[nishantdas]

Originally Posted by MurTuzA

Yup......Flintoff's bowling cud b vital.I still feel Harmison wont b a threatening factor cos of the pitches in England.U need swing in those conditions and the only guy who can swing consistently is Hoggard.Pieterson is definitely the X-factor.It wud b interesting to see Pieterson Vs Warne but I feel Pieterson can handle him.

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pieterson is a south-african birn player.... he has played most of his cricket there..... i doubt if he has ever been exposed to a spinner of warne's caliber.... n we all know how badly the south african players play warne..... remember daryll cullinan.... i actually cant think of a single southafrican player who has had success against warne consistently... even kallis has struggled a bit against warne... so i'll giv the edge to WARNE....

as far as swing goes.... yeah there's a lot of help for swing bolwers in english condition.... but how succesful has Mcgrath been there.... he's not a swing bowler.... if harmison can bowl a good line n length consistently england will win for sure... but can he??? im not sure.... also there's another question... will the aussies let him bowl line n length??? i think hayden n langer will come after him hard..... it comes down to a question of temperament then. well cant wait to find out

[Evanescence]

Originally Posted by nishantdas

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pieterson is a south-african birn player.... he has played most of his cricket there..... i doubt if he has ever been exposed to a spinner of warne's caliber.... n we all know how badly the south african players play warne..... remember daryll cullinan.... i actually cant think of a single southafrican player who has had success against warne consistently... even kallis has struggled a bit against warne... so i'll giv the edge to WARNE....

as far as swing goes.... yeah there's a lot of help for swing bolwers in english condition.... but how succesful has Mcgrath been there.... he's not a swing bowler.... if harmison can bowl a good line n length consistently england will win for sure... but can he??? im not sure.... also there's another question... will the aussies let him bowl line n length??? i think hayden n langer will come after him hard..... it comes down to a question of temperament then. well cant wait to find out

Hit the nail. Something easier said than done. McG's USP and invariably all others' weakness. I really hope Hoggard can do well and be regarded as a frontline bowler. He did well in India and then somewhere along the line he's lost it. The conditions will be tailor made for him and with Harmison as his partner he should be on fire.

[MurTuzA]

Originally Posted by nishantdas

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pieterson is a south-african birn player.... he has played most of his cricket there..... i doubt if he has ever been exposed to a spinner of warne's caliber.... n we all know how badly the south african players play warne..... remember daryll cullinan.... i actually cant think of a single southafrican player who has had success against warne consistently... even kallis has struggled a bit against warne... so i'll giv the edge to WARNE....

as far as swing goes.... yeah there's a lot of help for swing bolwers in english condition.... but how succesful has Mcgrath been there.... he's not a swing bowler.... if harmison can bowl a good line n length consistently england will win for sure... but can he??? im not sure.... also there's another question... will the aussies let him bowl line n length??? i think hayden n langer will come after him hard..... it comes down to a question of temperament then. well cant wait to find out

Well it aint mentioned in the Constituition of South Africa that a South African cannot play Warne well.The late Hansie Cronje was one of the best players against spin.Well only time will answer this question.
Regarding the bowlers....I will stick to my opinion.All depends on the weather.On an overcast day Hoggard wud run thru any batting line up.Harmison need cracked up pitches to work on where u have uneven bounce.Something u wont ever see on a UK pitch.

[duke]

Originally Posted by MurTuzA

Well it aint mentioned in the Constituition of South Africa that a South African cannot play Warne well.The late Hansie Cronje was one of the best players against spin.Well only time will answer this question.
Regarding the bowlers....I will stick to my opinion.All depends on the weather.On an overcast day Hoggard wud run thru any batting line up.Harmison need cracked up pitches to work on where u have uneven bounce.Something u wont ever see on a UK pitch.

Man to Man nothing has changed since the last Ashes Except Andrew strauss and Pieterson.
Harminson main weapon is bounce do u think he can bounce out players like Gilli and Hayden who score mostly on back foot. Hoggard is inconsistent and relies too much on outswing. Giles as a spinner wont get a place in any other team in the world. So I expect Australians to score well throughout the series against this pedestrian attack.

