Once again he is showing the poor level of captaincy that has plagued his brief captaincy career. Surely, he should declare now. It would tempt Pakistan to go for the total and thus give England chance to take wickets. If Pakistan are left with 400 to win they will just go out with a defensive mindset.
I think Fletcher is essentially a very conservative coach with his tactics. We saw that under Nasser Hussain, and lately Flintoff and Strauss have delayed declarations. Its only under Vaughan that England have shown a real attacking intent. Maybe if Flintoff or Strauss have more time to grow into the role they'll exert themselves on tactics a bit more - its never easy being a stand-in and captaining with someone else's team as Strauss is at the moment.
Its just speculation about how much of a say Fletcher has. I guess few people outside dressing room actually know. But i'd imagine Fletcher's role becomes more prominant if there is a stand-in captain.
I'm not sure if Flintoff will be seen as a stand-in or as first choice for the Ashes. If he's seen as first choice he should get more of a say on selection as he'll be out there on the field, he needs players he personally has faith in.
I wonder what Flintoff thinks of the Jones / Read debate, it was initially Fletcher and Vaughan who shoehorned him into the team.
The post match interviews suggest that the decision not to declare earlier was Fletcher's. I think he gets way too involved in these things...it's worrying that cricket is heading down a similar path to football in that respect.
Aye gh, a worrying trend indeed. But it seems to be driven by cricket boards. Ponting was the captain who lost the Ashes, but Ned flanders seemed to be the one with the hands on the controls. Now the same disease is afflicting England. Be afraid.
Seems to me the better England do the more praise Fletcher gets. I think Fletcher was to blame for not ending the innings on Sunday, if England had and won by bowling them out on Monday I can imagine the press praising master Fletcher once more! Fletcher isn't all he's cracked up to be, thats the real issue. Where has he stamped his influence since the ashes? He hasn't been able to, which shows you the ashes win was all about the right team.
But at the moment Strauss is copping the grief. Fletcher is a very conservative man, listen to Nasser and he'll say it half a dozen times a day when in the com box.
-------------------------------------------------------- I say it so it must be so.
All we had to do was to press on during the last ten overs on Sunday and declare overnight. Would have made the game two overs longer and we would have had ten overs with a new ball at the end of Monday. Seems like we were scared of them and happy enough to take a draw. Bit stupid I reckon as we had a 50:50 chance of a win with an overnight declaration even on that rubbish dead pitch.
Originally posted by Silly Point: Once again he is showing the poor level of captaincy that has plagued his brief captaincy career. Surely, he should declare now. It would tempt Pakistan to go for the total and thus give England chance to take wickets. If Pakistan are left with 400 to win they will just go out with a defensive mindset.
If this were the last test & the series all square then I would agree with you.
But the chances of England bowling Pak out cheaply was very remote considering the bowling attack, batsmen & conditions.
IMO this test was a missed opportunity for Eng to go 1-0 up.
My reasons for this are that the toss was pretty useful and Pak did miss 5 catches on Day 1 helping Eng to 3-300+.
Once that had occurred the match was only there for Eng to control.
There seemed to be a lot of hot air coming from the comm box about the recent one-dayers, Flintoffs slated return for OT and Strauss being just a stand-in skipper where as in fact none of this should have been influence the strategy employed by Eng for this match.
I agree with those saying Eng should have pushed on more on Day 4 and then declared at stumps. This would have given them a great chance of winning IMO without necessarily letting Pak in by the back door. (Remember Monty could have shut the run rate down very easily bowling over the wicket at leg stump).
Whether these strategic decisions were taken by Strauss or by the coach is a hugely moot point.
However even if Strauss was bullied into a certain way of thinking I'd contest that does not say a lot about him as a leader of men.
All we had to do was to press on during the last ten overs on Sunday and declare overnight. Would have made the game two overs longer and we would have had ten overs with a new ball at the end of Monday. Seems like we were scared of them and happy enough to take a draw. Bit stupid I reckon as we had a 50:50 chance of a win with an overnight declaration even on that rubbish dead pitch.[/QUOTE]
