Late August, already! Another Test series starts tomorrow, England versus Sri Lanka, three matches squeezed into a period of twenty days. This after the West Indies series was all over inside an eighteen day period. I wish we could return to the days when a test match summer was exactly that and touring teams would get proper practice matches and plenty of them. Come to think of it the only time I got to see the great West Indian team play in whites was a tour match at Chelmsford…
Sri Lanka should be stronger
opposition than West Indies but England should be expected to make this a 6-0
summer but now Stokes is out injured (bastard hundred) this series suddenly
seems a lot closer. Even with Joe Root
in the team the captain is our best player and irreplaceable, his loss will be
huge. That said I like that the
selectors have moved the middle order up one and picked an extra bowler, it
feels like the right thing to do. Chris
Woakes would have played many more test matches in almost any other era and
Jamie Smith has been impressive.
If I’m not mistaken
Sri Lanka haven’t won a test match against England since 2014 although that win
was enough to take the series, a rare home defeat for England. One day many of these England players will
have to cope without Stokes in the team, now is a good chance to get a bit of
practice and I still expect a comfortable home win.
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