Year: 2015

Gasoline

LordCanisLupus51 Comments

Just to tide us over until I get home tonight and can look and revel in the majesty of the press (incidentally, my Mail Online at work has no new pieces since Saturday night so I’m not up on Newman’s latest, for instance) if the mood so takes me, I thought I’d give my reactions to events of the past four days and the immediate aftermath.

In the middle of the 2013 series Australia had two really good first days – the Old Trafford and Oval tests. These were slightly contrasting wickets and yet Australia filled their boots in the first innings having won the toss and batted. At OT, you know who made a century, while at The Oval, I believe you know who added two half centuries. I just want to put that out there because it is amazing the likes of Samuel were invoking his name, and even Andrew Miller was snorting derisively at people mentioning his name on cricinfo, yet we are all supposed to be moving on and even, hell, yes even forgetting who he is. Dave Kidd’s remarkable piece of weapons grade buffoonery in the Mirror entilted “We Need To Talk About Cooky” (with Kevin crossed out) spoke volumes of a media completely in tumult. Those people just won’t let go, constantly invoking his name, going on about him incessantly. Of course, those people are the media. Not us. There’s not been that much KP stuff prior to this weekend, has there? Kidd’s “Players Thrive Without KP The Forgotten Man” bye-line is a classic. If this weekend was thriving, God help us.

It is important not to over-react. The way media types were jumping on the “look how many times we are three down for not a lot” bandwagon as if this was a shock revelation says it all. That Cook, who has only just started being of any benefit with the bat after his two year slump, is now absolved of all blame is not such a shock. In a reverse Whitaker, it appears to be Ballance’s fault, and it also tolls on the Bell. The other opener has been such a problem for so long now, it’s taken as a given we’ll have another soon. However frightening Ballance’s technique is at the moment, and how Bell’s regression is a terror-strewn binary nightmare, both were seen to be OK after a sixty in Cardiff. The Twitter mouthpiece of All Out Cricket (The Official Magazine of the Professional Cricketers Association) was ramming it down doubters’ throats. “Drop Moeen, Drop Ballance, Drop Bell blah blah blah” (love that underneath my Twitter column for that it has “Translate from Indonesian”) as if doubting these players was erased by a half decent 60. We aren’t doing it because we enjoy it, Jo. We do it because we aren’t blind to trends, to technique, and to the relative abilities of the teams we are up against.

I don’t want to pick on that individual particularly – although that Tweet rankled – because in the main I agree with sticking with people for a while. But this England team set the bar with Cook’s wilderness period, and now Bell, with a 143 of great quality not three months ago, in the firing line there is the obvious implication of one rule for one etc. That’s the problem with our selection process. We have journos and pundits saying they can’t drop Bell without dropping Ballance and vice-versa. Why the hell not. Since when has our selection process, that has trust as its prime factor over ability, had any logic in it? If we have only one replacement that they think can come in, then drop just one player.

I am rambling, as usual, but I want to leave this piece with a couple of thoughts. First of all, we weren’t as good as Cardiff made us seem, and we genuinely aren’t as bad as this performance made us look. But we found out some harsh lessons that the “experts” chose to avoid. Steve Smith is a class number three and for all this was a featherbed, he made 215. He looked supremely in control when I saw him even when not at his best. Don’t insult him Swann. Don’t talk rot. Then there’s the Johnson can’t bowl at Lord’s codswallop based on the 2009 model. It’s six years on, and he was devastating. I don’t think we have a thing about him, I think we have a thing about left arm pace. Thirdly, Anderson was atrocious. Yes, atrocious. But he’s another sacred cow in this team, and that’s our issue.

Let me go back to Dave Kidd on Thursday:

“Pietersen’s new chums in the bookmaking industry make England even money to reclaim the urn. If Cook continues to lead as he did at Cardiff, they may soon be red-hot favourites.”

I don’t call the Australians “the cockroaches” for nothing. They may have been displaying distress signals, but they are never killed off. That’s the sign of a resilient, formidable team. Not a “win one game, ain’t we just the best, shut up haters and doubters” mob.

