Once again, I'm at a loss

[El_Zigi]

Oh man this game baffles me sometimes. Ignore this post if you don't want to read about me crying after a huge loss in a Test match.

Pak v SL 1st Test

Toss: SL (who chose to bat first)

Pitch: Some help for pace/poor for spin

Weather Day 1: Mixture of unsettled and cloudy conditions for the day.

SL have a decent but not great looking batting line-up which includes an ageing Jayawardene and Sangakkara, both 37. Discounting those two geriatrics, Angelo Mathews has the best avg (40.4) in the team. Paks bowling attack is Asif, Rameez, Rizwan Akbar and Nayyer Abbas. Not great, but not bad either.

So I lose the toss but it looks like there might be something for my bowlers here and so it proves. After Akbar claims 3 quick wkts in his 2nd spell SL are in serious trouble on 109/7. So in comes there no.9, a regen on test debut by the name of De Mel. He is classified as an out and out bowler, but with a FC avg of close to 30 and a FC 100 to his name, it seems he can bat a bit. He might hang around for a bit I suppose but surely no more than that. My bowlers seem to be firing on all cylinders here and batting clearly seems to be tough so naturally they're on high aggression with an aggressive field. Little did I realise that De Mel is Geoff Boycott reincarnate. This debutant(!) displays an immaculate defensive technique. My bowlers, who remember have just ran through the Sri Lankan Top/Middle order cant even create a chance against the mighty De Mel let alone get him out. So he and their no.6 bat and bat with apparent ease, even chances are few and far between. Finally the no.6 falls for 67 and SL are 234/8. I breathe a sigh of relief, the torture is over, in comes the no.10, Test avg of 12. It's now the start of Day 2 and after a short rain delay play resumes, new ball in my bowlers hands. I'm hopeful I can knock over these final 2 wickets quickly. But no, more agony. What seemed so difficult for all but one of SLs top 8, ie batting, continues to be made to look easy by these tailenders. I start with an aggressive field, bowlers on 4 bars aggression to begin with. A stand of over 50 ensues before finally the 2 wkts fall and SL are all out for 291. Geoff De Mel Boycott finishes unbeaten on 86. He batted for 274 mins, faced 201 balls and hit 14 x 4s. In all that time there were only 3 chances against him, 2 lbw shouts and 1 played and missed. And there was me thinking that newcomers to tests needed a few games under their belts to get their bearings.

In reply, against a decent but certainly not great SL attack, all but one of my batsmen seem like they've never held a bat before in their lives. My opener gets 96 as I'm bowled out for 184. I must admit here that my batting line-up for this particular test, although long, was somewhat inexperienced. Of course inexperience didn't trouble the mighty De Mel tho when he was batting.

So on with the match and SLs 2nd innings. Weather has improved but pitch as per usual has deteriorated somewhat. Sadly, my bowlers have turned on me and become pie-chuckers. SL make 306-3 dec in just 88 overs. Their no.4 scores a disturbingly quick 129, only his second 100 in 66 test innings. Well, of course he does. SL declare with a lead of over 400. There's 30 mins and the 5th day to go. I decide to bat for the draw. So all my batsmen start and stay on 0 aggression. If SL can score 306-3 in 88 overs I'm pretty confident I can at least get very close to batting out the remaining time for a draw. Yeah right. Rolled over for 145 sounds about right.

In conclusion: The summer is coming, I can put this game away for an indefinite period of time and actually start playing some cricket for real. In reality I'll know what the hell is going on and be able to understand why certain situations evolved to go this way or that (most of the time anyway). In the sim that is ICC that most definitely is not the case.

I can't believe I felt compelled to write all that. Troubling.

[Phylos Fett]

Unfortunately, I've had games, and even series like that - my batsmen are blasted out for next to nothing, and the opposition look like they are batting on a different pitch entirely. Or every single appeal they make results in a wicket, when my team drops catch after catch. Or my star batsman is struck by a nasty ball in the first session of a Test series, and is out for the duration, meanwhile the opposition takes half a dozen body blows and shrug them off.

On the flip side, I have had games where the opposite is true - an opener will be dropped on 0, and go on and make 200 for me. I'll throw the ball to my part-time spinner to rest a quick for the new ball, and he'll snare a 5 for in no time at all.

I think it comes down to luck some times, and (hopefully) it all balances out in the wash...

[Mully2010]

I have had games where the opposite is true - an opener will be dropped on 0, and go on and make 200 for me. I'll throw the ball to my part-time spinner to rest a quick for the new ball, and he'll snare a 5 for in no time at all.

