We thought we were making progress in ODIs but we’re not so sure now. The opening partnership looks wrong (having failed numerous times in the past), Trott looks too one paced at number three, Yardy isn’t convincing at number seven, and we’re missing an inform Paul Collingwood to lift the side with bat and ball. The inconvenient truth is this: we are almost totally reliant on Eoin Morgan. Once the Irishman gets out, hope usually goes down the toilet. We’ve lost three matches in a row now.
Ok, you could argue that we’re tired and want to go home, but we don’t think that’s the case. The smug expression on Aussie faces should be enough to motivate any England side. Perhaps it’s time to re-evaluate and accept that we’re not as good as Australia in one day cricket yet.
Whereas the Aussie test attack is about as penetrative as the average public inquiry, they can bring back the likes of Lee and Tait for ODIs. Now that’s a cutting edge. Meanwhile, their batting order is strengthened by the addition of world class hitters like Cameron White and Shaun Marsh. Who can England bring in to improve the side? Err, Luke Wright and James Tredwell apparently. No wonder we’re getting stuffed.
Today’s defeat in Hobart was particularly demoralising. To have the Aussies reeling at 142-8 and then lose is galling. Fair play to Shaun Marsh for proving once again how inept the Australian selectors are (can you believe they left him out of their World Cup squad this week?), but England should have bowled Australia out for under 200. How did Doug Bollinger manage to score 30 for heaven sake? Maybe his rug is giving him special powers.
Having said that, England should have chased 230 without breaking sweat. It’s very disappointing we were unable to do so. We lost wickets at crucial times, got bogged down in the middle overs, and the Aussies knew that victory was theirs once Morgan holed out in the deep. Although England’s starlet can count himself unlucky to be caught by Shaun Tait – usually the commentators say ‘it’s in the air but safe’ when they see Tait under a high ball – it wasn’t the best shot. In fact, it was reminiscent of his dismissal in the Melbourne T20.
The defeat in the first ODI didn’t bother us too much. Shane Watson played a blinder and England are entitled to have the odd bad day. The manner of this defeat concerns us though. The bowlers can be excused as they were missing key personnel – Anderson, Broad and Swann are all quality performers – but what excuse do the batsmen have? Absolutely none. We were at full strength and batting was straightforward under lights.
Winning the Ashes was brilliant. At the time we didn’t care about the ODIs. However, today’s game reminded us how irritating self-satisfied men in Canary Yellow shirts can be. Their opportunities for supercilious celebrations must be kept to a minimum.
James Morgan
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Val Blundell and The Full Toss, The Full Toss. The Full Toss said: When Morgan fails, England fail http://bit.ly/hoX502 our reaction to the 2nd ODI #cricket #CBseries #EoinMorgan #EngAust what do you think? […]
QUOTE: “Perhaps it’s time to re-evaluate and accept that we’re not as good as Australia in one day cricket yet.” UNQUOTE
No it isn’t! When they have won at least 4 out of the 7 ODIs then I’ll agree with you. But even then it will only be for now and in Australia – it won’t necessarily be so in India.
But I get your drift. However you don’t get better by giving up (mentally if not physically boarding the plane home). You get back out there and try harder. There’s no better time than in Australia – now.
I do not think there is much difference between the sides on paper, Adam. However, Australia are still officially the number one side in the world in ODIs, so at this point I think it’s fair to say that we aren’t as good as them. That’s not to say things won’t change in India though. We have the potential to compete, but we are a little too reliant on Morgan atm.
It’s all very well to say that you should have chased that total down without breaking sweat, but Bellerive is a tough ground. It habitually gives rise to low scores which teams have difficulty chasing. In fact 230 was probably about par.
Shaun Marsh looked like he was playing on a different pitch to just about every other batsmen on both sides.
That maybe true, but it was still a poor effort in my view. As you said yourself, 230 was par, so England were well short.
It not so much the defeat, it’s the manner of the defeat. England say that they want to be the best side in the world and we have a great chance to hammer a struggling Aussie side into the ground, we are letting them off the hook at the moment and missing a great chance to humiliate them like they used to do to us.
The best sides in the world finish teams on the ropes off and right now we are giving Australia a lifeline. If we can win on Sunday we can put some pressure back on them and see if their ODI side has more character than the test team.
Hey, I just found out that totals of over 230 have only been chased down twice at Bellerive in Internationals.
It’s a tough track to chase on. 230 a fair bit better than par in that case.
We should be too hard on ourselves if this series ends up a disappointment. Four years ago Australia had the perfect opportunity to complete our humiliation by adminstering a drubbing in the ODIs. As it turned out, we won them. And no one cared, either then or now.
This series should have been held before the Ashes and consisted of max 5 matches. ODI’s after test series are always such a let-down.
Going back to your stat on 230 runs, in that case then maybe Australia deserve a lot more credit for their score.
Maybe our bowlers mucked things up rather than the batsmen. Makes my last post criticizing the batsmen look a bit stupid. lol
Sunday’s match is crucial. If we lose tomorrow imagine the pressure on Wednesday 26th!
We’ll be fighting to avoid a 5th loss on the trot (no pun intended) and the Aussies looking to celebrate winning the one-day series 4-0 (with the other matches being only a meaningless knockabout).