Back tonight.

2nd Ashes Test: Day Four review

thelegglance154 Comments

It’s one thing to lose, it’s entirely another to offer no resistance whatever, on a docile pitch, in good conditions.

This was as bad as anything on the Ashes from Hell tour, because this pitch offered absolutely nothing for the bowlers even on day four.  England at the start of play were clearly likely to lose the match, but few would have expected any side – not even Bangladesh – to surrender meekly in 37 overs.  This was abject, pathetic and spineless.  Sure, collapses happen, but with England they happen a lot, and they happen against Australia all the time – indeed even ignoring the three for not very many at Cardiff, it’s happened in 6 of the last 7 Tests against them.

That England went through the motions with the ball this morning is almost forgivable, given the match position.  Australia were so far in front even skittling them wouldn’t have made much difference.  But it did betray a side who knew their fate and didn’t rage against it.  The declaration when it came didn’t change the reality of what England needed to do, and what England knew they needed to do right from the start of play.

Instead, once again they flopped horribly.  Two of the first three wickets at least came from decent balls, though Lyth and Ballance both betrayed flawed techniques in how they got out.  What was extraordinary was how the Sky commentary team focused on these two dismissals and actually claimed Cook’s was a good ball at the time (Hussain in contrast did at least call it a “lazy little waft”).  It wasn’t, it was a dreadful shot, a short wide one that he went after and edged.  Getting out to a bad shot happens, it’s an occupational hazard of batting, but to seek to excuse it by crediting the bowler beggared belief, and merely fuelled the suspicion that Cook cannot be criticised on Sky.  Let’s get something clear here, players make mistakes.  They are human beings, and flawed intrinsically.  Pointing out a bad shot doesn’t lessen the person, it’s called being honest.  Stop making excuses.

England had lost their first three wickets for fewer than 52 for the 8th time in their last 12 innings.  It’s been repeatedly pointed out that the middle order will not always bail them out, and the horrible muddle England have got into over the last couple of years is still the same, even with different personnel.  Of the top four, the only one who is in any kind of form is Cook – and Cook the batsman is doing fine – indeed Cook the captain still didn’t have a bad match in the field, England certainly didn’t flop horribly because of his actions. Once again, the problem is not with what Cook does as a batsman, it is the way it is treated as though he’s Bradman reincarnated whenever he gets a few, while saying his dismissal was down to him being “desperately tired” as Mike Selvey put it – a tiredness that didn’t seem to afflict Rogers or Smith who scored far more runs.   And in mentioning Rogers, all cricket fans will have seen his dizzy spell with some concern.  Let us hope it was unrelated to the blow on the head he took at the start of day two.

And so once under way, the procession continued.  Bell again got out cheaply, and again in unconvincing fashion, managing to edge a ball that didn’t spin to short leg.  Stokes had the kind of dismissal that will haunt him for days to come, failing to ground his bat for an easy single.  Whether that was a simple matter of brain-fade or evidence of the kind of scrambled minds in the England team probably depends on how one wishes to think of them.

Buttler once again edged behind hanging his bat out to dry, and Moeen did absolutely nothing to prevent the addition of another piece of evidence that he can’t play the short ball very well.

By this point, not only were Australia rampant, but England were skulking around like a little boy who knew he’d been caught stealing.  Broad at least decided to go down fighting, throwing the bat.  That was another reminder of the dire displays in 2013/14, Broad reacting by trying to hit fours and sixes in a game long since gone.

Root’s dismissal as ninth man out was neither here nor there and entirely irrelevant to anything, while there was something apposite about the way Anderson’s stumps were shattered to end the torture.

The various Mitches had blown England away, and all credit must be given to them.  They will only get better having scented blood.

The only way of reacting to this omnishambles is that with the final wicket, Australia had gone into a 1-1 lead in the series.  It is scarcely credible that England had managed to fall apart so abjectly on such a placid wicket.  Yet they’d managed to, and shown no bottle whatsoever for the fight.  It is therefore ironic that the pattern of England wins and losses recently can be seen to be one of them being metaphorically flat track bullies, able to put sides away with aplomb when in front in the game, but collapsing in on themselves when challenged.  That is, except on non-metaphorical flat tracks where they aren’t just bullied, they are whipped, chained and thrashed.

