This was supposed to be a day 2 review – but seeing as it’s already over, I may as well wrap up the test as a whole.
Having stayed up to watch the entirety of the first day, followed by limited sleep and a social function that implored me to drink several lager beers, I am ashamed to admit I fell asleep at 0100, and awoke at 0930.
When I stirred, my girlfriend turned to me and very gently advised not to check my phone. This was a bad omen, I lay there for 5 mins or so, pondering over just how bad it could be, preparing myself for the worst.
I am glad I did that, because when I did look, I was met with a BBC sport notification informing me that England had indeed lost by 8 wickets.
8? How the fuck has that happened?
Well, in my subsequent review of the footage, it happened mostly because England refused to learn their lessons.
Root, I excused yesterday, he played a defensive shot to a brilliant ball and got nicked off, that’s fine. This time over, it was an incredibly poor decision that cost him his wicket. Those of you thinking “oh did he try a reverse ramp or something again?” No, it wasn’t that bold. What he did, was play a booming drive on length. It’s such a high risk shot against a bowler that we know gets movement and lift off a surface that was providing just that. It’s no good.
I don’t want to get hung up on the Smith dismissal, I thought it was odd from the third umpire to give it, but decisions go against you sometimes, it’s a part of sport.
The point is, we had ourselves in a golden position to go 1-0 up in the series, and we blew it for no good reason. They bowled well, but we batted stupidly, especially knowing that pitch was going to get much easier to bat on later in the day.
Speaking of getting easier to bat on, enter Travis head. He emerged to open the batting in a surprise move. It shouldn’t have worried England too much, they had set 200 to win, which was far from ideal but gave them half a chance, and Travis had looked a complete mess yesterday with no real form backing him either.
What Travis head produced, can only be described as a “fuck you I want a million beers tonight and you aren’t going to stop me” type innings. You have to respect it.
England thrashed, and I dare say, with that loss goes any hope of a series, or even a test victory.
It was such a shameful drubbing, I have been a big fan of stokes and Baz as leaders, but they got it wrong today, and its a mistake that is going to cost them.
5-0…..unless we look decent in the first dig of the next test, in which case I’m back onboard and its 4-1…..these predictions are not fixed,
Such a shame.
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