Welcome back to Backward Point. My name is Naja Syed.
Half of this podcast is in Pakistan right now and the other
half is in Canada with my brother and cohost.
Bashar. This podcast is a special one we
both watched. We will just finished watching
the second game of the Ashes and there's so much controversy, so
many things to talk about. The Baristow run out.
Ben Stokes is 155. The last session of the second
game. England 20 down.
Is basketball dead? So many things mean.
Bashar have already discussed a little bit off air, you know,
just in our family conversations.
And then we just saved it because we wanted to talk about
it on the pod. And we're here together as
always. Bashar is in the early mornings
of Canada and me in the evenings of Karachi right now.
And let's just get it on, man. Bashar, you saw the 2nd Test
match, You saw everything that unfolded.
I was following my Cricinfo, but as soon as the breast run out
happened and Twitter just exploded, everybody lost their
minds. Like including.
I don't know if you saw it, but there were like businesses also,
like like Victoria Wine was also tweeting about it and like, just
random things were happening. It was just a hailstorm going on
on Twitter and on the media. People were very, very upset
about the birds to run out. Let's just start with the
elephant in the room. What did you think about it?
So I sort of sat on the idea, let the the whole thing marinate
in my head. Initial thoughts when I saw it
was. That's not out.
Like how could that be out? Bairstow clearly missed the
ball. He marked this crease.
It was a last ball of the over and he walked through just
across have a discussion with Ben Stokes on the other end and
it kind of felt like gunny cricket in a way.
You know where you try to do these things, where the bats is
leaving, you throw the ball, try to get him out.
But the more I watched what happened and the more that I
got. More context of how it happened
and what was happening before the balls leading up to that
single ball. I felt like now it was fair.
What happened was fair. It was out.
It was within the laws of the game, actually, first innings
Johnny Barstow try to do the same thing to David Warner.
The Internet is a crazy, funny place.
People have started to bring out old clips of even Brendan
McCullum doing this to the to the England team back in 2009.
So this is something that's been happening.
It's within the laws of the game.
I don't know where to draw the line between the spirit of the
game and the laws of the game. If it's within the laws of the
game, what is the spirit of cricket?
The question then arises, is the spirit of the game just you
giving the batsmen another chance?
Because there was a lot of outcry from the English camp
about this run out. Let's not forget the 2019
controversial ODI World Cup final.
Lots of technicalities there. You know, there's a lot of
examples in the history of cricket where yes, you know, the
the thing that comes into my mind immediately is the Nepal of
game. I think it was Nepal versus
Oman. But sure, you might have to
correct me where the keeper had the opportunity to run the
batsmen out, but the batsmen had clearly.
Fallen on the pitch and he didn't do it.
That's the spirit of the game, right?
You have a chance. You don't take it because it's
unfair. This is clear cricket law.
I don't understand what the outcry is all about.
I don't understand what the media frenzy is all about.
This is a clear cut, stumping, run out, whatever.
However you are dictated. The ball was not dead, All
right? The ball.
Just because it went to the keeper, it does.
The ball does not die. I read the rules.
The ball was active. And he's been notorious for
doing this. Johnny Bristow has.
Johnny Bristow has many a times because there was a whole
context behind his run out. He's many a times come out of
the crease right after the ball passes, takes, his guard moves
again. Right.
This happened previously, three or four times during that, that
game, the game that we were following and it just, you know,
Alex Kerry was noting it. These are specialist marksman
keepers. They're aware of the game,
right. This is a person who is playing
the highest charter of cricket in the most competitive cricket
played in the world in Australia.
He knows everything that's going on around them.
The wicket keeper has to be like that.
Ms. Dhoni was that sharp. Brendan Mccullen himself was
that sharp and Alex Kerry was just.
Showing the cricketers are out, how attentive you have to be in
the in in the game, right? And he just was.
Baristo was caught slipping. It was lazy.
He was snoozing, I would say, on the pitch and he was just
caught. He caught himself walking on on
onto the pitch and it's a fair, it's a fair.
Dismissal, I believe. Now the question arises where a
lot of people are talking about. Even Ben Stokes said that that
dismissal is the make or break of the game.