The inquest will of course begin now, but there’s not much that isn’t already known and has been known for some time.

Bell is in awful form, and has been struggling for a couple of years.  Yet England set the precedent of standing by Cook when he had his drought, and they can rightly point to his form this year as being a justification for that.  So they’ve made a rod for their own back where Bell can legitimately say he deserves the same patience.  Whether he will get it or not is another matter, as is whether he should.  But missing straight balls as he has been isn’t terribly reassuring.

Lyth is perhaps one of two players under most pressure, but dropping him now would betray the same kind of muddled thinking that the ECB under Strauss have absolutely promised is a thing of the past in this brave new world.  Having not picked him in the West Indies when they should have, he then scored his maiden century only two Tests ago.  Lyth may not ultimately prove to be good enough, but that there is such a chorus for his replacement after two quiet Tests, and only four in total would be a return to the chopping and changing of the nineties.  And that worked so very well.

Ballance on the other hand has – at least for the time being – been found out.  He is clearly a highly talented player, and also young enough to improve, but his sophomore season is proving to be a nightmare for him.  The problem is that his place in the side is the critical number three position, and so the question of moving players around comes up.

Here is the rub though, moving Root up to number three is obviously an option, but Root didn’t perform particularly well as an opener two years ago, and there’s no pressing reason why he should do better now so high up the order.  Yes, he’s batting extremely well, but treating the symptom rather than the cause has never been much of a medical solution to anything.  Putting Root there would be to risk getting less out of England’s best batsman, not because of a certainty he would do better there, but solely because those above him currently are doing so badly.  That isn’t a justication, it’s negative selection.

Nor does it in any way address the problems Lyth and Bell are having, so while rearranging of deckchairs would give the selectors something to do, it doesn’t address the bloody great hole in the hull.

Naturally, as this was discussed, the elephant in the Sky studio hovered.  At one point Hussain talked about England needing a “Kevin Pietersen type” player in the top four, without a shred of irony.  At another, Ricky Ponting came dangerously close to saying the name of He Who Must Not Be Mentioned, and Gower flapped in utter horror (“don’t say it, don’t say it”).  This was extraordinary behaviour, but not necessarily for the reasons that might initially be thought.  There’s no reason to assume Pietersen would have made any difference in this Test, and no reason to assume he would be a panacea for England’s batting woes.  That’s not the point.  The ECB have made their decision and that is that.  But.  It is not for Sky to endorse that decision by refusing to even acknowledge the point, it is not honest to pretend it isn’t there.  An honest response is to point out the obvious that one player England could select is in the cold and then move on to the alternatives.  Each and every time this sort of thing happens, the recognition of what has been done is critical to the debate even if that decision is agreed with.  Pretending it isn’t there is ludicrous, no matter which side of the debate someone might be.

Once again, the fundamental point is that Sky’s editorial line is not meant to be at the behest of the ECB’s internal policies.  It’s a basic journalistic tenet, and one they have failed time and again.  It shouldn’t need stating, that’s the point.

More realistically in terms of England’s options, apart from moving those players around, Johnny Bairstow is the likely candidate to come in.  Should they do so then that certainly means changing the order as well, with Bell and Root at three and four.  A second spinner is also an option, if they also drop Lyth and move Root up to open.  That would be a lot of changes.

England were plainly unhappy with the pitch at Lords, which was more than obviously a chairman’s one, intended to last the full five days – so Australia (and England in a funny way) denying them the revenue from day five serves them right.  That’s somewhat ironic, because in one sense England were right to be.  Australia’s faster bowling attack is always going to be better on a very flat and slow surface where England’s fast medium offering is going to be akin to cannon fodder.  Yet this very flat, very slow surface was one on which England were shot out for 415 across two innings.  That’s woeful even on a green seamer, which if Cook has his way based on his post match interview is what we will get at Edgbaston.  The problem for him is that the Chief Executive of Warwickshire probably thinks otherwise.

