Shame on you!

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Some of these indian fans are crazy. I noticed yesterday a new poster mirpurmachine was posting and most indians were calling him Afridi14..... . Seriously their obbsession has no limits.... why not just celebrate your current series win vs england boys?

Ps, agree Neon has been here through thick and thin. His support cannot be questioned. He intellect, common sense, spelling and the ability to be creative can though and thats why hes on FILTER and will remain there for a while yet.

Yeah agreed. Viru has also been on the board. Both seem decent guys.

Its not really all boparas fault but he does frustrate me as a player. I think we have better batsman and that he is included because he can chip in with a few overs, problem is those overs are consitently poor in my view.

Bopara has 'flattered to deceive' so often but always ends up a big disappointment. The question is when will the selectors and Andy Flower recognize this trait. Hopefully being a team mate of Captain Cook and a pupil of Graeme Gooch, will not carry too much weight.

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So its Bopara's fault that England has lost 4-0? hunh as if others are oplaying great cricket ATM. What about cook himself. The guy is good for nothing captain and a failed bat in this seriese. rings some bell?

Bopara has averaged 13 in this series which is as bad as it gets. Even when he scores runs he lacks fluency and many of his runs are off the edge of his bat.

can't defend 300 runs with best seam bowlers and now blaming bopra..

straws and clutching..

I think this was inevitable for a couple of reasons.

First its important to acknowledge that India are not as poor, and England not as good as the one sided series in the summer would suggest. Neither team can aspire to true greatness (i.e Windies of 80's, Aussies of 90's) until they regularly win series away from home too.

Second England have repeated their recurring mistake of thinking of the ODI team as some kind of development team for the Test side, instead of a separate team with the need for a separate skill-set and separate mind-set too. In this incarnation of the mistake, it's the choice of captain.

Cook is a good test opener because he can maintain concentration for long periods, and has the patience to wait for the ball that gives him the opportunity to play one of his relatively limited range (in an international context) of scoring strokes. These attributes, such an asset in test cricket, are a liability in the one day game.

I think it is self-evident that Cook is only in the side because he's captain... there is no way that Cook is in the top 10 english One-Day batsmen based on his performances, much less the top-6.

The Aussies have long understood that to undermine the captain is to undermine the team. I think this is going on here too. In his heart-of-hearts Cook must know that neither his performances nor his tactics have earned him the right to lead this team.

He's there simply to get practice at captaincy so that when Strauss hangs-up his boots the selectors will feel better about handing the job to Cook. IMHO the selectors have it wrong. Failure in captaining the ODI side can only undermine Cook as a test captain.

The selectors should have the guts to pick the best person as captain for the test side without needing the figleaf of being able to say "... he has international captaincy experience with the ODI side"

As to the point about Neon - well, true, but lets not pretend this is a purely Indian trait. Plenty of English summer braggarts are also noticably absent recently - though I suspect many of them were actually football fans looking for something to do during the close season, and not really cricket lovers at all.