I don't know about that bash I I feel like.
Ben Stokes, his dismissal. When he left, with the way he
left with 7070 yard runs on the board, left to chase, that was
the end of the game. Whenever Ben Stokes is on the
field, when he's when he's in his pads on the crease, the game
is never over. You know, we're thinking about
the 2018 Ashes all over again. This thing never dies.
And I don't know, Do you think the Jerry Johnny Barnstow
dismissal was the end of the game?
Because I I don't. I don't believe so at all.
I think it's definitely a very crucial part of the game.
If you look back on story of this match, that thing sort of
just highlights and pops up. I have to totally agree with
what you said. Alex Carey was very attentive.
He was had a lot of presence of mind to ensure first monitor
that that Donny Bear. So is leaving his crease early
and then to actually make that decision of stumping him.
I saw the replay of that dismissal from different angles
and you could see as soon as he caught the ball, Alex Carey,
that's when he threw it immediately and it took a few
seconds for Johnny Barrisso to Marcus Crease and then leave
again. You know, typically what I've
seen happened of my years of watching cricket is that when
there's it over, you looked like Empire and you confirm that,
hey, I'm leaving my crease or you know, it's over.
Am I good to leave? And then the umpire confirms and
then the batsman. Continues to cross or you know,
go to the other end for a discussion with his partner.
In this case, I just felt like Johnny Berto was a bit really,
he was a bit casual and I don't think that's fair.
But I'm also sad that this whole Test match, this has been an
incredible Test match. But it's all come down to this
one moment, which I don't think it was the make or break moment.
You could say maybe if Johnny Bear so was on the crease,
things could have gone like they made-up, they might have had a
better partnership. England might have had more
wickets in hand. They lost by 43 runs.
He could have scored those runs, you know, you never know.
But again that's just it's hindsight, it's a what if
scenario. But it's just been incredible
discussions online on Twitter and I'm glad we're doing this
podcast like two days after the Test match happened because it's
given. Lots of people have dug up
videos of what happened in the past.
The my the talking thing for me was when I watched Twitter and
what was trending after the match, Ian Bell was trending.
I don't know why Ian Bell was trending.
He was not playing in this match.
But what I found when I click on his name was that there was an
instance where India was playing England in England and there was
a scenario where. Ian Bell was mistakenly run out
because he thought the ball went to the boundary before.
But in fact Praveen Kumar, the fielder had stopped the ball and
eventually threw in and Ian Bell was out of his crease and
Amazoni had run him out. So he was batting 130 odd at the
time and. Very similar to the Azar Ali run
out if you remember this. Exactly.
Exactly very similar. What happened?
Yeah, So Ms. Dhoni being Amazoni.
Called Ian Bell back. He continued batting.
So I I don't know, It's just it's hard to say what's the
right thing to do here. If you're within the laws of the
game, you should be fine to do whatever you want.
Cricket ultimately we do say is a gentleman's game.
But what transpired after that incident with Johnny Barstow,
with the Australian cricket team, the MCC members, how they
treated and and yelled and booed the Australian team?
Not a fan of that, and especially to my boy Oswan
Huaja. He got some extra words from the
MCC members. What?
She even sought back to retaliate.
Things could have gone ugly there.
But yeah, it's just disappointing to see at the end
of the day. You mentioned this and it's also
known internationally as well that cricket is a gentleman's
game. But.
The MCC, the the member, the members of the MCC, this is the
oldest Cricket Club in the world, right?
The inception of cricket begins from these people and the way
that they're retaliated and the way that they.
Reacted, they make the rule book for cricket.
Exactly. And and it was just ugly to see
that it felt very sore loserish. You know, and I don't expect
this from England, England's seen their ups and downs.
You know, they had a really bad patch in the mid 2000s.
Like, you know, nobody can forget that.
But they're sort of climbed their way up and it just seems
like their arrogance has gotten to their head, if I'm being
honest. It just they just, they just,
they thought that basketball was unpenetrable.