Yet Cook was correct that for England to have a chance, their own bowlers need to have a chance in the game.  Over the last few years Test pitches in England have followed the same pattern, slow surfaces intended to stretch the game out to the full extent.  It is this tendency that Colin Graves was quietly referring to when he raised the idea of four day Tests – another example of treating the symptom incidentally.  That this has had the result of spectacularly biting England on the arse is exactly what they deserve, for it has been a long time since England produced the kind of quick pitches that might actually prepare them a little for facing the two Australian fast ‘n nasties, and even allow England to develop one or two of their own.

This match was nothing but total humiliation.  It is striking that in the Tests between these two sides, there are very few close ones, one side absolutely batters the other albeit Australia batter England rather more than the other way around.  To that extent England will feel that there is no reason they can’t win the next one, and they are of course right.  If anything has been demonstrated in previous Ashes series, momentum is a rather overrated thing.

Yet England did have a real chance to put Australia under huge pressure in this match.  After Cardiff there were definitely cracks in the side.  Not large ones, and as has been seen in this game, not critical ones.  But had they produced the kind of English pitch we used to get before they started trying to be clever and extract even more money from the poor spectator, it likely would have worked to England’s advantage.  Not so much to guarantee a win of course, but at least to give them a chance.  The Test against New Zealand at Lords was of course a fantastic one, yet that was so unusual compared to the ones we’ve seen in recent years that one can’t help but feel it was some kind of happy error. Certainly the two prepared in 2014 were every bit as lifeless as this one, and note that England could not bowl Sri Lanka out in one, and lost badly to India in the other.

Once England had lost the toss here, their chances of winning were very low.  The difference is that there was no reason why they should lose the Test.  And no reason whatever that they should lose the Test by the margin of 820-10 to 415-20.  Or to put it another way, based on this, England would have had to bat a whole additional Test to reach Australia’s match total.

And finally we come to the media in general.  At the risk of repeating a common theme on this blog, they went completely overboard once again after the win at Cardiff.  It was a terrific win there’s no doubt about that, but the “fickle” people in such places as here and at the Full Toss, repeatedly cautioned that England had a habit of losing their next match badly after a win, and that triumphalism was both premature and more than a bit ridiculous.  It didn’t stop them.  From writing a homage to Andrew Strauss as the architect of England’s success to saying Ian Bell was back, to long paeans of how the new England under Cook would go on to terrify all and sundry, this thrashing is matters coming home to roost.  Again.  Doubtless they will now swing the other way, demand wholesale changes and assume England will be blown away in the remainder of the series.  And that is indeed a possibility, and unquestionably a fear given this implosion.  It’s just not guaranteed.

England may well recover from here, it doesn’t mean they can’t win from here.  It does mean there is concern about how they will react to it – that is up to them, to decide whether there really are scars from 2013/14 or not.

2nd Ashes Test: Day Three Review

thelegglance39 Comments

It’s indicative of the mess England have got themselves in that this was probably the best day of the game so far for them. And they still well and truly lost it. In isolation, a total of 312 having been 30-4 isn’t that bad, but it represents a major fall off from 266-6 which had represented a decent recovery, albeit while still miles behind in the game.

The trouble is that having got off to such an awful, and frankly careless, start, each wicket was a huge blow further deteriorating the team position. The pressure on the batsmen in such circumstances is immense, knowing a single error cannot be made, while conversely the Australians simply have to be patient, waiting for that mistake.

Cook and Stokes both batted very well, but such was the disastrous state of the game, each needed another hundred on top of what they got to become significant. Doubtless Cook will receive his usual media adoration for his innings, because that’s just how it is, but it wasn’t anything exceptional. He batted well, as did Stokes, and both were deeply frustrated by their dismissals, but in neither case was it close to being enough, and simply that means it has no material effect on the game. It’s not being churlish about this, but the focus on Cook to the exclusion of all else is so tiresome, it becomes vexing when he scores runs to know that it’s coming. In today’s instance, there is absolutely no reason whatever the focus should be on Cook rather than Stokes. None whatever.  Both batted well, but it isn’t the story of the day.

