It's The Ashes (again)

[Lurker#3]

Agreed. 

I'm not calling for an overhaul in style or selection, or anything as ludicrous as that. But Foakes has to come in and we must select a genuine spin bowler who has played regular cricket. Quite who that is, I don't know. But we can't persist with Ali. We need to somehow find a balance between being aggressive and showing positive intent without being reckless and giving wickets away. You don't need to be reverse sweeping, ramping and slogging to score quick runs. There's plenty of safe and sensible ways to score runs. 

Australia have taught England a bit of a lesson over the last five days. Slow, sensible and steady cricket beats fast, aggressive and reckless cricket.

England have dropped catches and missed stumpings that have cost significant numbers of runs. They’ve also had two of their main bowlers struggling with injury for the majority of the game. Despite all this, they find themselves 1/2 to win the game deep into the final session. 

Struggling to see how, given the above, that the Aussies have taught England a lesson?

Completely agree, but he won't answer.

The declaration isn't why we lost. The missed catches (there were a lot), missed stumping, and the no balls bowled were the reason we lost. Take even 2/3 of those chances at the right time, and we'd have won relatively easily. Broad doesn't no ball when he bowled Khawaja, I think there's another 20/30 runs instantly that we really could have used.

Those 3 things, every cricket team has to get right to win a match, and that's why they're far more important. The declaration is just something Stokes and McCullum are going to do because it fits in with their ethos. Get used to it.

They have won the first Test by playing ruthless and battling cricket. We had our chances, but didn't take it. We're not ruthless enough, and until we find that killer instinct and actually select the best team and players available, we won't have consistent success against the best sides. We're being too loyal to certain players (Crawley, and arguably Anderson and Stokes), and selecting players who haven't played red ball cricket in years). How'd you expect to win an Ashes series when you're already conceding an advantage to the opposition by not playing your best and strongest squad? Just another way where we're not ruthless enough. 

I don't think the declaration ultimately cost us, it was poor selection, but winning that toss, in that pitch, in those conditions, you should have been looking to pile on 500plus runs, bat for 1 & 3/4 days while grinding the opposition down in the field as well as batting the opposition out of the game. That's what Australia would have done. They  would have ground us into the ground, shown no mercy, and then bowl at a tired and worn down batting line up. They may not have won, and that tactic would probably have led to a draw, but they wouldn't have lost the Test. 

So yes, Australia have taught England a lesson, but we're far too stubborn and set into this overly aggressive mentality that will cost us consistency. They're current World Test Champions, the best side in the world and arguably the best Australian side since the early 2000's. Why shouldn't we look at how they play and take lessons from them? They're the standard. We're trying to invent the wheel while Australia are the wheel.

That's two Tests out of three we have lost when declaring. Will we learn the lesson or continue with ignorance? 

We're talented enough to beat this Australian side but the current selection and mentality won't get the job done, unfortunately. As I've said, I like us being aggressive and positive, but we don't need to be reckless and we need to play the game situation when it requires. You can't consistently go gung ho. It has already cost us the first Test of the Ashes. We must learn from that error and reign in the recklessness and replace it with some sensible cricket.

Agree with a lot of those points.
Given that our catching was lacking, stumpings were missed and we had a patched up bowling line up, then making a declaration on the first day of the test with under 400 on the board doesn't seem like the greatest way of going forward. OK, it provides great entertainment, produces a result, puts bums on seats, etc. But providing unnecessary advantages to the opposition won't win an Ashes series.

Our loss was absolutely nothing to do with the declaration. As pointe dout. We missed chances throughout, and in fact I think we were too hesitant in the final session. We didnt apply enough pressure around the batters, we didn't sledge them enough, we worried too much about the boundaries and gave them space to breathe and play each ball on its merit. 

As soon as we got Khawaja out we should have pressed the wicket, got catchers everywhere, took that new ball and got Jimmy and Broady in applying pressure and got the crowd going. 

If you're going to do something you have to commit 100%