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Stuart Broad and James Anderson: 5-99. The rest of England’s frontline attack: 4-218. The extent to which England will rely on their two veteran quicks this series was exposed yesterday on Day 3 of the first Ashes Test.
Broad and Anderson were precise, clever and relentless, forcing the Australian batsmen to toil despite the lack of assistance from a sleepy surface.
While that pair was suffocating, the moment either of them left the attack the batsmen could breathe freely once more. Never was that more obvious than in the first hour after lunch yesterday when Steve Smith and Pat Cummins swung the Test in Australia’s favour.
Prior to lunch, Broad and Anderson had looked supreme with the new ball, dismissing wicketkeeper Tim Paine and late-order slugger Mitchell Starc in quick succession. At 7-213 at lunch and with the second new ball only eight overs old, Australia were at risk of handing England a significant lead.
After the break English skipper Joe Root made the odd decision of using Jake Ball, Chris Woakes and Moeen Ali before Broad or Anderson. Ball’s pitch map during this spell looked like the face of a freckled child.
The tall right-armer, who has averaged a whopping 102 with the ball in his four Tests, has decent pace and the ability to get the ball to rear sharply at batsmen. But he can maintain neither that pace nor a testing line and length. On the evidence of his brief career, Ball looks a long way short of Test standard.
(AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)
Woakes, at the other end, was accurate but toothless, as he so often is outside of England. History shows that when the ball doesn’t swing or seam, Woakes labours. His bowling record away from home is very poor – nine wickets from eight Tests at an average of 64.
So too is Moeen’s – an average of 45 from 17 Tests outside England. Australian spinner Nathan Lyon was easily his side’s best bowler in the first innings, maintaining an impeccable line and length while earning disconcerting turn and bounce.
Yet Moeen struggled despite being granted the most favourable conditions a spinner could ever hope for in Australia. He dismissed rank tail-ender Josh Hazlewood and the worst batsman against spin from either team, Usman Khawaja.
In between, however, Moeen was impotent. Australia’s number nine, Pat Cummins, looked immensely comfortable against Moeen, Ball and Woakes during this pivotal hour. By the end of that period, when Broad belatedly came back on, Cummins was entrenched on 28 not out from 77 balls, and he and Smith had put on 48 invaluable runs.
England’s reliance on Broad and Anderson when playing away from home is similar to the way Australia lean heavily on batting contributions from Smith and David Warner. Yesterday it was Smith who rescued Australia for the umpteenth time in his career.
(AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)
Accustomed to flaying attacks in Australia, where he has a sprightly strike rate of 60, Smith shackled his ego and constructed a slow, bloody-minded knock. It was the kind of innings we rarely see in the modern Test era, when so many batsmen are preoccupied with acceleration.
Smith has many speeds to his batting and yesterday he sat in first gear for most of his innings. He was completely unflustered by some quirky tactics by England. Root set some truly bizarre fields. At times to Smith, Root had no mid-off, a leg-side ring field and three men out in the deep behind that ring as his quicks buffeted the Australian with short balls.
When that didn’t work he introduced a leg slip and asked his quicks to bowl fuller. Then the leg slip was replaced by a silly mid-off as England’s pacemen went short once more. While these tactics never looked like securing Smith’s wicket, they did reduce his scoring avenues.
England were hoping he would lose patience and, while many other Australian batsmen would have, Smith remained serene. He scored just 17 runs in the first session yet never appeared bothered. Smith gradually increased his scoring rate as he built one of the finest Ashes tons of the modern era.
(Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)
Smith’s masterpiece of 141 not out handed Australia a crucial 26-run lead. Before England could wipe away that advantage they had already lost veteran opener Alastair Cook and newcomer James Vince. Cook skied a hook shot to fine leg from the bowling of Josh Hazlewood, continuing his wretched run in Ashes Tests.
Cook will long be remembered for his phenomenal series during England’s Ashes victory in Australia seven years ago, when he churned out 766 runs at 128. Yet the former English skipper has floundered in his six other Ashes campaigns, averaging a meagre 27 across those series.
Given their top five includes the inexperienced trio of Mark Stoneman, James Vince and Dawid Malan, England will be desperate for Cook to banish his Ashes demons and contribute in this series.
After struggling for rhythm in England’s first innings Australia’s quicks were rapid and intimidating before stumps yesterday. Root was struck a fearful blow by a searing Starc bouncer which dislodged part of his helmet and forced a long break in the play as the batsman received medical attention.
Then Cummins roughed up Stoneman with a succession of vicious short balls. By stumps the whole mood of the series had shifted dramatically. England, so comfortable for the first two and a half days of this Ashes, were suddenly rattled.