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The third Ashes Test might only be a day old, but it already looks set to be defined by its fresh faces, with two men in particular setting the tone for their respective teams.
For England, it was Mark Wood; overlooked first due to conditions and then injury for the first two Tests of the series, the hosts’ quickest bowler feasted on a pacy Leeds track to stamp his return to the XI with a five-wicket haul, a scintillating burst to start the final session skittling the Australian lower order and turning a tea score of 5/240 into 263 all out.
But it wouldn’t be Wood whose heroics would define the day, but rather Mitchell Marsh, the recalled all-rounder unleashing an extraordinary blitzkrieg with a third and finest Test century to rescue Australia from the brink of collapse.
Reprieved on 12 when Joe Root shelled a simple chance at first slip – one of two regulation catches the England star put down on another dire day for the home side in the field – the Western Australian bludgeoned 17 fours and four sixes in his first Test since the 2019 Ashes, making good on his last-minute call-up for a sore Cameron Green in the most emphatic way possible.
Contributing 118 off 118 balls as part of a 155-run partnership for the fifth wicket with Travis Head, such was Marsh’s onslaught that Australia’s resident dasher could only play second fiddle throughout.
Then, to cap off the much-maligned all-rounder’s finest day in Australian colours, he struck late with the ball to remove a set Zak Crawley for 33, to add to Pat Cummins’ twin early scalps and leave England 3/68 at stumps and still 195 runs behind, with the match poised on a knife’s edge.
Speaking after play, a delighted Wood praised captain Ben Stokes’ use of him in bursts throughout the day for his perpetual ferocity, in similar style to Mitchell Johnson’s famous carnage-filled spells during the 2013/14 Ashes.
“Stokesy knows me well – he was very clear before the game that it would be short sharp spells, give it everything for three or four overs,” Wood said.
“That was amazing, a great feeling to get five wickets for the first time in front of my mum and dad. That was a lovely moment to see them in the stand.
“This is a must-win game, so we’ve got to back it up.
“Movement was the key [to my wickets]… all of them looked like hitting the stumps, sometimes if we went too full it slid on, so we were trying to bash the one [length] that hits the top of the stumps, then go full.”
For all Wood’s brilliance with the ball – his first spell recorded as the second-fastest by an Englishman since ball-tracking records were kept, and seemingly only building in pace from there – he had least had the support of Chris Woakes, who likewise vindicated his inclusion for his first Test since early 2022 with the vital wickets of Marnus Labuschagne, Head and Marsh, while both Root drops came off the right-armer’s incisive seam bowling.
“They haven’t said that and we as a group don’t feel they need to,” Wood said about Bairstow and Root having to make up for their fielding errors with runs. “Obviously they work really hard in training. We see that work that they put in.
“Of course it’s disappointing when catches go down but it can’t be helped, as soon as they go down, you move on. Head and Marsh, they would have been big wickets at the time, they know that, they accept that, they’re international sportsmen, but we know how it goes.”
Marsh’s mayhem stood as a lone hand, with Head’s 39 the next-highest score and only other above 25 (the 23 extras added to the total ending as the third-highest tally).
If Australia go on to win the Test and retain the urn, it will be an innings etched into Ashes folklore. It might be there already.
With the visitors sent in under cloudy skies after Cummins lost a third consecutive toss, an imperious David Warner start, on-driving nemesis Stuart Broad for four down the ground off the match’s first ball, would soon come unstuck.
The veteran wouldn’t last the over out before falling to Broad for a 16th time in Tests; flashing outside off to a ball he could have well left alone, a thick edge was safely pouched by Crawley at second slip.
But with Usman Khawaja and Labuschagne settling in to restore order, it would be Wood’s inclusion that would rattle Australia more than Broad’s early blow.
Beating two of the world’s best batters repeatedly with pure pace and helped by a far spicier pitch than the flat offerings for the first two Tests of this series, the only runs on offer were those from when Wood strayed too short, the ball pinging well over Bairstow’s head and into the boundary for four byes, taking out a neon advertising sign in the process.
Reaching 155 kilometres per hour with speeds to leave the crowd gasping with every ball, Wood became even deadlier when he found swing: his peach to knock Khawaja’s leg stump out of the ground zooming through the gap between bat and pad as the opener was comprehensively beaten for pure pace.
Labuschagne wouldn’t long outlast him, either; having withstood Wood’s early burst, Labuschagne would hand Woakes his first scalp on return, suckered into a loose drive with a hint of movement off the seam enough to catch the edge, Root at first slip doing the rest.
Dropped early when Bairstow failed to glove a tough inside edge moving sharply to his left, Steve Smith looked to rebuild the innings, hooking Woakes imperiously over deep mid-wicket for six as if to remind the 34-year old of his 2019 run of glory.
Broad, though, had other ideas: with Smith on 21, a nip-backer would catch a thinner inside edge this time en route to Bairstow; the Australian’s confident review of the on-field out call backfiring when a sizeable inside edge was detected via Snicko, one Smith seemingly hadn’t felt.
With Australia 4/91 at lunch and Head lucky to survive that far, having been spared when Bairstow failed to glove a regulation strangle down the leg side, at that stage 200 seemed a pipe dream for the visitors against a fired-up bowling attack.
Marsh, though, had other ideas: lucky to survive Root’s first slip blunder on 12, it would soon prove the day’s costliest mistake for either side.
Long regarded as one of the hardest hitters of a cricket ball in the world, Marsh made good on that lofty praise to take the fight back to England, and then some.
Demolishing anything short, wide or full with brutal ruthlessness, the highlight came when Wood sent down a bouncer at more than 146km/h. Marsh rocked back and cracked a stunning pull shot high and handsome into the stands over square leg, the sound of ball on bat reverberating around Headingley.
