Ashes

Australian bowlers under threat

The Test before last, Australia fielded a bowling attack of Hilfenhaus, Johnson, Hauritz and George. In this Test, they have Harris, Bollinger, Siddle and Doherty, who have barely taken a wicket between them. What happens now? Go back to the first lot?

The players can’t enjoy this selection drama. They’re not coming into a team because they’ve done well, they’re coming back into a team because the player who replaced them is worse than they were when they were dropped.

It’s a sort of ‘undermine and recall’ policy. The selectors basically say: “We’ve still got no faith in you, but our standards have dropped to such an extent that you’ve come back into contention.”

It’s like returning to a multi-storey car park and being unable to find your car. You check the same spots again and again, hoping that you somehow missed it, but to no avail. Sooner or later you’re going to have to accept that someone’s twocked your car and you’re going to have to get the bus home.

What use is a flat track bully?

The term ‘flat track bully’ isn’t so popular these days. It’s because it’s no longer indicative of a weakness.

A batsman who makes the most of flat pitches, bullying bowlers into submission, is basically what you want in Test cricket where 19 pitches out of 20 are basically pretty lifeless for the first half of the match (and often beyond that). Far better to have someone who is guaranteed to cash in when the going’s good than a player who can negotiate the moving ball who’s prone to lapses in concentration.

Before the series, we predicted that the batsmen England were most worried about, Cook and Pietersen, would actually be more influential than others. You wouldn’t fancy either of them when the ball’s swinging, but when it’s not, well, they’re right up there. Don’t be fooled by Cook’s more sedentary scoring – these two batsmen are creatures of their time.

When the Aussies bowl at Cook, there might as well be an asteroid parked in front of the stumps for all that he looks like getting out at the minute. Pietersen’s different. He swings across the line and plays the ball in the air, but if the bounce is true, he can just trust his eye and get on with it.

Australia’s era of dominance roughly coincided with a modern age of flat Aussie-style pitches worldwide. We’re not by any means suggesting that this was the reason for their success, but it’s worthy of debate whether that contributed at all.

The James Anderson plan

England showed us Plan A today – James Anderson beheads the innings with the new ball and then returns to sweep away the ankles with the second new ball. But you’re aware how fragile it is.

Today it worked, but even after taking three wickets in 2.1 overs, Australia still mustered 245, despite a few mistakes. Down under, it is a hard slog even on the good days. It must be bloody murder on the bad days.

The good thing for England is that James Anderson is doing his bit and he’s doing it brilliantly. He’s being given the narrowest of windows to make some impact and in this Test he’s slithered through like a greased invertebrate weasel.

High scores at Adelaide Oval Cricket Ground

History’s a load of arse. It gives you a slightly better idea as to what might happen, but really all it tells you is what’s already happened. It’s a guide not gospel.

We were told that Brisbane would be pacy and this that and the other, but the pitch started slow and that was when it was most dangerous.

Flatly refusing to learn from this, many have not so much predicted a high-scoring draw at Adelaide as written and filed their reports already, mentally moving onto Perth. While the second Test may yet slow in pace and turn into a leaden draw, it doesn’t make sense to forecast that on the basis of what we’ve seen.

The whole joy of sport is that it’s a drama that unfolds in front of you. It’s not a repeat. You’ve not read the book already.

Media coverage doesn’t affect what happens on the pitch, but it is part of the experience for most of us. Let’s not talk like we own a copy of the 2015 edition of Gray’s Sports Almanac. Predictions are fine, but assumptions are not.

Johnson Watch – part one

We figure we’ll formalise the Mitchell Johnson victimisation this year. Might as well. So here it is: ‘Johnson Watch’.

Sounds a bit rude, but only really if you’re American – and as we all know, Americans don’t count.

What passes for Mitchell Johnson news today is the following quote from Australia coach, Tim Nielsen:

“There’s a couple of little things we can work on. We can make sure we jump around the bowling group and each other and make sure he’s in as good a place as he can be.”

No idea what that means. Probably something about Johnson being a cack-handed gifford whose arms are possessed by gremlins.

Please don’t drop Mitchell Johnson.

Australia v England, First Test, day three match report

Sorry for those of you still waiting for match reports to appear, but we thought we’d make an exception to our normal rules about leaving everything in the queue for months on end in order to maintain the Ashes theme.

Remember that this isn’t Sam’s fault when you start the dissing.

Sam writes:

Ahead of our attempt at an Ashes all-nighter on Friday we ate pizza, watched Peep Show and two of us headed to Sainsbury’s for supplies.

We purchased a bottle of Bell’s whiskey in honour of Ian Ronald, a four pack of Red Bull as a nod to KP’s hyperactivity, and some vodka and beer because – well, why not.