Right. Because they, they were going
all over the world and just demolishing sides like they did
that to Pakistan. They went to Sri Lanka, they did
that to India as well. They were just demolishing
sides. And now that there's a chink in
their armor, their Achilles heel is sort of open for the world to
take a stab at. They seem vulnerable and they're
just going to these tactics that are that are beneath them.
To be honest, I don't expect this from the MCC crowd.
I don't expect this from the MCC club.
They're. They're supposed to be
prestigious, you know, voicing your disagreement.
Maybe you think it's unfair. Fine.
It always takes me back to that. Virat Kohli, last over in the
World Cup against the Mohammed Nawaz.
I thought a few of those rules going there were also unfair.
But you don't see me complaining about it or, you know, pelting
stones onto the Indian team about it.
They want fair and square according to the laws of the
game at the time, so. My only message to the MCC crowd
at MCC members would be to grow up, man.
Just grow up. Yeah, just to get what a feel of
what the people are thinking, did a poll on our Instagram
Story for the longest time. You know, we asked people
essentially, did you think that was out or, you know, the two
options were yes, it's within the laws of the game, no, it's
against the spirit of the game. And for the longest time, the
people were split halfway 5050. Between devices, yes.
But ultimately I think we finished with the 57% people
thinking that yes, it was within the laws of the game and the
rest four to three thought that it was against the spirit of the
game, so. People are actually also quite
people are also quite vocal on our Instagram like you said D
Ming us our our thoughts about it.
Quite some people were angry, like, you know, they were sort
of mimicking the MCC attitude. And some people were more tame.
You know what? It's and laws of the game and
all that. It always takes me back to the
Ravi Ashwin debate. The man CAD.
He gets a lot of shit for it, which is funny, by the way.
He tweeted in favor of that dismissal as well.
I was like, that's so Hon brand Ravi Ashwin.
You're not even trying to be a little bit conspicuous, but I
thought that was a bit That was hilarious.
But he also gets flak for basically what is part of the
game, right? If you are lazy and you are
trying to steal or run, you're trying to catch some yards and
the bottom has all the authority to run you out.
I think it's a stupid rule. If I have a problem with the
rule, change the laws. But as long as the laws exist,
and this is the law of the game, you have to follow it, no matter
how annoying I think it is. Right.
No matter how annoying I think like I I'm also in.
Like, the other rule that annoys me in cricket right now is the
substitution. Right.
Substitution is sort of, kind of maybe allowed, but only when the
batsman gets hit in the freaking head, right?
No other like Nathan Lyon was, He was barely good.
Stan and this man had to go out and face like 2-3 overs.
One of the fiercest bowlings in world cricket.
Like, in that moment. The umpire should, or the third
umpire or the match referee should be able to make the call
and be like, you know what, this guy's literally you can't walk
right. It's done for him this series,
he's out for the series. Get us a placement like why does
it have to be? There's only one slight like I
can. We can keep going back and forth
with these gripes, but the fact still remains that is the
current law of the game and if that's how I lose and that's how
I lose. I will protest the way that I'm
out. I still think the Mama Nawaz of
goalie thing running on on free head being bold like all of
that. I still still think is really
messy and there could be a cleaner way to deal with this,
but I'm not gonna cry about it. You know, I think you mentioned
a really good point about the Nathan line, his injury, I
think, which is huge news. He's out of the whole ashes,
tore his right cough, showed great sportsman spirit by coming
out to bat despite having. That torn cough.
I think it's a Gray area in the sense where people sometimes,
what if there's a person who is having a bad day, not performing
well and they sort of fake an injury, They fake tearing and
hamstring or not not being able to walk and they just replaced
it with somebody else. It was a better bowler on the
day, but even when the next line came to bat again.
People were saying he only came to bat so he can get hit in the
head. Kevin Kevin Peterson said that
and I think that was again a low blow from another one, another
person from the English camp who would want to get to the player,
get hit in the head, Especially Australia with the Phil Hugh
situation. That was just a mean thing to
say. That was uncalled for.
That's not how international cricket works.
KP should know better. He and KP has been known to
playing dirty his entire career. He should know better, man.
He should know where the line is from, what is sensitive and
insensitive. Yeah, yeah, but.
