1. Congratulations to the West Indies. I would love to see the Windies return to (somewhere near) their former glory, so I hope this is a step towards them harnessing some of the raw talent that is undoubtedly available. Good young players keep coming through their system, but a lot of them do silly things under pressure (Devon Smith is a good example).
2. This has been an awful series. Test cricket has been like this in the past, but very rarely at any point over the last decade have there been such tedious encounters. Nothing will kill the game quicker than these kinds of wickets.
3. If England are going to send teams to places where they will struggle to take 20 wickets, they have to take their best wicket keeper and give him a game. Prior may have scored a century, but every time someone drops Chanderpaul, Gayle or Sarwan on this kind of wicket, they actually owe the team a century.
4. Shah put in a fairly dismal performance after replacing Bell. He scored well below 10% of total England runs in his three appearances. There is now a Vaughan-shaped hole in the England batting order.
5. I like Strauss and I'm pleased that the captaincy has focused his mind on his own batting technique, but his decision to support Monty on the second referral this evening doesn't suggest he can keep a cool head in a crisis.
6. Monty needs seriously taking aside and being taught how to "work" an umpire. That is half the spinner's art.
7. There isn't much evidence yet that it's worth England turning up for the contest with Australia.

Please send Dewsburian's post to the ECB. Bordering on brilliant.

Fabulous stuff Dewsburian. Nail. Head. Hit.

This Test series has been a horrible experience, I feel for the poor sods who paid thousands of pounds, for maybe their only overseas England tour, and had to watch that mess.

Test cricket doesn't need to worry about being killed of by T20, it's committing public, televised, suicide by turning out those kinds of wickets.

It certainly does seem as though Vaughan is beginning to look like a viable option at 3 should he score runs for Yorkshire. However if he carries on like he did last year on the county circuit the point is moot.

The Ashes appear to be coming at just the wrong time. A total humiliation is on the cards right now.

I think a decade in the cricketing wilderness, starting with this defeat, may be the cricketing gods pouring out their wrath upon the ECB for selling it's soul to the Devil (Stanford).

The ECB deserved such punishment the moment a fraudulent Texan billionaire, who openly admitted to disliking Test cricket, was allowed to fly a helicopter into Lords with a perspex box full of cash and rent the England cricket team.

I think its only fair that I repeat myself with regard`s to Joe`s post.

Please send Joe`s post to the ECB. Bordering on brilliant.

I find it difficult to agree that MV is the most likely "shoe-in" to replace Bell/Shah in the England batting line up. Given the way he has batted for the last couple of years I think that there are several more deserving of a place.

If he can score meaningful runs in the CC for the Yorkshire cause, then fair enough. If not, he should consider retirement.

What else does Bopara have to do to start at number 3 in the summer tests?

Vaughan has scored no runs for ages, Bell has still got the same problem in that just as he looks to be 'in' he soon becomes 'out' and Shah is the new Ramps in that he looks to be like a rabbit in the headlights at Test level and nerves get the better of him.

We will never win another Test series with Prior as wicket keeper. Never ever. His incompetence with the gloves reached new (world record) heights in this match. There must be 10, maybe 20, better keepers in the country. I think we have at least 3 Yorkshire players who are better. His chum Moore's has gone, he should follow.

Whilst I'm not sure about Prior I dont think one should count the byes in the last game against him. A significant number of said byes should have been given as wides as it would have taken Superman behind the stumps to stop them

Sorry forgot to add ... TC's opinion that Shah is the new Ramps is totally correct. The guy will score thousands of runs in thew championship ... & end up playing 30-40 tests over a number of years without much success.

So lets put money on him crossing the river to the Oval and lining himself up for the next series of Strictly Come Dancing on Ice in the Jungle

dpressed - agreed about (some of) the byes. But when he drops the ball that goes straight to his gloves I find that unforgivable. I watched Brophy keep many many times last season and only saw him do it a few times. Prior does it seemingly every bloody over!

Cant totally agree with that YC ... I remember some Yorks members used to moan about a former Yorks keeper not taking the ball cleanly as he also used to drop balls that went straight through to him. But when it mattered (i.e. the batsman touched the ball) the former keeper almost always took the catch ... in fact the odd 'drop' was a topic of discusion on because it was so rare .... the keeper's name ... Richard Blakey ... someone we've never really replaced.

I think it's Trescothick for number three. Ashes being the most important date in the calendar, I don't care if he's not available next winter.

its a good shout K1 but I don't think he would come back if asked

by the time we have muddled through for another year, rudolph may be available, unless his recent comments in SA are accurate about possibly going back to play for the Saffers after all - does this not jeapordise his Kolpak status and make it tricky for us to play him?

The Telegraph player ratings

Link to ratings

All he has to do is produce ON the field

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/cricket/fletcher-vaughan-can-solve-englands-batting-problem-1643348.html

Yhe critiscism of Shah is totally out of proportion to his undoubted ability.
After two below par performances,he is instantly dubbed the new Ramps,which tells uds quite alot of the predujices that exist around here.
Ramps incidentally averaged over 42 in Tests against Australia,and if Shah can match that figure he'll not be doing too bad.
The man deserves another chance which he'll get and eventually prove his talent.
All talk of Vaughan returning is far too premature and without foundation.

is the wrong side of thirty and has now played 10 innings for England in test matches. He averages only 26.9. This is not the kind of form that normally gets you retained in the test team. Rob Key will attest to this.

Shah played in the England U17 team with Usman Afzaal who had his senior England chance some years ago and failed to seize it. The same team contained Andrew Flintoff and Gareth Batty, who are probably at the peak of their careers, but also our own Paul Hutchison, Richard Wilkinson and Alex Morris, all of whom are long gone from county cricket.

If the next England coach opts to look to the future, it's fair to assume that this is not the generation he'll be turning to.