England dropped Gary Ballance before the third Ashes Test of 2015 after a run of form that wasn’t actually all that dreadful with the benefit of hindsight. He had passed 30 once in his last 10 innings and had been bowled five times. People said he struggled against good quick
Continue readingCategory: Bangladesh
Zafar Ansari is almost certainly batting too high
Earlier today, we took issue with England’s willingness to make bold prophecies. However, we rather shot our match-previewing bolt yesterday, so we’re now going to have to commit much the same crime simply so that we have something to say. We are guessing/predicting that Zafar Ansari will be (a) playing
Continue readingGareth Batty – the winter bike
There seems to be a tendency in some quarters to perceive England’s Test tours of Bangladesh and India as being one long competitive outing. They are not. They are separate. For all the talk of ‘taking a look’ at players ahead of England’s arrival in India, there is a Test
Continue readingWhy Bangladesh are potentially having a reasonably well-attended party
Twenty-two runs – England’s winning margin – is not a lot. You can splice and dice it however you want. It’s a bunch of thick edges to third man. It’s a handful of extra runs from your lower order across two innings because you’ve picked countless all-rounders. It’s less than
Continue readingITV4 Test highlights programme begs a few questions
Yesterday we let you all know that ITV4 are broadcasting Test highlights for this Bangladesh v England series. We suggested that if you missed the programme at 7pm then you might be able to catch it via ITV’s on-demand service. We may have misled you there. Doesn’t look like it’s
Continue readingMehedi Hasan is no Murali
Mehedi Hasan is making his debut. Bangladesh saw fit to give him the Murali role. Younger readers might think that ‘the Murali role’ is all about being brilliant and freakish and baffling people with magic, but there is a more prosaic aspect to it too. For much of his career,
Continue readingITV4 are showing highlights of the Bangladesh v England Test matches
Just a quick public service post to say exactly what we’ve just said. ITV4 have got an hour-long highlights programme for each day of the two Test matches between Bangladesh and India. Tonight (Thursday) it’s at 7pm and having just scrolled through the listings, it’s also 7pm for each of
Continue readingEngland selectors spiked with Sunset Yellow
For much of the year England’s selectors are Uncle Alan and Auntie Cynthia, who always go to the Marks and Spencer coffee shop. On the average trip to town, they might stop in there two or three times to break up the afternoon. They will walk past any number of
Continue readingEngland are so good they even managed to beat Bangladesh
When England lost to Bangladesh at the World Cup, the British media stuck with the word ‘even’ – as in, ‘England are so bad, they even lost to Bangladesh’. That line was a good fit for the narrative of the time, so it would have been counterproductive to investigate, let
Continue readingJos Buttler’s feud with Bangladesh – who started it?
Jos Buttler is not an overtly angry man. Few batsmen better expose the fallacy that attacking cricket and on-field aggression are somehow symbiotically linked. As a batsman, Buttler demolishes via controlled explosions. He delivers a series of well-timed detonations and more often than not, the opposition implodes. Yet as a
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