The Ashes 2010

[Norbs]

Lol ^

Great start to the afternoon sesh

[Norbs]

Cook's 50 swiftly followed by Trott's 50 swiftly followed by a rendition of Only Fools and Horses by the crowd

[Craig_H]

145-1 now - cracking stuff. And i'm waning badly

[Norbs]

2 runs in half an ho.... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

[Norbs]

Oh FFS. I go for a wee and Cook gets a couple of boundaries

[Norbs]

Off you Trott

[Norbs]

I;m uteryl cunted. Makers Mark i f great with Pepse Max.

Come pon England

[Gray]

That massive picture of a burger is making me hungry

[Buzzo]

The Aussies must be sick of the sight off Cook... He looks wrecked as well, but they could chuck bricks at him and he wouldn't get out.
And if KP gets a ton, well, he looks in great form anyway you have a pretty imposing batting line up all in good form, except maybe Collingwood.

Good stuff, bring on KP's ton and Cooks double ton tomorrow.

[Reece]

Cook

[Leyton388]

We are in command here. I think we will declare if we get to about 600.

[dww]

Cook

To think for years the Aussies have banged on about his inadequacies. He's looking a proper player now.

[Vermilion]

Grreat; Super.

[Hollowman]

To think for years the Aussies have banged on about his inadequacies. He's looking a proper player now.

We've banged on about his inadequacies too, and rightly so sometimes. But what England have begun to do better in recent years is take young players and just play them constantly. Cook will be 26 during the tour, and he's already played 60 tests and carved up almost 5000 runs. That's invaluable at his age. Despite his great average, I've had doubts about his concentration in big matches as he has let himself down badly before, but this looks like it could be the series where he proves his mettle. Broad has played a lot the last couple of years too, and now Finn looks like the next one we can slot in.

Then you look at the Australians.

[dww]

Certainly (Pietersen as captain aside) we have been getting better at selecting for a number of years. Agree that some of the criticism of Cook has been valid but scoring the runs he has, especially as an opener, at his age is impressive and I think he has at times been unfairly singled out.