Ugh! Only a few more precious days until the bloody football starts again.

[Ash]

I'm struggling to remember the last time we successfully batted to save a test. Cardiff in 2009? We must have done more recently than that, surely?

Mind you, I think batting to save matches is a dying art.

Was that The Panesar Innings?

[Burney]

Was that The Panesar Innings?

That's the one.

[Ash]

Mind you, the prospect of watching Smith bat endlessly for four more tests makes me think I might not bother with the rest of the series.

He's the reincarnation of Donald Bradman apparently. Anyway, proper technique is for people who don't have the ability to slow down time.

[Burney]

It's OK - the lads have been practicing their range hitting this morning

If it's not on the line of the stumps I want every single ball left alone. Also, we should just run down the pitch at the seamers and pad everything away. No way are you getting out lbw if you're 3 strides down.

Oddly enough, I think the best advice anyone could give Jason Roy right now is to play as he would in 50 over match. Watching him try to bat the way he thinks a test batsmen should is painful.

[Burney]

He's the reincarnation of Donald Bradman apparently. Anyway, proper technique is for people who don't have the ability to slow down time.

By all accounts, Bradman was pretty dreary to watch as well.

But no. Dreary batsmen I can live with - even ugly ones like Smith or Chanderpaul. But there's an almost wilful lack of elegance and an unnecessary, awkward ungainliness to Smith's batting that I find genuinely offensive to watch.

[Pokster]

It's OK - the lads have been practicing their range hitting this morning

If it's not on the line of the stumps I want every single ball left alone. Also, we should just run down the pitch at the seamers and pad everything away. No way are you getting out lbw if you're 3 strides down.

With the umpiring in this match, yes you will

[Ash]

By all accounts, Bradman was pretty dreary to watch as well.

But no. Dreary batsmen I can live with - even ugly ones like Smith or Chanderpaul. But there's an almost wilful lack of elegance and an unnecessary, awkward ungainliness to Smith's batting that I find genuinely offensive to watch.

Surely it goes without saying that if you're going to hit a big score consistently, the best way to do this to only go after the bad balls. Those that, as a certain Yorkshire-man might say, are asking to be hit.

There something I like about he way he sometimes points his stick at the bowler though after his shot though, as if part of a magical ritual.

[Burney]

Surely it goes without saying that if you're going to hit a big score consistently, the best way to do this to only go after the bad balls. Those that, as a certain Yorkshire-man might say, are asking to be hit.

There something I like about he way he sometimes points his stick at the bowler though after his shot though, as if part of a magical ritual.

Of course. But there are ways of hitting the bad balls that are pleasant to watch. Nothing Smith does is pleasant to watch.