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England Cricket 2026
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In a drawn game on a road when England scored 583-8d and then took 16 Pakistan wickets in 176 overs despite having a bowling attack that included Anderson, Broad, Archer and Woakes. As potent a seam attack, in English conditions, as we've ever had.Blackheathen said:
Rob Key comes second (221 v WI at Lords 2004) to Zac Crawley - 267 v Pakistan at Southampton 2020killerandflash said:
Rob Key?LenGlover said:A bit of levity with a quiz question: of all the great Kent players to play for England in test cricket which one has the highest score as an individual?1 -
A Kent player still holds the record for scoring a double century in each innings in the county championship.0
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The retirement of two players in this series has been a representation of their careers as a whole.
On the one hand, the unassuming and almost embarrassed by his talent and achievements in the game, Williamson, quietly announced his retirement, without any fuss, following the First Test. On the other, Stokes, with his "in your face" attitude, will depart with all guns blazing but, in the process, made himself the story in announcing his retirement on the penultimate day of this Test.
NZ will be the happier of the two if only for the fact that it allowed Nicolls to, effectively, with that innings of 121 in the last Test, help them win that game and probably now the series.3 -
The ecb have forced stokes out.No natural successor as captain
no natural successor for the allrounder role
no point in playing the ashes next year1 -
Finding a good captain will be just as hard as Finding a decent all rounder to replace Stokes.
Root does not inspire with his captaincy and Brooke is not the answer either.
Stokes is going to be very hard to replace1 -
Would make life a lot simpler just to have sacked Key after the Winter and have no one in that role.0
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I would assume Ahmed becomes the all rounder and Bashir is never seen again. The captaincy is interesting because last time there was only one serious candidate too. Makes you wonder why we don’t produce many obvious captains0
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MarcusH26 said:Think at least Key is absolutely toast after this series.
The future is very very bright talent wise but there's going to be some growing pains trying to get them in the side.I admire your optimism, but not sure about our talent pool. On the bowling front especially, I think the short term future looks pretty grim.0 -
Batting seems a lot more of a strength, not convinced the likes of Baker and Crocombe are ready and don't need another year in the Champ just bowling regularly week in week out.abbeywoodaddick said:MarcusH26 said:Think at least Key is absolutely toast after this series.
The future is very very bright talent wise but there's going to be some growing pains trying to get them in the side.I admire your optimism, but not sure about our talent pool. On the bowling front especially, I think the short term future looks pretty grim.
Definitely not an out and out Stokes replacement out there.0 -
abbeywoodaddick said:
The writing has been on the wall for a while - assuming that we lose today then that will be seven defeats in our last nine matches and only the West Indies and Pakistan are below us in the Test Championship. We can argue about our fixtures and points deductions for slow over rates but we are where we are (4/13 wins) and Australia (7/8) are top simply because we have not been good enough and they have.MarcusH26 said:Think at least Key is absolutely toast after this series.
The future is very very bright talent wise but there's going to be some growing pains trying to get them in the side.I admire your optimism, but not sure about our talent pool. On the bowling front especially, I think the short term future looks pretty grim.
With Stokes departing, following on from Anderson, Broad and Woakes, that's seamers responsible for 1,752 Test wickets that have retired in less than two years and we have to find a decent spinner too. It will be very interesting to see, in the next couple of years, how Australia cope, by comparison, with Cummins, Haselwood, Starc, Boland and Lyon all likely to have left the Test arena in that period. Of course, we have a home Ashes this time next year which will be a challenge in itself.1 -
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Addick Addict said:abbeywoodaddick said:
The writing has been on the wall for a while - assuming that we lose today then that will be seven defeats in our last nine matches and only the West Indies and Pakistan are below us in the Test Championship. We can argue about our fixtures and points deductions for slow over rates but we are where we are (4/13 wins) and Australia (7/8) are top simply because we have not been good enough and they have.MarcusH26 said:Think at least Key is absolutely toast after this series.
The future is very very bright talent wise but there's going to be some growing pains trying to get them in the side.I admire your optimism, but not sure about our talent pool. On the bowling front especially, I think the short term future looks pretty grim.
With Stokes departing, following on from Anderson, Broad and Woakes, that's seamers responsible for 1,752 Test wickets that have retired in less than two years and we have to find a decent spinner too. It will be very interesting to see, in the next couple of years, how Australia cope, by comparison, with Cummins, Haselwood, Starc, Boland and Lyon all likely to have left the Test arena in that period. Of course, we have a home Ashes this time next year which will be a challenge in itself.
I would assume in English conditions the Aussies will bring Fergus O'Neill to spearhead their attack. I know he's not the quickest but his record for Notts is absolutely outstanding. Would be surprised if Hazlewood and Boland are around next year.
