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England are not making it, doors open for Pakistan and South Africa

That's why I said in my previous post: "If we had beaten India during the group stage or England in the final you could dismiss the defeat against a Zimbabwe as a one-off blip"

England played 6 matches in the tournament. They played 1 less than Pakistan because their match against Australia was abandoned due to rain.

Yes they lost to Ireland but they won all their other games including a game against India in the Semi-Final where they chased down 170 without losing a wicket.

5 wins out of 6 is a win rate of over 80%. They were worthy winners.

Pakistan won 4 out of 7. A win rate of less than 60%.

I'm judging England by the same standard and they deserved to win the tournament because they were by far the best team in the competition. Pakistan were nowhere near as good as them.
Your standards don't really matter. That's not how tournaments work.
 
Come on man, consistency is something you need to ask for and bring into the game, Pakistan cricket games are a roll of dice, no one knows what is going to happen.

Thats a seperate issue.

In tournament cricket there is no such thing as 'worthy' winners. Only winners.

Had Pakistan somehow won the tournament should we have given the cup to England because they were 'consistent'?
 
A big reason for SA victory today was the absence of tuk tuk Bavuma. Reeza Hendricks was the main enforcer today.. next game tuk tuk will be back instead of Hendricks and SA will be back with their poor starts with poor sr.. how the heck Bavuma is captain and starts before Hendricks is the starting 11 is AZ travesty. The guy is a total misfit for odi..
 
That's why I said in my previous post: "If we had beaten India during the group stage or England in the final you could dismiss the defeat against a Zimbabwe as a one-off blip"

England played 6 matches in the tournament. They played 1 less than Pakistan because their match against Australia was abandoned due to rain.

Yes they lost to Ireland but they won all their other games including a game against India in the Semi-Final where they chased down 170 without losing a wicket.

5 wins out of 6 is a win rate of over 80%. They were worthy winners.

Pakistan won 4 out of 7. A win rate of less than 60%.

I'm judging England by the same standard and they deserved to win the tournament because they were by far the best team in the competition. Pakistan were nowhere near as good as them.
The person who makes it to the final of the tournament is the person who deserves to win the game. It’s ridiculous the ends people will go to not give Pakistan credit. By your logic we should only have a group stage and whoever has the highest win percentage should get the trophy.
 
The person who makes it to the final of the tournament is the person who deserves to win the game. It’s ridiculous the ends people will go to not give Pakistan credit. By your logic we should only have a group stage and whoever has the highest win percentage should get the trophy.

You can read Pakistan’s showing in last year’s WT20 however you like.

I’m not sure why you’re so fixated about the outcome because if you go back to my original post the crux of my argument was about how mediocre Pakistan were during that tournament.

Making it to the final was a curse in disguise because the PCB saw the outcome as a success for Pakistan cricket so all was forgiven.

Babar’s horrible captaincy and all the other flaws were forgotten so therefore were not addressed.

The most important point that I’m trying to make here is that this should’ve been Babar’s last appearance as white ball captain.

Had we lost against Zimbabwe and then crashed out, I’m certain we would have had a better captain leading Pakistan in this World Cup. Not saying we’ll make the semi-finals in India but at least he can focus on his batting and the team could benefit from the presence of a better skipper.
 
The person who makes it to the final of the tournament is the person who deserves to win the game. It’s ridiculous the ends people will go to not give Pakistan credit. By your logic we should only have a group stage and whoever has the highest win percentage should get the trophy.
Why stop at the group stage? The haters rather have the WC decided by the virtue of a coin toss. Only question then is, best out 1, 3 or 5? I am sure if Pakistan wins a best out of 5, then the haters would want best out of 7!

You cannot reason with hate.
 
The person who makes it to the final of the tournament is the person who deserves to win the game. It’s ridiculous the ends people will go to not give Pakistan credit. By your logic we should only have a group stage and whoever has the highest win percentage should get the trophy.
This part I agree with to some extent, but it does show how much luck matters in a tournament for every team including winners.

Even 2019 England had to rely on a bit of luck here and their, had they lost to India, it might have been curtains for them.
 
