12-30-2018, 06:16 AM
I’m a bit too reactive I think, in both cricket and football. After losing this Test I was sitting here thinking the sky is falling and we’ll never win another Test match ever. But we won one against the world’s number 1 team only 12 days ago. How did we do that? Our openers put on partnerships of 112 and 59, with both making 50’s in the first innings. They didn’t perform well in this Test, but surely we stick with them for a while based on that. Head got a 50 in the first innings and Khawaja in the second innings, while S Marsh got 45 in the first. Paine made 38 and 37, which is handy from a keeper. And all this against the best pace attack to come to Australia since the mighty Windies teams of the 80’s (yes the stats do back up this big statement). Maybe our batting is not as bad as I think it is, just needs a chance to get used to Test cricket? I don’t have any problem with Paine’s keeping, so no problem there. The bowling? Well Starc and Hazlewood each got an early wicket in both innings, and we had them 2/8 in the first, and 2/13 in the second innings. Despite a Kohli century, Lyon got 5 wickets and we bowled them out for 286 in the first innings (lead for us of 43 runs), then we rolled them for 140 in the second innings, with the bowlers sharing the wickets, to win by 146 runs. I hated getting rolled in this Test, but we need to be careful about kneejerk reactions, maybe we aren’t that far away….