New Ashes thread

[Nails]

Jacques Kallis is the best cricketer in the world of the past 15 years at least.

How could you not see his value already?

[PowerBug]

oink oink. Oh wait wrong Swannie. :P

[henry]

God I'm so sick of these fake "all rounders" like Faulkner ... We keep selecting them yet they can't actually bat or bowl effectively ... Also faulkners slower balls and shower that may work for him in t20 shower won't cut it in tests ... Makes you see the value of a player like Jacques kallis who has been incredible all his career and is actually a true all rounder who could be selected on the merit of batting or bowling alone

+1 mate, having these false allrounders just weakens our team. I do like Faulkner, and the mongrel he's got like pattinson we need a bit of that in our team, but I don't think he's a good enough bowler yet to make the team based purely on his bowling, and he certainly isn't a top 6 batsmen which is what a true allrounder needs to be.

[me]

Jacques Kallis is the best cricketer in the world of the past 15 years at least.

How could you not see his value already?

Are you kidding? Not sure how you misconstrued what I said , I was merely pointing to the worlds apart distance between a true all rounder like kallis and the countless posers who keep getting baggy greens such as Faulkner/maxwell/smith/henriques

[Nails]

Jacques Kallis is the best cricketer in the world of the past 15 years at least.

How could you not see his value already?

Are you kidding? Not sure how you misconstrued what I said , I was merely pointing to the worlds apart distance between a true all rounder like kallis and the countless posers who keep getting baggy greens such as Faulkner/maxwell/smith/henriques

Makes you see the value of a player like Jacques kallis

"makes you see"

If you couldn't already see Kallis = best player in the world you = cray cray

[me]

Jacques Kallis is the best cricketer in the world of the past 15 years at least.

How could you not see his value already?

Are you kidding? Not sure how you misconstrued what I said , I was merely pointing to the worlds apart distance between a true all rounder like kallis and the countless posers who keep getting baggy greens such as Faulkner/maxwell/smith/henriques

Makes you see the value of a player like Jacques kallis

"makes you see"

If you couldn't already see Kallis = best player in the world you = cray cray

Not really sure what point you're attempting to make ... Its quite obvious i know about kallis seeing as i mentioned him specifically as an example of a true allrounder ... This has nothing to do with his specific achievements in the game as impressive as they are ... I was alluding to his value to the team as a true all rounder vs someone like Faulkner who really provides very little

[Nails]

You implied you only realised Kallis is gun because of how shower the Aussies are

You should have seen before we had shower Aussie ARs in.

[Scrads]

God I'm so sick of these fake "all rounders" like Faulkner ... We keep selecting them yet they can't actually bat or bowl effectively ... Also faulkners slower balls and shower that may work for him in t20 shower won't cut it in tests ... Makes you see the value of a player like Jacques kallis who has been incredible all his career and is actually a true all rounder who could be selected on the merit of batting or bowling alone

A first-class bowling record of 34 matches, 125 wickets @ 22.3 doesn't suggest to you that he could make the Australian side based on his bowling?

[Scrads]

Oh, and 4 wickets in his first ever test innings :)

[Nails]

Faulkner best figures for the match

[Scrads]

Last Shield summer he took 39 wickets in 10 matches @ 20.3 (which was the best figures for Tassie, the Shield-winning state), and averaged 34.1 with the bat.

If we waited around for someone like Jaques Kallis to be our an all-rounder for Australia, we would be waiting a loooooong time.

He is a fiery character, offers a bit of grunt on and off the field. All at the ripe old age of 23, so if you don't mind the selectors giving someone else a go in the 5th test of a series we are down 3-0 in then why not?

[me]

@nails   It's quite clear that's not the point I was making but I guess I can see why you thought that wAy. Even then, it would be a fairly legitimate point anyway as sometimes you only fully appreciate something when you lose it or have something worse. Ie. with our current spinners I'm sure many people appreciate Warnes greatness and contributions to the game even more now than when he was playing ...

@scrads. Of course he goes and gets four cheapies at the end but I'm not sold at all. His FC record is decent but he's not test standard from what ive seen ... Most bowlers have decent figures anyway in recent times given the FC batting is pretty average (with the aid of more bowler friendly pitches as well) ... Watson is streets ahead of him in all rounder stakes just wish his body wasn't so flowered... Look forward to more pain if we stick with bits and pieces players like him

[Nails]

Watson isn't shower on Faulkner

Watson would be lucky to take 5 wickets in the next 5 years

At least Faulkner is a genuine chance with the ball in future.

Watson used to be good with the ball, now he just bowls boring shower over and over without any real venom or wicket taking ability. Watson requires the batters to get themselves out.

[Scrads]

This is going to be a fun arvo to watch potentially :)

[me]

Don't agree at all ... I've seen watto bowl countless good spells and got some bags of wicket in south Africa Sri Lanka and against Pakistan in England that spring to mind ... and at worse provides Clarke with great control ... If anything he's got better as he's slowed up and can move it around as well

Look I hope Faulkner proves me wrong, nothing I would love more, but realistically and from what I've seen , he's not going to be anything more than a bit of this and bit of that at test level .... Time will tell

And yeah this final day going pretty well so far, hopefully take some real confidence and belief to Australia, I feel better about our chances now then 3 months ago that's for sure