That's why I said in my previous post: "If we had beaten India during the group stage or England in the final you could dismiss the defeat against a Zimbabwe as a one-off blip"

England played 6 matches in the tournament. They played 1 less than Pakistan because their match against Australia was abandoned due to rain.

Yes they lost to Ireland but they won all their other games including a game against India in the Semi-Final where they chased down 170 without losing a wicket.

5 wins out of 6 is a win rate of over 80%. They were worthy winners.

Pakistan won 4 out of 7. A win rate of less than 60%.

I'm judging England by the same standard and they deserved to win the tournament because they were by far the best team in the competition. Pakistan were nowhere near as good as them.
This is a waste of effort.
You get to the final, you’re one of the top 2 teams. You may not be a GOAT team but you were better than the rest in that tournament.
Yes Pak lost to Zim, but Eng the champions lost to Ireland. It doesn’t matter.
 
This part I agree with to some extent, but it does show how much luck matters in a tournament for every team including winners.

Even 2019 England had to rely on a bit of luck here and their, had they lost to India, it might have been curtains for them.
Yeah this amount of luck is true for every sport though and is part of the game. The sports which minimize it are like the NBA which have best of 7 series in the playoffs but even that has luck because of player injuries and the like.

At the end of the day though, what people remember is the long run tournament results. I couldn’t tell you a single thing about the 1975 or 1979 World Cups but people will always remember Australia/England finalists and the dominant West Indies winning both. In 1983, the West Indies were clearly the best team in the tournament but of course India will always be remembered and get credit for the upset win in the finals.
 
Why stop at the group stage? The haters rather have the WC decided by the virtue of a coin toss. Only question then is, best out 1, 3 or 5? I am sure if Pakistan wins a best out of 5, then the haters would want best out of 7!

You cannot reason with hate.
The funny thing is by their own logic the thing that should matter the most is the ranking since that captures results over a long period of time. But of course, since Pakistan managed to reach #1, the rankings have always been useless. Pakistani haters always change the standards.

The last 3 ODI trophies have been won by Australia, Pakistan, and England. That’s a way better measure of success than winning useless group games. The only purpose of group games is to qualify for the knockouts anyway where the game actually matters.
 
Yeah this amount of luck is true for every sport though and is part of the game. The sports which minimize it are like the NBA which have best of 7 series in the playoffs but even that has luck because of player injuries and the like.

At the end of the day though, what people remember is the long run tournament results. I couldn’t tell you a single thing about the 1975 or 1979 World Cups but people will always remember Australia/England finalists and the dominant West Indies winning both. In 1983, the West Indies were clearly the best team in the tournament but of course India will always be remembered and get credit for the upset win in the finals.
I don't mind Luck in tournaments. But luck only gets you so far. That luck needs to be made use of.

For example sarfraz botched it against Sri Lanka but they dropped his catch and missed multiple run outs he took the team home.

Fakhar botched it against bumrah but after the no ball he made them pay.

Warner against us a couple days ago botched it but he made usama mir pay for dropping him.

You need to compliment it.

In t20 world cup 2022, all the insane luck we had to reach the end amd we botched it still. In Asia cup 2022, Sri lanka gave us 11 extra before the first ball was even bowled lol, amd yet rizwan played his 55 of 47 and lost the game. It wasn't a collapse or anything, we could have easily gotten over.

England did get extremly lucky in 2019 but Stokes played a blinder once in a generation innings, it wasn't all luck lol.

This 1990 era approach means even if we get lucky and get opportunities theirs an extremely high risk of botching things like we did in 2022 mainly because the whole taking things to the end approach is beyond risky for obvious reasons.
 
Even in England they would lose to any Asian team on surfaces that is slow and offers turn. Their attacking cricket works only on surfaces that has very little help from spinners. Didn't they lose 3 games in the preliminary rounds? But for MSD they would have lost 4th and got kicked out before semi final. They like to load their side with batsmen and average bowlers and try to outbat opposition. Not a working strategy. It worked by fate.
 
I don't mind Luck in tournaments. But luck only gets you so far. That luck needs to be made use of.

For example sarfraz botched it against Sri Lanka but they dropped his catch and missed multiple run outs he took the team home.

Fakhar botched it against bumrah but after the no ball he made them pay.

Warner against us a couple days ago botched it but he made usama mir pay for dropping him.

