Rhino Richards

FMD. Watson gallant century entrenches him as the team's all rounder. Its superfuous playing two all rounders unless he performs with bat and ball. Despite the score we are exposed longer term by playing only 5 specialist batsman. His opportunities are limited and he needs to make it happen. Its a reality you cant see. And if you were really one for supporting our players you would be defending a proven player like Clarke against some of the caveman stupidity that has been prevalent here

Credit where credit is due. But that innings is long overdue. If he is to bat at 3 and bowl for the foreseeable future then I cant see more than one Test for Faulkner unless he blows the lights out on debut.

It clearly failed you and jazza badly. No one one could sneeze that much and that often even with a 3rd nostril to get you anywhere near that standard.

In other words you don't actually know. I trust you will be a the MCG to call Broad a cheat.

It's interesting the Cricinfo Huddle has Bryce McGain on it. He was more recent than Scott Muller. Lets hope that the infamous cameraman is not present at the Test.

A great day and well done Watson and Smith. Even better that Watto made it a big hundred. Might have benefited from Clarke's assistance in the nets. Well I never! England really surprised...at selection no Tremlett.... And their captaincy. Is Cook the worst captain to have maintained the Ashes? I can't believe they bowled a debutant finger spinner in the 1st session of a Test when the other team were chugging along at 1/60 odd. Even more so when he was brought on to cover another debutant that had been smashed. Baffling. By playing only 3 genuine Test bowlers England are really wasting this Test. Oh and can someone please shut Lehmanns and Arthur's mouths! I would have thought that Athurs settlement would have included confidentiality clauses. I can only think Boof or Boofhead had an Eddie McGuire moment on radio.

1-112 at lunch And 58 off 7 overs from the debutants in the Ist session. However, great partnership of 100 from Rogers and Watson. Keep going Shane. Rogers has really impressed with his gritty support in this series. Great session Australia.

Oh good grief. 1/101 Kerrigan has bowled an over half trackers to Watson 0 4 4 2 4 4 Happy Birthday Shane - 76 off 71 balls

Good 50 from Watson on a perfect batting pitch fast outfield with two debutants bowling soda balls. He needs to cash in here and lead the charge with a ton. Huge question mark on him remains if he doesn't....

At this stage 1-41 where it seems there little for the seamer and Swann within the 1st 20 overs is spinning the ball and Australia has 5 seamers and 1 front line spinner. England have chosen two. Hope it does not bite us bad.

Funny, I thought Siddle has the 3rd seamers spot????? Starc is a strike bowler. Faulkner is there to fill the all rounders spot that Watson failed to do. He must succeed with both bat and ball. It's not good enough to succeed with one or the other. IMO Bird is in competition with Harris and he is not up to that class yet. Playing Siddle, Bird and Harris together has a sameness to it.

Agree. 5 seamers and its dry Oval wicket where we bowl last on it. At least we won the toss. I am not disappointed Starc is in. Bird was loose in the 2nd dig of the last test. Starc should not have been dropped in the first place.

And misquoted out of context and misrepresented by someone who clearly doesn't know and should know better.Arthur's comments were with respect to the vacuum created by the departure of senior players Ponting and Hussey in a short space of time coupled with the lack of leadership of senior players like Shane Watson and the huge egos of younger players who earn exorbitant money through IPL. He also commented on his faltered relationship with Watson at the end of his tenure. It's not a good sign of a coach when that happens and is not a good reflection on Watson, an underperforming prima donna. It's worthwhile considering Watson's behaviour as senior player and the leadership and public behaviours of senior players like Ponting and Hussey. It's a chalk and cheese comparison at best.

We're two batsmen short. We dropped an out of form batsmen for an untried all rounder who bats at 7. We have elevated an out of form all rounder to No 3 ( for his batting only)who can't be justified either for his batting or bowling ATM. I don't like having to bat Haddin at 6. Capable at 7 but not a number 6 batsman. The other option would have been to replace Khawaja with Hughes. And that would have been dumb. But like often happens I am expecting most of the runs to come from the lower order. Oh well!

TD, I think the focus of CA should the home Ashes Series and trying to recover/achieve the best outcome possible in the short term. As you would agree there is a couple of must fixes. Certainly the batting spots 3,5 and 6 around Clarke have to corrected from the available pool on tour and best hopes in the Shield. It possible we might find a gem back home for one of the spots. Less probable is settling all 3 spots within 3-4 months. Happy to be shown to be wrong on this on the upside. If the press is to be believed and I think there is evidence of this....they don't have confidence in Lyon and he warming the seat until Ahmed/ Agar/ someone else better comes along. Add to that the ever present risk of fast bowler injury, there is already fair likelihood of considerable change to be competitive in the home series. With such an unstable environment surrounding the team I would be loathe to jettison the experienced Haddin unless there is a real form and fitness issue there.

