Rogue

No cricket coaches teaching biomechanics when you're a kid learning the game on the street.

I bet even Hogg is amazed that he's found his way into the Aus T20 side. On the other hand, Hodge was again overlooked and IIRC has now retired from Aus cricket entirely (maybe hanging around for the IPL and so forth?). It was good to see Wade get a nod in the T20 sides and, although it's early days for him, I think he looks to be a better player than Haddin is. Wade's a more aggressive batsman than Paine, and three years younger, so looks a good long-term prospect. As for the India Test series, I want to mention Clarke's batting. It's been really good since he took the captaincy and - as I think HT pointed out - his run-rate was very good this series, which is been really pleasing.

Why don't you think he's capable? I'd get what you meant if you'd said that he hasn't proven himself capable, which is what I thought you were might originally have meant.

I (think I) get what you mean, but that's an odd choice of words.

Even if Paine was going to come straight into the side, I don't see a problem with this. Wade gets experience that'll be good for him regardless of what happens after the Windies tour. However, it'd be silly to assume Paine will come straight into the side. That's a big call for most players, let alone a 27 year old who has played 4 Tests and averages 35 (31 over his first-class career). Stranger things have happened than Paine failing to find form, fitness or simply falling out of favour!

Unless we want to give Starc some game time/rest someone else then that's the obvious swap, yeah. I think we'll stick with Lyon for a little while, but it's still an important game for him.

When you open the field is up and the ball is hard. I reckon that's quite a good situation for Warner.

I'm going to guess that three have been appointed captain on a non-temporary basis; Dravid, Tendulkar and Dhoni. Sehwag (current VC) and Laxman may have stood in at times. I'm not sure there'd be anyone else.

Shah's always been a pretty good limited overs player.

In this situation everyone expects them to lose. Dravid's point is that the remaining batsmen should not be burdened by the pressure of having to bat for the best part of two days to have any hope of winning. I think it's a decent attitude to take at this stage of the game.

Weather: Today - Possible late shower. Tomorrow - Isolated early showers. Saturday - Partly cloudy. It looks like we should have plenty of time to bowl India out, but Hussey and Clarke are making the pitch look like a dream to bat on. The outfield seems pretty quick and we've hit 650 so far. Do we want to bowl at them tonight? What do we want as a lead? It currently stands at 459.

Any inner D'land smirk when our tail piled on some runs in the morning? I'm pretty sure I've even read quotes from Hilf admitting he had things to work on after he was dropped, and that he went away and improved his bowling.

Good to see some decent batting from our bowlers!

Why they were playing Pro40 or whatever they called it, I have no idea.

Katman returns? Read more: http://www.theage.co...l#ixzz1gcX4FNSU

I'll just put this out there: Given that batting first is common wisdom, teams tend to bowl first only when the pitch is likely to favour bowling on day one. Therefore it's not that surprising to see a decent win/loss ratio when teams bowl first, because it's not the default position - they only do so when they think it's clearly advantageous.

Really, Nasher? More like this: Bob: Johnson adds batting depth to our lineup Demonland: We lose more with the ball than he makes up with the bat. Bob: Okay, forget naming names, our tail is long because none of our bowlers can bat. Demonland: Sure, but so what? You should choose bowlers for their bowling; the batsmen have the responsibility of making the majority of runs.

There's a point to be made about having a long tail but today's situation never would have happened had Johnson been playing. It probably would have been worse. I get where you're coming from, but you can't disentangle his batting from his bowling; if so, we may as well say that it'd be handy having D Hussey coming in at 8.

...and the 15+ extra runs we would have conceded had he been bowling for us? I agree with TU that you shouldn't be picking bowlers because they can bat a bit.

Would he have been handy on the preceding days of the game?

Good question. Given he doesn't miss many games, and they don't win many, I'm guessing it's a very, very long time.

I swear that didn't say maybe when I saw it

We're not there yet!

^ Yeah, Hughes poked at it. Jaques is unfortunate that he's been in a bit of a trough so far this season. The other forgotten opener, Rogers, is probably past it at 34 years old but he's in good form.

I always knew I could be a commentator