Test Cricket Prediction and Discussion Thread [self - mod]

[ene1980]

India started really well and Agarwal is continuing his form and we might see another century from him, he is a good find for India and i do not understand why they including another fast bowler in Indian pitches when majority of the time they used to make pitches that help the spinners. Not sure we will see another repeat of the first test, if it is a batting pitch then it might end up in a draw.

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[JSRAW]

Pranjal says: I think the idea behind including Umesh is giving him game time rather than the pitch. When players are in the squad but don't get matches it deprives them of match experience and that does not do good to the bench strength.

Its a good point but Indian management doing the same "Keeping bench strength in dugout" for so long in the Test Matches. Bhuvi's name comes into my mind.

South Africa using good amount of short balls against the Indians but both the batsmen handled them well.

And Rabada strikes again! End of Pujara's inning, big wicket for Proteas he was looking set.

[Avirunes]

Indian Media is knowledgeable when it comes to game of cricket but they sucks, always looking for sensational comments. that's what media does all over the world

They just want some spicy headline for readers and watchers to keep their eyes on. There should be borders otherwise they will ruin someone's life one day.

Have anyone heard about the SUN and Ben Stokes incident. It really made me sad and really feel sorry for Ben Stokes when I read it today only. Here is what he tweeted:



(Source: https://twitter.com/benstokes38/status/1173893834377441280)


Decent start from India today. Pujara and Aggarwal both held it very well. Hope Kohli plays some good innings today and get on for partnership with Aggarwal for a good score. BTW we still have Rahane and Saha lined-up next so it won't be easy for S.A to wrap it quickly.

[JSRAW]

~snip~
Have anyone heard about the SUN and Ben Stokes incident.

I skipped it... so not sure who is guilty here but Royse and others were talking about this incident somewhere (In cricketing thread).

Decent start from India today. Pujara and Aggarwal both held it very well. Hope Kohli plays some good innings today and get on for partnership with Aggarwal for a good score. BTW we still have Rahane and Saha lined-up next so it won't be easy for S.A to wrap it quickly.

Yeah, we can say that now    and relieved that playing with one less batsman didn't backfire lol

Unfortunately Pujara got out. on the another hand Mayank is eyeing on 200 runs mark, hopefully he gets there. Damn as i was typing he got out.

[Sithara007]

Yeah, we can say that now    and relieved that playing with one less batsman didn't backfire lol

I would say that it was an intelligent decision to go with 4 full-time bowlers and one all rounder (Jadeja). India can get to 500 plus even with 6 batsmen and they don't need the 7th slot given to players such as Vihari. But as we saw during the first innings of the last test, Indian bowling struggled against experienced South African batsmen. Still, I would have liked Kuldeep in place of the other Yadav.

Umesh is a good bowler, but since this match is being played in India, on average around 70% of the overs will be bowled by the spinners (Ashwin / Jadeja). Therefore we have three bowlers to do 30% of the overs (Ishant, Umesh and Shami), and two bowlers (Ashwin and Jadeja) for the remaining 70% of the overs. I am assuming that it is another spin-friendly track.

[teosanru]

Yeah, we can say that now    and relieved that playing with one less batsman didn't backfire lol

I would say that it was an intelligent decision to go with 4 full-time bowlers and one all rounder (Jadeja). India can get to 500 plus even with 6 batsmen and they don't need the 7th slot given to players such as Vihari. But as we saw during the first innings of the last test, Indian bowling struggled against experienced South African batsmen. Still, I would have liked Kuldeep in place of the other Yadav.

Umesh is a good bowler, but since this match is being played in India, on average around 70% of the overs will be bowled by the spinners (Ashwin / Jadeja). Therefore we have three bowlers to do 30% of the overs (Ishant, Umesh and Shami), and two bowlers (Ashwin and Jadeja) for the remaining 70% of the overs. I am assuming that it is another spin-friendly track.

