The Ashes are alive – both the men’s and the women’s – and all roads are leading to Old Trafford for the fourth and what could be decisive Test between Australia and England.
The old enemy got the chocolates at Headingley once again, and suddenly it’s Australia with all the problems. Can David Warner keep his spot? Should Cameron Green play ahead of Mitchell Marsh? And what lowdown act of pure evil will the Aussies pull off next to try and retain the urn?
It’s time for The Roar’s resident cricket insomniac, Tim Miller and our very own Pom, Mike Meehall Wood, to get to the bottom of it all, and decide the answer to all the big questions as the countdown to Manchester begins.
TM: Well, Mike, the series is alive! Bad news for my sleep cycle, but great news for Test cricket.
MMW: Test Cricket is better when England win, right? That was a great match, though not fantastic for my heartrate or circadian rhythm. This England team will do that though, pretty much every game they play these days goes to the wire.
But for the first time, Australia saw the best of Bazball. When it first begun, it was marked by surprisingly confident, ODI style chases that made what would previously have been tough look routine. A side scoring at 5 and over on a Day 4 pitch would have been silly a long time ago, but England have done it about five times now.
Speaking of…how many overs were there in the chase, Tim? Trivia time…
TM: I should have known it was 50, but I’ll admit that I had to Google it and my original guess was 69. I’m that sort of person.
There’s part of me that is glad this series will at least not be decided in straight sets – the two teams were so close at Lord’s and Egbaston and it was only by winning juuuuuust enough key moments there that Australia got over the line.
At Headingley it was England winning them more often that got them over the line – Mark Wood’s spell late on Day 1, Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne’s brain explosions to hand Moeen Ali his 199th and 200th Test wickets, Wood cover-driving a Starc inswinger for four just when it was getting to squeaky-bum time.
To be honest, though, I’m still confident in Australia – for England to bowl as well as they did and to get practically nothing from Warner, Smith and Labuschagne, and yet only lose by three wickets, shows how close this series will remain.
Speaking of close series, a question for you… as someone who was conscious of 2005 as it was happening, how does the 2023 Ashes compare? It’s been bandied around a bit that this might be as good as or even better.
Andrew Flintoff (right) of England consoles Brett Lee during the 2005 Ashes. (Photo by Tom Jenkins/Getty Images).
MMW: Well, in 2005 I was 16 so everything was better! In terms of the cricket, we’ve got a way to go yet, because ’05 was great for five Tests and currently we’ve had three.
But the three we’ve had would stand with any from back then, for sure.
I think fundamentally 2005 sits on the pedestal because of how moribund the Ashes had been for 16 years, too. My first summer I remember was the West Indies touring in 1995, so England had largely been rubbish all of my life watching them, while Australia had been amazing.
The Aussies had won the 1999 World Cup and we got knocked out before the official pop song had even been released. 2005 swapped all that around and we finally beat the unbeatable team. This isn’t as dire as that.
Sure, we were rubbish in Australia last time, but England are double World Cup champions elsewhere and beat lots of other teams.
I’ve got distracted… are you about to recall Glenn Maxwell?!
TM: NOW we’re getting to the interesting stuff. It’s amazing what an Ashes loss does to Australian discourse – one defeat and we’re suddenly looking to ring the changes, bring in bolters and throw the whole team into chaos.
People love Maxwell because he’s been given a rough deal in Tests most of his career, but I just can’t see a way Australia can pick him. There’s no need in the team for an all-rounder – they’re going to have a hard time deciding between Cameron Green and Mitch Marsh at any rate – and if you’re going to pick a spinner I think it has to be Todd Murphy. Otherwise you might as well just go with the four quicks.
So Maxwell no, Michael Neser maybe – though I’m not convinced we’ll see any different results with the ball to Scott Boland given both lack out and out pace – and David Warner has to remain for one more Test at least, though me writing that didn’t seem to go down all that well this week.
Glenn Maxwell celebrates taking a wicket in 2017 in Bangladesh. (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)
MMW: If you should do what your opponent would like to do least, then pick Maxi. He’ll terrify England, whereas they’ll love Murphy. Manchester has taken spin in the past but that’s been a little bit overblown and generally it’ll be batter-friendly, as most of the pitches have been.