I think it comes down to luck some times, and (hopefully) it all balances out in the wash...[/QUOTE]


this happen to me while playing Australia Graeme swann got injured so i threw the ball to young batsman from the youth team, i made him bowl 20 overs straight with figures of 5-51

[outbreak]

There is some oddness at times in this game.
Last night i played an ashes series (as australia)and destroyed england but had trouble in one match and where england were dug in well and had just hit 400, i couldn't seem to get a wicket so i decided to bring on a part timer to bowl with my front line spinner (just taken 200 test wickets at an average of 22ish). My part timer was a batsmen who'd never taken a first class wicket and bowled medium pace on a pitch which wasn't good for spin or pace and had no cloud cover, perfect batting conditions. My medium pacer ended up taking 6 wickets while my front line spinner and other quicks couldn't do anything. I've tried throwing him the ball in the 2 tests i had left in this series and every time now he gets spanked at 5+ an over and does nothing. Guess it was his day to shine?

[q felt]

This is what makes ICC the best

[nilet]

its hard to win a game let alone a series in this edition on normal difficulty, you would have to be aus, eng, SA or india, the rest of the teams just cant compete at any level, the computer always seems to do u over. its so frustrating, i felt like throwing my laptop and the disc through the window the other day, all that time and effort and i constantly get a bad result even though im in better positions to win the game the computer always does.

[Scritty]

the computer always seems to do u over. its so frustrating, i felt like throwing my laptop and the disc through the window the other day, all that time and effort and i constantly get a bad result even though im in better positions to win the game the computer always does.

This happens a lot in this version. Sometimes in my favour. The longer the format the more unbalanced the game gets in the final innings.

So test matches are the most unbalanced. I'm not saying the most difficult because sometimes it's unabalanced in my favour - but unrealistic certainly.

Too many times I save a test match by scoring 450+ on a minefield over 5 sessions against good bowling. I've finished a 3 match series against New Zealand where the all three games finished with draws when they probably should all have been won by the side batting first.

In the first I was bowled out for 190 (about) in the first, conceded a huge first innings lead and batted 2 days (less 30 minutes) to score 420 for the loss of one wicket in the fourth innings. The bounce quality was zero (all red) and spin was almost full for the whole of day 5, and I didn't lose a wicket (zero aggression)

That was the most extreme, but all three went that way. The third test was reversed and I should have won, but NZ batted almost 4 sessions for the loss of 3 wickets on a minefield and were scoring at almost 4 an over as well. A pitch turning square and uneven bouce - a side that didn't muster 250 in the first innings on a good track - not just surviving but thriving on a minefield at a good run rate.

It just happens far too often to be a pleasurable part of the game.

Every game a "VVS Laxman V's Australia in 2002" scenario occurs.

Once every couple of years that's great - a "magic moment".

Every single game and the fun and novelty wears off very quickly.

It's incremental though - the longer the format of the game the more this effect seems to occur. ODI's,Pro 40 cricket and T20 is extremely well balanced.

Just realised that in England we play no 50 over cricket what so ever any more.
How on earth did we ever think we would win a competition in a format that we don't play at all?

What with bouncers on dead tracks, a total inability to bowl more than 2 yorkers an innings (despite the obvious success rate when we did manage it Broad - Bresnan) and batsmen scared to use their feet to spinner. Bloody "forward press" nonsense.

/rant off

Scritty

[Phylos Fett]

Just realised that in England we play no 50 over cricket what so ever any more.
How on earth did we ever think we would win a competition in a format that we don't play at all?

Have you seen what has happened to the domestic one day game in Australia? I'm not saying that including it the year before the World Cup had any effect on the result, mind you - I blame that fully on the team selected, and the captaincy

[ab5ides1]

Have you seen what has happened to the domestic one day game in Australia? I'm not saying that including it the year before the World Cup had any effect on the result, mind you - I blame that fully on the team selected, and the captaincy

I dislike the domestic one-day game in Australia now. I thought the FR Cup was great because it was the same format as the international games and gave players a good chance to do well further on, but the new competition isn't as good. It's like a restricted first class game. I hope they change it back. It's obvious that there is still tons of support for the 50-over game.

[Phylos Fett]

I dislike the domestic one-day game in Australia now. I thought the FR Cup was great because it was the same format as the international games and gave players a good chance to do well further on, but the new competition isn't as good. It's like a restricted first class game. I hope they change it back. It's obvious that there is still tons of support for the 50-over game.

I'm not sure why the powers-that-be have to constantly tinker with the format of domestic games. If they really want the players to be ready to step up to the international level, they should mirror the international format on the domestic level. I'm even for 5 day FC games in the Sheffield Shield in Australia. That said, maybe they'll go further the other way, and make domestic Twenty20 games 15 overs each, with the sides swapping every 5 overs, as a fresh new approach to the format :P

[El_Zigi]

The game just screwed me out of a series win. 2-match test series against the Windies. I win the first test easily.