Australia didn’t surprise anyone by refusing to enforce the follow on, and batted freely thereafter. That’s also not much of a surprise. But what this awful performance has done is to play a whole host of Australians into form. After Cardiff, the pressure was certainly on, Warner going so far as to publicly talk about the difficulties he was having. No longer, especially after he was given a life on 0 second time around.

As far as this particular game is concerned it is likely to matter little, as far as the series goes it could yet prove fatal. England had their foot in Australia’s throat after the first Test, to say they have released the pressure is an understatement, England have been every bit as awful at Lords as Australia were at Cardiff, Cook and Stokes the batsmen excepted.

Quite why this is is hard to pinpoint, but it’s not exactly hidden from view. Assuming England do go on to lose this game, it will the third time in a row that they have lost immediately after winning. And the third time in a row they’ve played poorly immediately after winning. Of course x the opposition in each case deserve the credit, but it isn’t coincidence that England don’t match up to their winning display, indeed don’t even begin to get close to matching their winning display.

Not that you’d know that from the media coverage, whi h on each occasion has got extremely giddy and made the customary ludicrous assertions that England are becoming a fine side, only to then brush that under the carpet with the subsequent collapse.

The game is now in one of those phoney war periods while we wait for the real action to begin. Australia will spend tomorrow winding up their attack on the England bowlers, and England will be forced into the position of simply trying to restrict the scoring to keep Australia batting as long as possible.  Clarke is in the enviable position of knowing that the lead is already far beyond what England can achieve, and so can simply tire out the England bowlers and turn an overwhelming position into a completely impregnable one.

Midway through the day, Australia will be over 500 ahead, and leave England around 130 overs to survive.   It’s not impossible that they do it either, this remains a very flat pitch, and is if anything dying for the bowlers rather than showing signs of wear. It’s that that is the risk for England, as the repeated drag ons today showed – the classic sign of a pitch that is getting even slower.

If Cook does an Atherton and bats through the last say and a half, that will indeed be worthy of note, for its hard to see too many others doing it.

In reality, England look a beaten side, it won’t cause paroxysms of shock if when they do come to bat they lose wickets early again.

@BlueEarthMngmnt

UPDATE – I hope TLG doesn’t mind me tapping on to the end of his post, but we are setting up a site to take on Century Watch and most of the photos, as well as things like book reviews etc. This is especially for the busy times so we don’t flood the main site with material.

The link is www.collythorpeii.wordpress.com – and I’ve just put up a couple of pics of batsmen walking off to start it up.

Ashes 2nd Test Day 3 – Comments Thread

LordCanisLupus78 Comments

P1060675

Back to normal for me, I’m afraid.

I’d like to thank Justin for inviting me to share the day with him and his colleagues yesterday. I had an absolutely brilliant day and appreciated it so much. A day like yesterday reinforced to me how great it must be to watch this sport and get paid for it. I know it was a one-off so it was probably more special for being so.

Some quick thoughts. Stuart Broad was immense yesterday. I thought he bowled superbly on a wicket not giving him much help. This isn’t Nagpur, as some tedious irk said on Thursday, but it is a benign surface and thought processes and proper considered bowling were required. Once again, Anderson, who was such a rock on surfaces and conditions like these, was below par. I really believe we hit the high-water mark two years ago at Trent Bridge, and something inside Anderson went with him. Sure, you’ll get good performances now and then, but the tiger inside may have roared its last. I’m probably talking nonsense, but he did not bowl well.

Steve Smith was a pleasure to watch. It’s not for the beauty of his batting, but for his temperament. He’s also a photographer’s nightmare / dream.

As for England’s batting. Knock me down with a feather. We collapsed. I missed Bell completely (toilet break) and Australia did Root up like a kipper. Watching Johnson in full cry was an amazing sight.

To today. England need a miracle, but I’ll say this. Ben Stokes came out at 30 for 4, and the Aussies are nervous of him. He was allowed to plonk his front foot down and drive, in stead of Johnson starting off with chin music. He has that swagger about him. It’s the first time I’ve seen him in the flesh. I was impressed. Cook’s knock at the other end was what was required.

