Australian all-rounder Mitch Marsh last night ripped through England’s middle order with a sensational display of swing bowling on day one of the fifth Ashes Test at The Oval.
The Australian selectors copped widespread criticism, including from yours truly, for selecting Marsh who had averaged ten with the bat and 59 with the ball in his previous six Tests.
Then Marsh started swinging the Dukes ball in both directions, making a fool of the English batsmen and his legion of critics.
England were well placed at 2-130 when the burly West Australian made his first breakthrough with a top-edged pull shot from Ben Stokes.
But the real carnage unfolded after tea as Marsh conjured a stunning spell. First he bowled a succession of out swingers to Jonny Bairstow before getting a yorker to tail back into to the keeper-batsman, trapping him plumb LBW.
Then he coaxed Sam Curran into driving at a wide sucker ball, earning an edge to second slip. Marsh followed that up by directing another in-swinging yorker at the front foot of Chris Woakes, who also was adjudged LBW. Just like that he had taken 3-11 in this burst of high-class swing bowling.
Earlier, uncharacteristic sloppiness in the field hurt Australia after captain Tim Paine’s unexpected choice to bowl first on a fairly benign pitch.
Mitch Marsh (AAP Image/David Mariuz)
The tourists have been excellent in the field across this series but were woeful last night, dropping England captain Joe Root three times.
The Oval is known as the flattest Test deck in England so it was a risk by Paine to opt to bowl first.
It seemed to be a particularly odd decision in light of Australia having flagged concerns about the workloads of their bowlers in recent days.
Not to mention the fact Australia have been a vastly weaker Test team when bowling first in away matches in recent years. In the past five years Australia have won just 22 per cent of away Tests when bowling first compared to 54 per cent when batting first.
The Aussie bowlers could have been forgiven for being grumpy with Paine’s decision. They must have been fuming when their teammate s then let them down badly in the field.
The first culprit was Peter Siddle, who himself has been tremendously unlucky with misfields this series, having had five catches dropped off his bowling.
In the 21th over, Root aimed a lazy pull shot at a short ball from Pat Cummins and skied the ball to deep square leg. Somehow, Siddle turfed the most elementary of chances.
Two overs later Root nicked a beautiful delivery from Cummins only for Paine to grope at it one handed and put it down, continuing his ordinary series behind the stumps.
Only three overs after that the Englishman got a third slice of fortune. Root flashed at a wide, full delivery from Siddle and it flew to the right of second slip Steve Smith who dived but couldn’t clutch on to this hot chance.
The fact that Australia, despite these errors, managed to keep England’s batting line-up in check was a testament to their attack. The typically precise Peter Siddle lacked control. But otherwise Australia were terrific with the ball once more.
Cummins continued his astonishing Ashes, tormenting the home batsmen with both relentless accuracy and nasty short balls. Josh Hazlewood, meanwhile, built suffocating pressure just as he’s done all series.
Upstaging them all, though, was the uber-maligned all-rounder from the West. Marsh was superb.
G Torre
Guest
Seriously though, stranger things have happened. I remember Saeed Anwar got a bunch of ducks in his first six test innings. 5 from 6 or something crazy like that, and then he turned into an absolute superstar opener.
G Torre
Guest
Maybe M. Marsh is an England specialist (like Praveen Kumar!). Throw him a Duke and he goes OK.
TheGeneral
Roar Rookie
Pierro, My last post, thanks for the kind thoughts and as I said have enjoyed our little discussions. Yes now looking forward to the tests in Nov/Dec. All the best.
Pierro
Roar Rookie
tend to agree U but flintoff really excelled in ashes more than anywhere else , he was huge in one of the series wins at hime
Pierro
Roar Rookie
I Liked him, he had some discipline issues on one tour from memory, hit the bottle a bit but a very good talent , you never know what gets inside the selectors heads as well as they have some favorites don't they
Pierro
Roar Rookie
General, actually a shame to see you go , I was really getting to know your mind a bit more by the end of our posting and wish you well. I will take a break shortly too. I feel the australian wickets/matches are a little more straightforward with drop in pitches this summer. We should return to winning ways with our pace bowlers having some brilliance about them. You definitely validated many of your thoughts even if we had many opposing views and always happy to read passionate views. Hope to see you online after a rest from it all in late november even if less so mate. Was a tough last test for us all to watch really and we can definitely chalk a lot of it up to poor batting from the usual culprits as I think you indicated and now some bowler fatigue I think. All the best general, ill be taking a bit of break until november/decemeber too mate, feel free to drop me a note then however brief and if you happen to be at a test match in the future please allow me to by you a beer or drink and have a laugh over all the passion for our team.
