Farhat with a very good 50, Pak need 69 to win and beat Australia in a Test match for the first time since 1995...
Cricket
- Thread starter EdWeatherall
- Start date
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
Dont put it past Pakistan to collapse, hope they dont but its Pakistan.
100 partnership up, been really impressed by how these 2 have handled the situation, although the Aussie frontline bowlers have been shit this series.
50 to win...
50 to win...
Farhat gone, surely they can't collapse now...
Dougie takes another one. fecking Pakistan, only they can lose in a winning situation. Still only 43 to get...
Choking. Later than usual but its happening.
End of day 4, Pak need 40 to win and probably due to losing the 2 wickets they won't take the extra 30 mins. Still never know with Pakistan, but they should wrap it up tomorrow.
What an odd decision. Why not just finish it off. What if its overcast and swinging tomorrow.
I suppose a couple of quick wickets scared them, and they didn't want to contemplate the scenario where another couple of wickets fall in a nervous fit for 10-12 runs.
This is Pakistan after all, and they have to won a test against Australia in a very long time.
This is Pakistan after all, and they have to won a test against Australia in a very long time.
Not gonna disagree with you about this Pakistan team's batting line-up - It is largely piss-poor, but that is because of reasons not associated to lack of talent.
In the 90's and early, to mid-00's we had: Salim Malik, Aamir Sohail, Saeed Anwar, Ijaz Ahmed, Inzamam Ul-Haq, Muhammad Yousuf, Younis Khan. Not a poor opening and middle-order line-up by anyone's standards. And that is forgetting the likes of Asif Iqbal, Zaheer Abbas, Hanif Mohammed, Javed Miandad, and so on. Some of the greatest and most naturally talented batsmen the world has ever seen have played for Pakistan...
Even now, Younis and Yousuf could play for a good couple of years at the very least.
What has always handicapped the Pakistan cricket team, has been the system of sifarish, or social nepotism - a perfect example of this system is Faisal Iqbal, a poor batsmen at FC level in Pakistan, yet he has played in 26 Tests for Pakistan, all because he is the nephew of Javed Miandad.
The Pakistan cricket team has always been made up of the upper middle-class, but unlike in England where the game is almost exclusively played by that class of society, in Pakistan, cricket is played everywhere, and there is talent in abundance in the lower-classes. Because of the lack of support and fundage from the PCB, that talent has never been allowed to grow and consequently, we get a team made up largely of players who have everything, but the drive to succeed. Being in the National set-up is to them, like playing for cricket team at University, its ultimately a hobby for them, and nothing more...
Not sure if you have gathered from my posts or not, but I'm from Bangladesh...so I know exactly what you are saying in terms of nepotism.
What I was trying to say was, as a casual cricket fan(football being my real passion), Pakistan has always produced more WC bowlers than batsmen. Of course in a nation with so much natural talent, there have been some real class batsmen. I guess the point was, say compared to India(almost always depending on this in the earlier parts of this decade - Sehwag, Ganguly, Dravid, Tendulkar, Laxman), Pakistan has had the bowlers be their strength.
There was another thing, education. I think a lot of the pakistani and Bangladeshi(especially us) players don't have a decent level of schooling. I don't expect cricketers to be Eton alumni, but school instills discipline, focus, ability to internalize new information, and this is obviously lacking in a lot of the players. Which is why they seem to make the same mistake over and over again.
What I was trying to say was, as a casual cricket fan(football being my real passion), Pakistan has always produced more WC bowlers than batsmen. Of course in a nation with so much natural talent, there have been some real class batsmen. I guess the point was, say compared to India(almost always depending on this in the earlier parts of this decade - Sehwag, Ganguly, Dravid, Tendulkar, Laxman), Pakistan has had the bowlers be their strength.
There was another thing, education. I think a lot of the pakistani and Bangladeshi(especially us) players don't have a decent level of schooling. I don't expect cricketers to be Eton alumni, but school instills discipline, focus, ability to internalize new information, and this is obviously lacking in a lot of the players. Which is why they seem to make the same mistake over and over again.
Is it on? Azhar Ali and Umar Akmal down!
Dear Lord they are rubbish
I'm amazed that the umpires have still seemingly not cottoned on to the fact that catches like the one we've just seen by Hussey always look like the ball has hit the ground when shown again on the camera. It's known as parallax error, I believe. The on-field umpires should have made the decision.
India 
Sri Lanka 642-4 declared! . . . . . Impressive. 
That's what happens when you're batting on a flat wicket and against an amazingly crap bowling lineup.Sri Lanka 642-4 declared! . . . . . Impressive.
It's alright, the SL bowlers won't do much better, India will get 400 in reply.
More than that I reckon, our batting is probably the strongest in world right now, just a shame that our bowling is on par with Bangladesh.
