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PoolieAlbatross

Listed below are comments made by PoolieAlbatross between Wednesday, 18th June 2008 and Monday, 13th July 2009.

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Ashes player ratings - First Test 2:01pm on 13 Jul 2009 #154 - no, self-belief and confidence is thinking that you won't get out unless you play a bad shot or get an outstanding delivery; arrogance is refusing to believe you might be capable of playing a bad shot, even when you patently just have....
Ashes player ratings - First Test 10:27am on 13 Jul 2009 On the subject of KP - I get the feeling that the problem a lot of fans have with him isn't so much that he gets out to the odd daft shot, as he then refuses to accept that it was daft or that it's anything to worry about. His dismissal to Hauritz was poor shot selection - his reaction? "I'd have got away with it if it hadn't hit my helmet, and that's the way I play". Contrast Michael Clark, who got out and said afterwards that he'd played a poor shot. KP simply never seems to admit that there's the slightest possibility that he might have got something wrong, and the arrogance that comes over as a result means people are always going to be quicker to turn on him.
Ashes player ratings - First Test 09:55am on 13 Jul 2009 Looking over the whole five days, there is to be honest very little to be positive about. On a fairly benign pitch the technique of the batsmen or their shot selection meant that had it not been for the tail wagging a bit we wouldn't have got close to a par score (450 on that pitch IMO) - the bowlers (and Strauss's captaincy of them!) then failed to at least restrict the scoring rate, never mind bowl Aus out; the batsmen then mostly failed again. Colly comes out with enormous credit for the way he applied himself with the bat - I'd give him a 7 or 8 - but the rest? Prior maybe a 6, but I think he's batting a place too high; KP a 5, and that's a huge disappointment as he could and should have got a big hundred in the first innings that could have seen us heading for 600 ourselves, the rest maybe 3s and 4s. Yes it was fantastic resistance from the likes of Anderson at the end, yes Swan got some good runs, but runs from the tail should be a bonus not a necessity to help save a game, and better bowling and captaincy should have made it not an issue.
Australia in a spin? 2:57pm on 29 Jun 2009 Moutarde (post 4) - are you suggesting that the Aussie selectors should have dropped Warne in order to encourage the others? If you are it sounds a bit odd, I'm sure anyone with a bowler like Warne at their disposal would be putting him in every time.

If however you're arguing that the Aussies should at least have shown a desire to play two spinners more often, that's a bit different. One issue though is once you get outside the subcontinent how many test matches are likely to be played on pitches where spin will be your main attacking weapon and not just on Days 4 and 5.

All of a sudden England look to hold the cards on the spin front, with 2-3 players showing signs of genuine test class albeit not in the class of the real top slow bowlers - but with a bit of help from the wicket they have the better options. The Aussies will be relying on their promising but a little inexperienced pace attack, England may be able to match them on that but the spinners might provide an extra edge. Will it be enough? I'd still say the Aussies are favourites, but without having all the bases covered in terms of spin, they are more vulnerable.
Old Firm departure would be ruinous 9:48pm on 21 Apr 2009 Firstly, to all of those saying that with access to the same resources the OF would easily break into the Big 4 - there is no guarantee. Look at Newcastle United - similar size stadium, similar support, last meaningful trophy 40 years in the past and more likely to be relegated this year.

OF might well be better than Champ standard, but European form etc indicates they're more likely to be battling for the UEFA spots than CL - top 10 sides at best without considerable investment. The perception down here is that it's a far easier game up there than down here - the comments about Chris Sutton where usually along the lines of "yeah, but anyone could score that many in Scotland". Not entirely fair, but when you've got SPL sides signing players from the bottom division in England (Jon Daly to Dundee Utd from my own team, to the bemusement of most Pools fans) a jaundiced view of the standard of the teams outside the OF is understandable.

Assuming it will happen in any case, which is exceedingly doubtful. Gartside (Bolton Chairman) is only proposing it as he wants to try and resurrect his idea from last season of having Prem 2; the lower clubs are all scared of being relegated having seen what's happened to the likes of Leeds, Charlton and Southampton, and some may think that it's better to have a second tier that they can then try and kick the ladder to the FL away from. By talking about inviting the OF he's gained a lot of publicity for the idea, but it's doubtful whether it will get beyond hot air.
I'm starting to miss plastic... 10:04am on 14 Aug 2008 The points about necessity and recyling are well made IMO, and in particular the one about the lack of joined-up thinking by the authorities. Where I currently am we have three wheelies - one for "rubbish", one for garden waste, one for cans/glass/paper/cardboard, and they get used (by us at least) extensively. However this has only happened in the last 18 months - before that we had much smaller boxes, cardboard wouldn't be taken etc. A few times we took stuff like that to the local waste reception centre, but given it's 8 miles away you felt it was somehow hardly green to make a 15 mile round trip in the car....

Local authorities vary - we're about to move to one where there are multiple bags and boxes again, and I suspect again they won't take cardboard.

I acknowledge that this is only part of the problem (companies need to think about making packaging recylable, cut down where they can, and individuals need to put a bit of effort in to actually sort stuff etc) but if councils make it straightforward to do then it's a lot more likely to happen.
Nappies: A messy situation 4:16pm on 07 Aug 2008 I have mixed feelings on this issue, but I do feel that some of the nappy evangelists on here don't always realise the arguments about cost etc are somewhat fallacious for many of us. It may be cheaper in the long run to use cloth nappies, but if you're talking about a £300 set-up cost, compared to maybe a tenner a week on disposables, many people will go for the disposables simply on the grounds that they haven't got the readies. This is also what keeps places like BrightHouse in business - people can't afford the up-front cost and ironically end up poorer in the long run.

Also, there is time (which isn't spent with the kids!) taken up with all the cleaning, washing and preparing, no matter how much you can argue it just becomes routine. They are in a way a labour-saving device, and unless nappy services can offer similar convenience there's little incentive for many people to switch.
Not the economy, stupid 11:58am on 18 Jun 2008 Just a thought, but maybe part of the reason for not talking about economic policy is that the Tories realise that there are factors that UK Government can't do too much about whoever is in charge, and therefore it might be better to say nothing, promise nothing, and therefore avoid some negative effects should they be in power and not be able to turn things around?

The two big economic issues of the moment seem to be the Credit Crunch and Energy (particularly Oil) costs - Global issues in other words that are quite difficult to divorce from the local effect on the UK Economy. If Cameron promises that things will be so much better and then discovers that due to Global Economic Factors that he can't deliver, he will get a kicking - if he stays silent on prospects, there's always a bit of a getout that he never said he could bring the UK unscathed through a Global crisis.... In the meantime the press headlines, rising fuel and other costs etc do the job for him in any case. Potentially it could be a smart political move by Cameron to say nothing.....

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