Posts Tagged: Stuart Broad

0The Ashes urn3–0 to England… what have we learned?

I’ve been away on hol­i­day for the past 2½ weeks and haven’t had chance to write about the crick­et.  Dur­ing that time there have been 2 more Ashes test matches and Eng­land have exten­ded their lead to 3–0.  Hav­ing been away from all the talk­ing heads I haven’t heard what they have to say, so here are some of my own thoughts, unin­flu­enced by the pundits.

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0The Ashes urnThe Ashes: Second Test — Day 1

So, anoth­er day of excep­tion­ally enter­tain­ing Test crick­et is over, and the second test match is well and truly under way.   Pleas­ingly today has­n’t been marred by any poor decisions (by umpires or play­ers), but I was dis­gus­ted by the mis­taken boo­ing of Jimmy Ander­son.  I’ll talk a little more about that later, but first some pre­dic­tions (admit­tedly a day late)… Read Full Article

0The Ashes urnHeart attack beckons after nervewracking finale

WOW!!  What a match. Gran­ted the shock­ing umpir­ing decisions (when you include 3rd umpires) per­haps made it a little closer than it should have been (although both sides suffered) but what a fant­ast­ic advert YET AGAIN for test match cricket.

Going into this series it looked like it was going to be hard going for Aus­tralia. On paper only three play­ers, at best, would make it into the Eng­land start­ing XI from the Aus­trali­an squad – Clarke, Wat­son and Siddle. Few people gave them a chance.  But through some hero­ic dis­plays they proved that, when it comes to the Ashes at least, as a team they are great­er than the sum of their indi­vidu­al parts.… Read Full Article

0Hotspot Snickometer Hawkeye DRSA growing number of bad DRS decisions…

So, the intriguing 1st Ashes Test at Trent Bridge con­tin­ues to be excit­ing with no clear win­ner emer­ging as yet.  How­ever I want to look back to a poten­tially key moment of the game — the “not out” decision giv­en to Aus­trali­a’s Agar.  Let me be clear — no fault can be laid on any of the play­ers or on-field umpires — only on the DRS sys­tem and the umpire man­aging it.  There have been sev­er­al wrong decisions in this Test match and in the recent cham­pi­ons trophy, lets look at each of them in turn.… Read Full Article

0The Ashes urnDays Two and Three — A Right Old See Saw

I was so incensed last night at England’s abil­ity to snatch defeat from the jaws of vic­tory by fail­ing to bowl a debut 19 year old num­ber 11 rab­bit out (helped by an appalling umpir­ing decision) and then their per­fect fol­low­ing of the script by los­ing two crick­et wick­ets in reply (note again – appalling decision) that I was unable to put key­board to laptop.

It looked that today might a have been a second day of radio silence but Eng­land man­aged to dig deep and loc­ate some so far as of yet reserves of guts and bottle (Ander­son aside). Well played to Cook and to KP for some decent con­tri­bu­tions but espe­cially to Ian Bell. I’ve been one of his harshest crit­ics of late – but only because he hasn’t been weigh­ing in with decent scores when they mat­ter. But today it was time to step up to the plate and he did so, ably assisted by Broad at the oth­er end.… Read Full Article

0England v New ZealandEngland vs New Zealand: Second Test, Day 5

And so it happened.

Eng­land wrapped up a con­vin­cing vic­tory thus tak­ing the series 2–0. It was all a little too easy. Only the weath­er could have saved New Zea­l­and from cer­tain defeat. It rained, but just not quite enough, and Eng­land stepped up to the plate and showed their true class.

They are a far bet­ter side than New Zea­l­and and they proved it. The bowl­ing attack in par­tic­u­lar through­out the series have per­formed very well although the Kiwis’ attack hasn’t done too badly either.… Read Full Article

0England v New ZealandEngland vs New Zealand: First Test — England Claim the Honours

After such a slow start to the game the first test fin­ished at break neck speed today – and what a per­form­ance by Stu­art Broad to raise the chequered flag.

Not only did he club 20 odd import­ant runs (not out) as England’s innings came to a quick and dis­ap­point­ing end but he fol­lowed that by a spell of supreme fast-medi­um bowl­ing which decim­ated the New Zea­l­and order.

When Broad is on-song like that he was today there is simply no stop­ping him and he can be vir­tu­ally unplay­able. The last time he delivered a per­form­ance like this was against the Old Enemy at the Oval in the 2009 Ashes clash. I recor­ded the high­lights of that day’s play and kept them for a few years just so I could watch it again and again. That day he got a 5‑for, claim­ing the scalps of Wat­son, Pont­ing, Hus­sey, Clarke and Had­din – so pretty much the Aus­trali­an top order.… Read Full Article