Sachin Tendulker just became the first man to score a ODI Double-ton.

Even more impressive when you find out it was against South Africa and not a minnow nation. 140 odd balls as well.

And who said ODIs were dead?

Watching the cricket in Nuxland...

New Zealand actually look like a competent cricket side. Great crowd at the Basin as well, wish I was there

Clarke doing well on a very SCG type pitch...

Jeffles you didn't make it over for the Test Matches like myself...

well done pup...discovered another way to give Lara the finger.

Some things conspired against me. My mate from Wellington moved to Sydney and another mate is in town from the UK.

New plan is England and Portugal in August.

So Zimbabwe beat us in a T20 warm up fixture. Great!

Good news though, Brett Lee injured himself again, and therefore we won't feel like we are required to play him, just because he is in the squad.

Ryan Harris in. The rest of the Aussie team probably threatened a boycott if Dougie was picked

Why is Lee still there in the first place? Taxi...

For some stupid reason he was given a Cricket Australia contract over some other players such as Nathan Bracken. TBH I think it must purely be sponsors $$$$ keeping him around.

The treatment of John Howard by the ICC is rotten. Normally the politics behind a sport don't stop me from supporting it but these bastards at the BCCI are making me come close to breaking that rule.

Well that was a depressing couple of Tests in India. India fully deserve their No. 1 ranking and Australia drops to No. 5 in the world!

In general this is a pretty ordinary team. Ponting is consistent as a batsman without being spectacular, but falls well short of his predecessors as a captain. Just doesn't seem to have a 'feel' for the game. Watson is really coming on as a batsman, but his bowling is dropping off. With such thin bowling stocks at the moment, is this a good idea? Despite his good form opening I would drop him down into the middle order which should free him up to bowl a bit more. Katich scratched around a bit - no real problems there. Clarke is in all sorts of bother at the moment. That dismissal in the second innings of the second Test showed a complete lack of awareness of where his crease was - a real worry for the man annointed as the next captain. Hussey and North in the middle order - this is the biggest problem for the team in my view. Neither should be in the team - if we're going to excuse poor performances, then at least let's put a couple of young batsman in who are going to develop. Both Hussey and North have had their chances - Hussey's time has gone and North has not been up to the challenge. Payne went well as a stand-in for Haddin. Haddin will come back into the team when fully fit, but Payne seems to have locked in the wicketkeeping job when Haddin retires (or loses form). The bowling department lacks a leader. Johnson appears to have been pushed into that role but I don't think he's up to it quite frankly. Hilfenhaus was probably the pick of the bunch, but that's not saying much. The phrase "bowled well without luck" was thrown around by commentators a lot - my view is that really good bowlers make their own luck. Not sure what to do with the spinners job. Hauritz clearly isn't up to it. Lacks the confidence both of himself and his captain. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any alternative ready to step in at the moment. Do you persist with him because you want a spinner no matter what, or put another quickie in who's better? I think we got so used to Warne being an automatic pick we just assume we should always have a spinner in the team. While that would be nice I would rather just pipck the four best bowlers and be done with it.

I'm sure they'll play better back home, but I'm very nervous about the Ashes.

What worries me about the Ashes more is the lack of warm up. ODIs against Sri Lanka after Test matches in India. Some first-class cricket in Australia wouldn't go astry Mr Sutherland.

No money to be made in warm up games. Good preparation takes a clear back seat to maximising revenue. Just ask Mike Hussey...

They always seem to find time to make some stupid tv ads though.

Also the days of considering Watson as an All Rounder are pretty much gone, his body struggles big time to keep up with his current workload, let alone making him a genuine Test Match bowler as well. Sure an over here or there to fill in some overs if he's feeling good, and can do the 4 overs in a T20 but not much more. It could be debatable if he's worth the cost of the two physios it pretty much takes to keep him running.
I agree Mike Hussey must be running out of time, he seriously has to be out of credits by now. His last Test century was against the Paki's in Sydney, and well its quite possible that any member of this forum could have probably scored a century against them after the recent revelations.

The test rankings are a little crap, Sri Lanka aren't the 3rd best test team, expect them to start dropping like a brick now that Mulari can't spin them to victory on home soil. We aren't the best anymore, that is clear, but we should be in a 3 battle/way tie with England and South Africa.