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England Cricket 2025

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  • Callumcafc
    Callumcafc Posts: 64,336
    edited 7:02AM
    271-4 at stumps

    Australia lead by 356.

    Head 142 n/o
    Carey 52 n/o

    Unbeaten partnership of 122
  • North Lower Neil
    North Lower Neil Posts: 23,118
    The Jacks pick is going swimmingly.
  • MrOneLung
    MrOneLung Posts: 27,091
    North Lower Neil said:
    The Jacks pick is going swimmingly.
    You can’t convince me he is a better spinner than Root. 
  • Callumcafc
    Callumcafc Posts: 64,336
    MrOneLung said:
    North Lower Neil said:
    The Jacks pick is going swimmingly.
    You can’t convince me he is a better spinner than Root. 
    Jacks 19-0-107-1
    Root 8-0-32-0
  • Gravesend_Addick
    Gravesend_Addick Posts: 7,334
    It's all very depressing but very predictable. 

    We could all see it was gonna be 5-0 after the first test couldn't we?
  • ValleyGary
    ValleyGary Posts: 38,187
    Dunno how anyone is still giving these wankers the time of day (or night)
  • MarcusH26
    MarcusH26 Posts: 8,321
    I thought all the planning and thinking for the last few years was to make a side that would be competitive down under.... I don't think it's too early to start the post mortems now because this needs to be an absolutely seismic change in thinking from the ECB. 
  • Addick Addict
    Addick Addict Posts: 40,447
    edited 9:09AM
    Gravesend_Addick said:
    It's all very depressing but very predictable. 

    We could all see it was gonna be 5-0 after the first test couldn't we?

    We're very good at winning dead rubbers and preforming when the pressure is off, though. Australia won't necessarily be totally invested in winning a long series especially when they will take the opportunity to  rest the likes of Starc and Boland. I hope that doesn't happen because it is those pointless wins that the English management tend to focus on - "we showed what we are capable of and need to build on that now". There's a reason why we haven't beaten Australia and India in series since 2018. 

    Ironically, Australia have, themselves, their own re-building process prior to the 2027 Ashes especially in the fast bowling ranks. The difference is that they are starting from a higher base and will gradually feed those players in. Where we find a spinner from, under the current system of prioritising "step and hit" cricket I really do not know.     
  • bobmunro
    bobmunro Posts: 21,088
    Baz Ball Bollocks. McCullum has to go.
    There is a reason why Test matches are scheduled for five days!

    There needs to be a root and branch review into the structure of cricket in England - they need to decide whether or not they want England's performances in tests to be a priority, or not.If it is then scrap the bash/20/20 non-cricket crap and focus on the county game. Not sure the ECB have the cohones though, and the counties would oppose because they are about the only money spinners they have.

    If the ECB don't do it then I fear England Test Match cricket as we used to know and love is dead.

  • MarcusH26
    MarcusH26 Posts: 8,321
    Addick Addict said:
    Gravesend_Addick said:
    It's all very depressing but very predictable. 

    We could all see it was gonna be 5-0 after the first test couldn't we?

    We're very good at winning dead rubbers and preforming when the pressure is off, though. Australia won't necessarily be totally invested in winning a long series especially when they will take the opportunity to  rest the likes of Starc and Boland. I hope that doesn't happen because it is those pointless wins that the English management tend to focus on - "we showed what we are capable of and need to build on that now". There's a reason why we haven't beaten Australia and India in series since 2018. 

    Ironically, Australia have, themselves, their own re-building process prior to the 2027 Ashes especially in the fast bowling ranks. The difference is that they are starting from a higher base and will gradually feed those players in. Where we find a spinner from, under the current system of prioritising "step and hit" cricket I really do not know.     

    Oh I think the Aussies will turn up with a pretty good attack in 2 years - probably led by Fergus O'Neill and Xavier Bartlett. I have no idea what the England attack will be by then. 