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Ben Stokes is a deep thinking man with his personal demons and the Ashes defeat wounded him deeply.
Also the serious facial injury he received when he was hit when the Durham youth were in the nets gave him more time to think about his future in Cricket and did he need the baggage and scrutiny that goes with the England captaincy; he decided enough was enough after the Lords late night club incident.
Ben can play for Durham, earn loads of money in India and the Hundreds and IF his body holds up, retire at 40 having enjoyed the autumn of his cricket career.
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They will put in a couple of new people in the management areas and stokes will be begged to come back as England's saviour for the ashes next year. Just like yesterday's over the top way of retiring from international cricket his return will be even more melodramatic.1
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You’d hope so. When you take into account his ability over the three disciplines, he might just be the worst player to have played test cricket for England since I first took an interest in the sport (2005 ashes).fenaddick said:I would assume Ahmed becomes the all rounder and Bashir is never seen again. The captaincy is interesting because last time there was only one serious candidate too. Makes you wonder why we don’t produce many obvious captains0 -
The timing of the announcement was down to Neil Fairbrother and Wasserman cricket, a rebrand of Phoenix management group.
It was unusual but it did spark the test into life even if it all became surreal with Stokes and Brook playing T20 in a 5 day test match.
I would call it Bashball more than Bazball !0 -
What's interesting though is despite his clear lack of ability he has more wickets after 20 tests than Nathan Lyon did! That does ignore things like economy rates etc. Lyon then had the benefit of playing a huge amount of cricket to improve, something Bashir is unlikely to get on quality alone.arny23394 said:
You’d hope so. When you take into account his ability over the three disciplines, he might just be the worst player to have played test cricket for England since I first took an interest in the sport (2005 ashes).fenaddick said:I would assume Ahmed becomes the all rounder and Bashir is never seen again. The captaincy is interesting because last time there was only one serious candidate too. Makes you wonder why we don’t produce many obvious captains0 -
He IS good at fielding. Stopped quite a few runs & effected the dismissal of Ravindra at the end of the first day by stopping a 4 the ball before.arny23394 said:
You’d hope so. When you take into account his ability over the three disciplines, he might just be the worst player to have played test cricket for England since I first took an interest in the sport (2005 ashes).fenaddick said:I would assume Ahmed becomes the all rounder and Bashir is never seen again. The captaincy is interesting because last time there was only one serious candidate too. Makes you wonder why we don’t produce many obvious captains
Use him.as a sub and bring him on every time a bowler has to go off for a comfort break / change of socks / whatever.1 -
I'm not sure that he gets a playing contract there simply because his record in T20s in recent years is nothing exceptional, he's not played in the IPL for five years, hasn't played T20Is for four years and his injury record is enough to put off suitors. The last time he played, in 2021, he had to pull out after one game with a finger injury.soapboxsam said:Ben Stokes is a deep thinking man with his personal demons and the Ashes defeat wounded him deeply.
Also the serious facial injury he received when he was hit when the Durham youth were in the nets gave him more time to think about his future in Cricket and did he need the baggage and scrutiny that goes with the England captaincy; he decided enough was enough after the Lords late night club incident.
Ben can play for Durham, earn loads of money in India and the Hundreds and IF his body holds up, retire at 40 having enjoyed the autumn of his cricket career.
Franchises in the IPL have had enough of overseas players, especially English ones, putting themselves forward and then pulling out (Brook, Duckett, Curran, Banton, Carse and Payne all did so this year) and are unlikely to commit to someone who might not be good enough let alone fit for what is a grueling couple of months.
All of that said, whilst Stokes doesn't need the money (albeit presumably he won't now be paid his central contract which he signed up to and including the Ashes) but probably does need a challenge. Will just playing for Durham and enjoying family life be enough? He might go the same way as Broad and Woakes and the media route but I'm not sure that he is the right fit for that. What might engage him is coaching but only he will know if he can stomach seeing players not able to do or, more pertinent, commit on the field in the way he did. Hoddle, one such example, struggled with those individuals in particular. Just ask Gazza.1 -
Arthur Fagg subsequently an umpireStarinnaddick said:A Kent player still holds the record for scoring a double century in each innings in the county championship.2 -
He isn't that good a fielder. A couple of decent stops doesn't make him one. His movement is lacking and he has dropped more than the odd catch including one in this Test. That is one of the main reasons he is found hiding down at fine leg. You would never pick Bashir in front of the likes of Cox who became a specialist 12th man in the recent IPL.golfaddick said:
He IS good at fielding. Stopped quite a few runs & effected the dismissal of Ravindra at the end of the first day by stopping a 4 the ball before.arny23394 said:
You’d hope so. When you take into account his ability over the three disciplines, he might just be the worst player to have played test cricket for England since I first took an interest in the sport (2005 ashes).fenaddick said:I would assume Ahmed becomes the all rounder and Bashir is never seen again. The captaincy is interesting because last time there was only one serious candidate too. Makes you wonder why we don’t produce many obvious captains
Use him.as a sub and bring him on every time a bowler has to go off for a comfort break / change of socks / whatever.
