SOS for him at this point.  

They already selected the squad for the first two tests. And Rahul needs to play ranji which starts today or tomorrow so he wont be back until the 3rd test. Maybe Gambhi gets one more chance or we give the debut to Nair.