England in India 2024-25 : The Pataudi Trophy

[Rajkumar Sharma]

England Test squad :

Ben Stokes (c), Rehan Ahmed, James Anderson, Gus Atkinson, Jonny Bairstow, Shoaib Bashir, Harry Brook, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ben Foakes, Tom Hartley, Jack Leach, Ollie Pope, Ollie Robinson, Joe Root Mark Wood

[prasen9]

Interesting. England's best test MO batters based on current performance are:

Brook, Root, Stokes (who will play only as a batsman), Bairstow, Pope

They will like to most possibly play all of them in the 1st XI. But, then the problem is that has no openers. Pope is a worse batter than Bairstow but they made him the VC. So, who will be the batters? Openers, Brook, Root, Stokes is the other option. But, they will want Pope in and thus will perhaps use Root as the fifth bowler.

Do they choose Foakes or have Bairstow keep and get another batter?

Allrounder: Rehan Ahmed

Their best pacers are Ollie Robinson and James Anderson. Woakes has been dropped because his away record is rather poor. The other two Wood and Gus Atkinson will perhaps rotate.

First spinner other than Rehan is possibly Leach.

So: Duckett, Crawley, Root, Brook, Stokes, Pope, Bairstow/Foakes, Rehan, Robinson, Leach, Anderson

In reality, they will possibly rotate Robinson/Anderson and the over-rated (but would possibly walk in the Indian team after Bumrah, Siraj) Wood/Atkinson.

This is a very long batting lineup. Rehan is a prodigy and took a 5-fer in Pakistan. So, we should be careful especially our junior players who are not that great players of spin having played little domestics. I would favor the Kumar policy of bringing back Mayank, who is a good player for Indian conditions.

[prasen9]

I have noticed one thing. A lot of England's recent test players who are of Asian origin are of Pakistani origin. Or at least Muslim. What happened to the likes of Vikram Solanki, Sameet Patel, etc.?

Rehan Ahmed, Saqib Mahmood, Haseeb Hameed, Zafar Ansari, Moeen Ali

Is cricket more popular among the Pakistani next gen these days and the Indian-origin kids are being pushed to academics? New Zealand is not showing the same pattern. Or is it just a coincidence?

As a comp, for New Zealand we have had:

Rachin Ravindra, Ajaz Patel, Jeet Raval, Ish Sodhi, Jeetan Patel

Australia, on the other hand, only has Khawaja.

South Africa has Muthusamy, Hamza (?), Shamsi, Majaraj, Tahir - a bunch of Pakistani-origin players but a bit more balanced than the latest crop of English players.

Not trying West Indians because there are too many.

[Rajkumar Sharma]

Indian kids are developing USA Cricket

[PKBasu]

England Lions will take on India A in a 2-day warm-up game on 12th-13th Jan, and then play the first 'test' starting Jan 17th (8 days before the first official test between the two countries). Here is the India A team for the two matches: Abhimanyu Easwaran (Captain), Sai Sudharsan, Rajat Patidar, Sarfaraz Khan, Pradosh Ranjan Paul, KS Bharat (WK), Manav Suthar, Pulkit Narang, Navdeep Saini, Tushar Deshpande, Vidwath Kaverappa, Dhruv Jurel (WK), Akash Deep

[Kumar]

Following Indian a team as part of the a series thread

[Sin Hombre]

Shamsi, Maharaj, Muthusamy all have Indian origins. It is just the UK - that piddly island is a shithole and Indians shouldn't be going there anymore.

[prasen9]

England is not what it used to be but it is still a first-world country with good human development. I would indeed prefer New Zealand to UK if I were only choosing on the basis of quality of life, jobs, etc. but I would choose UK over South Africa any day. South Africa is at best a 2nd world country, more like a 3rd world country with respect to health, infrastructure, etc. While UK is moving backwards, their healthcare, infrastructure etc. is maybe slightly worse only wrt Europe and the U.S.+Canada. But, it is way better than what one would get in South Africa. The U.K. has a substantial Indian population and a substantial Pakistani origin population. It used to have Indian origin players in its test team. The curious case is why the last five or so have been all of Pakistani origin and not of Indian origin. It may just be a small sample size anomaly and the Indian-origin kids in the U.K. will shine soon enough.