But I agree that. Should be something with the
substitution because technically for the last 1 1/2 innings that
Australia was bowling they were lacking their main bowler Nathan
Lyon. And the ironic thing is that
Nathan Lyon just made the record for playing the most consecutive
matches Test matches as a spinner.
I believe 101 Test matches and he got injured on while making
this record. So now he's out of the ashes,
Todd Murphy will perhaps replace him.
He's a like for like off spinner, is a really good
bowler, bowled really well and Australia's tour to India
recently. I'm just saying that the way to
gauge how to see if Claire is really injured or not is you
have medics on staff. This is modern cricket.
We're not talking about 1975, right?
We're talking about modern day cricket where you have.
Staff available, You have medics available.
You have high profile doctors that are on standby available.
You have match referees. You have third empires.
You have multiple like dozens of cameras around, right.
And some injuries you can just see like the Nathan Lion
situation. It was quite evident this man is
having trouble just being in in the Oval right now.
Let's let's get him a replacement, right.
So, yeah, I mean. There's ways to judge this.
On the same vein, just just looking back at the last World
Cup, imagine if we had that substitution rule shine off.
He gets injured, we may be able to have brought like Hasnain or
the Tahani Indu ball one of his overs.
Do you think that might have had an impact on the game rather
than us calling if Tahar? 100% that would have.
That would have been a make or break situation because at the
end of the day Shaheen ball is third over it with injury, could
even complete it if I remember correctly.
Right? And he we had to get somebody
else to complete the last 8 balls.
And with T20 it's it's those finer margins.
Every single ball counts like a dot ball is worth a lot more in
T20 than it is in world and ODIs versus Test matches, right so.
Yeah, I mean these rules should like if cricket wants to evolve
and become modern day, they have to see these rules come into
effect. They have to be a bit more
modern. I feel like cricket is trying to
catch up. There are definitely rules, the
power play, the free hits, the no balls, the reviews, how many
you can take etc etc. Where things are getting a bit
modern, but they usually take their times with stuff like
this. And it's it's quite frustrating
for their fans. But you know what?
You won't see us crying about it.
Like I said before, and to quote John Mayer, if the MCC want to
go cry it, cry about it, then go cry about it.
Why don't you, man? I don't.
We don't care. I think because of this whole
Donny Bear SO incident, it's taken away from one of the great
performances that we've seen in this Test match, be it Steve
Smith scoring his 32nd Test match 100.
Going to 9000 Test match runs, again like you mentioned last
episode, he is one of the greatest players of our
generation and one of the greatest of all time with his
Test match numbers that he has. And you know on top of that we
saw one of the greatest innings from Ben Stokes who scored the
high the most runs at number six and a second innings in Test
match history. This man has a knack of showing
up in the 4th innings of a Test match.
We saw him do it in Headingley when the when Day 4 concluded.
I saw that England needed like about you know, 250 odd runs and
I I wanted to say it was impossible.
But the same time when Ben Stokes on the crease, I know
he's not fit he his knee. Is having issues and you could
clear clear to see that by the way he's running by the way he
wasn't able to duck for bouncers in the and on on day four but
again a clinical knock. I mean we saw Virat Kohli tweet
out saying that Ben Stokes is the most competitive bloke that
he knows and seeing Ben pushed through on day five at Lords
against the quality of Australian Mali attack smashing
them to. All over the place at Lord's, 9
sixes, 9 fours, 155 runs and maybe he was you could say 40
odd runs short from leveling the series, but the fact of the
matter is that England is 2 zero down but a great knock from men
Stokes. Man, I feel like every time we
talk about Ben Stokes is great knocks on Test cricket.
It has to be. It always goes down as being
some of the best we've ever seen of all time.
Like this is just. The quality of the player,
especially with injury. I mean I went back and started
playing cricket here. I got in Karachi and I can tell
you as a 26 year old young man who is utterly unfit, Ben
Stokes, I would like to be that unfit being honest like it's
it's crazy what he can do with not even 100% Jews in the tank.
