I have not been impressed with England performances this summer, this team has some big problems and we now find ourselves in a situation where the selectors have some very big problems too(though it seems every Tom, Dick and Harry on the street is now chairman of the selectors). The woeful England batting line up managed to cobble together only a handful of runs last weekend and it now seems that Ravi Bopara is first to face the firing squad.
Now before I continue, I should state that I think Ravi is a fine young cricketer, this time last year I watched him help Essex demolish Kentish hopes in the Friends Provident Trophy Final at Lords, however he is not a Test Match number 3 bat, that has been shown these past 5 weeks, which has seen him average only 15 against the Aussies. Our number 3 needs to score more than 30 runs next week at the oval, this weeks country championship matches have given us a chance to look at the likely contenders for his place in the team should he be dropped, though I doubt his 1 run at Lords this week has done much to secure his place for the oval.
Mark Ramprakash, now for those of you who love bangwagons slowly passing your house, you will be saying that playing the 39 year old Surrey batsmen in this "one off" test, is a brilliant idea, you are wrong. "But he will score two centuries, the Oval is his home ground" I hear you cry, I doubt he will, I think it is two years too late for his comeback, and we need to remember that after this match, we travel to South Africa for a series against a team that is probably the best in the world. Are we going to take Ramprakash to South Africa, no, so I see little value in playing him in this test, then letting Ravi back to bat poorly against South Africa, we need someone to stake a claim to that spot, it will help England and Bopara.
Well if we are going to look at this batting change as a long-term thing, then the next candidate is Jonathon Trott. The good news for the England selectors is that Johnathon, like so many of our players, is South African! And with the South Africa tour coming up, there is no better way to fight fire, than with a great big bucket of fire! Trott is an excellent batsmen, he has a very high average this season, and has caught the selectors eyes previously, but is it a sensible idea to give him a test debut in a deciding ashes test match? To be fair, Pietersen was thrown straight in and did a fantastic job, but I really think some test experience is needed for this deciding test, though watch out for Trott, I expect to see him named in the squad for the winter tour.
This leaves us with one other condenter, and as far as I am concerned, the answer to the number 3 issue. Rob Key. In the last six weeks Key has been on blistering form, a 90 this week, a match winning 160 last week, and before that a career best 260 not out. Put simply he is THE in form batsmen in the country. He had a rocky test career between 2002-2005, whilst he was still a young batsmen, but what he gained was experience (not forgetting a double century against the West Indies in 2004) and from these experiences he has become a top batsmen, and must play at 3 in next weeks test.
The England selectors think this country should have 13 elite and centrally contracted cricketers, they are wrong, this country has some very fine cricketers indeed and they should all be given the opportunity to stake a place in the test side.