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  • iaitch
    iaitch Posts: 10,333
    MarcusH26 said:
    Addick Addict said:
    Gravesend_Addick said:
    It's all very depressing but very predictable. 

    We could all see it was gonna be 5-0 after the first test couldn't we?

    We're very good at winning dead rubbers and preforming when the pressure is off, though. Australia won't necessarily be totally invested in winning a long series especially when they will take the opportunity to  rest the likes of Starc and Boland. I hope that doesn't happen because it is those pointless wins that the English management tend to focus on - "we showed what we are capable of and need to build on that now". There's a reason why we haven't beaten Australia and India in series since 2018. 

    Ironically, Australia have, themselves, their own re-building process prior to the 2027 Ashes especially in the fast bowling ranks. The difference is that they are starting from a higher base and will gradually feed those players in. Where we find a spinner from, under the current system of prioritising "step and hit" cricket I really do not know.     

    Oh I think the Aussies will turn up with a pretty good attack in 2 years - probably led by Fergus O'Neill and Xavier Bartlett. I have no idea what the England attack will be by then. 
    They'll be picking the usual suspects including the always injured Wood.
  • fenaddick
    fenaddick Posts: 13,023
    edited 10:25AM
    bobmunro said:
    Baz Ball Bollocks. McCullum has to go.
    There is a reason why Test matches are scheduled for five days!

    There needs to be a root and branch review into the structure of cricket in England - they need to decide whether or not they want England's performances in tests to be a priority, or not.If it is then scrap the bash/20/20 non-cricket crap and focus on the county game. Not sure the ECB have the cohones though, and the counties would oppose because they are about the only money spinners they have.

    If the ECB don't do it then I fear England Test Match cricket as we used to know and love is dead.

    It doesn't need to be one or the other. The Australians take red ball domestic cricket more seriously than us, have a successful T20 league (even if it is fading a bit now), and have won both white ball World Cups as well as the WTC in recent years. The ECB definitely need to take the county game more seriously but that doesn't mean you have to lose the white ball stuff, it just needs proper structure
  • golfaddick
    golfaddick Posts: 34,311
    fenaddick said:
    bobmunro said:
    Baz Ball Bollocks. McCullum has to go.
    There is a reason why Test matches are scheduled for five days!

    There needs to be a root and branch review into the structure of cricket in England - they need to decide whether or not they want England's performances in tests to be a priority, or not.If it is then scrap the bash/20/20 non-cricket crap and focus on the county game. Not sure the ECB have the cohones though, and the counties would oppose because they are about the only money spinners they have.

    If the ECB don't do it then I fear England Test Match cricket as we used to know and love is dead.

    It doesn't need to be one or the other. The Australians take red ball domestic cricket more seriously than us, have a successful T20 league (even if it is fading a bit now), and have won both white ball World Cups as well as the WTC in recent years. The ECB definitely need to take the county game more seriously but that doesn't mean you have to lose the white ball stuff, it just needs proper structure
    Problem is the ECB invented the "Hundred" and want to promote that above all others. It would take an outsider to come in & take a thorough look at all versions before any changes would take place. And that's not going to happen. 
  • fenaddick
    fenaddick Posts: 13,023
    golfaddick said:
    fenaddick said:
    bobmunro said:
    Baz Ball Bollocks. McCullum has to go.
    There is a reason why Test matches are scheduled for five days!

    There needs to be a root and branch review into the structure of cricket in England - they need to decide whether or not they want England's performances in tests to be a priority, or not.If it is then scrap the bash/20/20 non-cricket crap and focus on the county game. Not sure the ECB have the cohones though, and the counties would oppose because they are about the only money spinners they have.

    If the ECB don't do it then I fear England Test Match cricket as we used to know and love is dead.