I think Boland’s line-and-length approach has been found out by Bazball – turns out that if you always bowl in the same place, eventually they just line you up. Neser has been great in the County Championship, but I guess England would say that they have an entire league’s worth of players like that. Still, I’d not be as confident with him as I would with Boland.
It’ll be interesting to see how Pat Cummins pulls up given he’s the only bowler not to get a rest so far – other than Broad for England – but hard to argue with an attack of him, Mitch Starc and Josh Hazlewood. As for Green and Marsh… I’ll take either. It’s unlikely that Marsh can back that up twice, and historically he hasn’t been able to.
As for us, it’s worryingly simple. Ollie Robinson has earned his rest and Jimmy Anderson has to come back on his own ground. Broady will explode if he doesn’t play and Wood is undroppable.
This confident feeling is weird, but one Test and our women’s team doing so well are setting me up for a fall…
TM: Speaking of… we should probably give the Women’s Ashes some love. England faced needing to win every match for the rest of the series after losing the Test to regain the urn. Four games in, so far so good!
The loss of Meg Lanning before the series was always going to have an impact, and I think we’re seeing that in experience as much as for her batting. There’s been times with the ball that her captaincy and savvy fielding placements might have been the difference in a bunch of tight games. And Alyssa Healy’s batting isn’t coping well with the adding burden of being skipper.
MMW: Australia’s women are an unstoppable force, so they’ll still probably win, but England have showed a level of nerve that, I have to say, I didn’t think they had.
I’m the world’s number one Kate Cross fan – she’s from my hometown, Rochdale, and I’ve followed her as the best kid growing up in local cricket through university, Lancashire and England – so to see her out there for the winning runs was amazing.
This England team seems to have the best of the old team from 2017 winners, plus some really exciting young players that haven’t been burned by years of getting thrashed by Australia.
And Australia, good as they are, aren’t often challenged like this. They lost the first ODI because of extras from bowling wides and no balls. They’re rattled. Let’s hope it’s contagious!
It’s been good to see both series last so long as competitive contests, so let’s hope that keeps up. Are you going to do the decent thing and chuck the Old Trafford game to make The Oval interesting?
I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but England are due to absolutely thrash someone given the way they’ve been playing…
TM: Much as a first Ashes Decider (patent pending) since 2009 sounds fun, a hard pass from me. I maintain Australia has done a ridiculously good job to be 2-1 up in the series despite having the worst of the conditions in every match, losing all three tosses and having the world’s best spinner ping a calf halfway through Lord’s.
I don’t think England’s win at Headingley was emphatic or spectacular enough to change the momentum of a series – the two teams went in tight and came out just as tight.
The Aussies are still just one great session with bat or ball away from grabbing the urn by the throat.
I’m less sure about the women. We spoke before about ‘05, and THIS is the series that is giving me those vibes… a strong, seemingly unbeatable Australia getting the challenge taken up to them by a young England playing, as you said really well, without the memory of years of Aussie torment.
I’d be surprised if they didn’t win at least one of the next two ODIs, and from there, it might come down to whether the weather intervenes!
Sophie Ecclestone runs out Grace Harris. (Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)
MMW: Now you’ve hit my big fear: the weather. Manchester is the rainiest place on Earth and that worries me massively because there is no margin for error. That said, England play so fast that they’ll likely take the draw out of the equation anyway.
I can see a world where our batters are good enough to get a score that Australia will struggle to match, especially if Cummins wins the toss and puts us in. Ben Stokes rarely bats first because they love to create an ODI chase, but England might not lose much by losing the toss.
I still think there’s plenty to come from Joe Root and, especially, Jonny Bairstow. It’s put up or shut up time for him and, historically, that’s when he’s been best.
Oh, and there’s this bloke you might have heard of. Grumpy fella. Used to be a model. His name is written in big letters on one of the ends. He’ll probably have something to say too…
TM: You think they’re recalling Reece Topley? Bold.
MMW: No, the reanimated corpse of Brian Statham – it’s the last thing they’d expect! Bazball strikes again!
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