andymacandy wrote:I agree with your comments, but these days, I regard Test, One Day and 20/20 as cousins rather than the same game.
Yes, they won the World Cup, but I don't put much authority on that as a pointer to Test form.
Now, the upcoming one day series will be a belter. England with confidence and home conditions, against the World Champions.
I think it is a terrible shame that test matches seem to be increasingly devalued, it is the only aspect of the game that I am really interested in, it has a lazy rhythm that is unique in sport. It develops and can see saw in a way that doesn't happen in the football sports or short format cricket.
I find T20 akin to watching U11s school boy cricket where everybody just slogs everything all the time and 50 overs matches are nearly as unsatisfying.
You could well be right that that these are almost different games to test cricket these days.
Both Australia and England certainly play a far more aggressive game in tests where batsmen try to get on top of the bowlers from the word go.
None of this giving the bowlers 10 - 20 overs to wear themselves out and get through the morning conditions before upping the run rate in the afternoon that we used to see
When that aggressive tactic goes wrong - 1st morning Trent bridge - it can go wrong comically and spectacularly.
I have practically no interest in the limited overs matches still to come, for me the summer will be over at the Oval, it was the ashes that was important and that is done, next up Pakistan in UAE and South Africa.