You need to compliment it.

In t20 world cup 2022, all the insane luck we had to reach the end amd we botched it still. In Asia cup 2022, Sri lanka gave us 11 extra before the first ball was even bowled lol, amd yet rizwan played his 55 of 47 and lost the game. It wasn't a collapse or anything, we could have easily gotten over.

England did get extremly lucky in 2019 but Stokes played a blinder once in a generation innings, it wasn't all luck lol.

This 1990 era approach means even if we get lucky and get opportunities theirs an extremely high risk of botching things like we did in 2022 mainly because the whole taking things to the end approach is beyond risky for obvious reasons.
I think in 2022, England was legitimately the best T20 team. I mean did you see what the did to India in the semi finals? 170-0 is as clean as it gets. Batting had a bad day and we didn’t put up a big enough score to defend - it is what it is. But we still had a way more competitive match with less runs on the board than India did with 168.
 
Even in England they would lose to any Asian team on surfaces that is slow and offers turn. Their attacking cricket works only on surfaces that has very little help from spinners. Didn't they lose 3 games in the preliminary rounds? But for MSD they would have lost 4th and got kicked out before semi final. They like to load their side with batsmen and average bowlers and try to outbat opposition. Not a working strategy. It worked by fate.
Yeah their strategy legitimately failed. They’re not just failing on pitches with spin though, they’re even failing on the flat pitches. I don’t know if it’s a lack of interest or what, but they’ve been so so bad.
 
Gotta say this was a very bold call by OP. I didn't really think they were favourites based on numbers but I expected them to be able to eke every advantage out of the team in terms of matchups and strategy and beat teams but all other teams are just as well if not better prepared.

We all know their bowling this time , bar Adil and Toppley, is minnow level but it looks like their batting numbers didn't lie either.

Post 2019 World Cup, against Top 6 attacks, their top order batting numbers are worse than all of IND/SA/OZ/NZ/PAK.


Last time around , they were scoring heavily, 2nd only to India and much faster than the rest of the pack.

So their batting and bowling are inferior to other sides this time. Honestly, all the other Top 6 sides should beat them this time.
 
I think in 2022, England was legitimately the best T20 team. I mean did you see what the did to India in the semi finals? 170-0 is as clean as it gets. Batting had a bad day and we didn’t put up a big enough score to defend - it is what it is. But we still had a way more competitive match with less runs on the board than India did with 168.
Batting didn't just have a bad day. Babar and rizwan were embrassing through the entire tournament minus the Nz game where Babar always ends up performing cause he fancies nz.

The whole tournament our batting kept and kept collapsing minus India who in 2022 were the worst bowling team of the tournament due to beyond injured players.

Eventually the bowling was going to give out. All that luck and we still couldn't fix the batting lol.

India was the best team in ct 2017, we dominated them.

We didn't capitalise on our luck, that's all their is to it. Luck matters yes, but babar and rizzu and imam and even Abdullah have been massive thorns in the side.

These glorified avg hacks have been exposed this tourney.

Sri Lanka's de silva crippled the start that mendis provided causing Pakistan and easier way to chase due to his accumulation nonsense.

Smith and labu outright killed any chance of beating India with smith's iconic 46 of 74 lol.

Williamson was crippling NZ before his finger injury and Chapman recovered

Bavuma who people praised so much, was the one who put way too much pressure on the lower order since the guy stayed till 10 overs and hardly contributed before getting dismissed.

Pakistan's philosophy of strolling amd chasing 170 in the last 20 is getting exposed against quality attacks.

These accumulators will always have better stats then actual strikers but the truth is ravindra is 100x a better no 3 then Williamson, in the same way fakhar when in form was 200x superior to anyone in pur unit, despite the averages not reflecting that and on paper babar's 89 sr not being too far from fakhar 's 91 sr lol
 
Was funny to watch the postmatch with the legendary Athers. I used to enjoy listening to him and Nasser.

Athers and Nass lol.

But during the pomp of the bazball era, they started to sound like old men trying to fit in. The poise they held for years started to crumble and they sounded more and more jingoistic.

Once the illusions crack, you see things clearer and nowadays listening to them is starting to get painful. Once that phase passes, it moves to the comedic.

