pablo jaye wrote:Some confidence building for England in the two ODIs v Ireland, ahead of the ICC trophy, and also good experience for the Irish too.
The schoolboy in me is delighted that England have a Willey and two Balls (one white and one called Jake). They have Wood too! And needless to say, they will be taking precautions with a Johnny!!
Haha, very true. The bowler's Holding the batsman's Willey still makes me chuckle to this day.
Yeah the ODIs against Ireland went as well as could be expected. A bit no win from an England POV but some of the fringe lads got a good opportunity and mostly acquitted themselves well. We'll be a handful for anyone at home in our conditions during the Champions Trophy but there's some seriously good sides out there.
I'm going to 4 matches in a 7 day period including England v NZ in Cardiff and England v Australia in the Hollies stand at Edgbaston. Looking forward to it, but I think I'll need a holiday afterwards to recover!
LincolnshireHammer wrote:
So the new 20:20 tournament will tun alongside the T20 Blast? What's the point? Either have one or the other.
It is a bit of a joke. I can only think the ECB have allowed two tournaments to run at the same time, so that the counties that have no "City" to continue to make money during the summer. Essex would lose out massively if the T20 blast was pulled completely.
Essex currently top of the CC Div 1 and through to the semi finals of the One Day Cup. Only lost one match so far this season in all comps (by 1 run!).
Great what Silverwood and McGrath have done. Always had a good one day unit but performances in the four day format were pitiful under Grayson. Hopefully have a good t20 campaign as well.
How Bairstow doesn't get in this team is beyond me, really what is the need for both of Ali and Rashid- either one will do! Root has proved he is a more than adequate second twirler should the game require it
Centre Half wrote:
How Bairstow doesn't get in this team is beyond me.
Agreed - it's absolutely bonkers!!!
He's our best batsman after Root - whether it's Tests or an ODI.
I would probably actually drop Plunkett from today's team. Even without him we'd have 5 frontline bowlers - Wood, Woakes, Stokes, Rashid, Ali. And even Root as an emergency 6th.
southendmadhammer wrote:Essex currently top of the CC Div 1 and through to the semi finals of the One Day Cup. Only lost one match so far this season in all comps (by 1 run!).
Great what Silverwood and McGrath have done. Always had a good one day unit but performances in the four day format were pitiful under Grayson. Hopefully have a good t20 campaign as well.
Haven't been able to stop Sangakkara though!
I really hope the light allows him to get the record of six consecutive hundreds