England vs West Indies first test Review

So the first test of the summer is over and it very much turned out the way most people thought with an England win and despite a fight back for most of the 4^th day and the first hour of day 5. After that though Alistair Cook and Ian Bell put together a valuable hundred partnership and the rest as they say is history.

The one thing that every team knows about when they go to play at Lords is that it is a very difficult place to take 20 wickets and so it proved again. During the final couple of hours of the test match it was day 5 and the pitch (apart from the areas where the bowlers had run on to the pitch) was absolutely perfect for batting still which is not something that happens at most venues.

With the second test just a few days away it will be interesting to see how the West Indies are going to change their team up and how they are going to begin to fight back. The pitch at Trent Bridge definitely will not be as good as the Lords one and you should see some spin there definitely on days 4 or 5 so Graeme Swann should be able to play a bigger role than this test match.

With 2 more test matches against the West Indies coming up and a bout of good weather heading our way it should definitely be some fun times ahead and there will be good opportunities for the rest of the England team that haven’t done great on my marks out of 10 (see below) to get some good scores before the South Africans arrive here later this summer.

Marks out of 10

A. Strauss – 8

A. Cook – 7

J. Trott – 6

K. Pietersen – 6

I. Bell – 9

J. Bairstow – 6

M. Prior – 6

T. Bresnan – 6

S. Broad – 9

G. Swann – 5

J. Anderson – 7

England vs West Indies

Squad in full and 10 things about the series:

 

Andrew Strauss (Middlesex, capt), James Anderson (Lancashire), Jonny Bairstow (Yorkshire), Ian Bell (Warwickshire), Tim Bresnan (Yorkshire), Stuart Broad (Nottinghamshire), Alastair Cook (Essex), Steven Finn (Middlesex), Graham Onions (Durham), Kevin Pietersen (Surrey), Matt Prior (Sussex, wk), Graeme Swann (Nottinghamshire), Jonathan Trott (Warwickshire)

1)      Jonny Bairstow, who maybe not a lot of people have heard of, is a brilliant young talent and someone who’s probably going to be in and around the international teams for a long time to come.

2)      It will probably come down to four out of six of the picked bowlers, and for my money the two left out will be Graham Onions and Tim Bresnan.

3)      Bairstow and Prior are both going for the number six position that would have been Ravi Bopara’s if he had been fit. Although based on previous I would say Prior will bat 6 and Bairstow 7 in the line-up on Thursday.

4)      Kevin Pietersen has been playing and scoring runs for the Delhi Daredevils but it’s a much bigger ask to go out on a swinging pitch in England in May and hit the ball as well as he has been doing.

5)      Andrew Strauss needs runs! This one cannot be said enough as if he fails again in another series he may struggle to hold on to his place especially with a winter ahead in the sub-continent.

6)      Ian Bell needs runs. Not in such a bad position as Strauss as Ian Bell scored a lot during the last year but he had a bad winter against Pakistan and Sri Lanka and could do with at least one maybe two centuries in the three match series.

7)      With three tests at Lords, Trent Bridge and Edgbaston and the last few weeks being full of rain will we even get enough play?

8)      Shivnarine Chanderpaul, well any cricketer or serious follower should know this person’s name. He is a fantastic batsman who very rarely looks in trouble and it’s going to be a big task for our bowlers to try and get him as early as possible in each innings.

9)      The West Indies have two good spinners and if we get some turning tracks they may be able to get their team into the games, although if we do get a turning wicket we have Graeme Swann so still feeling confident.

10)   Despite everything I’m going for a comfortable England win probably 3-0 and the only thing that I see stopping that is the weather.

The Start of the County Season

The start of the county season is a time for every cricket fan to rejoice and look ahead to a feast of county and international cricket over the next few months, well at least that's what we were thinking of when the weather was nice in the early part of April then came the constant downpours of the last few weeks and the cricket that we've actually had has been a very small amount.

The County Championship is on it's third game of the season so far but there is not a team out there at the moment that has not lost some time to the weather. I come from Essex and as such am a huge fan and follow them whenever I can, so with our second game being against Yorkshire who are also chasing promotion back into the top division we thought that it would give a good indication of the way things would go and see if we were correct in thinking that the top 2 places would be between those two teams. A lot of rain later and we still don't have a clue.

In the top division it seems as if it might be a race between Warwickshire and Nottinghamshire who lead the way after the early few games although there are a lot of other teams that might have a say in that such as Durham, Somerset or last years winners Lancashire. Still with at least 12 games to until the end of the County Championship season there is plenty of time for another team to make it up there or one of the before mentioned teams breaking away from the rest.

Moving across to the international scene and we are welcoming the West Indies here very soon and the first test match will begin on the 17th May. Growing up I heard a lot about the great West Indian sides of the past with people like Malcolm Marshall and Joel Garner but when you compare that to the current day side you see how far backwards they have gone. Chanderpaul is a wonderful player but apart from that I just cannot see anyone else troubling our bowling attack and I think we will win comfortably in all forms.

Still as long as the weather controls itself and we get a bit more like the sunshine we hoped that we would have then we could be in for a cracking few months both domestically and internationally.