Australia will win if Mcgrath and Warney bring the old memories back to england players. If England bat well then they may have a chance
most of previous Ashes the tone of the series is set on the First Day. England will have to play really well in the first test.

[nishantdas]

Originally Posted by MurTuzA

Well it aint mentioned in the Constituition of South Africa that a South African cannot play Warne well.The late Hansie Cronje was one of the best players against spin.Well only time will answer this question.
Regarding the bowlers....I will stick to my opinion.All depends on the weather.On an overcast day Hoggard wud run thru any batting line up.Harmison need cracked up pitches to work on where u have uneven bounce.Something u wont ever see on a UK pitch.

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agree a bit.... all im saying is ------ how many world class leg-spinners has pieterson played against in his career so far?? i'd say none...... how many decent leg-spinners has he played against??? not many..... can he even pick warne?? im not sure.... so warne has the edge in my book.... lets leave it at tht.....
btw.... to prove my point .... u said cronje's a good player of spin..... i agree to a degree.... he has had succes against lots of spinners especially in ODIs.... he was the one who started playing the so-called slog sweep most effectively..... guess which bowler has dismissed him the most in test-cricket..... shane keith warne... 8 times in 12 tests..

abt harmison .... i think he's a much improved bowler..... he was the best bowler in the world according to wisden last year.... .
these r his figures in WI in 2003-04.
O M R W 5wk 10wk best avg s/r e/r
139.5 41 342 23 2 0 7/12 14.87 36.48 2.45
n this is wht he did against the kiwis at home in 2004
. 169.2 44 464 21 0 0 4/74 22.10 48.38 2.74
now to suggest he did all tht on cracked/uneven pitches is a little harsh.

these were hoggard's figures in the same series.

109 28 385 9 0 0 4/75 42.78 72.67 3.53

[nishantdas]

andrew strauss's form is starting to worry the england team management...... he has scored just 81 runs in his last 8 innings in county cricket..... shane warne has written him off... saying he's no threat to the aussies.... warne clean bowled strauss for 9 in his last outing...

[nishantdas]

ICC hav announced the name of 30 probables for the johnnie walker super series tht will pit the ICC World XI against Australia in 3 ODIs n a one-off test --- all in october..
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Tests and ODIs
england ----- flintoff.
india ------ dravid, pathan, sehwag, harbhajan, duckDullkar.
NZ----- McCullum, vettori.
pukes---- akhtar, inzy, rana naved.
SA---- boucher, gibbs, kallis, ntini, pollock.
SL--- murali, sagakkara, vaas.
WI---- lara, sarwan.

only Tests.
england ---- harmison, strauss, vaughan.
india ---- kumble, laxman.
pukes --- kaneria, younis khan..
SA --- nel, smith

only ODIs.
england --- gough, pietersen, trescothick.
pukes ---- afridi, malik, razzaq, youhana.
SL --- jayasurya.
WI --- gayle.

selection panel consisted of --- gavaskar, clive lloyd, hadlee, artherton, de silva n jonty rhodes.....they will cut the squads dwon to 20 in july and again to 13 (tests) n 14 (odis) in august

[nishantdas]

@cricket-lovers ...... check out the highlights of the WI vs SA 3rd ODI being shown on ten spors right now .... u wont believe the finish!!!

[nishantdas]

4 runs to win off 7 balls with 4 wickets in hand....... easy win right??? not if its windies tail with their bat in hand.... first to go.. courtney browne ..leading edge of ntini well caught at mid-on by nel.... 2 singles of the nxt two balls.... .now just 2 runs needed of 4 balls with 3 wickets in hand.... surely they cant mess it up from here.... oh no they can.... ian bradshaw n darren powel both cleaned up by charl langaveldt .. both swinging across the line... n then... corey collimore plumb infront .... SA win by 1 run .. they win the series 3-0.....

langaveldt had 2-62 from 9.2 overs which became 5-62 off 9.5

[Spiderman]

Cant Believe The WI Tail..They are more Pathetic than the Bangldeshis