Nice to see lots of the media giving Stokes fulsome praise. However, let us just remind ourselves what a true great is before we go gushing into overdrive about Stokes. I give you the name of Garfield Sobers. He was a true great, bowling seam and spin as well as being a most naturally gifted batsmen and fielder. Moreover, he was a gentleman and didn´t get himself involved in "conversations" outside casinos or pubs at two o`clock in the morning.
Well Stokes is all of those apart from bowling spin. And he delivers when England need him most. So he will go down as one of England's finest players.
Hampshire will play their home matches in the Bob Willis trophy at Arundel. Playing Sussex, Surrey, Kent and Essex.
Just remembered that the cricket started today. First ball I saw was Stokes clean bowled. I would apologise for bringing about the wicket, but seeing the replay and the size of the gap between bat and pad, he can have all the credit.
The irony was they had just been talking about how well both he and Burns were moving their feet to the spinner. After that I suppose it was only to be expected that Stokes would stand perfectly still to a seamer.
If I have this right, the previous Old Trafford pitch started to misbehave and take spin, after just 4 days use. Is this Old Trafford pitch expected to behave differently, or have the Windies got it wrong by choosing to bowl first? The fact that they are playing with 2 spinners would suggest that spin will play a big part in the game. Or are they expecting the pitch to die and offer no support for the bowlers in the 4th innings?
I'm not surprised that they reversed their original thinking of putting us in the West/Midlands group. It would have been ridiculous enough when playing home matches in Hampshire, let alone in Sussex. Good to see it's been confirmed that all t20 matches will be live streamed, in addition to four day cricket. I haven't yet decided whether I'll roll my membership over to next season, or get a refund. But probably the former. Pope lucky!
Please can we see a Dwayne Leverock style catch from Cornwall. It would be worth England losing a wicket to see that!
