Cricket fred

[Puja]

Putative England squad for the Ashes named, with a fast bowling attack being selected from Mark Wood, Jofra Archer, Gus Atkinson, Byrdon Carse, Josh Tongue, and hopefully Ben Stokes. Chris Woakes is being given the Jimmy Anderson treatment and taken round the back of the barn with a shotgun - he's been a good servant, but realistically, I'd rather have kept Jimmy longer and given him the boot a while ago, so I'm glad he's not being taken to Australia yet again in the hope that he'll suddenly turn into a player capable of playing outside of English conditions.

Pope axed as vice-captain - surely feeling Bethell's breath on the back of his neck. Hell of a lot of pressure for us to be heaping on a 21 year old by promoting him this much though.

Puja

[Galfon]

..Chris Woakes is being given the Jimmy Anderson treatment and taken round the back of the barn with a shotgun - he's been a good servant, but realistically, I'd rather have kept Jimmy longer and given him the boot a while ago, so I'm glad he's not being taken to Australia yet again in the hope that he'll suddenly turn into a player capable of playing outside of English conditions.

Pope axed as vice-captain - surely feeling Bethell's breath on the back of his neck. Hell of a lot of pressure for us to be heaping on a 21 year old by promoting him this much though.

Puja

Woakes is 36, effectively lame post-surgery and has struggled in those conditions previously - i'm sure he would have been astonished to be kept on board.
HB and latterly JB must have convinced them they have qualities needed for the extra responsibilities - taking a chance with the latter tbf.
That mixed bag of quicks look useful but a few are injury prone which could scupper things.
We're handicapped still by not having an elite spinner (yet..), just hope the batsmen can rise to the considerable challenge !

[fivepointer]

Thought Rehan Ahmed might get the nod.

Not surprised Woakes has been left out. Plenty of firepower with our quicks. Can they stay fit, though?

[Puja]

..Chris Woakes is being given the Jimmy Anderson treatment and taken round the back of the barn with a shotgun - he's been a good servant, but realistically, I'd rather have kept Jimmy longer and given him the boot a while ago, so I'm glad he's not being taken to Australia yet again in the hope that he'll suddenly turn into a player capable of playing outside of English conditions.

Pope axed as vice-captain - surely feeling Bethell's breath on the back of his neck. Hell of a lot of pressure for us to be heaping on a 21 year old by promoting him this much though.

Puja

Woakes is 36, effectively lame post-surgery and has struggled in those conditions previously - i'm sure he would have been astonished to be kept on board.
HB and latterly JB must have convinced them they have qualities needed for the extra responsibilities - taking a chance with the latter tbf.
That mixed bag of quicks look useful but a few are injury prone which could scupper things.
We're handicapped still by not having an elite spinner (yet..), just hope the batsmen can rise to the considerable challenge !

Agreed on the spinner, although with the pitches the Aussies tend to prepare, it's entirely possible to get away without a top-level spinner if your quicks are good enough. You're not wrong about the injury-proneness of our bowling attack though - could very realistically see a situation where Wood, Archer, and Stokes are all injured and we're left with Atkinson, Carse and Tongue.

Puja

[Puja]

Australian newspapers having an exeptionally normal one. I think they're actually a touch worried - they're never normally this weird if they're actually confident.

Puja