So yesterday's post-match, almost the entirety of Atherton's chat with Buttler was about the heat and how that cooked the poor frail Brits. Reminded me of India's 2012 disastrous tour of England and how many snide comments were passed by the lot about India not liking the cold. Even Sehwag fielding, hands in pockets, was a sight to be mocked. Bresnan even said If you don't like the cold, go home.

But when it's the heat in savage land, the sturdy British foot soldier is to be mollycoddled.

:rp
 
Dosti yaari culture hurting England. Butbar should've selected Jason Roy rather than his buddies Malan and Bairstow. And playing Stokes as a batter only and with a hip injury, what a waste of a spot. Desperate from England. Even Sam Curran and Moeen Ali would've shown more fight
 
Thats a seperate issue.

In tournament cricket there is no such thing as 'worthy' winners. Only winners.

Had Pakistan somehow won the tournament should we have given the cup to England because they were 'consistent'?
Well if Pakistan has won the tournament then they should keep the cup, but then that is where the worthy winner or fluke/lucky winners debate comes into the picture but hey I am not debating that, all I want is less ire, irk, anxiety, anger and condemnation when we play.
 
England was thrashed badly by New Zealand in the very first match and that thrashing has made England look weak tbh. They could not even beat Afghanistan and they are 90 percent out of the race to qualify for the KO stage. Their team looked weak on paper as well.
 
Gotta say this was a very bold call by OP. I didn't really think they were favourites based on numbers but I expected them to be able to eke every advantage out of the team in terms of matchups and strategy and beat teams but all other teams are just as well if not better prepared.

We all know their bowling this time , bar Adil and Toppley, is minnow level but it looks like their batting numbers didn't lie either.

Post 2019 World Cup, against Top 6 attacks, their top order batting numbers are worse than all of IND/SA/OZ/NZ/PAK.


Last time around , they were scoring heavily, 2nd only to India and much faster than the rest of the pack.

So their batting and bowling are inferior to other sides this time. Honestly, all the other Top 6 sides should beat them this time.

It’s really not as complicated as this.
England has picked the biggest names, which some would call England’s A team. They didn’t pick their in form batters
like Salt, Duckett, Brook, Hales because that’s “B” team but there B team had current form.

It’s absolute nonsense to say their bowling or batting is trash/minnow. On paper, it is reasonable to rate this bowling attack of Adil Rashid, Mark Wood, Reese Topley, Woakes, and Curran as more talented and skillful than both Pakistan and India’s. Adil Rashid as a spinner has achieved much more than Kuldeep, Mark Wood is the world’s most fastest bowler. Topley is class but can’t seem to get that dip and swing. Woakes and Curran aren’t finding any seam or accuracy either.
Where they are lacking is current form.
Ditto with Pakistan. Current form matters a lot in tournaments.

On another thread, you were wrongly claiming Shaheen cannot bowl accurately, reacting to his recent form. As you saw yesterday vs Aus, he absolutely can when he’s in mentally and physically in a good space.
You, like most fans in the world, react way too much to few games/current form.

This exact England team could have absolutely smashed this World Cup if they were in form right now. On paper, there is no batting attack more dangerous than Root, Stokes, Bairstow, Butler, Brook, Malan, Livingstone. This is absolute juggernaut when on song.

As they say, form is temporary but class is permanent.
 
That is not what you said. Here is your quote:
“Munaf bowled very accurately in that World Cup - a level of accuracy that none of Wasim Jnr, Rauf or Shaheen have.”

Reacting to last few games where Shaheen was a bit erratic, you were claiming that Shaheen is not very accurate. Shaheen showed last game vs Aus how accurate he can be when he’s fit. Test cricket is where accuracy matters the most and you can’t get a bowling average of 25 in 27 tests bowling inaccurately. Munaf, the epitome of your accuracy bar, has a test average of 38.5.

Anyway, I do not agree with your assessment that on paper this English team is below par or their bowling is minnow level. On paper, I rate this team right up there and I still think English batting unit is more dynamic and dangerous than the current Indian team’s. They are just out of form. English bowling is also much better than what they’ve shown. Wood, Adil, Topley, Woakes is very competent.
I expect them to bounce back in near future.
What I meant by that was Munaf was hitting a good line and length throughout for a good 4 year period.

