Cricket-Match-Special ... A forum for discussion

Lions -v- SA has churned out 180 overs of cricket in 2 days

those players won't get anywhere with that sort of attitude... bowling a full complement of overs? Shoddy, very shoddy

South Africa have had a good tour so far....

Tied the ODI series 1-1 with England.

Beat England 2-1 in the T20s.

Beat Ireland 2-0 in the T20s.

The real challenge will be the Tests, of course.

Warm up not going that well.

It's on! England 42-3. Familiar start.

Ironic if they have to go off for rain, after the summer so far.

Surely the UK can't have hosepipe bans without there being something for the spinners.

Bairstow bowled through the gate for a duck. Normal service has been resumed. Serves me right for picking him in my fantasy team.

Lesson 1 for Stokes: bowl first, apparently.

Still, early days.

Thus series appears to be drawing minimal interest.

bigfluffylemon wrote:Bairstow bowled through the gate for a duck. Normal service has been resumed. Serves me right for picking him in my fantasy team.

Lesson 1 for Stokes: bowl first, apparently.

Still, early days.

Can't do that if you lose the toss...

SA have bowled really well ; plenty of movement for their seamers and apart from Pope no-one got going. Losing Stokes last ball of the session was a blow for England as the counter-attack was building. Hard to see them mounting a par score from here ; but we have seen too many swings and roundabouts this year already to be making predictions just yet !

bigfluffylemon wrote:Bairstow bowled through the gate for a duck. Normal service has been resumed. Serves me right for picking him in my fantasy team.

Me too!

Presume the ground isn't as parched as The Oval in 1976, though the weather similar. Wonder if the hosepipe ban will have an impact on the series.

Well done to Pope on the 50. He's a positive for the summer.

Foakes goes, down to the bowlers. But no J.Overton.

is this what they call an 'oops'?

I think we agreed earlier in the year that the first lesson for SA was never to let England chase. Clearly they learned that lesson. I don't think there was any chance of SA choosing to bat even in perfect batting conditions.

Durhamfootman wrote:I think we agreed earlier in the year that the first lesson for SA was never to let England chase. Clearly they learned that lesson. I don't think there was any chance of SA choosing to bat even in perfect batting conditions.

Academic at present . Certainly wasn't perfect batting conditions ! Have to say SA exploited the prevailing assistance really well. Contrary to some ill-informed stuff I've seen online , the score is hardly a result of England batting recklessly (though Stokes did play some wild shots early on , as is his wont : he actually got out attempting to defend or avoid) : batsmen were basically got out by very good bowling. Rabada and Jansen consistently threatening ; Nortje mixing some loose short stuff with some absolute peaches - which at his pace made him probably more dangerous than more predictable accuracy

One might even say that by still trying to play positively (Pope continued to play shots , once he was "in") England at least ensured they had a hundred odd on the board when a more ultra defensive approach could well have seen the same six wickets down for a good deal less...

Weather to be a bit better day two , I understand. Should still be good for bowling though so it will be interesting to see how SA bats fare when they get in - which might not be long given the fragile looking England tail !

England 165 all out

Pope 73

Rabada 5-52
Nortje 3-63
Jansen 2-30

Good start for SA with the bat. I presume England are favourites for this series. SA inexperienced at this level in UK and in decline generally.