One of the biggest thing to happen in county age group cricket right now is the advent of specialist fielding coaching including, of course, keeping. You can teach these things later in life but educating a 15 year-old movement, catching and throwing is harder to do at that age than when they are 12 simply because, by that time, bad habits have become ingrained.
This might surprise some people but I heard, a few years ago, of a first team county keeper who received one session of specialist keeping a month for the duration of the season. Almost as incredible as going to an Ashes without a specialist fielding coach. Now who would be silly enough to do that?3 -
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Well done @Blackheathen and @Addick Addict the much maligned Zak Crawley is the man.2
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On that count, Crawley averages 20.54 in the County Championship and 24.57 in the Vitality Blast this season. That just goes to show that you can take the Crawley out of England but not the England out of Crawley!LenGlover said:Well done @Blackheathen and @Addick Addict the much maligned Zak Crawley is the man.1 -
As Stokes doesn't have a Hundred contract, amusingly his first game after England could be in the 50 over cup. Or he'll be steaming in to bowl for Durham in the county championship.
I imagine he'll play the Big Bash and maybe the SA or NZ T20 competitions in the winter. Getting an IPL gig will be tough though, unless he does really well in those.0 -
I can see an IPL side bringing him in purely as a marketing stunt but not sure how attractive that will be to himkillerandflash said:As Stokes doesn't have a Hundred contract, amusingly his first game after England could be in the 50 over cup. Or he'll be steaming in to bowl for Durham in the county championship.
I imagine he'll play the Big Bash and maybe the SA or NZ T20 competitions in the winter. Getting an IPL gig will be tough though, unless he does really well in those.0 -
I actually didn't realise Stokes didn't have a Hundred deal. Some of these outgrounds for the Metro Bank are going to be rammed if he plays1
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Addick Addict said:
I'm not sure that he gets a playing contract there simply because his record in T20s in recent years is nothing exceptional, he's not played in the IPL for five years, hasn't played T20Is for four years and his injury record is enough to put off suitors. The last time he played, in 2021, he had to pull out after one game with a finger injury.soapboxsam said:Ben Stokes is a deep thinking man with his personal demons and the Ashes defeat wounded him deeply.
Also the serious facial injury he received when he was hit when the Durham youth were in the nets gave him more time to think about his future in Cricket and did he need the baggage and scrutiny that goes with the England captaincy; he decided enough was enough after the Lords late night club incident.
Ben can play for Durham, earn loads of money in India and the Hundreds and IF his body holds up, retire at 40 having enjoyed the autumn of his cricket career.
Franchises in the IPL have had enough of overseas players, especially English ones, putting themselves forward and then pulling out (Brook, Duckett, Curran, Banton, Carse and Payne all did so this year) and are unlikely to commit to someone who might not be good enough let alone fit for what is a grueling couple of months.
All of that said, whilst Stokes doesn't need the money (albeit presumably he won't now be paid his central contract which he signed up to and including the Ashes) but probably does need a challenge. Will just playing for Durham and enjoying family life be enough? He might go the same way as Broad and Woakes and the media route but I'm not sure that he is the right fit for that. What might engage him is coaching but only he will know if he can stomach seeing players not able to do or, more pertinent, commit on the field in the way he did. Hoddle, one such example, struggled with those individuals in particular. Just ask Gazza.
Free from playing for England and trying to get fit for playing test matches, he will be given another chance in the IPL if he wants to as he is a big name and much to my chagrin, in the Hundreds if it continues to get the new younger audience and the money for the big names.
The Hundreds is good for the women's game so it can grow which it is anyway with the T20 WC going well in England but not keen on the men's version but the organisers want both.
This will be a newer relaxed Ben Stokes, not one fettered by being England's captain.0 -
Interesting seeing Stokes talking Marcus North. They will be like ships in the night - Stokes playing for England for the duration of North's time at Durham, with very few games for the county and now Stokes going back to Durham a matter of a few months after North became the National Selector.0
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Root run out
The end is nigh.
Thank you Ben Stokes & good night.0 -
Embarrassing
With this England team, when the wheels fall off they REALLY fall off.1 -
The England fans who turned up today should ask for a refund ?
For their traveling expenses!1