Pune's pitch is kind of a flat pitch without much on it for bowler I think which is why India decided to go with 5 bowlers so there could be more bowlers searching for something out of the pitch as all of them have separate strengths. I consider Jadeja a full time batsmen so it's not 6 batsmen I think it's certainly 7 batsmen out of which one is all rounder and not to forget Ashwin can be a great night watchman at times. So India has a lot of batting strength and surely an extra bowler would improve their bowling stats.

Pranjal says: I think the idea behind including Umesh is giving him game time rather than the pitch. When players are in the squad but don't get matches it deprives them of match experience and that does not do good to the bench strength.

Its a good point but Indian management doing the same "Keeping bench strength in dugout" for so long in the Test Matches. Bhuvi's name comes into my mind.

South Africa using good amount of short balls against the Indians but both the batsmen handled them well.

And Rabada strikes again! End of Pujara's inning, big wicket for Proteas he was looking set.

I think South African bowlers are hardly finding any swing like the ones they have in South Africa which is why they might have just changed their strategy to short balls. India has a reputation of being weak against the short balls.

[Sithara007]

Pune's pitch is kind of a flat pitch without much on it for bowler I think which is why India decided to go with 5 bowlers so there could be more bowlers searching for something out of the pitch as all of them have separate strengths. I consider Jadeja a full time batsmen so it's not 6 batsmen I think it's certainly 7 batsmen out of which one is all rounder and not to forget Ashwin can be a great night watchman at times. So India has a lot of batting strength and surely an extra bowler would improve their bowling stats.

I was watching the match on TV, and one of my friends who was sitting besides me commented that there seems to be a lot of grass on the pitch (which we normally don't expect on flat tracks). I am not that knowledgeable and therefore not sure whether he was right or not. But if that is the case, then India made the right decision by going ahead with 3 pacers.

But in case the pitch is offering support for the pacers, then we can expect both Nortje and Philander to perform well tomorrow. They looked dull today, as Kagiso Rabada was the only South African bowler who managed to trouble the Indian batsmen. And Keshav Maharaj had another poor outing. He is proving to be very expensive and the Indians looked very comfortable against him.

[Haunebu]

Am mighty impressed with the way Agarwal is playing. He is playing fabulously as an opener while Pujara gave him good support. The run machine seems to be set for another century while Rahane is supporting him as expected.

I am very confident that India will defeat South Africa and whitewash the series unless rain intervenes. Most of the South African bowlers are performing badly and this is why India has the upper hand.

[Vishnu.Reang]

South Africa is looking clueless out there and today only one of their players (Rabada) looked like he could compete against the Indians. I am not sure about their recent drop of form, but I still remember the time when South Africa was regarded as one of the heavyweights in cricket. When cricketers such as Shaun Pollock, Lance Klusener, Jacques Kallis.etc were playing, South Africa was almost invincible. And look at the current state of affairs. I feel bad for them.

[JSRAW]

Yeah, we can say that now    and relieved that playing with one less batsman didn't backfire lol

I would say that it was an intelligent decision to go with 4 full-time bowlers and one all rounder (Jadeja).
(~Edited out~)

Sithara007 : You agree or not but Jadeja is Full time bowler    Ashwin has 4 tons and Jadeja got 1 ton under his belt in the Test Format.

Umesh is a good bowler, but since this match is being played in India, on average around 70% of the overs will be bowled by the spinners (Ashwin / Jadeja). Therefore we have three bowlers to do 30% of the overs (Ishant, Umesh and Shami), and two bowlers (Ashwin and Jadeja) for the remaining 70% of the overs. I am assuming that it is another spin-friendly track.

I don't like Umesh Yadav in shorter format but in Test Match he can be very useful when bowling in Indian dusty wickets, he has a capability of taking wickets with his reverse swing and if pitch doing a bit of movement then he can be lethal with his speed, we should not forget that he can cloak 145 kmph all day. my only worry is he always gets carried away with his speed and leaks extra runs and this time i genuinely hope that he prove everyone wrong.

~Edited out~
India has a reputation of being weak against the short balls.

