Eliminating our weaknesses before attempting to gain improvement via acquisition seems a pretty simple strategy to me.
Start by picking a balanced side, name the right sub, and don't play injured players for starters, any of that will help out and not cost draft picks or necessitate fancy trading strategies.
Because the last decade has taught us the following;
1. Playing opposition who we always struggle to beat, even at our best (in this case because we arrogantly regarded them as an irrelevant club and tried to buy them to get their players). 2. Playing an opposition that we match up poorly against. They have a real ruck, proper structure and three tall forwards. 3. Playing opposition that physically intimidate us, sometimes with dog tactics, but generally they just play basic football that is too much for our seagulls. Goldstein, Swallow, Firrito and Petrie et al. treat us with contempt. 4. Playing opposition that were woeful last week, have been baked in media and thus have point to prove. 5. Big game with high stakes - winner is a chance of finals, loser is playing for draft pick position. We never, ever win those games. 6. Friday night game, so they want to play well to showcase their club. 7. Also Friday night, which means we'll probably get Ray. Ray + the diver = not a good night.
Even when conditions were "favourable" we had periods when our batting simply failed. End of day 4 being a case in point. Getting out when set is a sin on a deck like that - and an eternal problem with Watson. When conditions are favourable we need to cash in - but don't. And then there is always Swann to contend with in the periods where Anderson isn't warping it around.
I agree that Starc has the capability but doesn't do it often enough. Is he dangerous enough often enough i.e. does he bowl enough good balls to get a gig at Lords? He didn't seem to cause great angst aside from the novelty of being a left armer. Gee he can leak runs, and can look deadest ordinary when the ball isn't swinging.
I agree that Bird is the logical replacement but is he going to "make things happen" if the pitch is flat or grind out wickets... bearing in mind that the poms seem perfectly happy to grind out decent scores at 2 an over? Is our attack too same-same with Bird and Siddle.... but the thought of Bird hitting a spot on the downhill ramp at Lord's does peke interest.
Agreed, it took a miracle from Agar and Hughes (of all people) to prevent this being over in 3 days. The 14 run margin seems to have clouded people's minds to reality - our batting failed twice, and nobody posted a score in both digs (= inconsistency, our biggest problem).
Haddin out driving away from his pad, to a ball that wasn't quite there to drive... haven't we heard that one before? In Haddin's defence, why was he placed in that position in the first place? 0/100 FFS! Bloody top order - again.
Gees we owe this mob of diving, sniping, squealing hypocrites more than just about anybody, but thanks to the small paper for the acid treatment... just about guaranteed norf win this week.
Don't expect anything other than a truckload of pineapples from the judicating personnel as well... really worried that what we saw against ST K will be amount to nothing more than a "dead cat bounce".
I don't know about you Boof, but the big blond bloke at first slip needs to start contributing something - ANYTHING - because we've got enough passengers in this team as it is.
Please play Clarke at 5 and bat Siddle at 4. Don't bother with the others, we may as well paint a garbage bin white and lean a Gray Nick against it for all the defensive nous those blokes have.
