1st Test Australia v Pakistan Dec 14-18 1250hrs @ Perth Stadium

[Underarm]

In all seriousness test matches in Perth against lower drawing teams like Pakistan should be played at the WACA rather than Optus Stadium.

That was the original plan but the WACA is being redeveloped into a boutique cricket ground now so I am not sure if that is still the plan.

Optus Stadium is OK for T20 games like the Scorchers home games but test matches in WA should still be played at the WACA if possible.

The WACA was an iconic unique test ground, it had history and character and it was where WA people had a connection to as a test venue.

Optus Stadium doesn't have that which I think is one of the reasons why test crowds have dropped off since they shifted test cricket there.

I reckon crowds would have dropped off in Adelaide too if they shifted test cricket from the Adelaide Oval to a big Optus Oval like stadium.

How do you justify charging the same price for a ticket to a test at the WACA and at Perth Stadium when the quality of the 2 has a chasm between them?

 

[Mr Meow]

One swallow doesnt make a summer. Those guys haven't been averaging 30 the last 3 yrs, those guys scored runs against England and India, those guys barring Khawaja arent anywhere near retiring but Ussie averaged mid 40s against India and England this year with a couple centuries to boot. One innings is isolation means f all.

So in the last 24 months his:

-94, 95, 66 and 60 against England
-68, 51 and 164 against Pakistan
-48 vs West Indies
-200 vs South Africa
-43 vs India

Were just innings in isolation. We're very confident someone like Bancroft would've done better.

The other 4 in the top 5 being in better form doesn't mean Warner should be out of the team. Squeezing Green in and shuffling the order may occur after the Pakistan series but it's hardly been a no brainer decision based on Warner's output.

 

[AvantGardener]

So in the last 24 months his:

-94, 95, 66 and 60 against England
-68, 51 and 164 against Pakistan
-48 vs West Indies
-200 vs South Africa
-43 vs India

Were just innings in isolation. We're very confident someone like Bancroft would've done better.

The other 4 in the top 5 being in better form doesn't mean Warner should be out of the team. Squeezing Green in and shuffling the order may occur after the Pakistan series but it's hardly been a no brainer decision based on Warner's output.

You can pick out whatever innings you want but he was averging low 30s in the last 3 years and thats with the 200 against a second rate demoralised SA. A decline like that and at his age unfortunately careers dont last forever. Who was the last specialist batter to average 30 across such a big time span and remain in the team? Blokes have been moved on for less than that. No centuries against England and no 50s against India is really telling.

I am not confident anyone could have done much better but I know giving somebody experience now would put us in better stead moving forward and have minimal impact on this summers results.

 

[Jamurp]

Weird scorecard, heap of runs but no 50s outside of Warner's ton, pitch perhaps doing enough.

Pakistan we get rolled for under 250 though.

 

[Mr Meow]

You can pick out whatever innings you want but he was averging low 30s in the last 3 years and thats with the 200 against a second rate demoralised SA. A decline like that and at his age unfortunately careers dont last forever. Who was the last specialist batter to average 30 across such a big time span and remain in the team? Blokes have been moved on for less than that.

I am not confident anyone could have done much better but I know giving somebody experience now would put us in better stead moving forward and have minimal impact on this summers results.

And you can keep adding caveats like "padded up by this" and "would've been this without that". His selection for the Pakistan series is close to being justified on this innings alone, where he and no other team mates stood up. He helped get us over the line with the run chase at Edgbaston, had a good knock in the winning Test after that at Lord's, survived 146 balls total in the tricky hang-on-for-dear-life draw that retained the Ashes and gave it a hell of a show in the run chase at The Oval.

World cup heroics and 164 to follow that up. He's plugged along fine without starring and with no good openers waiting. The amount of mouth frothing over this has been spectacular.

Giving blokes experience before they demand and deserve it has rarely been the Australian way. Oh no, they don't get two Tests against Pakistan before earning it. This will set us back a decade.