HR
Roar Rookie
Sounds about right. There are also those reviews not taken that would have been out... :angry:
TheGeneral
Roar Rookie
Jero, Keep enjoying the game. I have enjoyed our banter, and go Aussies.
Jero
Roar Rookie
Enjoy the game wherever you are, General. Nothing wrong with wearing your heart on your sleeve either.
TheGeneral
Roar Rookie
Pierro, I hope you keep up your learned knowledge of our game. We have differed on many topics, but I have enjoyed our many posts. I have decided to leave this site and just enjoy the cricket, without getting too worked up about it. I think I am getting too thin skinned for some of the comments that have come my way. Being melodramatic I know, but that is how I feel.
Jero
Roar Rookie
It’s got me thinking of what we mean by “gut call”. If thinking with your head means evaluating all the best available data and making the decision, a gut call seems to be disregarding the data and going with what you want to happen. Not unlike the “thought” process that yields a 0 from 11 DRS review record across the series.
Waxhead
Roar Rookie
@Ronan Why humble pie? So what - M Marsh finally got lucky and most of his scalps were lower order batsman. 1 lucky bowling event doesn't change anything. He'll need another 10 of these before anyone should alter opinions. He failed in 1st innings batting as expected when the luck ran out.
HR
Roar Rookie
Mind you it's not looking like a great decision at the moment...
Pierro
Roar Rookie
Wade and marsh please make runs! Wouldn't be my go tos usually with bat but this is a flat wicket for me. they can do it if they don't play wildly
Pierro
Roar Rookie
Right now living in reality of the side, happy for paine or wade to come up , give warner a chance to get out of the archer and broads new ball headlights. Its not working . Lyon might survive more at the top as a comical note thats how bad this is . Ive never seen such poor opening in england which is why Im reactionary with order reshuffles . In australia I wouldn’t touch the order, in time you’ll note how different I am with australian selection and firmly agreeing with you on holding the order back home
Pierro
Roar Rookie
Hey I'm not sold on usi getting us further than 50 with labs opening but it is way better to take that shine off the ball here at the oval. Id take 50 for 1 in a heartbeat jeff. Highest average opening of 13 three all series its just so poor it wasn't working repeatedly. Its why I tell you, the first class averages/shield are not the answer in england they need to be malleable not to mention as we both agreed sticks to the same openers with bancroft if warner didn't go until 4th test.
Jeff
Roar Rookie
yes, but but, UK's 40 was on the back of getting dropped on 13, he just got another chance to get out after making another 27. I'm not sold on UK. I think there is merit in dropping Warner down the order. But I'd only do it on the basis of Paine or Wade, maybe Marsh slotting in as opener.
Pierro
Roar Rookie
Averages of 9 jeff both of them now. they had to go , it is now just ridiculously unfair on head and khawaka with triple and double the averages. Getting marsh in depended on the order reshuffle for me , now we are under pressure. No excuses for the openers. As usual labs and smith opening , I only wanted the best for australia mate. Im genuinely upset on the openers failure not so angry just it didn’t have to be like this . Usi has scored a 40 and a 32 . Could have been a huge platform. Labs has scored 48 here again opening. No problems in the slot in england. I can only hope warner finds his second innings form 2015. They should drop him down the list second innings and go for some sort of elevation
Jeff
Roar Rookie
Yes. But no guarantee the other two would do much better. They were dropped for a reason. Jury is probably out on Head, he may have done better, but doubtful as an opener, but Usman has a near-decade of poor results overseas, UAE excepted. Maybe Usman would have scored an extra 10 to 20, though that's not really that material. The selectors rolled the dice and it is what it is. Maybe would have been better, maybe not. The gutsy move would have been Paine to open, exploiting his defensive technique, but that's probably too big a change to make. Let's see how Wade and Marsh go.
Pierro
Roar Rookie
Well am in USA so woke one hour late and dissapointed to see the openers do what I thought they would jeff. Just all too predictable which Is why I wanted khawaja and Head in for the shambles of those two openers