1. You can't select a team on a match by match basis. If we don't have the players for this match, it is because we didn't select the right players two years ago. Basically, if you can't cobble together a convincing team at the beginning of the series, the problem hasn't just emerged.
2. Don't scapegoat. Philip Hughes was blamed for the defeat at Lords in 2009, when it was really Mitchell Johnson's fault if anyone. Hughes' confidence has been shattered ever since. Now we need him and he is in dreadful form.
3. Don't throw away test caps on long shots - it cheapens the currency. The (almost) selection of Michael Beer is a disgrace and it introduces an element of arbitrariness into the process which unsettles everybody. Let's pray he never makes it onto the field.
4. Experience is priceless. Hauritz was growing as a dependable bowler and traded away for... who? Can't remember him. He was a debutante rushed in to bowl to a strong England batting line-up. It didn't work. No kidding.
5. Encourage experienced players to stay. Brad Hogg and Stuart MacGill should have been given more enticement to stay. Stuart Clark was a great bowler treated harshly after injury.
6. See the writing on the wall. Was anyone predicting that Marcus North was going to last the whole series? So why not act straight up and axe him?
7. The Sheffield Shield is in crisis, but we knew that already. For decades, players have come up through the Academy system, earmarked for selection from birth it seems. (Anyone who has ever played any youth rep cricket in Australia will know that there are those players who are tagged from the start and there's nothing much you can do if you are an outsider to get a tag). Warne and McGrath, for example, seemed to spend almost no time at the Shield level. So the real crisis is in the Academy and other youth programmes. What's going on there I'd like to know?
8. Does anyone really think that Michael Clarke is the right man to captain Australia next? Nice guy I am sure. But - score some runs please. Since when do we nominate the successor to the captain YEARS before?
9 comments:
1. yep
2. yep
3. yep
4. yep
5. yep
6. yep
7. yep
8. yep
9. YEP YEP YEP!
I don't think it's just a matter of form with Hughes, Michael; he lacks technique (footwork!) and needs more experience against the swinging ball. But I feel that is the least of our problems - you've outlined the rest. Say, how do we select selectors, anyway?
I think that No. 1 says it all and is the root of all their problems.
Perhaps another one:
The team leaders are not standing up. The team often reflects it's leadership. When did we last see a gritty 100 by an experienced player when the team was on the ropes. I think of the recent period with Waugh, Langer, and Gillie who often stood alone when everyone else was down. If the leaders (batters and bowlers) took some responsibility then the youngsters would have someone to glean some confidence from.
I have a question for you, Michael, that has nothing to do with cricket, which in America is an insect!
I just finished reading your book on martyrdom and self-identity. It was excellent, and well worth the Christmas money spent on it! However, I have a question, which maybe you could answer or at least direct me to something to read on this subject.
The question is this: Given the fact that temptation or testing is an inevitable part of the human condition, what does Jesus mean when he tells us to pray, "Lead us not into temptation"?
The direction of my thinking is that, first, the petition to lead us not into temptation, must be combined with the petition "and deliver us from the evil one." Therefore, Jesus is asking us to pray that we would not be led into temptation such that we would be condemned through our failure, or given our failure, we would turn again to Jesus, who is the only true overcomer of temptation. In addition, the request is that we would so enter into the watching and praying that Jesus asks of us, that we too would learn to overcome the temptations to flesh, faith, and allegiance that come our way.
Am I on the right track? Is there something I should read on this? Thanks for your book and your help.
--Bill Weber
Mmmmm.
How about the NSW centrism?
Want to play for Australian, move to NSW. Even I'm thinking of coming back.
I think its all ebb and flow. We had a good run, other's turn now.
Personally, I'm loving it!!!
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Ha ha, you guys got screwed. Come England! Go on my sons!
Seems they may have got it RIGHT with pup. Who was the selector that made that call? 4 - 0 India who would have guessed? But how do we select in Aus to play on English wickets and their strange reversing / swinging balls? Punter best stay home - he never gets runs in Eng ... Then again who thought he would get a double ton?
Cam
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