titan_uranus

I'm sorry but you're way, way off it here. Haddin's keeping has been nearly flawless. The byes you speak of are often the product of terrible bowling from Starc or Agar or Lyon. It's this high quality keeping that means that no one else can displace him until they get better at keeping. Wade is a better batsman, we all know that. Paine is probably a better batsman too. But Wade's keeping whilst he was the Test keeper was disastrous (dropping du Plessis at Adelaide, anyone? That's just one example of many, though). We can't afford to have a keeper dropping catches on a regular basis, runs or no runs. Prior's not making runs for England but they're doing just fine - keeper runs are important, sure, but not the be all and end all of a team. If your top 6 make runs, the keeper's primary job becomes keeping. Haddin's doing his job fine, right now, though clearly we'd all like to see him making 100s. Haddin is the best gloveman in Australia right now. Paine is getting there, but he needs to continue to find consistent form with both gloves and bat on his way back from injury. Wade is way, way off it.

Sorry, that's total crap and completely unfair on Haddin. His keeping has been superb. Hasn't dropped a thing and has made some tough chances look easy. Wade's keeping is abhorrent by Haddin's standards, and as much as I love Wade's batting, he's nowhere near good enough as a keeper. Specialist batsman or nothing for Wade.

Well I genuinely didn't think I'd wake up after it was raining over lunch to find we'd been bowled out. I should have known better.

Aannnnd it's raining.

Huge fightback from Harris to get rid of Bell and Prior, then Broad. But those late runs to Bresnan and Swan have pushed the lead up to 299, and I reckon that's about 40-50 too much for us. To chase this is going to require a really concerted effort from our top 7. With the freedom of time to help us (let's hope there's no rain), we need our batsmen to get themselves in and then to diligently work together to knock this off. You'd think we'll need one of Rogers and Clarke to post a big score, but I want to see Warner, Khawaja, Smith, Watson and Haddin show something.

Harris is having a massive one. Top 3 all gone, keeping us in the hunt. Pietersen and Bell could change this Test, if we can remove one or both of them cheaply we might just be in with a sniff.

An observation about umpiring/DRS: Three umpiring errors were made this morning in our innings (Rogers paid not out, Lyon paid out, Harris paid not out). The use of the DRS ensured that the correct decision was made on two of them, whilst if Lyon had chosen to review, the third error would have been corrected as well. When the DRS is used correctly, it works. The problem has generally been incorrect use by the third umpire and by the players. There are flaws which need to be addressed (Hot Spot's reliability, getting real-time Snicko, ensuring the third umpire knows exactly what he's doing), but the DRS is helping reduce the number of incorrect decisions.

Rubbish shot from Clarke. We've been lucky this morning some regards, though Rogers looks a bit settled in. Three down now but no Clarke. We need a big one from Rogers.

That's the correct DRS decision. The third umpire would have told Hill it was 'umpire's call' on hitting the stumps, and he would have said 'I didn't think it was hitting the stumps'. Therefore, on the catch it was not out because he didn't hit it, but on the LBW it remains not out because, ignoring the bat, it wasn't hitting the stumps. Rogers very lucky, though.

2/12. Warner and Khawaja both found wanting against inswing. Good bowling, but both of them were struggling to get bat on ball in general. Broad's bowled a few leg-side deliveries, but neither was able to put them away. Need Rogers and Clarke to hold on, wear the shine off the ball, see off the swing, because as it keeps swinging we're going to keep losing wickets.

Another wonderful bowling display. Most of our bowling innings this series have been disciplined and aggressive at the same time. Lyon went another step to making the Agar decision look woeful, Bird showed up Starc (Starc may feel disappointed but he continually releases pressure with half-volleys and leg-side rubbish. Run-scoring pressure is what did in Root, Bell, Bairstow and Prior), Watson showed that he has to bat at 6 to be able to chip in with his bowling. Great fielding too (Bird's early stop on the boundary, Khawaja's catch off Trott, Harris' catch off Bell, Haddin's catch of Pietersen, all great). Will be interesting to see how we bat on this pitch. The Rogers-Warner partnership will also intrigue - Rogers is in form, Warner's not, and the Rogers-Watson partnership was doing fine. Pressure's on Warner. Watson meanwhile will hopefully avoid the swing and maybe get to get stuck in to Swann. Very keen to see how Watson goes at 6. All in all, the more we play like this and keep things competitive, the more hope and confidence we can draw for the return series. You could argue Warner's our second best batsman. But you'd be wrong. Rogers is our second best Test batsman, and at the moment Steven Smith is third (which shows you where Australian cricket is at right now). That is, of course, besides the point. Maxwell is not a Test cricketer. His bursts of wickets/runs are just that, bursts. They distort his averages. On the African tour for Australia A he made the big 155, but also made a pair. He also took just one wicket in four bowling innings. It's that kind of inconsistency that renders him a limited overs player. He has talent and potential, no one's disputing that, but he is simply not a Test cricketer. Australia has to stop trying to take limited overs talent and moulding it into Test match talent.

