Two days ago I submitted this 😂

Luckily the game is still evenly poised so the article still holds some relevance

I think NSW wins this game pretty comfortably to be honest.
Considering that NSW bowling attack would be close to one of the best in the world let alone Australia.
Not to mention that you also have a destructive short form player like Daniel Sams also waiting in the wings.

Warner and Smith providing plenty of class in the top order along with players like Hughes and Henriques that have shown to be able to get the job done domestically.

You may want to consider Handscomb or Head in place of McDermott who both have impressive List A careers. Handscomb was the player of the series in the last Marsh Cup.

I can understand the concerns around Smith but as I stated in the article only Kohli, Azam and Malan have higher averages than Smith batting at three when playing more than 15 innings.
Smith has a pretty decent body of work behind him. Hopefully he gets his eye in during the 2nd Leg of the IPL.
I really think Smith could be one of the key contributors to any success we may have during the WC

Not really, his form in the BBL was awful and he was just keeping his head above water at an international level.
Certainly not showing form that makes him an automatic selection outside of him having the captaincy.
For mine Finch may need to embrace being an anchor style batsman. His ability to be explosive from ball one isn’t what it was.

You find a list of opening batsman that average more than Warner at home or abroad

24 Test Match hundreds at an averages of 48 as an opener.
He predominantly scores his runs at home or in South Africa, (surprisingly good record in Bangladesh considering Australia’s struggles against spin)
but any assertion that Warner isn’t close to a world class opener because of one tour is incredibly short sighted.

This wasn’t so much a “Haha Australia is so much better than you” article.
I’m very aware of our own shortcomings.
This was more, “how can England have an armoury of white ball players but simply no test batsman at all outside Root?”
County Cricket is the oldest first class system in the world and none of the players coming out of the system are test quality.
At least in Australia’s favour they have 3 of their top 6 that are World Class players, Smith, Warner, Marnus. Father Time does seem to be catching Warner but at the moment he’s one of the class openers in the world.
Whereas England have one and if you expand to include an allrounder they have 2 in Stokes.
The majority of the elite white ball players have been given a run at test level and have huge flaws in their game. So how have England managed to produce exclusively white ball players and no one that seems to be able to make the leap to Test cricket?

Certainly it’s not impossible…but India are a much better side than England. Especially when they are travelling.

Sibley averages 30 and Burns averages 32 so they haven’t scored many runs anywhere. Neither player tours well. Only place Sibley averages more than 20 was South Africa and 133 of his 324 runs came in 1 innings in which he was not out which inflates his averages. In 22 overseas innings he has 3 scores over 50.
Burns isn’t much better, in 21 overseas innings he has 5 scores over 50. As you’ve correctly stated they have deficiencies rotating the strike and they’ve played more than 20 tests each and haven’t made any significant improvements to any facet of their game. IMO these two are about as good as they are going to get. Neither of them has any great propensity for scoring runs and if they hang around long enough all they do is chew up deliveries and they need to be doing more than that as Test top order batsman.

It’s not just their bat lift.
Sibley looks like he has no offside game to speak of.
He just waits until people drift into his pads. Even then he’s not automatic, India set him up for a catch at short mid wicket.
Burns’ set up leads him to playing a lot of things on the up through point and gully and with the extra bounce I can see Hazlewood and Cummins having a field day.

Even if they show they can see off the new ball, Australia can dry up the runs and wait for them to make a mistake and not have to worry about the score getting away from them.

England are lucky to be considered as close as they are. Anderson and Broad are pretty toothless with a Kookaburra. Archer is gone.
Burns and Sibley maybe have 1 attacking shot between them. Even if their peculiar techniques survive the bounce in Australia they won’t apply any scoreboard pressure.
Root has zero runs under his belt over here and he’s supposed to be the one with any Test reputation.
Buttler, Bairstow and Pope are all below average Test batsman.

Their batting is not comparable on paper. Root is the only batsman averaging over 35 whereas Australia can boast 3 batsman that are World Class in Smith, Labuschagne and Warner.
Green and Pucovski have a mountain of recent Shield runs behind them as well.
Don’t think that Broad will give Warner the same trouble with a Kookaburra in the blazing heat compared to a Duke with consistent swing.

Honestly on paper it looks like it will take a minor miracle for England to win a test let alone the series.

No worries, don’t worry I share the frustration. I typically don’t pick Sanga as a wicket keeper for the exact reasons you have. I disagreed with him being out into the ICC team of the decade as a keeper despite not keeping in a single test this decade. In this case I tied my own hands with my criteria.

I neglected to put into the article that the intention of this XI was purely a visiting XI.
Matthew Prior I’m fairly certain has a century as a Wicket Keeper but I didn’t consider him when making the side as it was supposed to be for foreign players.

