Sky commentators were calling that performance by England last night a new low. I intended watching 45 minutes or so between 8.15 and 9.00 before heading into work but the match was already finished at that stage. England absolutely hammered by 9 wickets and 30 odd overs to spare. Joyce made 11 which should boost his average.
I sense a little dig against Bray’s finest there. The thing is he might now struggle to make the World Cup squad. It’s a 16 man squad and KP and Vaughan have to come back into the mix. They’ve taken Mal Loye on board now as a big hitter at the top of the order too so you’ll probably have Strauss, Loye, Vaughan, Pietersen, Bell, Collingwood and Flintoff as the 7 batsmen. They’ll need 2 'keepers (1 cover as it’s a specialist position) and then their 7 bowlers. Maybe they will see Flintoff as an all-rounder and this will make room to bring Joyce too but even though the whole batting line-up is playing terribly, as Joyce is relatively new, he’s the one under threat. He needs a couple of very big scores in the remainder of this series.
Joyce just run out for 66 against NZ. Didn’t see any of it but a good knock by him apparently. They’re going to get routed again - 164 for 6 after 36 overs chasing 319 to win.
A first ever century for Bray’s Ed Joyce leads England to victory over Australia.
Fair play to the lad. He asked to be promoted to open the innings and showed a bit of courage and desire in doing so.
Then he responded with 66 against NZ the other day and 107 this morning.
The way he nudges the ball around he’s the ideal player to anchor an innings at the top of the order rather than coming in late on at number 5 or 6 where you need to be a big boundary hitter.
An opening combination of Joyce and someone with a lot of power like Trescothick could just be what England need. Of course Tresco isn’t available for the WC but that’s the kind of mix that would work well together.
What’s the scal with Treschothick now Bandage? Is there a timeframe for his recovery?
Decent performance by Judas - that’s 3 top scores from the last 4 matches. The game next Tuesday will be interesting to see whether they can do it with the pressure on.
There’s no timeframe with him at all.
They named a preliminary WC squad a couple of weeks back that has to be reduced to 15 for the tournament and wasn’t in that.
I’m not sure if he’ll ever get back to the top level.
England defended 270/7 there against NZ to qualify for the 3 game final against Australia in the ODI series. Joyce made 26 before getting caught coming down the wicket trying to up the run rate. You’d wonder if the Aussies let them win that game last Friday so they could tonk them another 3 times in the final.
Is the final another 3 games? Jesus wept.
England beat the aussies by 4 wickets in the first game of the final. Didnt see that coming.
I did cos I watched the end of it!
Didn’t think they had it in him to come back from 15/3. Some knock by Collingwood who was very much out of form until his century the other day against NZ.
Fair play to the spinners and Flintoff who hauled Australia back from 170/1 after 30 to 252 ao.
Great interview with Flintoff and Hussain there.
‘So you can captain this team then…’
‘Eh, yeah cheers Nas.’