Shaheen has never shown that because he was mostly a pitch it up and swing bowler as long as he had his pace. He has never shown the ability to bowl normal good length and line and stay there for long periods of time. And to be fair he never had to. Munaf was never a swing bowler like Shaheen.

You can check the pitch maps of your bowlers from the Sri Lanka match to understand that.

Shaheen and Rauf only pitched around 45 % or maybe less on a good length. Hasan Ali was landing at least 70 % and that's why he could control the rate and take wickets.

You can check the match thread and I've mentioned it there as well.

And any reason why you think accuracy is more important in Test cricket ? Or did you just assume that?

Accuracy is extremely important in ODI cricket but it depends what you mean by it.

Shaheen wasn't bowling Test match length against Australia the other day.

He was bowling hard lengths(8-10m) and that's why he didn't get hit like Rauf.

It's probably even more important to be accurate in ODI's (length depending on venue) and it's not a standard Test match length(6-8m) either.

Shaheen adapted to the Chinnaswamy length on that day but he doesn't do that consistently. In Ahmedabad, he struggled to find it and no it's not a form issue. He's just a naturally attacking bowler who prefers to pitch it up and look for swing or bowl short.

I disagree with your assessment of England and I don't think they are anyway near good enough - either in the batting or bowling to be favourites. Even on potential, they are not ahead of the 3 sides I named in terms of batting and even lower for bowling.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Okay Guys, Please don't discuss Shaheen or any other individual in this thread. We have a separate thread for him to discuss. Please stick to the topic of this thread or else we have to remove the posts.
 
What I meant by that was Munaf was hitting a good line and length throughout for a good 4 year period.

Shaheen has never shown that because he was mostly a pitch it up and swing bowler as long as he had his pace. He has never shown the ability to bowl normal good length and line and stay there for long periods of time. And to be fair he never had to. Munaf was never a swing bowler like Shaheen.

You can check the pitch maps of your bowlers from the Sri Lanka match to understand that.

Shaheen and Rauf only pitched around 45 % or maybe less on a good length. Hasan Ali was landing at least 70 % and that's why he could control the rate and take wickets.

You can check the match thread and I've mentioned it there as well.

And any reason why you think accuracy is more important in Test cricket ? Or did you just assume that?

Accuracy is extremely important in ODI cricket but it depends what you mean by it.

Shaheen wasn't bowling Test match length against Australia the other day.

He was bowling hard lengths(8-10m) and that's why he didn't get hit like Rauf.

It's probably even more important to be accurate in ODI's (length depending on venue) and it's not a standard Test match length(6-8m) either.

Shaheen adapted to the Chinnaswamy length on that day but he doesn't do that consistently. In Ahmedabad, he struggled to find it and no it's not a form issue. He's just a naturally attacking bowler who prefers to pitch it up and look for swing or bowl short.

I disagree with your assessment of England and I don't think they are anyway near good enough - either in the batting or bowling to be favourites. Even on potential, they are not ahead of the 3 sides I named in terms of batting and even lower for bowling.
1. Again, you’re reacting to a few recent ODIs and Shaheen’s ODI/T20 bowling. He’s not pitch it up swing bowler in test cricket. He bowls tight lines and length in test cricket. It seems you haven’t seen his long spells in test cricket.
2.While accuracy is important in all formats, it’s non negotiable in test cricket. Good Test batters will bank on their on defense and wait for bad balls all day long. The only way you can get them out is finding a weakness and pinning them down with your stock ball and surprise them in their weak area. That can’t happen unless you can hit a consistent line and length. In shorter formats, you can still get away with mixing it up with variations. This is cricket 101.
3. This is a strange and unique take on English cricket. This line up are world champions in both ODI and T20 right now on the back of this world class batting that is transforming how ODI and test cricket is played. Meanwhile, Indian batting hasn’t won jack in the last decade. The difference is current form. On class and dynamism, no comparison for me.

Let’s get back to topic though.
 
There’s a hypothetical scenario with 5/6 teams on 12 points so England have a simple equation. Win every game and see where you end up.

