Just how far down the pecking order have Harmy and Hoggy (along with others) fallen to be overlooked for a 29yr old roof tiler from Australia to be picked ahead of them? Yes, he’s had a decent season so far and taken wickets but really? He’s played something like 11 first class matches and all of a sudden he’s given the new ball against one of the best test sides in the world! Where is the history to show he can do is consistently at a high level? I don’t have any beef against the guy himself, its not his fault he got picked, but just how the bloody hell was he picked in the first place?

I’m hoping the reason for not picking Harmy is so as not to disrupt his bowling recovery mid-season, keep him bowling and taking wickets before bringing him back for the winter tours ahead of next summer’s Ashes series. But we also need to win this series, and putting in an untried internationally bowler against a side which batted for over two days in the 2nd innings at Lords without problems is not the right way to go about it.

The other issue is the delightful keeper-batsman quandary again. I’m all for Freddie in for Colly, but little Tim Ambrose has not done enough with the bat since he got in the team to suggest he can fulfil the role that a number 6 has to. Maybe I’m just being a bit too pessimistic – roll on day five and we’ll see if I’m right or being an idiot!

And then after those questions, we also have the whole controversy over catches claimed which aren’t so – its all too much for one day’s test cricket! Maybe I’ll post once I’ve had a think over the weekend about what this all means. In the mean time, I read a cracking post from Aggers over on the BBC TMS blog, well worth a read.