His last 2 Test matches with the bat has probably given Buttler the right to finish the series, as a batsman only. As we have no Stokes, I'd give Foakes the gloves for the last 2 games and Buttler to bat up the order. Woakes and Foakes also maintains our 'oakes' sounding compliment of surnames. That should be enough justification for his inclusion.
And for me therein lies the problem .. we haven't really replaced Strauss, Cook and Trott at the top of the order... more times then not the middle order are coming in to face a new ball making it difficult for them to play their expansive games.
I agree, even though the openers Burns and Sibley are the right type of batsmen to open, I do not think they are good enough, certainly not in the same league as Strauss. Trott & Cook.
there is a huge problem with england test players. it may be partially solved by persisting with the current notion of the one-day and test teams being different elevens, but i suspect that's temporary. for me, test players should be playing 1st class county games between tests. since central contracts came in and since the accountants want england players playing one of test/odi/20-20 games round the clock for the entire season, players don't get back to their county and don't get chance to fix their batting or bowling. nope. it's all milk the buggers for every second and sod their plummeting averages. a few sixes will cover the cracks in the eyes of the paying paying paying public. give the struggling players a game or two to practise building an innings where the opposition attacks are a bit more forgiving and get into their skulls that you don't need to score at 2020 run rates in test matches.
just been looking at stats from this summer's 1st class county tournament and was a little perturbed to find out who is top of warwickshire's batting averages so far: Player Mat Inns NO Runs HS Ave BF SR 100 50 0 4s 6s TT Bresnan 2 3 1 165 105 82.50 395 41.77 1 0 0 18 2
Therein lies the problem for Bairstow. He was dropped last season from the test team and advised to go and work on his technique and get a stack of runs for Yorkshire. He then goes off to play different forms of 20/20 around the world (thus allowing his first class game to further deteriorate). He played last week for Yorkshire, but its very rare over the last few years. He has developed into probably the best opening bat in the world at shortened game, but at the expense of his test spot, and I don't see a way back for him. I still believe he's a better wicket keeper and batsman than Buttler, who has been given so many chances by selectors and had a ridiculously low test average.
According to the BBC radio commentary yesterday, after England dropped two slip catches in the morning, our recent slip catching record was 73% compared to Pakistan who at 89% currently have the best record of all the major test teams. You could well be right about Root, but it seems we have others who also have butter fingers
Tbf we've been dropping catches on a regular basis for some time now .. i highlight Root as at first slip he seems more prone then others but as a team we are poor .. not just in the slip area
I agree. Apparently Pakistan employed a guy whose name eludes me and he has coached them into being the top catching side in the test arena. Seems we need to do something similar as our record is currently way below standard
Butterfingers. What a simplistic yet descriptive compound word which wholly captures the essence of its meaning. This is why English is such a beautiful language. See also Dickhead and Knobhead. I'm sure that you can all think of more.
It's a pity, as with Buttler struggling wit the gloves he could have maybe got back in, but as you say it sounds as if he chased the money rather than try to get back into the Test side reckoning.
