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No excuses here, Australia have been too good

20th December, 2017
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England wasn't good enough – but Australia was a cut above. (AAP Image/Dave Hunt)
Expert
20th December, 2017
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Reading some of the reaction to England’s defeat in the Ashes, you could be forgiven for thinking they had committed a serious crime.

As ever, at the top of the scale there’s been the usual knee-jerk nonsense: ‘they’ve got no pride’, ‘gutless’, ‘no passion’, ‘incompetent’, ‘they should all be dropped’ – in fact any team losing in any sport anywhere in the world seems to produce the same reactions.

After this, on the tier below and with a slightly less hysterical slant, there’s the inevitable finger-pointing at the system: ‘too much four-day cricket’, ‘not enough four-day cricket’, ‘green pitches’, ‘Twenty20’, ‘average selections’, ‘ineffective academies’ and so on.

Then you get those who lament the competitiveness of teams playing away from home, a trend that shows no sign of abating as the schedules get ever more squeezed and priorities face differing demands on their time.

And once you’ve waded through the noise and clutter and if you’re lucky to find someone with a touch of perspective, you might find those who simply state that Australia were on a different level.

There is room for debate, as there should and always will be, but no manner of annoyance, vitriol spouting and excuse delivering will hide this all too apparent fact.

(Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)

England were in the game at certain stages of all three Tests, but when it came to the pivotal situations – Australia seven wickets down in their first innings and a good few behind in Brisbane, England four down and 170 shy of their target in Adelaide, Dawid Malan and Jonny Bairstow going strong at 4/368 at the WACA – they were found wanting, and that is how contests are decided.

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A few individuals – in the aforementioned duo and Malan especially and at times Mark Stoneman, James Vince, Craig Overton and Jimmy Anderson – have stood up, but spasmodic contributions do not consistent victories accrue and therein lies the rub.

And when you have players like Alastair Cook, Stuart Broad and Moeen Ali contributing next to nothing your position becomes even weaker.

When there is a need to force the issue and make an advantage work in your favour you need more from the majority, and that wasn’t forthcoming. The result, as was shown, is games sliding away from you with little chance of what has been squandered being clawed back.

Hence an unforeseen and ultimately decisive lead being constructed by Steve Smith at the Gabba and the England middle and lower orders being snuffed out in Adelaide and again in Perth – Australia managing exactly what England could not, to put it bluntly.

With a batsman at the peak of his powers – Smith and Virat Kohli are putting daylight between themselves and the rest – solid contributions from the supporting cast and a highly effective and ruthlessly efficient seam attack, not to mention a spinner allowed to operate as he wished, the hosts applied pressure where it would be most keenly felt.

(AAP Image/Dave Hunt)

Play on the fact the tourists did not have the pace to make significant inroads on good surfaces, a spinner able to hold an end up and a tail susceptible to a high-speed, short-pitched mode of operation – show me a tail which isn’t? – and go from there.

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Once England were six down the groundstaff might as well have started the roller given the speed with which the end of the innings arrived, and on only one occasion, in the second innings of the second Test, did the England seamers have their own way, and that was after a poor showing first up.

The contrast has been very clear, and it is one that was deliberately orchestrated, with the Australian hierarchy making no secret that they wanted their seamers to work at the high end of the speed spectrum.

It was a good plan well thought out and delivered as per the specification, the outcome being a final two Tests with little resting on them apart from the reputations of a few of the England stalwarts.

If you’re going to make predictions, then it only seems right that they are revisited once the game is over, and my 3-2 to England hasn’t aged particularly favourably.

No excuses coming from where I sit, though; Australia have been just too good.

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