 

[AvantGardener]

And you can keep adding caveats like "padded up by this" and "would've been this without that". His selection for the Pakistan series is close to being justified on this innings alone, where he and no other team mates stood up. He helped get us over the line with the run chase at Edgbaston, had a good knock in the winning Test after that at Lord's, survived 146 balls total in the tricky hang-on-for-dear-life draw that retained the Ashes and gave it a hell of a show in the run chase at The Oval.

World cup heroics and 164 to follow that up. He's plugged along fine without starring and with no good openers waiting. The amount of mouth frothing over this has been spectacular.

Giving blokes experience before they demand and deserve it has rarely been the Australian way. Oh no, they don't get two Tests against Pakistan before earning it. This will set us back a decade.

Remove your isolation and my caveats. He averages 30 last 3 yrs. Since when has that been good enough to hold down a specialist batting position?

You can say its not the Aus way but after Warne, McGrath and co retired we sucked and the nation said lets not retire 8 or so blokes in about 12 months again. History will repeat

 

[Mr Meow]

Remove your isolation and my caveats. He averages 30 last 3 yrs. Since when has that been good enough to hold down a specialist batting position?

Since the scores I posted were factors in positive results for a largely competitive side. When the selectors have no confidence the next openers in line could do better. I keep mentioning some players (there are others) who were low 30s near the end who survived and you keep just asking the same question anyway.

We've probably missed out on 3 years of Bancroft averaging 20. I can barely sleep at night knowing that.

 

[AvantGardener]

Since the scores I posted were factors in positive results for a largely competitive side. When the selectors have no confidence the next openers in line could do better. I keep mentioning some players (there are others) who were low 30s near the end who survived and you keep just asking the same question anyway.

We've probably missed out on 3 years of Bancroft averaging 20. I can barely sleep at night knowing that.

You havent mentioned one player in low 30s? You may have to someone else but not to me?

I wasnt calling for Bancroft for the last 3 yrs. Only now calling for someone new not 3 yrs ago...

 

[Mr Meow]

You havent mentioned one player in low 30s? You may have to someone else but not to me?

I wasnt calling for Bancroft for the last 3 yrs. Only now calling for someone new not 3 yrs ago...

You think it's a big deal, costly, devastating or whatever and I don't. I guess that's what it comes down to.

I wouldn't have been outraged at Warner being dropped just like I'm not outraged at him being retained. It'd be a different story if we had exciting openers waiting in the wings, or Warner was as consistently awful as people make out (e.g his Ashes 2019 work). I thought he had something left in the tank for this series and it appears he does. I know that's annoying for some but there will be a chance to can him further when the retirement is official.

 

[Black Diamond]

Warner didn’t play very well and was lucky to survive early when the bowling wasn’t very good.

Then when the bowling improved later in the day he threw his wicket away. On 164.

Each of Khawaja, Labuschane, Smith and Head batted well against bowling which was variously good or bad, depending on how they got out, and all were dismissed by good balls.

Also, Bancroft who has passed 50 three times in ten tests and averages 26 would have done better.

 

[Greendogg5]

Gonna be a long summer.

 

[Soggy2112]

I’m not a big Warner fan, but I have kind of warmed up to him the past few years for a couple reasons:

1. I think he has genuinely grown in terms of his on field behaviour, some of his actions are a bit cringe, but there a long way off from the obnoxious campaigner act he used to do.

2. He cops it far more than he deserves. Yes he can be a bit of a prick and he has made some big errors. So was Langer, Hayden, Mark Waugh, Warne etc. but Warner cops it far more than any of those guys. Particularly in regards to sandpaper (which he is still being punished for mind you), he received the biggest punishment of anyone, far above what any other player has received, yet he still isn’t able to move on in the eyes of the media?

3. Yes he’s a flat track bully at times, but so were a lot of greats (Ponting averaged 42 and 26 in England and India respectively), he’s still in the conversation for our best 11 in all three formats of the game. He’s scored 18,477 runs for his country and made 49 centuries. He’s won three world cups (2 one day, 1 T20) and been a huge part of all 3. He’s won the WTC and been a part of 3 winning Ashes series and 2 retainments in England. Yet he’s rarely given the credit he deserves which I think is sad.