[Kumar]

https://www.hindustantimes.com/cricket/ ... 1-amp.html

As per this article, Team mgmt does not want KL keeping. Ishan is asked to play the domestic Ranji and he may be in running for the wicket keeper slot. I actually like Shreyas Iyer for test match in India over KL. Surprisingly, Their averages are almost similar in India with KL tad better.

[Kumar]

Squad announced for first two test
https://indianexpress.com/article/sport ... 7295/lite/

India squad for 1st 2 Tests vs England: Rohit Sharma (C ), S Gill, Y Jaiswal, Virat Kohli, S Iyer, KL Rahul (wk), KS Bharat (wk), Dhruv Jurel (wk), R Ashwin, R Jadeja, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohd. Siraj, Mukesh Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah (VC), Avesh Khan.

Most likely top 6 batsman Rohit, Jaiswal, Gill, Kohli, KL, Bharath


I think Iyer should absolutely play in place of Gill… but unlikely to happen.

As to bowlers, Bumrah, Siraj, Jadeja, Ashwin and Axar .. gives our batting a slightly better depth with Axar. If the pitch is going to be spinning track, I would play Iyer instead of Siraj.. and give new ball to Ashwin

Ishan story is not going to end well. He is definitely on the out posting a picture of him doing meditation … and pretty much refusing to turn up for his domestic side. I hope common sense prevails.

[Rajkumar Sharma]

This series was ideal to launch new pacers keeping in mind SENA test maches. Spinners will chew up England.

[Kumar]

U seriously think this series will be a cakewalk. Our players are not as good as they used to be at playing spin.none of our batsman will have played domestic first class cricket on Indian pitches. There is a good chance that we may loose this test series.

16 member squad for home series is a joke. Four pacers for home series. This selection committee is in danger of being the worst ever

[Rajkumar Sharma]

U seriously think this series will be a cakewalk. Our players are not as good as they used to be at playing spin.none of our batsman will have played domestic first class cricket on Indian pitches. There is a good chance that we may loose this test series.

Yes, spinners will chew up this English side. There is a heaven & hell difference between Indian Spinners & Pak / Sri Lanka spinners. To loose this test series, selector needs to prepare green track with bowl swinging like English condition. Rehan Ahmed & Jack Leach lacks bite.

16 member squad for home series is a joke. Four pacers for home series. This selection committee is in danger of being the worst ever

Bumrah & Siraj should play one or two test in this series. Atith Seth, Kaverappa should have been prepared before next test series in Australia. Most 3rd class selection is KS Bharat.

[Raju Bhai]

Instead of Kaverappa Mohammad Kaif should be in the side, someone who can bowl at 140+ and can bat at 7.

[prasen9]

Brook, Root, Stokes (who will play only as a batsman), Bairstow, Pope

They will like to most possibly play all of them in the 1st XI. But, then the problem is that has no openers. Pope is a worse batter than Bairstow but they made him the VC. So, who will be the batters? Openers, Brook, Root, Stokes is the other option. But, they will want Pope in and thus will perhaps use Root as the fifth bowler.

Do they choose Foakes or have Bairstow keep and get another batter?

Allrounder: Rehan Ahmed

Their best pacers are Ollie Robinson and James Anderson. Woakes has been dropped because his away record is rather poor. The other two Wood and Gus Atkinson will perhaps rotate.

First spinner other than Rehan is possibly Leach.

So: Duckett, Crawley, Root, Brook, Stokes, Pope, Bairstow/Foakes, Rehan, Robinson, Leach, Anderson

In reality, they will possibly rotate Robinson/Anderson and the over-rated (but would possibly walk in the Indian team after Bumrah, Siraj) Wood/Atkinson.

This is a very long batting lineup. Rehan is a prodigy and took a 5-fer in Pakistan. So, we should be careful especially our junior players who are not that great players of spin having played little domestics. I would favor the Kumar policy of bringing back Mayank, who is a good player for Indian conditions.

So now, Brook goes back home. That means their MO batter logjam is a bit relieved.

Duckett, Crawley, Root, Stokes, Pope, Bairstow, Rehan, Robinson, Leach, Anderson, Wood.

They can strengthen the keeping by playing Foakes. Or they can get another bowler in. A second spinner or Atkinson in place of Wood or any of the other two pacers are the other choices.