In recent times, England have been fun to watch.
A combination of the great talent at their disposal and their admirably consistent inconsistency, there are few more watchable teams in the world – you’re rarely bored by this England team in any format.
Here are 48 moments from the recently completed men’s international summer that either made you laugh, had you scratch your head out or watch on with glee:
1. Picking a 55-man super squad at the start of the summer yet still leaving out two of the three leading run-scorers in last year’s Division One
2. James Bracey nearly forcing his way into the Test side with his runs in England’s intra-squad friendly
3. Stuart Broad, England’s second-leading wicket-taker of all-time, being left out for the first Test of the summer
4. Ben Stokes forgetting social distancing protocols at the first toss of the summer
5. After waiting five months for the return of Test cricket, Dom Sibley almost immediately leaves a straight one
6. That Stuart Broad interview
7. Jofra Archer’s Twitter spat with Tino Best
8. Blackwood continuing his surprisingly brilliant record against England with a match-winning fourth innings 95 that wasn’t even that good
9. Jofra Archer had to miss a Test match for popping home for an hour. Imagine saying that in 2019
10. Ben Stokes still including this six in his slowest ever Test hundred
11. Rory Burns making Roston Chase look like Ravi Ashwin, not for the first time
12. Jos Buttler opening the batting with Ben Stokes in a Test match
13. Stuart Broad becoming quite good at batting again by modelling his technique on… Shane Warne
14. Rahkeem Cornwall wearing loads of hats
15. Ireland’s Player of the Series being a 21-year-old debutant who’s never actually played cricket in Ireland
16. James Vince briefly having England’s best ever ODI bowling average
17. Ireland, the 11th ranked side in the world, hitting the highest ODI score of the summer
18. David Willey, England’s Player of the Series against Ireland, losing his place in the squad
19. Shan Masood scoring more runs in one knock than in his eight previous innings against England
20. Mohammad Abbas’ magical ball to Stokes…
21. Despite being unavailable to bowl at the start of the Test, Stokes still taking two crucial wickets in Pakistan’s second innings
22. That Chris Woakes-Jos Buttler stand
23. Jofra Archer taking 4-86 yet still copping flak for his performance
24. Fawad Alam’s stance
25. Fawad Alam registering a duck in his first Test innings in 11 years
26. Dom Sibley becoming Jonty Rhodes for a game
27. Bad light…
28. Azhar Ali, previously a leggie, bowling the perfect away swinger with the last ball of the second Test
29. Mohammad Hafeez breaking the bio secure bubble by taking a photograph with a woman in her 90s
30. Zak Crawley going into the final Test of the summer in danger of his first-class average dipping below 30…and ending up surpassing Sachin
31. Dom Sibley’s ‘leg-spin’ making an appearance in a Test match
32. All the drops off Jimmy as he approached 600
33. Anderson, at 38, still bowling as well as he ever has
34. Stuart Broad, after enjoying arguably the best home summer of his career, taking pop at a journalist on Twitter
35. Azhar Ali’s collaboration with Jay from the Inbetweeners
36. Mohammad Hafeez being 39 and somehow still getting better
37. Pakistan not playing Haider Ali until the final game of the tour
38. Dawid Malan becoming the No. 1 ranked T20I batsman in the world but might not be in England’s first choice side
39. Australia being 98-0 in 11th over chasing 163…and losing
40. England celebrate a win by doing the ‘Penguin’
41. Alex Carey batting at six, then at three before getting dropped in the T20I series
42. Matthew Wade only facing nine balls this summer but still playing its best shot
43. Josh Hazlewood making a mockery of his 2019 World Cup omission
44. England being 148-9 and Australia being 144-2 in the same game… yet England winning by 24 runs
45. England losing two wickets off the first two balls of the game, managing to post a 300-plus score, having Australia 73-5 and then losing
46. Maxwell playing one of the innings of his career and still nearly cost Australia the game
47. Eoin Morgan having one of his great captaincy performances one game and then having people call for his head the next