Miller is an allrounder with a bowling average under 23 who regularly operated with the new ball.
I understand your affections for Hughes’ performance at Lords but you can’t honestly think they are a like for like swap.

Absolutely, when researching for this article Miller’s exploits at Lords were incredible. Especially in the warm up games when they actually meant something.
Could have added a whole lot more but the article would have taken forever to write. 😁
He certainly was a character and a Goliath of Australia’s sporting history

Agreed. Maybe a sneaky wave to the crowd if you go an innings without conceding a bye as well.

I tried to balance this side between players careers and their exploits at Lords.
No doubt Hughes’s 117 and 84 were supreme quality but the rest of Hughes career left him with a career average around 37 and not in the same caliber as the players in this side.

Yes Sanga is my keeper and I am aware of the discrepancy between Sanga the keeper and Sanga the batsman.
He did keep for most of his career in the one day game and an average of 40 is still very good for a keeper.
In the wake of there not being a keepers honours board I was stuck choosing from people who could keep that had scored 100s and I feel Sanga is likely the best candidate under that criteria.
A dismissal milestone should be something people look at in the future. We ask keepers to do their job with the gloves but unlike batsman who have 100s and bowlers with 5wk hauls they have nothing to acknowledge their excellence.

I deliberately picked touring players.
I realised I didn’t establish that in the article.
There are some very impressive English performances at Lords.
Hobbs, Botham, Willis, Anderson, Cook.
Enough to make a handy English side.

I wanted this one the be an XI that came to the home of cricket, let themselves in and proceeded to put their feet on the couch and act like they own the place 😁

I think the most startling thing about the Indian team isn’t that they are head and shoulders above the opposition because that’s simply not true.
Their strength is their depth and just how many international standard players they have waiting in the wings.
That Indian side was decimated by injury and beat an Australian side that would have expected to beat a full strength side.

I do agree with you point in regards to their middle order.
There does appear to be some fragility their especially if Kohli continues to misfire.
However they are nigh unbeatable at home and their bowling attack has gone from one that was outclassed outside the subcontinent to being a pace attack that travels incredibly well.
I don’t think they are in the same category as the 70s and 80s Windies or the 00s Australian sides but they have put a lot of work into their domestic scene and identifying talent so I think they’ll spend a long time being the team to beat.

I understand your argument fine. I just don’t think it’s correct.
You’re opposed to a team to risk a win and lose the game because of WTC points when a draw would have sufficed to secure a series win.

Rewarding the mindset of playing for a draw is such backward thinking.

Denouncing a change to the game that encourages teams to play positively because of some misguided sense of tradition would be like turning the game off because they stopped bowling under arm.

Honestly if this is your reasoning that people like me have a low IQ for enjoying what the WTC brings.

All the WTC has done has taken those bi-lateral series and have them amount to something. So instead of pumping your chest that you got a draw in a relatively meaningless Pakistan v England test series you now can pump your chest that your performances have propelled you towards a higher goal.

We are spoiled here in Australia that we have series like the Ashes that engross the whole country and the exploits become folklore but could you honestly tell me the history of West Indies v Sri Lanka or Pakistan v South Africa?
Most nations don’t have that history with test cricket to give those test series long lasting relevance. They play them because their supposed too. Despite Test cricket falling in popularity and being the most expensive match to prepare for.

Without a larger goal to amount to you run the risk of Test cricket losing its relevance all together as the smaller nations stop seeing the point in spending so much money to compete.

So you’re not in favour of teams playing to win?

You’re in favour of a system that encourages teams to play negatively?

I have to say your reasoning to disprove the idea of a points systems is flawed at best

How would scoring points and winning the series ever conflict?
You get points for winning tests and winning tests allows you to win the Ashes and B-G trophy.
I don’t see a scenario where the pursuit of WTC points would clash with the desirable outcome of a test series.
Teams already play to win or fight to save a test to secure a draw, which is all they can do with the WTC points.

It’s is possible to enjoy the history of test cricket and realise that there need to be changes to the game to make it relevant.
In short form cricket teams are playing to win World Cups. What do Test nations play for other than the sake of it?
Bi-lateral series that in essence don’t mean anything.
We hold the Ashes on a pedestal because it’s Australia v England. But when Sri Lanka play South Africa what are they really invested in? Most nations don’t have any marquee series to build towards.
The WTC gives a semblance of relevance to all the test series.

For starters a drawn test series isn’t worth the same as a lost series in the current system.
Points are accrued per game and if you lose tests you aren’t awarded any points.

And how would you go about determining the World Test Champions differently if this setup is so flawed?
It’s not a perfect setup but it does give a relatively timely way of working it out.

I suppose it comes down to what sports you’ve been exposed too.
All of the sports I follow religiously have a final so the concept of just finishing the season and handing it to the top team seems foreign to me as much as the idea of a final seems to you.
I for one enjoy the drama around the best teams playing off for all the marbles.