In a refreshingly candid interview Australian captain Michael Clarke has announced the England starting 11 for the first Ashes test. We’re not sure it’s a good thing that he seems to know the team, but the team he listed is the team we would have picked ourselves, so it could be just intelligent guesswork.
If England had selected Graham Onions in their squad (as they should have done) we would have preferred to see them play 5 bowlers, but England rarely pick 5 and they wont want to change a formula that has brought them a lot of success in the last few years. Most of the team picks itself (1 wicket keeper, 3 obvious bowlers and 4 obvious batsmen) so there are really only 3 places to sort out. Given that England consistently pick 4 bowlers we need to find 1 bowler and 2 batsmen. In all 3 cases the choice seems straight-forward.
- Cook
- Carberry
- Trott
- Pieterson
- Bell
- Root
- Prior (or Bairstow)
- Broad
- Swann
- Anderson
- Tremlett
This is a pretty strong looking side, and I fancy their chances against any 11 the Aussies have to offer. So with that in mind, it’s time for my series prediction. I’m going to go with 3–0 to England, although I wouldn’t be all that surprised if the Aussies sneaked one. With that said, what do we expect the Aussie side to be?
- Chris Rogers
- David Warner
- Shane Watson
- Michael Clarke
- Steve Smith
- George Bailey
- Brad Haddin
- Mitchell Johnson
- Peter Siddle
- Ryan Harris
- Nathan Lyon
As we’ve said before, we’re not convinced by Shane Watson or Steve Smith as batsmen. George Bailey in unknown and unproven at test level. In the bowling department Mitchell Johnson doesn’t tend to bowl well against England and Nathan Lyon wouldn’t get near the England starting 11. 3 of the Aussie 6 batsmen are left-handed which is a bonus for Graeme Swann.
“The pink ball appears grey/blue in red/green deficient vision, depending on its severity. I did a simulation with colour blindness…”