4. If we’re picking our best 11, he’s simply in it. I get the idea that we should have used this series to develop his replacement and that’s fair, but you can’t say that our best team does not have Warner in it. Yet people have continually acted as if he’s being gifted games.

 

[The Passenger]

4. If we’re picking our best 11, he’s simply in it. I get the idea that we should have used this series to develop his replacement and that’s fair, but you can’t say that our best team does not have Warner in it. Yet people have continually acted as if he’s being gifted games.

Warner getting a few games at the end isn't near as concerning as the fact he has averaged ~30 for 3 years and no other opener has been good enough to rip that spot off him...

Maybe Bancroft will make the most of his third chance in the team but I'm not holding my breath - for Australia's sake, I hope he does because Usman isn't going to be holding up the other end for a whole lot longer and things will get very dicey if we've got to fill both openers spots in 12 to 24 months.

 

[western royboy]

Gonna be a long summer.

Lots of confected stories to try and garner some interest but bottom line outside of the top 3 and at times NZ this is going to be a disaster and it will only get worse - even Richard Roxburgh’s performance in the ad was shit - admittedly it was a poor script

 

[Black Diamond]

There us also not sufficient acknowledgement of his achievements.

Not many players score a triple century.

Scoring two hundreds in a match is also quite rare. Warner has done it three times, and shares that record with Ponting and Gavaskar.

 

[Gough]

I read some scuttlebutt that nobody within the team is that keen on any of the replacements and they'd prefer to rejig the batting order and include Green.

 

[Borisdog]

I read some scuttlebutt that nobody within the team is that keen on any of the replacements and they'd prefer to rejig the batting order and include Green.

They could do worse than call up many of the fantastic cricketers posting here.

Any of them would do better by their own accounts.

 

[western royboy]

I read some scuttlebutt that nobody within the team is that keen on any of the replacements and they'd prefer to rejig the batting order and include Green.

Stories like this have gone round before - some baseless, some semi verified, Khawaja has a massive knock on him personality wise, ultimately performance and taking your chance matters most

 

[BStaff17]

Gonna be a long summer.

Cricket Summer peaked 4 weeks ago when we beat India in the World Cup Final.

I think its going to be hard to get the enthusiasm up especially with the quality of opponents coming out.

BBL quality is trash as well.

But what can you do we can't keep playing India every year we all get sick of that as well. And in the end its just the rich getting richer if thats the case.

Outside of 1 ashes series in 2010/11 when England beat us its not like England have ever been competitive in the other 6 or 7 ashes series out here since the early 90s. If it wasn't for the history of the Ashes you would question why they should be invited out here on a regular basis when they have been uncompetitive for the majority of last 30 years.

 

[Jim Prideaux]

Warner didn’t play very well and was lucky to survive early when the bowling wasn’t very good.

Then when the bowling improved later in the day he threw his wicket away. On 164.

Each of Khawaja, Labuschane, Smith and Head batted well against bowling which was variously good or bad, depending on how they got out, and all were dismissed by good balls.

Also, Bancroft who has passed 50 three times in ten tests and averages 26 would have done better.

He batted well all day, against for the most part decent bowling.

 

[Grand Uncle Horace]

I see quite a few mentions of Warner being in awful form over the past 2 years so I took a deeper look:

Starting January 2021: England (home), Pakistan (away), Sri Lanka (away), West Indies (home), South Africa (home), India (away + neutral), England away, Pakistan* (home). 3 home series (4th just started), 4 away series. India and England played home and away.

1407 runs from 44 innings at 31.98 runs per innings

Not great, but not nearly as terrible as made out with some tricky away series making up a fair chunk of it. We've had plenty of senior greats go through similar periods over the years.

