Lords - Day 4, And Why Broad Should Be Dropped

In what must surely have become the most overused cliche in English cricket over the last 12 months, Alastair Cook continued to mercilessly accumulate runs as, barring a repeat of "The Cardiff Incident", the second test peters out to a draw

England's bowlers had a strange morning, occasionally bowling excellantly, taking some very good wickets, but sometimes appearing to be trying to see who could best imitate Mitchell Johnson with some leg side filth. Steven Finn, who most people think is the likeliest member of the attack to be dropped for Anderson, took 4-108, and in the meantime became the youngest England player to reach 50 Test wickets, but then his inexperience (at the age of just 22) shone as he tried to bounce out the tailenders instead of just attacking the stumps, almost killed Suranga Lakmal and inevitably missed out on his fifer.

Meanwhile, Stuart Broad, Test bowling average of 36, manages to retain his place in the side with 1-125. In my opinion (which is unlikely to be heard by the England selectors), Broad needs to be dropped for a few months to have some time in County cricket. His average has been steadily on the rise for the last year, and is ridiculous for a Test bowler.  Like Pietersen, who I refuse to talk about, the selectors seem to have him in the side for thoughts of better times, like when he ripped through Australia in 2009. Finn is a better Test match bowler than Broad, and certainly deserves a run in the side.

On to the England innings, Strauss joins a certain person in having trouble with left-armed bowlers. Although the ball from UWMBYMCA Welegedara was magnificent, and practically unplayable, Strauss needs to fix the problem before it consumes him like it has done someone else.

Tpwrds the end of the day, we had a remarkable look at the future of Test cricket, with the floodlights on, and the clear quartet of familiar shadows surrounding every player. It looked remarkably like a day-night ODI, well, except that Alastair Cook was batting as he usually does.

Cardiff - Day 3 (Or Two And A Bit In Terms Of Overs)

From the mouth of an Englishman at the SWALEC yesterday: Got an jokes about Wales? Yeah, the weather.

Whose stupid, stupid idea was it to play an English Test in miserably drizzly Wales? The weather's been horrible, the pitch has been yawn-inducing and the crowds have been non-existent. Knowing that the match was going to be rain interrupted, surely the groundstaff could have prepared a pitch capable of producing a result in 5 days, let alone the 4 we'll barely get. This pitch, accompanied by these batsmen, doesn't look like producing a result until the zombie apocalypse

 If Alaistair Cook and Jonathon Trott. were to continue their current form for the next year, they would probably end up being banned from Test cricket for life, due to their inability to ever get out being completly unfair on anyone else. It's amazing batting, but not the most spectacular to watch. The key word to describe any Trott-Cook partership is accumulation.

The main speculation coming into this Test was the topic of whether Eoin Morgan could prove his worthiness of Collingwood's vacant space, alas, he may not even get to bat in this Test at all . In fairness, Pietersen mightn't even get to bat at this rate. I reckon the England selectors might have missed a trick here, just pick Cook, Trott, Morgan (also standing as keeper) and 8 bowlers. We'd get a result at least.

As it is, to win this Test, England need Cook and Trott to go into overdrive mode and start scoring at about 4 an over, be incompetent at it, get out, and let Pietersen, Morgan, Bell and Prior have a lash at it for 40 overs and some damage, declare, and somehow try bowl Sri Lanka out with only 3 bowlers and sponge poor pitch.

And I can't even watch it, cos Sky have decided to put Huddersfield vs Peterborough on Sky Sports 1 instead.
It's a bad week...