Indians did okay today, let's hope India doesn't lose any early wickets tomorrow. 

[erikalui]

5 overs less today but not much would have happened in those 5 overs. Rabada took Rohit's wicket early so he couldn't even make 50. Looks like they'll be able to easily make 350-400 if Virat is still batting but if his wicket goes, they may settle for less than 400 runs. Still not bad considering SA's last performance. Just checked Saha's track record. He doesn't have a good SR (infact it's quite poor) and he's quite senior with little experience in ODIs and test matches. Why did they choose him to come in at 4th or 8th place is something I can't understand.

[teosanru]

Pune's pitch is kind of a flat pitch without much on it for bowler I think which is why India decided to go with 5 bowlers so there could be more bowlers searching for something out of the pitch as all of them have separate strengths. I consider Jadeja a full time batsmen so it's not 6 batsmen I think it's certainly 7 batsmen out of which one is all rounder and not to forget Ashwin can be a great night watchman at times. So India has a lot of batting strength and surely an extra bowler would improve their bowling stats.

I was watching the match on TV, and one of my friends who was sitting besides me commented that there seems to be a lot of grass on the pitch (which we normally don't expect on flat tracks). I am not that knowledgeable and therefore not sure whether he was right or not. But if that is the case, then India made the right decision by going ahead with 3 pacers.

But in case the pitch is offering support for the pacers, then we can expect both Nortje and Philander to perform well tomorrow. They looked dull today, as Kagiso Rabada was the only South African bowler who managed to trouble the Indian batsmen. And Keshav Maharaj had another poor outing. He is proving to be very expensive and the Indians looked very comfortable against him.

Actually yes it's not that flat of a pitch this time. There is some grass and help for bowlers. But bounce is pretty good something what we call the batsmen bounce. that is why India went with extra pacer and South Africa chose to keep things bouncy for india today.

South Africa is looking clueless out there and today only one of their players (Rabada) looked like he could compete against the Indians. I am not sure about their recent drop of form, but I still remember the time when South Africa was regarded as one of the heavyweights in cricket. When cricketers such as Shaun Pollock, Lance Klusener, Jacques Kallis.etc were playing, South Africa was almost invincible. And look at the current state of affairs. I feel bad for them.

Yes that is pretty correct i never expected spinner to rock on this pitch and that really did happen . However I thought Philander could give some troubles with his pace.

~snip~

~Edited out~
India has a reputation of being weak against the short balls.

Indians did okay today, let's hope India doesn't lose any early wickets tomorrow.  

Yeah I agree but this is the best thing south africa have in their pockets to beat India. Their spinning department isn't working while the extra pace has never hearted India.

[ene1980]

I think South African bowlers are hardly finding any swing like the ones they have in South Africa which is why they might have just changed their strategy to short balls. India has a reputation of being weak against the short balls.

India did have a bad reputation of having a weakness against short pitch bowling in the past but now a days majority of the players are good in the back foot too and in Indian pitches how much the short pitch bowling can cause issues, if it is a green wicket then they could have troubled the batsman, unless they play reckless shots against the short pitch bowling they will not fetch any wickets in this pitch.

[eaLiTy]

but I still remember the time when South Africa was regarded as one of the heavyweights in cricket. When cricketers such as Shaun Pollock, Lance Klusener, Jacques Kallis.etc were playing, South Africa was almost invincible. And look at the current state of affairs. I feel bad for them.

South Africa had some of the greatest talents and all rounders the world have seen and they had some incredible fast bowlers and they were unbeatable at home when Hansie Cronje was their captain and after the corruption and all the controversy i saw some major changes in the team and now it ended up like this.

India is playing well and if South Africa is able to take some wickets in the morning session and trouble the batsman then there is a game in hand, if not India will win the match easily and playing in the last two days will not the easy and winning the toss is a major factor in this series.

[Sithara007]

South Africa had some of the greatest talents and all rounders the world have seen and they had some incredible fast bowlers and they were unbeatable at home when Hansie Cronje was their captain and after the corruption and all the controversy i saw some major changes in the team and now it ended up like this.