There was a big carry on about his 2023 Ashes form because he didn't go on with his starts (hence an average just shy of 30 looks underwhelming), but in every match besides Headingley he saw the new ball off and protected the rest of the line up (for reference he saw off about as many balls as Crawley who relied mostly on one mammoth innings to pad that figure up, and Joe Root, then more than Brook and Duckett), and made useful contributions towards the 2 wins and draw that retained the Ashes, while giving it a hell of a go in the 5th test run chase. He was excellent in the field.

Not everything can be deduced from stats alone. Bairstow's average was pumped up by the big century England delayed the game to nurse him to, which left them no time to bowl Australia out. A bunch of guys averaged 30-40 without having big series. Labs was about Warner level output, he just went on with one innings.

Ironically when he does go on with starts and gets big scores, these are neatly removed to maintain the narrative. The same will happen with today's innings. Because...they're at home, or not against England/India and therefore don't count - a rule that never got applied to past Australian players, or others in the current side.

Anyway I'm sure the needling and snarky comments will continue until he's gone. It's interesting just how aggressive the commentary is though, and it doesn't always stand up to scrutiny.

Warner had numerous tours of England and India. Never made a ton. He has 26 Test centuries, of which 20 were scored here. He really should have had his passport removed a decade ago.

 

[philreich]

I did like one suggestion on ABC radio last night, as a solution to slow over rates - the offending team should NOT be allowed to take the new ball until they catch up. This would mean the spinners would bowl more overs, allowing the allocation of 90 overs to be bowled sooner.

 

[Mr Meow]

I’m not a big Warner fan, but I have kind of warmed up to him the past few years for a couple reasons:

1. I think he has genuinely grown in terms of his on field behaviour, some of his actions are a bit cringe, but there a long way off from the obnoxious campaigner act he used to do.

2. He cops it far more than he deserves. Yes he can be a bit of a prick and he has made some big errors. So was Langer, Hayden, Mark Waugh, Warne etc. but Warner cops it far more than any of those guys. Particularly in regards to sandpaper (which he is still being punished for mind you), he received the biggest punishment of anyone, far above what any other player has received, yet he still isn’t able to move on in the eyes of the media?

3. Yes he’s a flat track bully at times, but so were a lot of greats (Ponting averaged 42 and 26 in England and India respectively), he’s still in the conversation for our best 11 in all three formats of the game. He’s scored 18,477 runs for his country and made 49 centuries. He’s won three world cups (2 one day, 1 T20) and been a huge part of all 3. He’s won the WTC and been a part of 3 winning Ashes series and 2 retainments in England. Yet he’s rarely given the credit he deserves which I think is sad.

4. If we’re picking our best 11, he’s simply in it. I get the idea that we should have used this series to develop his replacement and that’s fair, but you can’t say that our best team does not have Warner in it. Yet people have continually acted as if he’s being gifted games.

Spot on.

Warner had numerous tours of England and India. Never made a ton. He has 26 Test centuries, of which 20 were scored here. He really should have had his passport removed a decade ago.

Anything less than the electric chair and I'm going to keep making so many snarky posts on here!

 

[The Passenger]

I did like one suggestion on ABC radio last night, as a solution to slow over rates - the offending team should NOT be allowed to take the new ball until they catch up. This would mean the spinners would bowl more overs, allowing the allocation of 90 overs to be bowled sooner.

Probably a bit too harsh but a reasonable middle ground seems that however many overs behind you are at the 80 overs is how many additional you have to bowl to get the new ball. So if you should have bowled 86 when you hit 80, that's another 6 before you get the new ball...

 

[philreich]

Probably a bit too harsh but a reasonable middle ground seems that however many overs behind you are at the 80 overs is how many additional you have to bowl to get the new ball. So if you should have bowled 86 when you hit 80, that's another 6 before you get the new ball...

Well it's a bloody good incentive to bowl your overs in the allotted time. Not being able to take the new ball before stumps could result in 2 set batsmen returning to the crease on the following day, which is far from ideal for the fielding team.