There goes the match, not a great shot that.
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Thakur man of the match? Woakes has also had a decent game.
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Kind of typical really, one wicket goes and about 3 follow in quick time.
England with the first innings shouldn’t have lost but I think it shows how bad that first innings by both was.
This England team is going be destroyed in the Ashes, maybe Covid will cancel it.
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England
Just had a look at the county scores, Middlesex are currently 348-0 from 75 overs at Sussex. Talk about a road.
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2-1 India.
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Got to be between Rohit Sharma and Shardul Thakur
Thakur for me.
Thought Hameed did alright - bright future ahead for him I think.
Bumrah with some delicious bowling there this afternoon.
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They’ve given it to Sharma. Good knock but he did it when the pitch was at its best. For me, Thakur with 50s in both innings a) made India’s first innings vaguely respectable, b) took the game beyond England in the 2nd innings. He then also got the key wicket of Pope in England’s first innings when he looked nailed on for a century, as well as the dogged Burns and, of course, Root, in England’s second innings. For me his contribution was the more deserving but Sharma definitely played well.
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Yeah Thakur me made the game changing moves, before his bat in the first England would probably have set a 150-200 lead, then his wicket of Pope and his bat in the second.
All key
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Shardul would have been my choice as well.
India have developed a habit of putting in pitiful first innings totals only to obliterate the opposition in the second. So much so I’m starting to think it’s deliberate.
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No Tom Curran, praise the lord. Looks pretty strong even without Archer and Stokes. Interesting that they’ve gone for a lot of pace/seam options as opposed to spin like India.
I’d have Root in as well. He’s very hard to contain and is an excellent partner at the other end for the bigger hitters.
Parkinson should be in there IMO
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Seems like the door has been closed on Root in T20. Not really sure why as he’s a superior player to Billings and Vince who is the reserve, only thing I can think of is that they want him to get as much rest as possible when he’s not playing tests.
Parkinson is a bit unlucky, surprised that he wasn’t included in the reserves either but that spot always seems to go to Dawson who is a competent batsmen.
- Buttler
- Roy
- Malan
- Bairstow
- Morgan
- Livingstone
- Ali
That’s a strong top 7 even without the likes of Root and Stokes, probably the best in the tournament in fact.
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Morgan is a very good captain, which I think has saved him from being dropped a few times. Also, he has the knack of putting in a match winning performance with the bat just as his position is coming under serious scrutiny.
Otherwise I’d swap out Bairstow and Morgan for Root and Stokes.
Suspect we won’t see Stokes for a while 
Bairstow is a gun in T20, think his IPL experience will serve him well in the UAE. Stokes actually has a pretty modest T20 record, especially for England. It’s by far his weakest format, I’m not sure I would have had him in my side even if he was fit. Archer really will be a big miss though, I don’t think England have another truly world class bowler in this format. Wood can be a bit hit or miss, Mills has obviously been out of the international scene for a while so it remains to be seen how he fares, Jordan is just meh in general and Willey/Woakes/Curran are all far more competent at opening the bowling than they are at the death. Suspect we’ll be a lot happier chasing totals down.
If I were a betting man I’d say this will be Morgan’s last tournament with England and Buttler will be taking over as the captain in both of the shorter formats.
Test match back on.
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