India is playing well and if South Africa is able to take some wickets in the morning session and trouble the batsman then there is a game in hand, if not India will win the match easily and playing in the last two days will not the easy and winning the toss is a major factor in this series.

It was not just Hansie Cronje who built the team them. The major contribution came from Bob Woolmer, who coached the team. Younger individuals may have never heard about him, but he was the master brain behind South Africa back then. He brought innovation in to the South African team. For example, it was Woolmer who made use of TV recordings to finalize their strategy against the opposition bowlers. Sadly, both Cronje and Woolmer died in suspicious circumstances, which some people blame on the betting mafia.

Now coming back to the topic, I don't have any doubt about the results for the second test. We watched the first match, and saw how meekly South Africa surrendered to the Indian bowlers and how clueless were their own bowlers (especially Maharaj). They can try hard, but what can be done when the opposing team is a few levels ahead of them, as far as the skills are concerned?

[ene1980]

They can try hard, but what can be done when the opposing team is a few levels ahead of them, as far as the skills are concerned?

If the South African batsman can stay in the crease for a longer period of time and have the patience to defend and frustrate the Indian bowlers then they can go for a draw but winning the match with a bowling line up who does not pose any major problem to the experienced Indian players is worrying if you are a fan of South Africa. Morning session is important if South Africa need to have a grip on the match and if they are able to pick quick wickets then we will have an interesting day.

[JSRAW]

Well nervous period of first hour with New ball is gone and its seems to me that South Africa's suffering not going to finish anytime soon because they just lost a review and both the batsmen Kohli (91) - Rahane (41) looking set as well, Let's hope India go wicket less in the first session now its safe to say India is set for the Big target, unless middle-lower order collapse.

India : 326/3

Test Stats Of Indian Batsmen

[Ayiranorea]

Well nervous period of first hour with New ball is gone and its seems to me that South Africa's suffering not going to finish anytime soon because they just lost a review and both the batsmen Kohli (91) - Rahane (41) looking set as well, Let's hope India go wicket less in the first session now its safe to say India is set for the Big target, unless middle-lower order collapse.

India : 326/3

In this match the middle order is performing extremely well, when the batsmen gets strong automatically a pressure gets developed over the bowlers. This can be now felt over the bowling from South Africa. This time we can see the score above 500 as the previous match. Anyhow by today India will declare. Other than Rohit everyone has scored a 50+ and Rahane is reaching close to the 50 runs.

[onrise]

Well nervous period of first hour with New ball is gone and its seems to me that South Africa's suffering not going to finish anytime soon because they just lost a review and both the batsmen Kohli (91) - Rahane (41) looking set as well, Let's hope India go wicket less in the first session now its safe to say India is set for the Big target, unless middle-lower order collapse.

India : 326/3

In this match the middle order is performing extremely well, when the batsmen gets strong automatically a pressure gets developed over the bowlers. This can be now felt over the bowling from South Africa. This time we can see the score above 500 as the previous match. Anyhow by today India will declare. Other than Rohit everyone has scored a 50+ and Rahane is reaching close to the 50 runs.

Mayank Agarwal start on both the test match has given a huge relief to India as they can build on partnership in middle order and get the score pass 400 easily . With Kohli making century India stand a good chance to surpass 500+ runs and put pressure on SA right away .

[Haunebu]

Well nervous period of first hour with New ball is gone and its seems to me that South Africa's suffering not going to finish anytime soon because they just lost a review and both the batsmen Kohli (91) - Rahane (41) looking set as well, Let's hope India go wicket less in the first session now its safe to say India is set for the Big target, unless middle-lower order collapse.

India : 326/3

The run machine is on fire at the moment and it won't be long before he crosses Ganguly's record in test matches. I feel like he will score another double century today while Jadeja will support him from the other side.

South Africa will probably lose this one by an innings at this rate unless their batsmen perform well like in the first match. Am expecting India to declare around the 550 point and South Africa will be under immense pressure.