When Cook got out Strauss' voice when mental

took him long enough to realise

Far less posts overnight than I expected. It's almost as if the poms have less to say when they're getting lolsmashed.

First innings aside I thought that was a real lame bowling effort by England in the second innings. I expected them to come out firing but they looked totally flat. Most of them bowling in the 120's and thats not including Swann. Might be a different story this morning but its a bit late now. 2/50 at stumps and they might have held some hope of chasing 350.

lol all the <500 post accounts who never once posted in the earlier Ashes thread

Lol

Yep the poms have gone into hiding.

It's a long series boys, don't get too excited. This match isn't even over yet.

Precisely why us Aussies are enjoying being on top while we can. We know it'll all come tumbling down sooner or later.

Well, let's just describe day 2 as less than ideal.....

Bed at 1am and all was good, Cooky and Carbs going along nicely.

So, wake again before 6am and spend the whole day trying to teach 10 year old kids how to argue properly. Finally get a chance to check cricinfo and wished I hadn't even bothered getting out of bed.

Glutton for punishment though, still watched the highlights

You do realise that it happens at night over here......

It's closer to a road than a 431 for 20 pitch. Most batsman were culpable — only Johnson got bowled, rest were caught off balls they didn't need to hit.

OK, a couple of them were worked well by bowlers, and tail-enders don't count as much, but probably 12/16 of the two sides' combined top eights were to blame for their demise, either through carelessness, technical error or probably panic from being in the midst of a collapse.

Aussies should have got plenty more than they did, and given that they didn't break 300, England should have managed to establish a decent first innings lead.



Obv this Test is now pretty much gone for us, but the second innings of the match is still important to set the tone for the rest of the series. I didn't expect this winter to be a walkover like the last two series, but I still don't see the Aussies getting the urn back this Christmas.

Right. Time to knuckle down England! Bowl very dry and try to slow the Aussies as much as possible. Then bat like heroes in the fourth innings and save the game, crushing their spirit.

I'm not saying this is going to happen though...

With so much time left in the game, we probably have more chance of winning than drawing.

Australia will either declare with too many to chase and too long to bat for the draw, or we'll skittle them ourselves sometime between lunch and tea today and leave ourselves a target which is just about makeable if we bat very well in the last innings.

KP auotgraph punk is epic.

I reckon it's going to be a battle of the awful batting this series, who can get skittled for more

Would really like to see Cooky set some attacking fields today.

No point at all in just sitting back and defending the boundaries, because then the aussies will just knock the singles about and slowly accumulate an insuperable total

lol

Comeback on.

Fk here we go

It's that man again


That's the way to start the day

England won't be thinking about saving this game, they'll be thinking about winning it. They'll be aiming to bowl Australia out in a day and chase 450 odd in 6 sessions. Tough but achievable

Where's Carberry?

BOO THIS MAN, BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO


seriously, please boo him at every Test match

icwudt.jpg

We need to boo him at home as well if it will make him bowl like this.

STUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU