Summer has finally arrived which brings about the end of the fantastic football campaign of 2010/11 and the start of a action packed summer for cricket. Manchester United paraded around Manchester with just the Premier league trophy having lost in the champions league final and noisy neighbours City pick up their first trophy in over 30 years. So plenty of time for transfers to be made and Henderson to Liverpool and De Gea and Jones to Manchester United are the headline transfers so far but surprisingly City have stayed quiet so far. Arsenal should look to sign a more experienced player but whether or not they will is up to the Gunner’s boss.
Onto Cricket and a fantastic test match to kick of England’s summer. Action packed last few hours saw England shake up Sri Lanka who thought they would have a comfortable 50 overs to get some batting practise and it would have been if anyone could actually stay at the crease. England were short of their star test match bowler Jimmy Anderson. Horrific performance from Sri Lanka. Eoin Morgan showed the selectors why he should be playing with a very nice 50 and the 2 run machines continued to score, Trott and Cook both getting hundreds for fun and Trott’s double hundred was brilliant to watch. Rain made the test match look out of sight and when England let Bell go out to get his century sent the crowd a message that even England couldn’t have possibly expected to win. After the break England bowled line length and with pace and bounce, and the reward payed of especially for terrific Tremlett who picked up a 4fer and swann bowled brilliantly again. The second test match was the opposite, what i would a game of two halves. Yet again Cook continued to do his job and it’s almost as if he is expected to get a hundred and what he gets after that is what matters. This time he fell short by just 4 and even cook could not believe it. England showed strength in depth, Prior batted quickly and efficiently and is outstanding with the tail. Even Stuart broad made 50 and showed signs of that test match 100 against Pakistan. Sri Lanka’s bowling line up was straight but didn’t cause enough problems on England’s in form Batting line up. Then England’s bowling for the rest of that day was terrible they bowled well wide of the stumps and Paranavitana said thank you very much as he marched his way to a calm and composed 50. Dilshan’s innings as always was a brilliant innings to watch he raced to 100 and punished the poor bowling. He very nearly made his first test double century but fell touching distance away for 193. The following day both Jayawardenes nearly made 50 but England’s bowling was much better. Steven Finn was top quality as was swann taking 7 wickets between them. After that the test match fizzled out, batting continued to be good but the bowling needed to be good right from the start from both sides to get 20 wickets in less than 6 sessions. Sri Lanka dismissed the out of form England skipper for 0 but his opening partner produced yet again scoring a brilliant ton. 50’s for: Pietersen in what he’ll hope is a return to form but yet again he got out to left arm spin, Bell who was not out and seems to be in good form, and Trott who recovered form his first innings blip. England declared on 335 for 7 leaving Sri Lanka needing 342 to win in pretty much 1 session. England took 3 wickets including 1 for Jonathan Trott but not quite the heroics of Cardiff to win the match.
The T20 has started and yesterday Lancashire lost to Yorkshire in a battle of the roses it ws taken down to the wire but Yorkshire held strong. Finals day is at Edgbaston this year and Warwickshire will hope they can pick up some momentum and compete at their home ground in August.
So what’s in store for the rest of the summer, England have Jimmy Anderson back for the 3rd test at the Rose bowl and with Dilshan unlikely to be back due to a broken finger it looks as though England will clich the series with what i think will be a 2-0 win. In terms of the Indian series it looks like being a close call, England’s batting line up are in form and only Strauss is struggling for runs. England’s bowlers need to take 20 wickets and it hasn’t been a problem recently and hopefully won’t be a problem for the rest of the summer.
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