England weaknesses !

per AB De Villiers   

www.espncricinfo.com/south-africa-v-engl...nt/story/964187.html

"Their batting is not 100% best-in-the-world material.

The bowling line-up is very experienced but some have lost pace over the years

but they're very smart and very skilled.

They're not unbeatable "

He's obviously trying to wind everything up and if Jimmy reads it he'll have a word," Cook said.

"I actually think his speeds have been quite good in this series.

It's a brave man to call Jimmy Anderson out but I guess it will spice up the match a little." 

AB being brutal and brutally honest there. I wish he was a little less so 
He said everything and yet he said nothing, if you catch my drift. "The bowling line is experienced but some have lost their pace" Boom! Burn notice sent to the English cricket team!

Don't really agree with De Villiers if I'm honest. I find the current English team to be really well-balanced and quite strong in all aspects of the game. No, they are not unbeatable but they are a side who could easily role over South Africa. Steyn for me is the only real strike bowler for South Africa. They are not as strong as they used to be with Steyn, Philander and Morkel at their best around 3 years ago.

For me Ben Stokes is a class act. He has the potential to one-day be the best player in the world and with Joe Root in career best form, this England side really is a treat to watch. Can't wait for Australia and England to go head to head in the Ashes next year. Will be a hell of a series.

If a player is going to try and wind the opposition up before a game, isn't it wise to at least base what your saying on facts?

Anderson, if that's who the comment was aimed at, as shown quite decent speeds in the tests upto now if I'm not mistaken so all its done is make AB look like the idiot that he is.

Maybe he's not got over the fact that after begging for the captaincy and him being overlooked for all them years, when he DID finally get to captain his side for the first time, they got smashed all over the park by that so called average England team he's talking about.

It was captaincy 101 from AB. Highlight the weaknesses of your opposition to take the focus off your own dressing room. He also isn't wrong about England's batting. There are still major question marks regarding their lineup; they still need to find an opening partner for Cook, can Compton score runs without getting too bogged down, and is Taylor the answer at number 5?

After AB's performance and his duck, maybe he needs to look at his own batting more instead of the opposition.

Also if you are getting out by the same bowler time after time after time...your game might not be as good as you pretend to think it is.

As a captain myself, I applaud what AB said. He was doing everything possible to take the focus and attention away from his underperforming players. In the build up to this Test, no one was talking about South Africa's ongoing batting woes, but instead, his comments. His players have responded accordingly, posting a score of 475.

Your comments about AB perhaps not being as good as he thinks he is, is madness! AB is one of the games best batsman across all three formats of the game. Since de Villiers made his debut, only Cook, Sangakkara and Pietersen have scored more runs in Test cricket. And Sangakkara is the only batsman to score more runs across all 3 formats of the game.

To put his numbers into some historical perspective, ABdV is one of only 29 batsman to score at least 8000 runs in Test cricket, and his average (50.77) is 13th best among those, higher than the likes of Viv Richards, Alan Border, Kevin Pietersen, Gower, Gooch, Mark Waugh, Jayawardene, Sehwag and Graeme Smith.

ABdV is also one of those rare breeds that actually has a higher average in overseas Tests, and is one of only 20 batsman to have scored a minimum of 3000 runs in overseas Tests at an average above 50.