Today’s game between India and NZ is the least relevant game for the semi finals
 
They'll probably beat us but feels like this is the end of an era for this England team.
 
1. Again, you’re reacting to a few recent ODIs and Shaheen’s ODI/T20 bowling. He’s not pitch it up swing bowler in test cricket. He bowls tight lines and length in test cricket. It seems you haven’t seen his long spells in test cricket.
2.While accuracy is important in all formats, it’s non negotiable in test cricket. Good Test batters will bank on their on defense and wait for bad balls all day long. The only way you can get them out is finding a weakness and pinning them down with your stock ball and surprise them in their weak area. That can’t happen unless you can hit a consistent line and length. In shorter formats, you can still get away with mixing it up with variations. This is cricket 101.
3. This is a strange and unique take on English cricket. This line up are world champions in both ODI and T20 right now on the back of this world class batting that is transforming how ODI and test cricket is played. Meanwhile, Indian batting hasn’t won jack in the last decade. The difference is current form. On class and dynamism, no comparison for me.

Let’s get back to topic though.
T20 batting has nothing to do with ODI batting .

England's ODI batting dies not have enough class this time and they struggle in Indian conditions anyway.

His long, accurate spells in Test cricket are the reasons he has such horrible numbers against NZ, England and Australia

Indian batting not winning anything has nothing to do with English batting now. I didn't say Indias batting is the best of the lot. Just said it's better than England's.

For that matter , Pakistan had the best T20 attack for 2 T20 World Cups.

What do Naseem and Shaheen have to show for it ?

Absolutely nothing. Doesn't mean the attack is not good.
 
T20 batting has nothing to do with ODI batting .

England's ODI batting dies not have enough class this time and they struggle in Indian conditions anyway.

His long, accurate spells in Test cricket are the reasons he has such horrible numbers against NZ, England and Australia

Indian batting not winning anything has nothing to do with English batting now. I didn't say Indias batting is the best of the lot. Just said it's better than England's.

For that matter , Pakistan had the best T20 attack for 2 T20 World Cups.

What do Naseem and Shaheen have to show for it ?

Absolutely nothing. Doesn't mean the attack is not good.
On topic, English batting is world class and it has everything in it to make a strong comeback in this World Cup. They are defending champions in both ODIs and T20s whereas India hasn’t won a trophy in a decade. It’s a very strange and unique take by you about the Eng team. Clearly, an overreaction on their current poor form.
Butler and Stokes for example are clutch batters. In T20 semi final last year, Eng demolished India and showed the gulf in explosiveness.
Apart from Kohli and Rohit, the rest of the Indian batting is good but not formidable. Iyer, Gill, Kishan they are all new and haven’t done anything on world stage yet. However, all of England top 6 is scary good on paper. There are no weak links.
They are still the top side on paper.
 
On topic, English batting is world class and it has everything in it to make a strong comeback in this World Cup. They are defending champions in both ODIs and T20s whereas India hasn’t won a trophy in a decade. It’s a very strange and unique take by you about the Eng team. Clearly, an overreaction on their current poor form.
Butler and Stokes for example are clutch batters. In T20 semi final last year, Eng demolished India and showed the gulf in explosiveness.
Apart from Kohli and Rohit, the rest of the Indian batting is good but not formidable. Iyer, Gill, Kishan they are all new and haven’t done anything on world stage yet. However, all of England top 6 is scary good on paper. There are no weak links.
They are still the top side on paper.
I called them overrated even before the World Cup .

I only rate Malan in the current lineup. Bairstow and Buttler are inferior to 2019 versions.
 
Mentally weak captain and aging players.

Played worse than anyone imagined but you see from the first game they weren't going to make it.
 
Mathematically they are not out.

Mentally they are already at Heathrow Airport.

What a lousy tournament they have had.
 
Their bowling attack was always meh, but boy has their batting imploded! They are completely mentally shot - might as well forfeit the next few games and go home.
 
England are a proud nation and one of the greatest ever , arguably in the Top 5 after Australia, Bharat, Weat Indies, Pakistan & Southern Afrikaan.

They are not a team that will go from here with no vengeance in their mind.

Unfortunately some team will now have to cope all this pain & suffering built up inside the British team. Question is who that unfortunate team would be?
 
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