Jones must justify his place
I am at an utter loss to explain Geraint Jones's continued presence in the England team after another abject failure with the bat today at Perth.
Jones was dismissed for a duck off the innocuous bowling of Andrew Symonds, yet again thrashing at a wide delivery.
The Kent wicketkeeper has a reputation for being an affable, honest cricketer. But you do not select a player for the heat of Ashes battle simply because he is a good bloke.
Given Jones's woeful batting form, England's tail effectively begins at number seven - or six, as Andrew Flintoff has made just 0, 16, 38 not out, 2 and 13.
For Jones, it seems to be harder to get out of the team than it was to get in it.
Jones is clearly not a better wicketkeeper than Chris Read, so the selectors have picked him because of his supposedly superior batting.
But Jones has scored just 259 runs in his last 20 innings, including today's effort.
Three of his innings have ended unbeaten, so that gives a mightily unimpressive average of 15.23 since the second innings of the second Test against Pakistan in November last year.
When Read finally got his chance against Pakistan in the summer, after two and a half years in the wilderness, he made scores of 38, 55 and 33.
And he proved himself to be a high-class performer with the gloves.
England have made so many errors in this series that I lack the space - or energy - to catalogue them all here.
But one of the worst has been changing the team that beat Pakistan so comprehensively just a few months ago.
Ashley Giles and James Anderson have rightly made way for Monty Panesar and Sajid Mahmood at Perth.
So how can the selectors explain choosing Jones over Read?
Going into an Ashes series as holders for the first time since 1989 was a wonderful feeling.
Sadly, by the time I write again, the famous urn will be back in Australia's grasp.
www.robwightman.co.uk
posted by Rob Wightman @ 11:41 am
3 comments
3 Comments:
At the close of day three of the Third Test in Perth the fat lady was certainly in the pavilion clearing her throat. However, she has had to sit down for the moment and wait her turn thanks to some resolve at last from Alistair Cook and Ian Bell.
One cannot help but have admiration for the marvellous batting display the Australians gave on Saturday. Adam Gilchrist was outstanding and the magnificent knocks of Clarke Hussey, Hayden and Ponting demonstrated just how good they are in the top order.
Today England had to show the same quality if they were to get anything out of the game and salvage the series. Cook, with his record fourth hundred before the age of 22, and Bell produced a sound platform, KP looks set.
I can not understand why Matthew Hoggard was sent in as night watchman with the ball just a few overs old and of course the inevitable happened.
However, if England is to get close or indeed survive, they need a hundred from either Flintoff or Jones and preferably both! But I cannot see Jones emulating Gilchrist, I hope that he proves me wrong and as you quite rightly say, it is time for him to justify his selection.
So our best hope is for KP and Flintoff to bat the best part of the last day. A draw is enough to keep the series alive, so tomorrow it’s a case of heads down lads.
467 days of joy has turned to misery again. Why did we select Giles, Anderson and Jones. Was it loyalty to the team who regained the ashes after 18 odd years or was it a cold calculated process of picking the best form cricketers in England. I think the former and the selectors and coach should be held accountable for the results so far. We have had some superb individual performances but you can not carry passengers against the Aussies. Now for the final two tests where I have no doubt we will field the team that should have played in the first test.
I agree with David about the terrible mistakes made with team selection. It's almost as if we started carrying out the post-mortem on England's Ashes failure before a ball had been bowled. That's how obvious it was they had got things wrong from the outset.
What disappoints me above anything else is that this was a real chance for England to at least produce an entertaining series.
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