Let's face it. When the tabloids in Australia announce on the backpages that Andrew Flintof is the best batsman in the world you know the home side is in the deepest pits. For the first time in 17 years, the Australian side has had to follow on. And while the resistance is happening, the truth is, England have yelled "check!" on getting the Ashes back.
Okay, last year, I had to weather the Red Sox bust their 86-year hoodoo (and it was my fave hoodoo in all of sport too), but now I'm getting to see the Australian side as spent and depleted.
Not suprisingly, the Ausralians are losing their cool . Mark Butcher, the 'celebrated' hacker during England's long dormancy had this to say:
Body language can be more expressive than a Van Morrison lyric. It has certainly told us something about the state of Australia during this Test, no more so perhaps than at the start of play on Friday morning.Butcher is right. These hungry Englishmen are out for blood, and boy are our boys ill-equipped to deal with this adversity. After all, the last Australian dynasty was built from the burning husks left from the glorious 1970s team that burnt down to the ground by the middle of the 1980s. The dynasty was built on hungry young guys who were sick of losing. In stark contrast, looking at the current Australian roster, there's no longer anybody who was there to take the stick from England in the '80s. Ponting is going to have take on the role that Alan Border once took upon himself; to guide the next generation of Australian Cricketers back to the light.
England were four wickets down with not much more than 200 on the board. A couple of early breakthroughs then and if Australia were not exactly through, they would have made fairly serious inroads. But they did not attack to get those wickets, they placed sweepers on the off and leg sides from the start.
It was as if they feared what England could do to them, rather than thinking what Australia could do to England. Believe me, I know that feeling well from having played Australia over the years. It colours your decision-making, you can become fearful. It can be fraught with irksome possibilities. So that, for example, you take out third slip because you feel you ought to defend and the next minute the ball goes in the air where third slip would have been. Then it is too late, the chance has gone.
Over the course of a series, a side play the game in their captain's image. Now, in the case of Australia it is said of Ricky Ponting that he has had to set the in-out fields he has because he can hardly trust his bowlers. But that is part and parcel of the quality of England's play and the pressure they have exerted.
Before the Trent Bridge Test started, England had had the best of the previous eight or nine days of Test cricket. The gap between the Third and Fourth Tests allowed England to get over the tourists' great escape at Old Trafford and to clear their minds and ensure that they were able to dwell on their superiority over so long.
One other thing we have disproved over the past few weeks, whether the Ashes come home or not, is the perception that to have any hope of beating Australia we had to prepare seaming, sporting pitches. In its way it was a good kind of theory, but I was always suspicious of it. If the opposition had Glenn McGrath in their side then wasn't he likely to take rather significant advantage of a pitch working in his favour?
All in all, it's not such a bad thing. As I've been pointing out, the side has been due for a sea-change for some time. This is going to make Test Cricket a lot more interesting too.
The Other Dynasty Fights on
The Yankees are still in their bun-fight for the post-season. Since taking the series against the Chisox last week, they've won 3 of 4 from Toronto and 2 of 3 from Kansas City. Okay, beating the Kansas City Royals might not look like much, but here are the facts: The Royals have put together a 5 game winning streak since coming out of their worst losing streak in history and they put some of those wins against Bosox. They were a suddenly hot team. And while Randy Johnson turned up as himself to guide the yanks to one of the wins 3-1, the Yankees had to pull out a 5-run ninth to beat the Royals 8-7. The Royals were so hot they scored 7 runs off Jaret Wright and Aaron Small in 7.2 innings.
"I've seen these guys do this so many times, be down four runs and then work their magic," said Lawton, who was traded to the Yankees from the Chicago Cubs on Friday and contributed a single and a run during the rally. "I've got something to talk about now. I've got a lot to tell my friends."The good news is that Boston dropped one today against Detroit. As it turns out, the schedule down the stretch favors the Yankees according to the Replacement Level Yankee Weblog:
Manager Joe Torre, seated in his clubhouse office afterward, called the game "as good as any we've played all year, as far as winning this type of ballgame."
The victory - the Yankees' seventh in nine games - kept them pointed toward the postseason. They entered the game trailing the Boston Red Sox by two and a half games in the American League East, and tied with the Cleveland Indians and the Oakland Athletics for the wild-card spot. Rodriguez, who drove in his 103rd run of the season, said that coming back from a 7-3 deficit in the bottom of the ninth seemed unrealistic, regardless of the opponent.
But the Royals, who had erased a 3-0 deficit against Yankees starter Jaret Wright, all but chaperoned the Yankees around the bases.
Prior to the game it was announced that the Yankees had acquired Matt Lawton from the Cubs for minor league pitcher Justin Berg. Berg's a low A pitcher who hasn't demonstrated much, and is not considered much of a prospect, so this was probably just a salary dump. Lawton's not a bad pickup. He's not a very good defensive player, but in his career he has demonstrated an ability to get on base at a decent clip (.366 this season), and gives the Yankees some depth in the OF. The Yankees don't consider him a CF, but they feel that he can play LF with Matsui shifting to CF. If the Yankees can do that, they can run the following lineup out there:Yeah. Right On. This is actually interesting as the Yankees now sit 1.5 games back. :)
Jeter, SS
Matsui, CF
Sheffield, RF
Rodriguez, 3B
Giambi, 1B
Williams, DH
Posada, C
Lawton, LF
Cano, 2B
I don't know about you, but to me that's the best lineup they will have had all year.
Larry ran some numbers to estimate the strength of schedules for the AL playoff contenders through year end as of yesterday, which I'm going to post here.
Using actual records
Strength of Schedule the rest of the season:
Red Sox: .503
Athletics: .500
Twins: .498
Angels: .493
Indians: .487
White Sox: .484
Yankees: .467
Adjusted for .540 Home Field Advantage:
Athletics: .505
Twins: .500
Angels: .496
Red Sox: .489
White Sox: .488
Indians: .485
Yankees: .471
Projected Records using log5:
Boston: 94-67
Yankees: 91-71
White Sox: 100-61
Indians: 90-72
Twins: 86-77
Angels: 93-69
Athletics: 90-72
Using “adjusted” records (Adjusted records come from Baseball Prospectus's adjusted standings.
Strength of Schedule the rest of the season:
Red Sox: .522
Athletics: .521
Angels: .516
Twins: .508
White Sox: .505
Yankees: .491
Indians: .488
Adjusted for .540 Home Field Advantage:
Athletics: .525
Angels: .519
Twins: .510
White Sox: .510
Red Sox: .507
Yankees: .494
Indians: .485
Projected Records using log5:
Boston: 93-68
Yankees: 91-71
White Sox: 96-65
Indians: 91-71
Twins: 85-78
Angels: 92-70
Athletics: 90-72
Basically, all this tells me is that it's too close to call, and that Cleveland, the Yankees, and Oakland will be in a dogfight for the Wild Card. It also tells me that the division is still very much in play, particularly with 6 games remaining between Boston and the Yankees. Regardless, this should be the most exciting September that we have had as Yankee fans in quite some time, so sit back and enjoy it.
No comments:
Post a Comment