'Can't get cocky': Don't underestimate England

Australia have thumped England in the first Test of The Ashes by nine wickets.

The match was largely dominated by Australia as their attack was on point and their batting line-up didn’t disappoint. They had many things to cheer about, like the Travis Head century, the first ball dismissal or even Nathan Lyon’s 400th Test wicket.

On the flip side, the visitors had almost nothing to be proud of as they were simply being defeated and outworked by Australia in all departments.

The Aussies’ dominance began on the very first ball on day one when Rory Burns had his leg stumped knocked over by Mitchell Starc. The rest of the batting order followed suit as England were all out by tea, before rain cancelled the rest of the day’s play.

A low total of 147 was certainly not the start the English were after and Australia took advantage of this as they posted a magnificent 425 runs, including a brilliant 152 from Head. This gave them a 278-run lead, which put them in the driver’s seat, and many were saying things would be wrapped up by day 3.

The duo of Joe Root and Dawid Malan started to turn things around for their team as they batted through most of day 3 and finished the day both in the 80s not out.

England started to believe they had hope as they were only trailing by 50 with eight wickets in hand. Their hopes were dashed the very next morning as the Australian bowlers clicked into gear and bowled England out by lunch.

When we take an overview of England’s performance, you can feed them with all the excuses you want but their batting collapses were what stopped them having a chance to defend a good total. Their second innings batting performance was not one of the worst, however, the first innings was the one that really killed them.

Nobody stood up and became a leader as the top scorer was Jos Butler, who didn’t even reach 40. The man who everyone thought would get his team back on track after the early wickets was captain Joe Root, who was gone for a duck, however, was the best of the English batters in the second innings as he scored 89.

Root’s history in Australia is not pleasant as he averages more runs in every other country he’s played in. If he can put his past behind him and play to his full potential, then England would have a much larger chance as it can also spread confidence into the rest of the team.

Australia cannot start counting their chickens by any means, because when England are at the top of their game, they are the best in the world and quite unstoppable. Plus, let’s not forget that their top bowlers – Stuart Broad and James Anderson – will be active for the Adelaide Test and could do the same damage to the Australian batting line-up that was done to their own.

For Australia’s sake, they can’t get cocky right now, otherwise we could see an England blitz incoming.