0Eerste beurt Mislukkings - Tyd om denke Kry, Engeland

Hierdie jongste missive kom by jou uit my siekbed. Ja, liewe leser, Ek is tans in die bed lê op 'n Vrydagaand terwyl ander geniet 'n post werk pint of vyf in 'n plaaslike herberg. ernstig, wat erger kan wees as voel soos dood opgewarm op 'n Vrydagaand?

Wel ten minste, Ek hoor jy huil, dit gee my die kans om hierdie kort missie na dag twee van die eerste As-stryd te pen.

En ek is bang dat die onderwerp van vandag terugval na 'n bietjie vertrapte paadjie - d.w.s.. Die kolwers van Engeland laat die kant toe weer ondertoe. Geof­frey Boy­cott summed up the side’s per­form­ance in his own par­tic­u­lar style by simply refer­ring to the per­form­ance as “pathet­ic.” And he was spot on. 136 is, goed, a pathet­ic score by Eng­land. Eenvoudig nie goed genoeg. After bowl­ing with beau­ti­ful con­trol and rhythm on Thursday, Broad helped to fin­ish the job off this morn­ing and must have felt like a well-earned rest was in order. Instead he again tried in vain to bring a modic­um of respect­ab­il­ity to the score by hit­ting a quick-fire 32 loop - tweede top puntebehaler die span se deur een of ander manier.

Now I’ve been check­ing back through the stats – Eng­land have star­ted the last few series badly when it comes to the busi­ness of mak­ing runs.

Die eerste toets teen Pakistan aan die begin van 2012 - Beurt van 192 and then 160

Eerste toets teen Sri Lanka - Maart 2012 - Tellings van 193 and 264

Eerste toets teen Wes-Indië - Mei 2012 - OK hulle het dit met 'n ordentlike eerste beurt totaal

Eerste toets teen Suid-Afrika - Julie 2012 - 'N net oor par telling van 385 (maar dan geslaan byna eiehandig deur trippel ton Amla se) fol­lowed by a meek 240

First test v India – Novem­ber 2012 - Eerste beurt-telling van 191 (bet­ter go of it in the second innings – but the dam­age was already done)

First test v New Zea­l­and – March 2013 - Eerste beurt-telling van 167 (improve­ment second innings to save the match)

First test v New Zea­l­and – May 2013 – dis­tinct­ively aver­age scores of 232 en 213 (bowl­ers pulled a rab­bit out of the hat to force victory)

Open­ing test of this year’s Ashes – July – first innings score of 215

And finally this Ashes cam­paign – first innings total of 136 – a total com­fort­ably beaten by just two of the oppos­i­tion – a jour­ney man keep­er-bats­man in Had­din (per­haps a little harsh) and a bowl­er – John­son. Now here’s hop­ing of course that we can pull off a minor mir­acle in the rest of the match and sal­vage a draw but if we do it will be des­pite this first innings calamity.

Of course this doesn’t make Eng­land a bad side – far from it. In most cases we have recovered our com­pos­ure and demon­strated our class and ground the oppos­i­tion down and won the series – although usu­ally because of the bowl­ers it must be said.

But the Eng­land man­age­ment – who plan every last little finite detail down to the last atom must be a little con­cerned at a seem­ingly con­sist­ent fail­ing in the open­ing test. If Eng­land are going to keep on win­ning series they need to on top of their game from the off.

If I had the answers then I would be out in in Aus­tralia at present help­ing the team out and not lan­guish­ing in my sick bed on a freez­ing-cold Novem­ber night.

But it’s an on-going issue that needs address­ing – there are only so many times the bowl­ing attack can keep on res­cuing their bat­ting counter-parts.