Comments on the day’s play here. I might put some of the 235 pictures I took yesterday up during the day.

Ashes 2nd Test: Day 2 review

thelegglance36 Comments
P1060682
Ballance is bowled by Johnson – look closely and you will see a bail in mid-air….

Now what was I saying about all those who piled in to complain about the pitch after one day?  In the Australian press it was all about England doctoring the surface, which apparently means creating one that Australia rack up a huge score on, and then rip through the England top order.  Indeed, it was wryly amusing to hear Stuart Broad imply that the surface very much aided Australia and not England.  Spin on both sides.

Meantime, the English press went big on the idea that it was a nailed on draw, that the groundsman should be shot and that it was impossible to get wickets on.  The old adage that you shouldn’t judge a pitch until both teams have batted on it is as true as it ever was.  Australia have bowled superbly on it, and have put themselves in prime position to square the series.

There did seem to be a little bit more in it today, but it remains excellent for batting, as Australia demonstrated all too well in their innings. Steve Smith led the way with 215, and as fabulous as that innings was, it was curiously less assertive than normal, and slightly more sketchy than at his best.  Which if anything should cause serious alarm in the England dressing room.  For Chris Rogers, it’s quite possible that his 173 is his last innings at a ground where he has served Middlesex so well.  If so, it’s quite a way to finish.

From there, the scorecard looks like Australia fell away somewhat, which is a good example of a scorecard not conveying a match situation.  Australia were pushing on and trying to score quickly.  Slow surfaces are often quite hard to score rapidly on, and the wickets fell at regular intervals.

England’s reply was a shambles.  As has been pointed out England keep finding themselves three down for very little, and sooner or later Joe Root wasn’t going to bail them out.  Adam Lyth’s poke at a wide ball was fairly typical of what often happens when a team has been in the field for the best part of two days, but it doesn’t make it any better a shot.  Ballance was again undone by a full ball, and while it is good to keep faith with a player, it’s at the point now where he’s not going to get anything else, so transparent are his difficulties.  He needs to work this out and fast.

Bell too was undone by a full ball, and once again this has become a notable weakness in his game.  Any player can be beaten by a full swinging ball, but not time and again. As for Root, he failed today.  It’s going to happen sometimes. From there, Cook and Stokes batted extremely well.  Broad again made a rather telling slip in the post play interview saying that it looked much better when England batted in a more disciplined way.  The implication of that was fairly clear.

There’s no reason whatever England can’t continue to bat that way, this remains a very easy paced, very flat surface. The trouble is that having lost four cheap wickets, they are 481 runs behind.  It is a huge ask for them to even reach the follow on point, no matter how flat the pitch might be. About the only positive they have is that they have frontline batsmen down to number eight in the form of Moeen Ali.  But to even get to within 200 runs, more than one player has to score a century.  All hopes really rest on Cook going very big and batting through.  It’s a big ask, but it’s what’s necessary.

England have got themselves in a horrible hole, and have been completely outplayed in the first two days.  The reality of their plight is that they can’t afford to lose so much as a single session if they want to get out of this one.  1-1 seems almost inevitable given the time left. @BlueEarthMngmnt

Dmitri Undercover…..

LordCanisLupus54 Comments

image

Comments to follow during the day.

Got a decent pic of the first ball.

Surrounded by top people. And Graham Gooch is nearby…..

Broad bowling well.

Think Voges looks in awesome touch. Very good morning’s cricket.

On the phone so sorry for the short bursts. A pleasure to watch Smith but he had a monster on there. Silly shot in my view. Nevill looked dead handy. Still looks like 600.

Ashes 2nd Test: Day One Review

thelegglance60 Comments

If there’s any amusement to be had from Australia closing on 337-1 today, it’s that it has once again made an awful lot of journalists look silly.  They don’t need much help in order to achieve those lofty heights, but their continued lack of awareness when jumping on a single victory as a harbinger of the future generates as much amusement as ever.  One wonders if today’s play was mainly down to Andrew Strauss as well, for example.