I dont think your batting is as strong as it was a couple of years ago when
Sehwag
Tendulkar
Dravid
Ganguly
Laxman
were all in great form....
All these batsmen are now wrong side of 30...and have not all performed together in a while.
Sehwag
Tendulkar
Dravid
Ganguly
Laxman
were all in great form....
All these batsmen are now wrong side of 30...and have not all performed together in a while.
Bresnan called up for Shahzad who is still having trouble with his ankle.
Pretty clear what the team is going to be now
Strauss
Cook
Trott
KP
Colly
Morgan
Prior
Broad
Swann
Anderson
Finn
Pretty clear what the team is going to be now
Strauss
Cook
Trott
KP
Colly
Morgan
Prior
Broad
Swann
Anderson
Finn
Fear him.
Think Sehwag and Tendulkar's form has gone up in the last two years while Dravid's form has definitely deteriorated. Laxman's form has remained pretty much the same, you've missed Dhoni from our list who is extremely consistent.
355/4 India's score at the end of the day, what a boring this match has been so far.
Eagerly waiting for Pak-England tommorow, think it's gonna be a cracking series with Pakistan most likely winning it
Tim Bresnan shouldnt be anywhere near an England squad period, never an international class bowler in a million years and i cringe everytime i hear his name even associated with the England side, he just reeks average and i pray he dosnt make the ashes tour, hed be utter cannon fodder on those ozzie pitches, useless lump.
Anyway looking forward to tomorrow, should be a good series i think Englands extra batting strength will prove enough to see off Pakistan whos batting is still very raw, i think thats where England will target and a good bowling attack of Anderson/Finn/Broad/Swann should do plenty of damage especially in helpful conditions.
Agree with the above 11 to, looks a good strong side.
Really? i think that’s wildly optimistic, England are in probably as strong a shape as they’ve been in for years (since 05 for sure) and they dont lose home series very often, Pakistan just barely scraped a drawn series against a way below par Australia an average looking australia who England have had under the thumb in every form of the game for over a year now, wasim Akram had it right when he said facing England will be a step up from the Australian side they’ve just barely squeaked a draw against.
I also think if you were to put Pakistans side up against Englands there would be a clear and visible difference in class between the two sides, id say Pakistans bowling edges that department (although in English conditions England has a very strong bowling attack) but Englands batting is in a different galaxy quite frankly, i dont think a single Pakistani batsmen would even make the England side.
Id back this England side on home soil against any other side in the world right now and I think England will win this series quite comfortably if im honest, don’t see Pakistans batting making enough runs to challenge England, im going for a 3-1 series win.
Sehwag and Tendulkar are absolute beasts right now. Can't stop scoring.
Dravid's been screwed around too much by the selectors sadly.
Such a shame Sehwag got out at 99
I might start watching Cricket again. Although, all the matches played in Sri Lanka by any team are dull as feck.booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooring.
India 588-5 n reply to 642-4Declared.
So that 1200+ for the loss of only 9 wickets, and day 4 is not over yet.
Sangakarra and Tendulkar with double centuries.
India 588-5 n reply to 642-4Declared.
So that 1200+ for the loss of only 9 wickets, and day 4 is not over yet.
Sangakarra and Tendulkar with double centuries.
This match is unbelievably boring. Was great to see Sachin get his double ton and Dhoni his 50.
We should bat it out for the entire day tomorrow as well just to let Sachin and Dhoni make as much as possible
We should bat it out for the entire day tomorrow as well just to let Sachin and Dhoni make as much as possible
What's the point of even playing this test match and than they wonder why the interest of Test cricket is going down in Sub-Continent. I'm much more excited to see the England-Pakistan match.
Yeah it's been ridiculously boring.
The only thing that might make this test match interesting is if India score 250 runs in the next 40 overs and put lanka to bat for the last day. Although I doubt our bowling is competent enough to dismiss a team completely in one day on any pitch in the world let alone this flat track.
I don't know why they play test matches in Sri Lanka. They're the worst team in the world, with the most retarded pitches.
yeah ok,
WI
Pakistan
New Zealand
Bangladesh(specially us, I would love for us to be as shit as SL, most of us dream of that day)
would like to disagree.
*Fair enough about the pitches, but remember they did win the previous test.
I didn't mean the worst team in the world in rankings, but to watch play. All they do is pile on runs, and then let a spinner or two bowl the entire day.
well they are a small nation, with not a lot of international standard players.
They had Vaas and Murali as a combo for a very long time. They now have Malinga(injured in this match, and they miss him badly) for the next couple of years, and are looking for a spinner to come through.
Speaking of boring...
2 wickets in no time
Too late.
Akmal back to his usual wicket keeping crapiness, dropping a sitter right now.
Big wicket before lunch for Pakistan. Aamer looks great again, but the other seamers need to up their game a bit. Trott looks to be in good touch, but the amount of time he takes to get ready with his fecking rituals is annoying.