Bringing up a 59-ball half-century with a more circumspect tucked single an over later, Head, having had a nine-run head start, had been left in the dust on 20, content merely to rotate the strike and watch the show from the other end.
A pair of brutal off-drives to send Wood hurtling to the boundary almost as quickly as his balls had arrived necessitated a change of tack from Ben Stokes; but the off-breaks of Moeen Ali wasn’t about to change the onslaught.
With Marsh continuing to make hay off the seamers at the other end, Head began to motor as he carved and crunched anything wide or full from Moeen into the off side; briefly, having moved to 34 off just 52 balls, he seemed capable of matching the Western Australian stroke for stroke.
Marsh, though, seemed to take Head’s surge as a challenge to up the ante, duly obliging with a fearsome pull shot to send Ollie Robinson into the deep.
Reportedly suffering from back spasms, Robinson wouldn’t last the over, limping off midway through and forcing Broad to take up the cursed chalice of bowling to Marsh: a stunning cut shot would welcome the veteran who had so tormented the Australian top order in the first session, dispatching him for a 12th boundary.
Once regarded as vulnerable to spin, Marsh rubbished that long-forgotten speculation with a pair of brutal boundaries to pile the pain on Moeen: the first a murdered cover drive that thankfully no Englishman was near enough to even attempt to field, the second an audacious pull right off his stumps, middled perfectly past backward square.
Having seemingly been raising a half-century mere minutes ago, a larruped loft down the ground off Moeen again brought Marsh to 99; then, as he had been at 50, a tucked single, this time behind point, would bring a century to cherish.
Mitchell Marsh celebrates with Travis Head after reaching his century. (Photo by Stu Forster/Getty Images)
Embracing Head after reaching a first Test ton – off just 102 balls – since January 2018, it was no doubt a moment Marsh thought would never again come; yet the masterclass brought him level with legendary England all-rounder Ian Botham for Ashes centuries, fittingly at the venue of his most infamous miracle in 1981.
Marsh wasn’t done yet, either: bludgeoning Woakes dozens of rows back for another six, Marsh, who had headed to lunch on 5, brought up the remarkable achievement of 100 runs in a session.
The fun ended, though, in the final over before tea: even in his dismissal, an inside edge onto thigh pad and looping up for a simple Crawley catch at slip, emphasised the power of the man, so easily did the ball carry off only the smallest sliver of his railway sleeper of a bat.
For all Marsh’s fireworks, though, 5/240 presented an avenue for England to wrest their way back into the match, though Root would again be red-faced shortly after tea when a regulation outside edge with Alex Carey on 4 was shelled again.
Having been denied twice by his first slip, Woakes would make it third time lucky the next ball: coaxing the outside edge again, Root would make no mistake to claim the bigger scalp in Head, out for 39; though as he furiously flung the ball to the ground in his frustration, the former captain wasn’t in a celebratory mood.
The arrival of the Australian tail brought with it the return of Wood; he’d take just three balls to strike, a superb inswinger crashing through Mitchell Starc’s defences to take the top of off stump, the ball remarkably travelling so quickly that it carried all the way over the fine boundary from the ricochet.
If Starc had been made to look a full by Wood’s pace, Cummins was a regular court jester: done by a nip-backer and trapped utterly and entirely plumb LBW, the captain’s second-ball duck a fourth Australian wicket for just nine runs added.
Usually a man for a crisis, Carey too would fall to the England tearaway: rattled by a bouncer catching him flush on the helmet and forcing a delay for a concussion test, the wicketkeeper would last just one more ball before wildly backing away and flaying Wood straight to deep cover for a fourth scalp.
Remarkably, the nine added between last pair Todd Murphy and Scott Boland – eight coming via boundaries as Murphy first inside-edge past his stumps then cracked a cut off Woakes – would be Australia’s highest stand-post tea, Wood ending the innings as Murphy chopped on for 13 to secure a five-wicket haul.
Of Wood’s 5/34, four had come off just 14 balls – and just five runs conceded – to close the innings; having tormented all Australian batters sans Marsh, the haul was a fitting reward for the man whose pace and determination had made him one of the only Englishmen to leave their 2021/22 Test tour of Australia with reputation enhanced.
Faced with a tough two hours to negotiate before stumps, Crawley was in a mood for runs, striding down to Cummins and whipping the captain’s second ball behind square to signal England’s intent.
It would be Cummins, though, with the early breakthrough; Ben Duckett once again coaxed into chasing a wide offering on 2, a thick inside edge spectacularly pouched by a diving Carey, clinging to it by his fingers and holding it in with his lips.
Promoted to number three in the absence of Ollie Pope, Harry Brook could muster just three before falling to Cummins for the second straight innings; off a perfect length with a hint of movement away, the prodigy’s nervy prod caught the edge to be safely pouched by Smith at slip, Australia’s cordon catching already putting the hosts’ to shame.
While Root was off to an expansive start, racing to 13 off just 12 balls with a pair of stylish late cuts off first Starc and then Boland, Crawley’s promising early form began to teeter.
Lucky to survive an outside edge falling just short of Khawaja in the gully, it would be Marsh to put the final stamp on his golden day; introduced for a late spell, the third ball of his second over found a perfect line outside off stump, eliciting another anxious prod from Crawley, to be gleefully if not entirely safely snaffled by Warner at first slip.
At 3/65 and suddenly at risk of undoing all Wood and Woakes’ good work, Root and Bairstow’s one objective was to survive the final 25 minutes until stumps.
While Marsh did his best, nearly castling the latter with a perfect nip-backer, the experienced pair would get the job done, Root to resume on Day 2 19 not out and Bairstow on just 1 off 19.
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