Draw it was then, but only after a tense, tense day
Good match in the end & after picking up Kartik & Ganguly early, Laxman & dhoni stood between England & the win. Tremlett produced 3 good wickets including Laxmans (although somebody needs to ask Zaheer Khan what the flying fcuk he thought he was doing pulling at that stage
) & it was all summed up by 2 balls from Panesar. One to Dhoni which squared him up late on & whispered past off stump, & a pretty adjacent lbw shout on Sreesanth late on. Its all opinions though & Dravids dismissal possibly wasnt a great decision.
Fair play to Dhoni though, especially as I was figuring he could be dropped for the 2nd test
He pushes across the line & he was probably lucky not to get out to some of the shots he played, but the end result is what matters & having watched him when England levelled the series in India early last year, I didnt think he had it in him
Apparently when he walked out to the crease earlier, Prior said: "Yuvraj is looking excellent in the nets y'know, Dhoni"
England should have won, of that I have no doubt. My KP 6's bet restricted me to a loss of only -12.9pnts on the match but I wouldnt have played it any other way tbh as I firmly believe it was easily the value call. Anybody whos backed the draw at the type of prices I laid (1.55 & 1.23) & not traded, even though they eventually won, must have had a very uncomfortable 5 days. It just wasnt value & was a ridiculous price to back a draw on these wickets.
The pitch looked hard but was never dry throughout & as I kept pointing out only the really technical players at the top order (Dhoni excepted) survived, the lower & middle orders were consistently wiped out throughout the match.
I see much the same at Trent Bridge tbh, starting friday. Accuweather currently says:
Weds - rain day & night
Thurs - thunderstorms day & night
Friday - cloudy
Saturday - rain day & night
Sunday - thunderstorms
Monday - thunderstorms
Tuesday - ok (whoopee-fcuking-do
)
Betfairs currently trading @:
England 2.8
India 5.8
Draw 1.96
I was tempted into laying the draw straight away but a couple of things have stopped me for the moment, as it needs a decent bit of thought:
One is that with people backing the draw at absurdly low prices this time & getting away with it, I expect the price to drop a fair way during the week.
The second is that without the Lords drainage, this test would certainly have been a draw. Now I took that into account but a lot of the 'floaters' probably didnt (more like definetly) Now Trent Bridges drainage simply isnt as good as Lords, although its not bad but this is an unprecedented summer in living memory. So its fair to say we're looking again at a 300-350 over test.
This Lords test lasted 343 overs & its probably fair to say that at any other ground you'd probably say the 43 overs would have been lost leaving just the 300.
The last first class match at Trent Bridge was 10 days ago where the 1st & 3rd days were washed out & only 85.2 overs overall bowled.....although Notts scored 400 in 85.1 so the pitch wasnt bad but I guess there being no chance of a result should be taken into account. The 20/20 quarter final last tuesday was put back a day as the ground was flooded but it was completed on the wednesday, although very soggily. Now that game was on Sky (or should have been anyway) & I cant remember the number of litres of water removed from the ground by the 2 'super-soppers' but I do remember it was astronomical
& I also remember one of the super soppers blew up !! Now you'd assume it'll have been replaced by friday, but.......
So again it could be weighing up the possibility of only 300 overs or less against an England attack that excelled in seamers conditions at Lords & will expect more of the same conditions.
Looking at Trent Bridges stats, 42% of tests here have been draws, but none in the last 4 & only 3 in the last 10, including 1 in the last 6.
The interesting point is that theres normally a few overs lost at Trent Bridge & in recent years that hasnt meant draws. The only match to last over 400 overs was against India in 1996 which was a draw, the other 2 being India again in 2002 in 361 overs where England lead by 260 but India scored 424-8 second dig to make safety, & Zimbabwe in 2000 which lasted 298 overs.
The 7 results in those 10 tests have lasted: 339, 328, 360, 369, 194, 392, 363
6 of those results have needed over 300 overs, although only 3 over 365 which effectively means losing a days play
India 2 draws in the last 2 which has stopped me as well, but my belief is that they're struggling in these conditions at their ages. Also can an inexperienced England bowling attack bowl that well again ?? Sidebottom on his home ground as well.
Much to think about & I think I'll wait to see how low the draw goes. Theres no way I'm backing the draw in these conditions in this country...its a road to ruin quite honestly, but whether I get involved in laying it depends on whether enough people force it down to around the 1.65 mark or below
India in England
) that I wasnt sure on the strength of the Indian 'Galacticos'. Like the article above I dont really have many doubts over Dravid, & I have a lot of respect for Gangulys 'toughness' but I'm not sure they're as good as they were. My theory was/is that a tour of England tends to be a perfect end to a big career, particularly regarding India & the old 'Empire & Commonwealth' bit, & its the kind of tour that you hold on for in your career. An example of this but the other way around was Warne, McGrath, Langer & even Martyn walking after or during last winters Ashes. 