2nd test, Windies win the toss and put me in. Some help for pace/no help for spin. Overcast conditions with rain around. I bat very well tho and score 402 and because of rain delays my innings finishes on the morning of Day 3. Day 3 is almost a complete washout so by the time the Windies are all out for 344 there's only Day 5 and a very small bit of Day 4 to go. With that amount of time left and a 58 run lead naturally I'm thinking securing the draw and hence series win will be a formality. I mean the only chance the Windies have is to roll me over and very quickly.

They did. 76 all out in 33 overs!!

[Mully2010]

The game just screwed me out of a series win. 2-match test series against the Windies. I win the first test easily.

2nd test, Windies win the toss and put me in. Some help for pace/no help for spin. Overcast conditions with rain around. I bat very well tho and score 402 and because of rain delays my innings finishes on the morning of Day 3. Day 3 is almost a complete washout so by the time the Windies are all out for 344 there's only Day 5 and a very small bit of Day 4 to go. With that amount of time left and a 58 run lead naturally I'm thinking securing the draw and hence series win will be a formality. I mean the only chance the Windies have is to roll me over and very quickly.

They did. 76 all out in 33 overs!!

i just got belted by i tahir a guy who can't bat to save his life along with his his partner at no 10, with them chasing 450 to win on a wicket where the ball is swinging like crazy with over head cloud just the perfect bowling wicket.
I run through there entire batting lineup yet still i couldn't get their two last men.

[anant_shah94]

I feel your pain. In a test match, a number 8 took 7 wickets against me, then scored a century in 140 balls

[Liquifier]

50 over cricket is basically dying. The restructure of List A to be split-innings in Australian domestic cricket is a litmus test for the ODI structure. The powers that be, therefore, are tinkering with the format in domestic circles to see what works and what does not, so that 50 over cricket doesn't become completely redundant.

I watched almost every single Aus domestic one-day game this season (at least when aired on Foxtel) and thoroughly enjoyed the split-innings format.

At the very least it ensured less dead overs (incentive to bat quickly early on comes from the bonus point you get if you lead at the 20 over changeover mark), and then the first 5 overs upon resumption of the innings (i.e. overs 21 - 25 I believe) are power-play-esque, with some fielding restrictions, to ensure that sides hit the ground running upon resumption.

Lopping 5 overs off the actual size of each innings (i.e. from 50 to 45) also ensured more urgency for more of the innings itself. I saw some incredible comebacks and also some really large scores, and the average run-rate was higher than in previous seasons (cluey thinkers will also cite the impact of t20 cricket as another reason for such an increase in aggression, and they'd of course be correct also).

Obviously this is merely my opinion, and anyone who counters is limited to the same restrictions of it merely being their opinion. I do believe though that the fact I could easily sit through all 90 overs, whereas in days gone by I only watched the end of an innings (i.e. overs 35 - 50) due to the fact that the first 35 were typically stodgy, 3.8 - 4.4 an over boredom.

I say give it a try guys, if you are to counter to me saying there is nothing wrong with 50 over cricket as it stands then I think you need to be more honest with yourself.

50 over cricket breakdown (in its current form, generally):

Overs 1 - 10: Have a bit of a go, aim for around 50 runs
Overs 11 - 35: Score at 4 an over, keep wickets in hand
Overs 36 - 40: Attempt to increase rate, keep wickets in hand
Overs 41 - 50: Go for it

You can basically switch the TV off from the 11th over through to the 40th unless you want to watch people knocking around singles and preserving their wicket (which I personally believe to be about as boring as it gets in terms of cricket viewing, people who say 'Test cricket only goes at 2.8ish an over' are missing the point of the fact you watch Test cricket for an entirely different viewing experience when compared with One-Day).

New format ensures they go hard in the first 20 to get that pivotal bonus point, then upon resumption you have the fielding restrictions in place, ensuring more boundaries. Once you get to the 25th over (out of 45) you may have 5 - 7 overs of knocking it around at 4ish an over, then acceleration once more. 5 - 7 overs of knocking it around versus 20 - 30 overs of knocking it around is a no-brainer for me.

Interested to see what others think too. I stand by my opinions obviously, however am always open to a perspective I've not yet considered.

Thanks for reading, if you made it this far

[Scritty]

50 over may well be my favourite format.
Sure games can ebb and flow a little in 20 over - but generally they don't.
They nearly always do in 50 over, I even like the 25 over hiatus where batsmen look to "work it around" (though often they don't) it's "cat and mouse".

Personally, as the 6's tally in IPL (sorry DLF Maximums) reaches the several hundred level, 6's have pretty much lost any meaning with me.

"Ho hum..another 6...missed it? Don't worry there will be another in moment..yawn"

Scritty