    It doesn't need to be one or the other. The Australians take red ball domestic cricket more seriously than us, have a successful T20 league (even if it is fading a bit now), and have won both white ball World Cups as well as the WTC in recent years. The ECB definitely need to take the county game more seriously but that doesn't mean you have to lose the white ball stuff, it just needs proper structure
    Problem is the ECB invented the "Hundred" and want to promote that above all others. It would take an outsider to come in & take a thorough look at all versions before any changes would take place. And that's not going to happen. 
    Of course, that's why I said it needs proper structure. Having Rob Key in such a crucial role doesn't help either, he wasn't a good pundit and he isn't a good administrator either
  • northstandsteve
    northstandsteve Posts: 14,363
    Our first class cricket is shit and that is the top and bottom of it, we don't have anyone near the class or level of Broad or Anderson, maybe I don't watch enough cricket but I haven't got a clue which counties Carse or Tongue are contracted to. Until we sort our county cricket out we will never be able to compete with the Aussies.
  • Addick Addict
    Addick Addict Posts: 40,447
    northstandsteve said:
    Our first class cricket is shit and that is the top and bottom of it, we don't have anyone near the class or level of Broad or Anderson, maybe I don't watch enough cricket but I haven't got a clue which counties Carse or Tongue are contracted to. Until we sort our county cricket out we will never be able to compete with the Aussies.
    You don't need to know which counties England players are contracted to because they are protected from playing for them by the ECB. When you hear that Brook is being paid £450,000, in addition to his very lucrative central contract, to play in the Hundred, why should he bother doing so?

    Equally, in terms of not knowing who someone plays for, we also have an absolutely ludicrous situation where England's so called (by the management that is) number one spinner, specifically selected in the last couple of years for the Ashes in Australia, cannot get a game. When I say that, I don't just mean a game for England. He has no county contract. Imagine that. A 22 year-old ranked the best in the country at what he does by the England management that no county wants. 

    A poor schedule, wrapping cricketers in cotton wool and saving them for Mickey Mouse cricket and the lack of a vehicle for them to develop equals failure on the highest stage - both in red and white ball. 
     
  • brownbear
    brownbear Posts: 96
    The arrogance and insouciance of Key and McCullum in selecting 'hunch' players like Bethell, Hull and even Bashir has shown them to be nothing but a bunch of chancers. How can our only spare batsmen have NEVER scored a first class hundred? How can we not have picked another all-rounder to potentially take the pressure off Stokes? Who is giving the bowlers tje verbals if they continue to bowl a load of shite?
  • Chizz
    Chizz Posts: 28,462
    brownbear said:
    The arrogance and insouciance of Key and McCullum in selecting 'hunch' players like Bethell, Hull and even Bashir has shown them to be nothing but a bunch of chancers. How can our only spare batsmen have NEVER scored a first class hundred? How can we not have picked another all-rounder to potentially take the pressure off Stokes? Who is giving the bowlers tje verbals if they continue to bowl a load of shite?
    I think the results of the matches in this series are due to more many more significant issues than the inclusion of Bethell, Hull and Bashir in squads.  
  • bobmunro
    bobmunro Posts: 21,088
    edited 12:35PM
    Addick Addict said:
    northstandsteve said:
    Our first class cricket is shit and that is the top and bottom of it, we don't have anyone near the class or level of Broad or Anderson, maybe I don't watch enough cricket but I haven't got a clue which counties Carse or Tongue are contracted to. Until we sort our county cricket out we will never be able to compete with the Aussies.
    You don't need to know which counties England players are contracted to because they are protected from playing for them by the ECB. When you hear that Brook is being paid £450,000, in addition to his very lucrative central contract, to play in the Hundred, why should he bother doing so?

    Equally, in terms of not knowing who someone plays for, we also have an absolutely ludicrous situation where England's so called (by the management that is) number one spinner, specifically selected in the last couple of years for the Ashes in Australia, cannot get a game. When I say that, I don't just mean a game for England. He has no county contract. Imagine that. A 22 year-old ranked the best in the country at what he does by the England management that no county wants. 

    A poor schedule, wrapping cricketers in cotton wool and saving them for Mickey Mouse cricket and the lack of a vehicle for them to develop equals failure on the highest stage - both in red and white ball. 
     
