England Cricket 2026

lolwray said:

Addick Addict said:

Steven81 said:

Gotta have cox as test keeper now his keeping to spinners is another level to smith.

Jordan Cox, Sam Billings and Ollie Robinson came through the Kent system and were all coached by Ray Willis there. Had Ollie Robinson played when he was flown out to NZ then that would have been three England keepers Ray would have coached. 

In the finest traditions of Kent cricket going back to Hopper Levett,Les Ames,Godfrey Evans, Alan knott,Paul Downton and Steve Marsh and the bloke from Australia who became English 

Who ended up playing for his country of birth, Papua New Guinea. 

PeterGage said:

@Addick Addict  - advice please.

In one of the earlier ODIs against Sri Lanka, the following occurred. Atkinson facing, the ball his part of his body and flew between 3rd slip and gully, towards the vacant 3rd man. Atkinson took off for the run (and may be more). Sri L appealed for leg before and the umpire agreed, stopping Atkinson in his tracks. The review showed the ball missing the stumps and Atkinson remained as the batsman. However, the whole situation meant the Atkinson was not credited with any runs, which he would have lawfully gained, had there had been no appeal. This seems fundamentally wrong to me. Please clarify for me. Thanks

I've actually raised this issue before on here because four legitimate leg byes were "scored" but an on-field LBW decision disallowed those and that meant the difference between winning and losing a game. To me, the umpire should not be making that decision until such time as a run or runs have been completed. If the umpire then gives the batter out LBW then those runs should be disallowed. 

The argument, I suppose, is that as there is no review system below the professional game, a decision should not take that long to be given and there is the chance that a "run out" might occur even though a player is out LBW. In that scenario, though, an LBW decision should over-ride the run out and all runs be disallowed.

To vindicate my view that umpires should wait to make an LBW decision, there is, of course, one scenario where the Laws dictate that umpires do not immediately call "dead ball" and that is the case of "no shot played". The umpire does not call "dead ball" until the run is completed - any run out would count but the runs would not because the batter wasn't playing a shot. One would also have to accept, though, that a batter could be run out even though they were taking evasive action because the ball would still be dead.  

This has all only come about because of VAR. There are plenty of occasions, every year in fact, where Laws are changed because the game has done so too. Surely this one such case where it should and then all forms of the game would be on a level playing field. 

Reehan Ahmed being left out for is fairly significant. Unlike the five spinners that have been selected, he doesn't, yet, have the control with the ball and/or isn't a consistent enough batter to warrant inclusion. 

MarcusH26 said:

Addick Addict said:

Reehan Ahmed being left out for is fairly significant. Unlike the five spinners that have been selected, he doesn't, yet, have the control with the ball and/or isn't a consistent enough batter to warrant inclusion. 

Does make me wonder who will go to Bangladesh spinner wise if Rehan is starting to fall out of favour. The podcasts all love Calvin Harrison as the man to go there. 

The times that I've seen him, Calvin Harrison has bowled well and he can bat too. Not sure whether his numerous DJ commitments will prevent him from touring! 

According to Cricinfo, Bashir is going to be given another central contract. Played two Tests in the last 12 months for his last one and he didn't bowl in one of those. For Derbyshire, in Division 2 this season, he took 24 wickets at 47.70 and averaged 4.55 with the bat. What has he done to earn this new contract?

fenaddick said:

Addick Addict said:

According to Cricinfo, Bashir is going to be given another central contract. Played two Tests in the last 12 months for his last one and he didn't bowl in one of those. For Derbyshire, in Division 2 this season, he took 24 wickets at 47.70 and averaged 4.55 with the bat. What has he done to earn this new contract?

Would possibly make sense at a push if we were playing tests in the subcontinent in the next year but we aren't. I presume they want to give a test contract to a spinner and no one has forced their hand to change who it goes to. I do agree it's a bit mad though and I think I probably root for Bashir more than the average person

England do have two Tests in Bangladesh in February. That really isn't justification, though, to give Bashir a 12-month central contract. This would have been an opportunity to pit him against a couple of other spinners, who also wouldn't be contracted, on a level playing field.

Addick Addict said:

Whatever the criticism regarding the selection of Nic Maddinson for the Australian Test squad (and you only have to read what some former players think of that to realise it is far from popular), from a humanity perspective and a lesson to others to get themselves checked out, it really is a great story that he has gone from being diagnosed with testicular cancer 18 months ago to playing cricket again yet alone for Australia. 

"Once I found out I had to have chemo, that was pretty hard to deal with. It had spread to parts of my abdominal lymph nodes and lung. That was a bit where it was pretty daunting."

Maddinson's wife Bianca was also pregnant with their second child when he began chemotherapy and had to quit her job as a dentist to look after their toddler son while Maddinson underwent treatment.

"By the second or third week, I lost all my hair. I was feeling pretty average. I was taking types of steroids to manage side effects, but they would keep me up at night. I'd be at the hospital from about 11am to 4pm. Then a sleep. Then I'd force myself to have dinner. I'd sleep until about 1am, but sometimes I'd then be awake until 6am. I found that difficult. I was super drained and felt like I had to sleep 24/7.

"I felt guilty. I couldn't do anything around the house."

It would really be fantastic if he was able to prove the doubters wrong but, even if he doesn't, somehow I think he'll be alright about that. Life and death really are more serious than football sport.

The knives were out for Maddinson once his selection had been made known and they will have been well and truly sharpened following his innings today. A naturally aggressive batter, he looked like someone who hadn't played any form of red ball for 18 months in making a 33-ball duck. That also included a negative LBW decision that wasn't reviewed by South Africa for a ball that was hitting the stumps.

Australia are currently 100-4 and in a touch of bother with Maddinson, Head, Labuschagne and Smith all back in the hutch. They are also back to their, tried and tested, bowling attack of Cummins, Starc, Hazlewood and Lyon who now have an average age of 36. In fact, Australia do not have a player under the age of 30 (and only Renshaw is under 32) in their XI with an average age of almost 35.