155 fourth, 4th innings, 5th day, you know you're batting
with. The tale kind of store broad is
there hanging out. He's not really sure how to
conclude this. You know, even in the 2018 Test
matches, I think it was the last match in Headingley where he
also got a life, right. He got another life here by
Steve Smith. And then the thing with Ben
Stokes is if you give him more than one life, he capitalizes on
it, right? He wants to make sure that he
hurts you. And he was so close to bringing
this game back. It's insane, like.
Ben Stokes, Sir Ben Stokes, Man like I genuinely think he is one
of those players that is redefining the game.
You know, I we think about the greats of all time in all
sports. Ben Stokes, his name has to come
up. When we talk about Test match
cricket, it's changing the way. That people are approaching it,
you know, 250 on the last day is becoming approachable.
People actually go out and go for the chase, they don't go for
the draw, which England 100% could have if they decided to go
for that negative mentality of you know what, we're going to
see this out, we're going to draw it, we're going to try to
save the test over stay of the series.
This could have been a very depressing game at the end,
especially with the John Duberis so stuff, but you know, it
became exciting. That being said, England is 2
zero down, with one game just between them and the Ashes going
back. To Australia, or actually
Australia has the Ashes right now, if I'm could you clear that
up for me? Yeah, they will retain it if you
want to say. Yeah, yeah.
So Australia could retain the Ashes if they does win one more
game. So you know, all the chips are
out and England is sort of against the wall.
But I want to talk about the 4th innings batting collapse that
England faced, the 46 for four. I don't know where that came
from. I don't know why nobody showed
up. It wasn't that difficult, I
believe to sort of see off the new ball, make sure you have
wickets in hand. So you go into the fifth day
with eight or nine wickets in hand.
So you can actually have a stab at this.
The fact that Ben Stokes has to come down bad with the tail hit
155 and still lose by 40, that says a lot about how the upper
order, the the high order never showed up do root is sort of.
Supposed to be the anchor from the top and he's like nowhere to
be seen. And in this game which, oh, this
innings, I should say. And that was tough to see as
well. I think it you can't keep.
Yeah, go ahead. No, it's not as say in their
defense. I think there was a top quality
bowling spell by Mitchell struck a ball swinging in late and I
don't know if he saw the ball that he bowled against all the
Pope. Almost gave me shine of really
slash Mohammed Amir Vibes of tailing the ball back in late
into the stumps and then the ball of Pat Cummins ball to
Harry Brooke top of off stump nipping back.
So I think it was yes, I I understand that they don't they
didn't show up but those deliveries would get most good
batsmen out. So I wanna give their top order
the benefit of the doubt of facing some top quality bowling
from the Australians. Yeah, I mean, no disrespect to
Australia. I mean, full credit to Pat
Cummins and his men. Like, they were on the money.
They were ruthless. Like genuinely ruthless.
And there's a conversation to be had the opposite way.
I mean, you might, you're not gonna like this, but where the
hell has Jimmy Anderson been in the past two games?
You know he's averaging 73, strike rate of 156, three
wickets and four innings. Like this is abysmal.
What is like Kevin Peterson was right to be pissed off.
You know he were used the word shambolic.
I think he's a bit he was of being a bit dramatic for Sky
Sports. But I'll.
I'll retweet it. You know what?
I'll retweet it. It was shambolic.
Jimmy Anderson, the store brought.
These are the finest Ballers in the world.
They're coming in. They're not even clocking 85
miles. You know you have something to
say about that bash because this is genuinely appalling to me.
This is Ash's cricket if. Yeah, if I'm being fully
transparent. I think what's happened here is
that I thought Stuart brought, if you want to talk about him,
first looked tired. He looks tired from bowling.
Long spilled in the first Test match.
He's old. I don't think his body has
recovered as well as, as it may have maybe 5-10 years ago.
Jimmy Anderson as well. I think pace was down looking
tired, looking sore. And the one thing that Ben
Stokes and this whole basketball thing has taken away from the
England fast bowlers, Kryptonite used to be England scene,
bowling conditions, green top pitches, overcast conditions,
Jimmy Anderson, Stewart, Broad Hoving and around right, left
through corners. But you know, because of these
five pitches, they're not getting any movement, they're
not getting any swing. And that this is what happens
when you're focusing on making five pitches and scoring 400
each innings. So it's I do agree that they've
not been at their best, but there's reasons behind that.
