England have won the toss and will bat

100th Test at the Oval.
3 Deb's in our lineup.

Here's hoping for an improvement from the Notts effort.

A better lineup, not sure what Dawson brought to the party but Adil Rashid bowled well for Yorks last night.

A bit hit and miss at top of order,hope I am wrong.
Stronger down the order with Moeen at number 8 down from 7

Saw something on SSN yesterday about the 100th test - was showing clips of Len Hutton getting his 364 there in years gone by

Hameed really needs to find his form soon and end this sorry saga of Jennings

Agree but until Hameed gets runs for Lancashire I think Hales may be the best choice.

DAVETHEVICAR wrote:Agree but until Hameed gets runs for Lancashire I think Hales may be the best choice.

They seem to have stuck Hales in the white ball only players category but Hales would be a big step up from Jennings

I'm amazed Jennings is still there to be honest

113 for 3, Westley and Root both got starts but back int' utch!

As I feared,Jennings,Malan and to a certain extent Westley not up to the standard of Test Cricket.
I know it is a Malan and Westleys first starts but don't see them as future Test players but hope I am proved wrong

To be fair to Malan though it was a pretty unplayable delivery that got him out, not even Geoff Boycotts 'tekneek' would have kept that one out!

To be fair to Malan though it was a pretty unplayable delivery that got him out

Yes it was a fantastic delivery but Malan had problems with similar balls leading up to his dismissal and Philander was building up to that ball after quickly working out a weakness in Malan's game! That's the difference between county and test cricket.

I despair a little to be honest at the lack of top quality batsmen in the county game and it's a great shame as we have the basis of a great side with a few Xfactor players but we need a few solid batsmen to come to the fore and I do not see where they are going to come from. I'm just hoping Haseeb Hameed is not another false dawn because we could really do with him hitting some form and giving him a run.

It's not as if they haven't given players a fair crack of the whip either. They have been more than fair. It's a shame Vince couldn't cut it either as he seemed a classy player

BigChaCha wrote:Yes it was a fantastic delivery but Malan had problems with similar balls leading up to his dismissal and Philander was building up to that ball after quickly working out a weakness in Malan's game! That's the difference between county and test cricket.

I despair a little to be honest at the lack of top quality batsmen in the county game and it's a great shame as we have the basis of a great side with a few Xfactor players but we need a few solid batsmen to come to the fore and I do not see where they are going to come from. I'm just hoping Haseeb Hameed is not another false dawn because we could really do with him hitting some form and giving him a run.

It's not as if they haven't given players a fair crack of the whip either. They have been more than fair. It's a shame Vince couldn't cut it either as he seemed a classy player

Frustrating.com

Just returned after being down The Oval. It was pretty tough conditions to bat but SA generally bowled very decent.
Jennings looked uneasy right from the off, nil confidence, I think he needs to be "rested" to get some runs in county cricket (but is there an obvious replacement?)
Westley seemed to have plenty of confidence, went for a few shots off bad balls. He was maybe too confident, played a bit loose when he was out but he seems a better England prospect that Ballance given that was his first effort. See how he goes in 2nd innings.
Malan- difficult to judge, he got a pretty good one early on.
Cook had a bit of luck but he's got so much application/grit-he deserves it. Hopefully we can get 300+ and get into SA in the 2nd half of the day when the cloud & humidity build up again (using the BBC weather forecast).

I found england's selection odd for this game. England's priority for the winter is clearly finding someone to open with Cook this winter. I can just about understand why they kept faith with Jennings, but given his uncertainty with two vacancies in the batting line up, in my tiny mind it would seem to make sense to bring another potential opener into the side and let him bat at either 3 or 5. As it is, either Hales (who looks to me well suited to a middle order role in test cricket) or yet another debutant in stoneman will open at Old Trafford.

Worth remembering how difficult it is to become a test opener in england - think the last one to successfully break into the england team whilst opening in a home series was Strauss, and before that it is sparse. Cook debuted in india and then batted 3, vaughan started at 4, Atherton had a number of early tests at 3, etc.

Westley looked ok to me - a bit of a reincarnation of John Crawley actually, with his front pad thrust out towards mid off whilst he stood tall and worked towards wide mid on. Presumably he'll struggle with well pitched full away swingers as all but the best players of that ilk do, but plenty have got runs that way. Malan got a beauty but he'll need to open his stance up if he's to be a success.