Every time Maxwell blazes away, whether in First Class (almost never) or limited overs format, people salivate and say 'he could be the next big thing in the Test side!' He's not close to a Test player. I'd rather see him keep doing what he's doing and being a long term member of the ODI/T20 squads than attempt to play Test cricket and end up somewhere in between a Test and ODI player. His turn in India highlighted how massively far off it he is, and a blazing ODI 100 doesn't change that.

Fantastic bowling from all of our bowlers. Clarke dropping Root may really come back to haunt us, but we're doing a great job so far. It's going to be mightily frustrating for us if we get close (like, 7/8/9 wickets in) and it rains or the light is bad. So many overs lost to rain/light. And of course, in cricket's wonderful ye olde glory, we take a 40 minute break for lunch at the scheduled time despite losing about 40 overs since tea yesterday. Sometimes cricket baffles.

Great cricket from Australia, but I don't think we're good enough to get a win in this Test. That missed chance/drop from Cook in Lyon's first over might come back to really bite us. Lyon showed why he should never have been dropped; Agar will be back one day, but not right now. I think I can understand why Warner reviewed, with his bat hitting his pad. I think. It didn't cost us (unlike Watson's selfishness did) so I'm not too fussed. Bresnan I think was victim of the DRS' problems. A fully functioning DRS system would have encouraged him, but once Erasmus paid that out, how confident can you be of Dharmasena overturning it? Bresnan wasn't to know which angles were going to be available and what mood Dharmasena is in. I understand his decision, but obviously a bad one.

dee-luded, your opinion of Clarke is misguided, ill-informed, and just plain wrong.

Unfathomable decision. If that isn't considered conclusive evidence, then there's no point having the DRS at all.

Correct decision to replace Agar with Lyon. I certainly don't think Lyon is going to magically bowl us to a victory, but I think he will not only do better than Agar (with the ball, anyway), but he deserves a crack. Warner for Hughes is much of a muchness, really. Bird's pretty unlucky to miss out, I think. Good start so far from the openers. Some of Rogers' stroke play has been great. Obviously the key is to get a nice big platform to give the middle order something to work with, but it's been good so far.

I cannot wait for NFL to start. With Melbourne and the Australian cricket team absolutely stinking, I need to see the 49ers again. Something that resembles a professional, successful team.

As I read this, I heard 'Trengove kicks into the man on the mark'. Apt.

Terrible results from the Sussex game. Cowan 66, Hughes 84, Smith 98*, Khawaja 40. Smith may go on to make a 100, which will save his spot, but what do we do about the rest? Can we drop Hughes after making an 84, to go with his (superb) 81* at Trent Bridge? Can we drop Khawaja for only making 40, despite being better than Smith and Hughes at Lord's? Can we drop Watson despite not giving him a chance at Hove? Warner's 193 now also looks just OK given the South Africans' batting. You'd expect Warner to get back in, which means someone has to go. I think it should be Watson but surely he can't be dropped without getting a chance at Hove, so if it's not him, I'd pick Hughes, even though this 84 is good. Khawaja looked maybe like he was getting comfortable at number 3. If Lyon bowls well, don't be surprised if Agar gets 'rested' or something along those lines (I maintain he never should have been picked). Bird and Starc have Pattinson's spot to play for, too (maybe they'll both play if Harris isn't fit).

There was an article in the paper today about Simon Katich, the forgotten man. Should never have been dropped when he was. He's currently in good form in English County cricket and has said he has not retired from international cricket. We could do a lot worse.

It's actually worrying. We have one Test quality batsman in the entire country (Clarke). There are 0 players not in this squad who are threatening to become a Test player, whilst the current side is made up of barely first class talent.

He's a one-dimensional fail of a Test player. Another useless, standard Watson innings. 20 off 23, out LBW. Get him out.

That catch that was turned down by the third umpire was disgraceful. Far too many poor umpiring decisions for what is supposed to be the most important Test series of the year. Doesn't make much difference to our ineptitude, though. The pitch is a road, but the bowling wasn't very good. Pattinson's having an absolute shocker, might not hold his spot for the next match. Agar's also not good enough. His 98 makes it hard to drop him, but his bowling isn't close to Test quality. Again, that 98 makes this sound unfair, but he shouldn't have been picked in the first place.

I think that's the damning point - I don't think England are playing that well at all. Cook and Pietersen are struggling, Trott's had two ducks already, Root's not firing like he was going into the series, and Prior's struggling too. All they've had with the bat is Bell (outstanding so far) and helpful but not huge contributions from others (e.g. Trott, Broad in the first Test, Bairstow in the second). Bowling-wise, Anderson obviously has stood out, but even though Swann took a 5-for, he didn't really bowl as well has he has in the past. We are just awful. Our shot selection essentially killed off our whole innings (Watson, Rogers, Khawaja, Hughes, Smith, Haddin all got out to poor shots, and Clarke didn't deal well with the bouncer-yorker combo).