I was a bit surprised Mark was not back for this test.
But Cook did talk a good talk.

Durham have Rushworth, Onions and Wood all firing. Wood makes it a very strong bowling line up.

Where did I say Broad and Anderson are useless ?
Careful you don't disappear up your own arse Mr Knowall

You said Englands attack was useless and needed a freshen up. Yet you also posted that Woakes was doing ok. So that doesn't leave many to be called useless does it ? The two main bowlers.

Are you now saying Englands bowling attack isn't useless ?

I am certainly not a know it all but I am certainly also not one who knee jerk reacts.

TBH it does leave Finn/Ali.

in these types of pitches England need a far better spinner to give better support to the pace bowlers.

Disagree with Willis, england could replace Ali with Rashid.
Rashid really should play one test before india/bangladesh.

It was interesting to hear the Test Match special crew accuse Cook of being a by-the-numbers captain.

I have only been able to catch bits on TMS around work but they seemed to think that in-form Woakes should have been preferred to Broad who struggling and Woakes was better from the City end. But they felt that Cook bowled Anderson and Broad as that what he always does.

Woakes has given us a chance with the last ball wicket. A couple of early ones tomorrow and we will be back in the match.

tbh broad is a bit off colour at the moment looks like he planning for the winter tours since he working on the off cutter/leg cutter and getting the ball coming in at the batsman and because of it his wrist position is all over the place which stop him get swing at the moment.

Hard to write him off though since he always as a gun spell in him.

Good article from Dobell.
http://www.espncricinfo.com/england-...y/1042607.html

I missed most of today's play as I had to work, was the bowling really as bad as some are saying?

England have had better days with the ball and in the field but you also have to credit Pakistan who batted superbly today too. As Nasser said on commentary "sometimes you just have to say, we were outplayed by a better team today." That's what it was. Fabulous knock by Ali and a great innings by young Aslam

Average was the right term at the tea break after 1 wicket and 2 missed chances in the field by England. Pakistan bat another 50 + overs at this rate and they will be out of sight.

It wasnt Jimmys best opening spell by a long chalk and he struggled to get it back from there.

Broad is in a dip at present I dont see him as a threat on flat medium paced tracks and I can only hope he finds some form. His battng has become a mess too. He doesnt look anything like a test all rounder now.

Finn was off with his line and length which was a pity he could have posed the pakistan batsmen some awkward problems.

Woakes bowled alright but he doesnt seem quite right in front of his home crowd, is the pressure getting to him after a good season.

Ali does all right with the bat but spin bowling against skilled opposition is too much and I'd rather see Borthwick or Rashid in his place for the Oval match.

[quote=mb@2day;83448042]Average was the right term at the tea break after 1 wicket and 2 missed chances in the field by England. Pakistan bat another 50 + overs at this rate and they will be out of sight.{QUOTE] The word average is badly misused ( I blame Simon Cowell) It was not the correct word. The word is poor.

Ali does have a decent knock occasionally but he would not be in my test team. England are obliged to have 5 bowlers because he cannot keep an end quiet

Thanks Darren, some of the comments I've seen on social media and on here are practically calling for the heads of match winners, is nobody allowed an off day? Anderson and Broad can be patchy at times but on their day are match winners and with over 700 test wickets between them I would have thought their experience is invaluable. Considering how brilliant Woakes has been over the last 7 or 8 tests it was bound to be that he would have a bad day at some point but no reason to lose faith. I will say that Finn hasn't been in good enough form to be in the team this year but 1 man doesn't cause what's happened today.

for me they bowled too short for too long and basically wasted the new ball

at risk of getting flamed for being "anti-cook", i agree with the earlier comment about cook being a "by the numbers" captain. it looked to me today they had a plan of bowling how you would usually bowl at edgbaston rather than taking account of the fact this pitch is a bit slower than normal so needed the bowlers to bowl a fuller length.

what i can never work out is why it takes them so long to amend plans when its obvious that plan A isn't working, or that they didn't learn from watching pakistan bowl that bowling back of a length might not be the way to go.

no knee-jerk reactions here, as others have said broad and anderson have shown they are our best bowlers and can have a bad day, same can be said for waokes after the summer he has had even tho he will be disappointed he had it on his home ground. i said before the game i wouldn't have picked finn and apart from the odd delivery today i'm not sure anyone could really justify his inclusion.

it is a little bit of a worry how sloppy england can get in the field when things aren't going their way as well.

got to give credit to pakistan tho, after a big loss in the last game, and then losing a wicket in their very first over today, they could have been feeling the pressure but it was a cracking partnership from ali and sami to get control of the game.

really ?

in the last 4 years his stats by year are ;

2013 - 62 wickets @ 25.8
2014 - 30 wickets @ 26.7
2015 - 56 wickets @ 23.82
2016 - 32 wickets @ 25.82

that really backs up your "opinion" that he has been deteriorating for some time doesn't it ...

Actually they have 811 wickets between them Aaron - quite incredible really especially as they have a few years left in them yet!

I stand corrected, I know Anderson is well over 400 what's the split? It seems like yesterday when Broad was celebrating 300 lol

At the moment Jimmy has 459 and Stuart has 352.

Let's hope they get some more in the first hour of play tomorrow.

Australia in all sorts of trouble in Galle

82/7 with a hat trick for Herath

They have avoided the follow on though....

.."make that 85/8

Aus all out for 105 and Sri Lanka already 9/2

Still 15 mins till lunch and 10 wickets so far this session

Pleased to see Sri Lanka doing well and how upset the aussie commentators are

Waiting for Brendan Julian to start crying

Think we may be in the same boat with our winter tour though

Shows how important conditions are to the result when comparing SL to the team that we we beat easily last month

This could be over today

Not seen a defensive shot yet..

Is the SL v Australia match live on TV in the UK please?

Yes, it's on Eurosport (2 I think)

Tea is due in one over so it may not be on when you tune in !!