The problem is that they play so little 4 days cricket at this time of year. Jennings has not played much for Durham.
England have very much the look of a one-day side.

CleggHall wrote:The problem is that they play so little 4 days cricket at this time of year. Jennings has not played much for Durham.
England have very much the look of a one-day side.

Not sure that's right to be honest. Jennings has played plenty of 4 day cricket for durham this season - but he's been a bit out of nick and may not make it anyway.

And in fairness to england, of the 5 batsman to have occupied the top 4 batting positions this series, only one is a one day player of reputation - and that's the captain who is also the best player.

Scoreboard isn't looking too bad just now.
S Africa 51/5

Excellent debut for Roland-Jones a nice 25 to push up to a very good total and then an amazing bowling spell where he could of got 5 wkts.

Great captaincy from Root as well. Not many would take Jimmy off after only 3 overs in them conditions to give the new guy a do.

62/7 now.

Two sides which clearly can't resist "runs on the scoreboard pressure", Stokes did the job today before handing over to Rowland-Jones. One sided matches but who wins the series?

Great day to be an England fan down there today.
Before play started, if you couldve laid out the best you hoped for, it probably wouldn't have been as good as what actually transpired.
This morning session was the best batting conditions of the game so far & England made the best of it. Stokes was able to take advantage of the solidity of Cook (and himself) yesterday and press on with good support from Bairstow & R-J.
Good bowling from England and the weather was kind with the humid/cloudy conditions falling just short of game-stopping rainfall.
Memorable start to the 100th Oval test match.

Durham done Lancs a favour against Leicester tonight in a 7 over game.

CleggHall wrote:Two sides which clearly can't resist "runs on the scoreboard pressure", Stokes did the job today before handing over to Rowland-Jones. One sided matches but who wins the series?

Two very evenly matched sides, in a strange sort of way; both capable of some very good cricket but also very poor. So far in the series, they've not played well or poorly at the same time. Could have had some very close games had they matches each other.

430 plus lead.
Still 4 wickets left.

What's the weather forecast?

What are we doing still batting! Probably still win, but this is just making it harder to get the result??

It seemed like they batted longer than needed, especially after Bairstow turned his ankle. Having your wicketkeeper hobbling about, when you need him to be at his best shortly to take catches, seems a bit risky (just for the sake of moving the lead upwards from an already massive 450).
I thought Cook was considered the cautious one!

Hopefully we win the match with a bit to spare anyway.

No really great side around at present, no really great fast bowlers.
One day cricket has infected test cricket making it more entertaining but taking away the real skills.
Time to return to uncovered pitches, and smaller bats and really see who can play.

"Time to return to uncovered pitches, and smaller bats and really see who can play."

Yep, take away the helmets, various paddings (and boxes) as well eh? That'll sort the men from the boys.
Bring back big beards as well and sailing to foreign parts on liners (2nd class for players, 1st class for gentlemen).

Broad strikes early
SA 25/1

Dropped the other opener 3 balls prior. A routine catch too IMO

78-4
Stokes 2 and Roland-Jones the other
Du Plessis again out lbw without playing a shot

It's got to be the worst looking dismissal in cricket. Terrible way to be out .

South Africa at the end of an era.

Test cricket is at a bit of a low ebb

South Africa Second Innings Runs
Extras (3nb 0w 5lb 0b) Total 117 for 4 (38.0 overs)
Kuhn b Broad 11
Elgar not out 72
Amla c Root b Roland-Jones 5
de Kock † b Stokes 5
du Plessis * lbw Stokes 0
Bavuma not out 16
Philander
Morris
Maharaj
Rabada
Morkel
Fall of wickets: 1-21 (Kuhn, 5.2 overs), 2-47 (Amla, 15.5 overs), 3-52 (de Kock, 16.5 overs), 4-52 (du Plessis, 16.6 overs)
Bowling O R W
Anderson 8 20 0
Broad 10 27 1
Roland-Jones 7 20 1
Stokes 8 29 2
Ali 5 16 0

All over England win by 239 runs

Moeen Ali finishes with a hatrick.

Great response by England. Not sure Cricket matches should be affected so much by winning the toss. But hey a wins a win.

2-1 England. Next up Old Trafford and probably plenty of lost play to rain.

Incredible finish, hat trick for Moeen.

England win by 239.

South Africa are incredibly weak at present but then they do lose a lot of players to us.

Three one-sided tests so far, unusual but England have more depth, OT to decide the series.