    Just some examples to illustrate that very point.

    MCC played 402 first class games for Kent and 102 tests for England
    Boycott - 609 first class games for Yorkshire and 108 tests for England.
    Thorpey played 341 first class games for Surrey and 100 tests for England
    Joe Root has played 58 (yes 58) first class games for Yorkshire and 160 tests for England. I'm not saying Root can't play test cricket btw - he's an exception - but even he is playing Baz Ball.

    Back in the day top order batsmen (especially top three) learned their trade playing county cricket - they learned how to score safely and slowly, selfishly at times protecting their wicket. That was their job - not anymore for England.

    All-rounders:

    Ian Botham played 402 first class matches and 102 tests for England
    Ben Stokes has made three appearances for Durham (all in 2024) since 2022

    Bowlers:

    Fred Trueman played for Yorshire 459 times whilst accumulating 67 tests
    Jimmy Anderson played over 300 first class games for Lancashire and 187 tests
    Jofra Archer in his entire career has played 46 first class games for Sussex and 17 tests (I accept his injury issues) - yet he has played over 70 ODIs/T20s


    Fine - if the future of cricket is the almost instant gratification of 20/20 - 100s then so be it. Not for me though - the four/five day, two innings each is the cricket I love.

     




  • Addick Addict
    Addick Addict Posts: 40,447
    This AI thingy is brilliant. It can even predict things that haven't happened. Yet anyway:

    The quickest a team has lost an Ashes series in terms of actual days of cricket played is just 10 days, a record set by England in the 2025-26 series in Australia. The 2002-03 England team previously held the record for a five-match series, losing the Ashes in 11 days of play. 
    Fastest Ashes Series Loss (by Days Played)
    • 10 Days (2025-26 series): England reached this unwanted record during the current (as of December 19, 2025) series in Australia.
      • The first Test in Perth was a two-day match.
      • The second Test at The Gabba lasted four days.
      • Australia secured the urn on day four of the third Test in Adelaide (meaning the first three decisive Tests combined only used 10 days of play).
    • 11 Days (2002-03 series): The previous record for a five-match series saw Nasser Hussain's England side lose the first three Tests in a combined 11 days of cricket. 


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  • Addick Addict
    Addick Addict Posts: 40,447
    I then asked the same question again and got this. You just can't trust modern technology, can you? The good news is that, if we are to believe this, that Australia still hold the record.

    The quickest an Ashes series has been lost in terms of playing days is 8 days, which occurred during Australia's tour of England in 1921. 
    The series was decided over three Tests, all of which finished quickly: 
    • First Test (Trent Bridge): Finished within two days of play.
    • Second and Third Tests: Also concluded rapidly, resulting in the series being over in a total of just 8 days of actual cricket. 
    More recently, the 2002-03 and 2021-22 series were both decided in just 12 actual playing days across the first three Tests. The first Test of the current 2025-26 series in Perth also finished inside two days, the first time in over a century for a single Test match. 
  • MarcusH26
    MarcusH26 Posts: 8,321
    What I will say as a fan of a county with centrally contracted players , it almost feels like a special treat from the ECB to let them play for their counties? I know obviously Jof has had his injuries but Bob makes a fantastic point about the lack of FC games he's actually played for Sussex. 

    What I'd like to see and will never actually happen because of certain franchise tournaments clashing is all the squad that's out there in Oz spends next April and May playing for their counties and getting time in the middle, now the stupid Kookaburra experiment is over there couldnt be any complaints about players being under prepared. 
  • killerandflash
    killerandflash Posts: 70,435
    I've never entirely got the hype over Archer as a red ball bowler. He doesn't have the skills of a Jimmy or Broad when it comes to moving the ball around, but he also doesn't have the engine of a Starc, who can bowl spell after spell at top speed. Plus his lack of red ball games, full stop.

    It was laughable before the series, the number of English pundits who in a combined team would have included Archer in front of Starc, someone with 400 wickets at 26.

