England's tour of Sri Lanka (January 2021)

comment by The Welsh Xavi (U15412)
posted 6 seconds ago
5 away wins in a row for the first time in 100 years according to Sky.

We're looking so much better under Silverwood.
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For sure. Jos Buttler finishes the series with an average of 65.5 too, that's not bad at all. Hopefully starting to justify the faith shown in him.

Burns and Stokes back for India and we're looking good.

Burns
Sibley
Crawley
Root
Stokes
Lawrence / Pope / Bairstow (sigh)
Buttler / Foakes

good batting line up on paper, im sure theyll throw some strange spanner in the works.

Burns
Sibley
Crawley
Root
Stokes
Pope
Foakes
Bess
Leach
Archer
Anderson / Broad

Despite it only being a 2 match series, most of the players will be pretty happy with their contributions. Crawley has work to do but we should persist with him.

The spinner issue needs to be sorted. Despite getting 12 wickets at 21.25, Bess isn't the answer, certainly not yet. I think Leach plus 3 seamers and Stokes is the way to go. Broad and Anderson showed their quality and should possibly both play the first test along with Archer.

I'd play Leach over Bess, certainly. I don't think Bess offers enough consistent runs to justify his inclusion ahead of Leach on the basis of being an "all-rounder."

Moeen then?

It's a shame this was only a 2 test series because I'd have linked to seen either Virdi or Parkinson get a go before India.

Moeen will be in contention as I don't think either spinner will be delighted with how they bowled and India are far less likely to throw wickets away in clusters like SL did.

comment by The Welsh Xavi (U15412)
posted 5 minutes ago
It's a shame this was only a 2 test series because I'd have linked to seen either Virdi or Parkinson get a go before India.


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It's always a shame when test series are only two matches long. Same on the just-announced series at home to NZ in June - what a shame it's not the full 5 matches.

Test series against NZ in the summer?

Where did that come from

I'm amazed NZ want to risk coming over here to Plague Island tbh...