But I definitely feel like the next Test match, England needs
some fresh legs. They need some pace.
We saw how well Josh Tongue bald in a second Test match, his
first ever Ashes Test match. I'm thinking maybe if Mark would
have fed in the next test set test he can come instead of
Stuart Broad or Jimmy Anderson. Firstly, I just want to tell you
that it's pronounced Tong, which is ridiculous.
Yeah, it's insane that you spell it like Tong and you expect it
to pronounce it Tong. But OK, Josh, it's up to you.
Is your name firstly. Secondly, I don't think that's a
defense for Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad, because I want to
take you back to day one of the second Test match.
It's raining. It's overcast conditions.
You know what? It's moisture in the air.
There's clouds above the Lord's cricket ground and still
nothing. Still nothing like Jimmy
Anderson and store brought should take lessons from Stark
and and Pat Cummins in Hazelwood and the gang to see how you
bowl. The 4th innings spell that they
bowled with 44 or 46 or 4 and left England 46 or 4.
My bad. That's how you do it, right?
This is Ashes Cricket. This is the most.
This is the most intense. Test cricket will ever be, not
even to the WTC has enough repertoire as as this game does
or this series does, so you gotta show up with your best.
It's sad to see, and it's sad to even say this, but maybe we're
seeing the end of the broad Anderson partnership.
They're touching 40, you know Anderson has already crossed
4041. It's just, it just seems like.
You need fresh legs in. Do you think basketball is in
the place to make that move? You know it's it's a do or die
Test match and that leads. If they lose, it's all over from
here. Do they go and switch out the
two most important bowlers in English cricket history and you
would agree with that? Do they search them out to get
fresher legs in to see if they can bowl shorter on the deck,
bouncer on the deck hit? The batsman a little bit nick,
the batsman a bit scared because right now these Australian
bowlers are playing these bowlers like we we play our
cousins in Gully cricket, man. I have no doubts that maybe
either one of them are going to sit out the next Test match.
There's Chris Wolk on the bench, there's Mark Wood on the bench
and you know England has a myriad of options in their
county and cricket system, so. Do I think that they should be
replaced? I think you know there is no
replacement for experience. There's no replacement for Jimmy
Anderson, who has close to 700 Test match wickets.
So at the same time, yes, they are tired.
There might be a need for fresh legs, some extra pace Mark would
I feel like would be. A good addition.
We saw how how well Josh Tong bald, I mean, he had that extra
pace. He really troubled David Warner
both innings. Even his bouncers actually felt
like they were a yard quicker. I saw a stat where the average
pace for the Australian attack was 8586 miles an hour, whereas
the average pace for the England Ballers was around 80 or 81 mile
an hour. So I think that extra 5 miles,
10 kilometers can make a difference between timing the
ball and miss timing it, nicking it, skying it in the air.
So I think these are decisions more just to be made by Ben
Stokes. I I do want to see some extra
pace. I want to see Mark put if he's
fit back in the side. Trouble is Australian Matson
because if you recall we saw a barrage of shortbridge bowling
and all four innings. It was almost weird to see every
single ball being a bouncer. It didn't work but they got
wickets. England got Australia in the
second innings like that and then Australia used a short
pitch against England in the 4th innings really well.
Who do you make the call? You're Brendan McCullum.
You're Ben Stokes. Who do you sit down for?
Mark Wood? Tough because Stewart brought
Even though he's tired, he's still bowling.
Well, Jimmy Anderson is just totally off color.
The balling that I've seen him ball, there was just too many
bad balls. He's not putting it in the right
area as long enough, which is what Jimmy Anderson used to do.
So maybe he's carrying an injury, maybe he's just not, you
know, in rhythm. So perhaps I would give to a
broader chance to rest out, recover for the next match while
I would bench Jimmy Anderson, as I said that I would bench Jimmy
Anderson, bring back Mark Wood. And if you're Jimmy Anderson, do
you fight for your spot in the 11 or do you say, you know what,
I think I'm being a liability in the team right now.