    I do think he's a top class white ball bowler though, as he's excellent at "white ball" skills with his slower ball.
  • billysboots
    billysboots Posts: 1,604
    Not sure if it’s related , but Australia only have 6 first class states that play shield red ball cricket , so the standard is invariably better than our county cricket where any talent is diluted across 18 counties. I can’t remember them having too many overseas players in those sides either.

  • MrOneLung
    MrOneLung Posts: 27,091
    I would love it, if the Aussies just picked an under 23 squad for the rest of the Ashes, just saying they are planning for 2027
  • Callumcafc
    Callumcafc Posts: 64,336
    edited 2:33PM
    billysboots said:
    Not sure if it’s related , but Australia only have 6 first class states that play shield red ball cricket , so the standard is invariably better than our county cricket where any talent is diluted across 18 counties. I can’t remember them having too many overseas players in those sides either.

    This is the elephant in the room that I don’t think many people will want to address.

    Would be horrific if we invariably lost high level CC in places like Kent and Sussex (who would definitely be up for the chop in favour of Surrey) - but what good is it doing to have the likes of Joe Root or Jofra Archer playing against Northamptonshire?

    Are we saying that time in the middle alone is good enough to help these talents progress regardless of who the opposition is, or do we need to find a way to concentrate talent in a few select places to ensure the most competitive and pressurised environments to find the best performers?
  • fenaddick
    fenaddick Posts: 13,023
    Callumcafc said:
    billysboots said:
    Not sure if it’s related , but Australia only have 6 first class states that play shield red ball cricket , so the standard is invariably better than our county cricket where any talent is diluted across 18 counties. I can’t remember them having too many overseas players in those sides either.

    This is the elephant in the room that I don’t think many people will want to address.

    Would be horrific if we invariably lost high level CC in places like Kent and Sussex (who would definitely be up for the chop in favour of Surrey) - but what good is it doing to have the likes of Joe Root or Jofra Archer playing against Northamptonshire?

    Are we saying that time in the middle alone is good enough to help these talents progress regardless of who the opposition is, or do we need to find a way to concentrate talent in a few select places to ensure the most competitive and pressurised environments to find the best performers?
    But some of the worst underperformers are all playing at one County in a squad with lots of expensively sourced players providing competition for places
  • killerandflash
    killerandflash Posts: 70,435
    edited 3:23PM
    The 2005 and the 2010/11 teams came through the county system, ditto the 2019 WC winners.

    There definitely is an issue with English cricket at the moment though, as the white ball team is way off looking like a team which can win one of the WCs.

    One thing I massively disagree with is the way The Ashes has been treated by England as the only series that matters, with other series being treated as warm series where an Ashes team can be honed. We won in 2005 and 2010/11 because we had a really good team, a team which had been successful for a couple of years already. The best preparation for the Ashes is having a battle hardened, winning team.
  • MarcusH26
    MarcusH26 Posts: 8,321
    Callumcafc said:
    billysboots said:
    Not sure if it’s related , but Australia only have 6 first class states that play shield red ball cricket , so the standard is invariably better than our county cricket where any talent is diluted across 18 counties. I can’t remember them having too many overseas players in those sides either.

    This is the elephant in the room that I don’t think many people will want to address.

    Would be horrific if we invariably lost high level CC in places like Kent and Sussex (who would definitely be up for the chop in favour of Surrey) - but what good is it doing to have the likes of Joe Root or Jofra Archer playing against Northamptonshire?

    Are we saying that time in the middle alone is good enough to help these talents progress regardless of who the opposition is, or do we need to find a way to concentrate talent in a few select places to ensure the most competitive and pressurised environments to find the best performers?
    I'd give up on cricket entirely if this ever happened. It's bad enough losing half a Sussex side to The Hundred to play for Southern Brave. 
  • MrWalker
    MrWalker Posts: 4,161
    One of the physio team down under has a lad who plays in the same team as my eldest. Have got to know him quite well. He was convinced we would beat the Aussies and that Crawley would be top scorer of the series 

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