I use to think our stellar W/L record at Lords was something on our side until I realised its means nothing of the sort. While Tim Paine is a talented cricketer he has missed a lot of cricket. His performance with the gloves in SA has at least from the press reports has neither noteworthy or sub standard. But his batting 54 runs in 5 digs in 2nd rate has been well below the performances of an Australian No 11( but above an Australian No 3!). So I can't fathom why there is the slagging of Haddins efforts at the top level. And he had one poor innings in Lord otherwise he has had a stellar series with 25 dismissals in 4 Tests (including one innings washed out). Has a keeper did better than that in 4 tests of an Ashes series. Barring injury or being hit by a bus, Haddin looks like being keeper for the GABBA and on present form for the rest of series. There are serious holes in the batting and changes (possibly frequent) through home series to patch with 2nd rate options available. When a keeper is doing his job why would your force an unnecessary change at this point. If Haddin is still the form keeper at the end of the home series then you do have to look for solutions for the future. At present the incumbent is performing and the main challenger (Paine) has no performances on the board. Now things do change over the course of the season and you must keep it monitored. But where we stand at the moment, there is not a solid or plausible case to be looking at Paine for the GABBA over Haddin. And without injury or loss of form, Paine would have to play absolutely out of his skin with gloves and bat to either overhaul Haddin or be selected as a batsman. Given the gaps at 1 to 6, that may be his best chance.

Agree. I cant understand the lack of love for Haddin. Been good with bat and ball. Provides leadership assistance that Clarke has lacked with the retirement of Ponting and Hussey. In a tough series he has average 25 with the bat and played a couple of critical knocks. His keeping has been generally very good and took a ripper leg side catch in the last Test. 25 catches in the series thus far and I cant remember him dropping many. Clearly changes need to be made by the GABBA test but they are necessary here. Wade is not good enough to make it as a bat in Tests. Then again you could say the same for Hughes, Khawaja etc.

Closest chance to see what he is like in the big time. It would be bizarre that if Australia takes 2 spinners to the Oval that Lyons and Agar are not it. Well done to Hazlewood who has fought back from serious injury. I was thinking our stocks were tested with Cummins, Pattinson and Hazlewood on the injury list.

LOL. Oh dear. You have my deepest sympathies.

I think it evident that in some areas we don't have the talent and haven't for sometime. Another Blind Freddie situation I would have thought. I would have thought those that will not comply with the team ethos won't be part of it. Each of those elements are at best fringe players (eg Watson, Khawaja) or are not out of the team ( eg Johnson). Their time of reckoning is not too far away. And if there had indeed been the talent at Shield level, their day of reckoning would have been sooner. Do you think writing in CAPS makes your points seem less hollow than if you don't?

Oh another bash Clarke post. It's not like you to fester. Geez jazza you make it so hard work out who I would back in knowledge about leadership.... Ian Chappell or you? Boy it a close one.

Clarke made an accurate statement that even Blind Freddy can see. At present there is no one else presently good enough. The discussion on here rightly raises the challenges with the options. There are no obvious choices banging down the door. Since Ponting and Hussey departed there has been a golden opportunity for prospects to shine. The reposes has been at best fickle I think the shot selection statement is rightly and validly made by the coach Lehmann. And the batsman you mention highlight that their probably not good enough either ATM.

It's bit of a misnomer when you want to blame the last 4 batsmen relative their peers for losing the test when the failure has been the top six ( particularly the middle order). Of the batting, only Rogers and Clarke can hold their heads above water. All the other have averages hovering in the mid 20s. It's not good enough. And is bizarre Haddin at 7 gets crucified when his record was comparable to the above. The question is when the call was for batsman to stand up and be counted who did and who didn't? I know Khawaja Smith and Watson didn't. I can't believe a player like Watson who averages only 27 with the bat and 78 with the ball is seen as a critical member of the side. Flawed technique and an inability to address it, at 32 he must be on the way out, injured or not. Got to be question marks on Smith and Khawaja. If Khawaja isn't happy on the English tour ( and I'm not sure where this piece of fantasy comes from) then it's the 2nd tour he's cracked the dads and not produced. See ya. Disappointing that we did not back Harris's great work up with bat and ball. Siddle and Bird bowled very poorly with the 2nd new ball and lost their heads. It's outrageous that Clarke was forced to bowl Lyon after 11 overs with the new ball. And a 70 run loss is loss by degrees. A dropped catch cost us 14 runs, dumb bowling cost us 40 or so and there is a big ? on Bresnan not playing a shot in front of his stumps and given not out. Nevertheless 300 was a big ask even though Rogers and Warner gave us the start. My changes: In Starc, Faulkner Out: Harris ( if he needs a rest, otherwise he plays) Watson. If the Oval is turning we should use Smith and get some value out of him rather Agar. We should be using the Oval Test with a focus on the Gabba.

Any decision which is not finally decided by the umpire ( referred in some manner to the 3rd umpire) or is a clear or blatantly obvious error by the central umpire has and will attract controversy. It's a poor metric of judgement. The real test is when used properly does the DRS result in better decisions ( ie has the process resulted in an incorrect decision being corrected) or vindicating the decisions made by the umpire. Technology is here to stay and we will not walk away from it. We either learn to use it better or seek to develop it further towards the aim. Drums are beating.......

That's the problem. You are concerned about DRS being intrusive and undermining the central umpire. Well, well, well, the slowness of Test cricket is exacerbated by the 3rd umpire having to do a witch hunt on everything he thinks is an issue. And he certainly won't pick up the close calls and will have Khawaja moments. I think those in the middle should be the ones to instigate the review with the opportunity for the 3rd umpire to call out the obvious howler like the Stuart Broad snick And FWIW, Petersen was confirmed out on the issue of sound noise in the absence of a clear hotspot mark. It's not the be all and end all. It's not a matter of black or white in whether you back hotspot or not. There are a combination of factors to be considered and judged upon.