I think this is Ashes Cricket. This is, like you said, it's
it's high intensity, everybody plays to win and if if Jimmy
Anderson resting would mean that England might have a better
chance of winning, so be it. I mean there's also Chris Wokes
here, so I think it's fair and I also want to come back to.
The fact that England is 2 zero down.
The fact that, you know basketball.
Brandon McCollum and Ben Stokes have been saying we're playing
to entertain, we're playing to entertain to to play a good band
of cricket for people to watch. Ultimately people want to watch
England win. I love the entertainment, I love
how exciting this is, but if I was an English fan, I would
wanna see results. You know, we have seen results
last one year. They've won.
In Pakistan they've won. In Sri Lanka, they've won, you
know in in New Zealand. But this is where it mattered.
This is crunch time. This is the Ashes, This is the
the oldest rivalry in sports. This is high intensity cricket.
So I want to see results. I know him has been very close.
first Test match you could say Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyons
stole the game from them and then this last match they were
40 odd runs short. But these fine margins make or
break a series. And sorry to say, basketball,
there's question marks on it now.
Yeah, I think Nasir San said something similar as well.
I was listening to him talk about this and I agree with both
of you guys. I think it's, it's fun.
But I would not be. I I hate, I would hate to be at
the losing end of that basketball regime right now.
You know what? I understand that it's
entertaining. Fans are having fun.
The crowds are insane. It's never been better than
Ashes Cricket than it has been this year, if I'm being honest.
But you have to put the nail in the coffin.
And you know what? Basketball isn't being able to
do that. And I don't even know if this is
basketball's fault. I just think English cricket has
been missing the margin by one percent, 2% off.
They're just a little bit off target, and that's just enough.
For Australia to capitalize, These are ruthless people, man.
These players are insane. They don't.
They don't give a shit about basketball.
They don't care about whatever you want to call it.
If you cannot beat them on the day, they will come and crush
you. That's how amazing and
disrespecting at times the Australian cricket team can be.
So you cannot take them even for granted for even for a second.
You have to go for the kill every time.
And I just feel like the English cricket team has just been
missing the mark. By the finest margins.
And that's what we're talking about, right The the last wicket
in the first game, 42 or 40 odd runs here.
In the second one we have three more games left.
Ben Stokes is looking for a 32V. I'm still hoping for a Ben
Stokes basketball English cricket team revival.
I think there's a comeback waiting.
I think there's a comeback on the brink, maybe leads and
heading, heading leads and leads, right, if I'm not
mistaken. Yes, correct.
I think you'll have memories are sort of rejoined from years,
years past and you'll see another Ben Stokes or new Ben
Stokes coming from the ether. I think Ben Stokes is going for
the kill now. There's nothing to lose.
You go all in and you go for the kill.
There's no other way to win this because you have to go up 3 two.
You don't have any margin to lose.
Yep, Yep, I I agree. And then secondly, Australia's
without Nathan Lyon, the van, Todd Murphy, the news just came
in that all the Pope has dislocated his shoulder again
and he's out of the team. So that's that's a loss for for
England. One of their main mats been
down. But yeah, there's three Tests to
go. It's tough to say that England's
going to bounce back because if they lose the next match they've
basically lost the series. Australia retained the Ashes.
And I cannot imagine the media backlash on this England team
being led by two Kiwis, Merton McCullum and and Ben Stokes,
both born and raised in New Zealand.
So it's just it's a funny turn of events here.
But again, I've just been loving watching Test cricket and and
watching how intense these games have been, how it's it's a game
of fine margins. One session that you play badly
could cost you the match, so I think that's that's a good way
to end this episode. This has been a review of the
second Test of the Ashes on backward point.
This is your your cohost Bashar signing out.
Do you have any final dots? No, this, I mean you ended it at
our strong point there. I think our predictions have
been a bit wavered. We thought it was going to be 3
to England. I mean, it could still possibly
could be that, but hey. I said three to Australia.
Well, then your money's on them on the mark right now, so far as
it goes. I thought it was 3 to England,
but I I just may be off a little bit.
We don't know. Three games left.
It's going to go down to the wire.
TuneIn guys is TuneIn. So don't forget to like,
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