TOPIC:

So what is going to happen in the ashes series? This one will hopefully be a bit more competitive than the last few , which have been pretty one sided.
Australia’s chances of winning will depend on the following factors
• Ryan Harris’s fitness ( he is the only bowler capable of skittling the poms IMO)
• Michael Clarkes back and his ability to score a lot of runs
• Whether Watson can bowl and therefore provide a 5th bowling option
• Mitchell Johnsons ability to bowl straight and ignore the barmy army
• Batsmans ability to put together solid partnerships and avoid the horrible collapses they have suffered over the past 3 – 4 years, sometimes losing 5 or 6 wickets in a session
England will certainly be strong favourites despite their rain interrupted preparation. In Cook, Trott, Pieterson, Bell, Broad, Swann and Anderson, they have a proven group of world class players and if they all fire then Australia will be no match for them. They haven’t got a huge amount of depth in their squad and they may have some weaknesses in their back up bowling and batsman which Australia could take advantage of if there are any injuries to the main men
It is very important that Australia get off to a strong start in Brisbane and if they can get England on the back foot early, you never know what might happen. The mental aspect of playing England may be as much of a barrier as nearly all of the Aussie players have never played in a winning series against England ( Clarke the only exception I think)
It will be good to see some test cricket before the BBL circus overwhelms the season in December

If we had a full squad of fit fast bowlers at our disposal I would be tipping us for an upset Mike but now we are down to barely our last 4 decent quicks I think the Poms might beat us 3-1 unfortunately!

3-1 is spot on. In fact we'd be lucky to win 1 test I reckon. Poms $2.05 now. You'd may aswell have a money printing machine in your lounge room

2/70 odd at lunch......Watson once again using his experience to guide Australia 'safely' to lunch.......lovely shot their Watto considering the circumstances....always next innings mate.....yeah it's a process....hopefully a lesson Watto will learn in due course

Time to show Watson the door, the guy just doesn't produce regularly enough

Sacko wrote: 3-1 is spot on. In fact we'd be lucky to win 1 test I reckon. Poms $2.05 now. You'd may aswell have a money printing machine in your lounge room

Our chances look even more ordinary now at 3/73

Broad has bowled well but fair dinkum have you seen 4 more ordinary shots from allegedly test level batsman? Hopefully Bailey and Smith can put together a partnership but not holding my breath. You can see the Poms have got them mentally shot

Have a look at the standard of first class / club cricket these days and you don't need to think too hard why we are quite ordinary in test cricket.

What a friggin joke another collapse..we've lost 4/29 since lunch

Just turned the radio on...5/100!! Lucky we've got a "High Performance Manager"