Instead of reacting with pleasure to England’s victory at Cardiff, but noting it was a single Test match and that Australia hadn’t become a bad team overnight, several once again got giddy – just as they did in the West Indies, and then just as they did against New Zealand.  After one outbreak of egg-on-face disease, it might have been thought that a lesson would be learned, but oh no, they did it again after England beat the Kiwis, and then a third time after Cardiff.  There’s not a thing wrong with offering an opinion, or making a call on what might happen – the risk that you will be wrong is an occupational hazard – there is a lot wrong with going over the top repeatedly and failing to learn the lesson that baseless hyperbole tends to bite back.  Doubtless the scurrying back over the bridge and pretending none of it happened will be in evidence tonight.

Now equally, it shouldn’t go too far the other way (place your bets on how doomed the fourth estate will consider England after today), it’s day one of five.  Lords is what it has been for quite some time, an excellent batting surface lacking in pace and movement.  It shouldn’t come as any kind of surprise that Australia, having won the toss, have had a good day.  It shouldn’t even come as that much of a surprise that they’ve had an exceptional day.  They’ve simply made the most of conditions, which is what decent sides do.

The irony is that over-reaction is one of the charges continually aimed at the bilious inadequates, yet it is the established press (one again) who are most guilty of it time and again.

No doubt also there will be some complaining that the pitch is too flat and that it is therefore some kind of anti-cricket surface.  That may yet prove  to be true, but it is a faintly ridiculous line to take after a single day.  Much will depend on how it plays over the remainder of the Test – should it prove to remain entirely flat, then such comments will be justified.  If it deteriorates – and let’s be clear, Lord’s usually produces a result – then there’s no reason for any such claim.

What today’s play does mean is that Australia are in a very strong position to dictate terms for the next couple of days at least.  England didn’t bowl badly, and while they missed a couple of half chances they couldn’t be said to have performed badly – not that they were outstandingly good, just not bad – it was benign conditions for batting and Australia just cashed in.  At this stage it’s already going to be key how England bat in response.  Even with everything going right, England are going to be facing 450; more realistically somewhere around 550 and above is probable.  Rogers and Smith deserve immense credit for maintaining their discipline, and should they survive the first hour, England will unquestionably be chasing leather.

The pitch at that point is if anything likely to be even better for batting on, so there’s no reason for England to have a problem on it.  Except that thing called scoreboard pressure.  Australia will have their tails well and truly up, and negating the early stages will be critical.  Cook had a quiet first Test, but he will be needed to play one of those long innings in reply.  There’s no reason whatever he can’t.

For Australia, the one person in the team who may need to be kept away from sharp implements is David Warner.  Being positive against the spinners is one thing, and players who take a chance in order to dominate always risk looking foolish when it goes wrong, but the nature of the three shots in an over against Moeen Ali were outright slogs at the ball.  First one was fair enough (a full toss), the second was wild, and the third was downright rash.

Cook rotated the bowling well enough, trying different things, and attempting to find a combination that worked.  Sometimes you just have one of those days.  What we do not know yet is whether that is an example of England lacking penetration on flat surfaces or simply a result of the conditions.  Certainly the ball barely swung, and definitely didn’t seam.  England tried to counter this by bowling dry, which was exactly the right approach, but weren’t able to maintain the pressure.  If one was to be critical, that’s perhaps where it might lie, a few too many four balls.  It’s quibbling, they worked hard.

Short of having a disaster and being bowled out for 150, day one is a set up day, with limited certainty about what is to follow.  It has always been that way and always will be that way.  Australia have had an outstanding day today, but whether it is a decisive one, it is impossible to say.  There’s no doubt though that England are up against it as things stand, and will have to play well to get a result.  They are quite capable of so doing, and if they do, there is the potential for a borefest.  The additional pace in the Australian bowling order will make them feel that they can get something out of the surface that England didn’t, and they may be right about that too.

Today is one day.  And a very good one for Australia it was too.

@BlueEarthMngmnt