Returning to the flat we noticed that the other two in our party seemed to have transformed the kitchen into a betting shop, the whiteboard filled with names and numbers that I didn’t understand.

For reasons I won’t go into here we had two televisions in the lounge, neither of which were in working order, so we all crowded round the laptop for the start of play.

After lunch just two of us remained. Several beers, some vodka and Red Bull in a mug and two packets of Pringles – inevitably referred to as Dereks – were consumed before we switched to cups of tea to keep us going.

At tea time we decided we couldn’t take another wicketless session and headed to bed.

Alastair Cook creates a weird scorecard with help from Jonathan Trott

When have you ever seen an England scorecard that read 517-1? Against Australia as well.

We said that Alastair Cook would be okay and with 235 not out, you’d say we were probably right about that. We also predicted a whole host of series results though – none of which featured a draw.

Defending with an angled bat

Previous TV analysis of Alastair Cook has given the wrong impression. It makes you think that he’s destined to fail if he does anything even slightly wrong, but cricket doesn’t really work like that.

Batting in Australia is more about the batsman’s head than his technique, so the players who have made it to international cricket overcoming technical limitations are actually more likely to succeed. It’s counter-intuitive, but if you’re given a pool of international batsmen and asked to identify who’ll do well down under, pick the guys with the worst technique. They’ve got something about them that makes up for those flaws and those strengths will be of greater importance in Australia than elsewhere.

Cook and Trott on scorecards and in highlights

It has to be said that Alastair Cook and Jonathan Trott is the perfect partnership for this tour. We Brits can wake to the fruits of their labours without enduring the detail. Put these two in a highlights package and they’re quite watchable. Or maybe we’re just watching the bowlers’ faces.

An Australian bowling attack unsuited to Australian conditions

You’ve got to break partnerships in Australia. You’ve got to somehow take wickets when the ball ain’t doin’ a right lot.

This Australia bowling attack seems ill-suited to the task. Today one wicket fell – to Marcus North. No matter how flat the pitch, no Australian bowling attack should completely fail over the course of an entire day, but this one did. They even had a big first innings lead to help them apply pressure.

So what are they lacking? Basically, all of the qualities that England always look out for in their bowlers, having learnt from many days just like this one in previous Ashes series.

Height

Australia don’t have a ganglatron of metronomy like Glenn McGrath or Stuart Clark. Their pace bowlers are all over six foot, but elite sport rewards the freaks and there’s no-one you’d spot in a pub and think ‘Jesus!’ about. Their tallest bowler, Mitchell Johnson, entirely negates his height by delivering the ball from about mouth height

Pace

We get the impression that the speed guns at the Gabba are less generous than some others. They might even be accurate. Johnson is the quickest Aussie bowler and he’s hovering around the mid-eighties with the occasional ball hitting 90mph (144kph). It’s quick, but not terrifying. More pertinently, it’s not negate-the-pitch quick.

Mystery spin

The mystery is how a worthy but essentially mediocre finger spinner like Xavier Doherty ever ended up playing for Australia. To make a Matthew Hayden style statement: his presence is fading the fabric of the Baggy Green.

All are very good bowlers

But none is good enough to operate effectively on a batting track when the sun’s out. It’s probably Johnson’s job to break a partnership on those days, but the unpredictability that is his strength is a last resort for Australia in the absence of the above qualities elsewhere in the attack. Unpredictability is not the greatest strength.

Batting partnerships in Australia and breaking them

James Anderson started with a blinding spell to Mike Hussey, but as we said yesterday, the cricket after the new ball matters too.

It’s easy to look on the first hour of the third day as being England’s chance to break the Hussey-Haddin partnership, but Test cricket in Australia is really about finding ways to dismiss batsmen when the ball isn’t doing a lot.

Anderson couldn’t have done much more with the new ball, but there are a lot more overs with the old ball, so that can be the difference between sides. The team that’s better with a stroppy, uncooperative waster of a ball is the one that wins.

Earlier, Nasser Hussain said it was a fine line between success and failure, noting how Prior got a first-baller and Haddin got a hundred. In a sense, he’s right, but then again England had another 286 balls to dismiss Haddin after his first and he survived all bar the last one.

The cricket after the new ball matters too

Yesterday’s theme was of how bowling success can be about playing well frequently rather than extremely well occasionally.

You remember great bowlers for the occasions when they took 7-20; when the ball was swinging or turning a mile. But often those performances aren’t what made those players’ reputations. It’s often about the times when there was a massive partnership and the ball was doing jack shit. What does a bowler do then? Can he motivate himself?

None of England’s bowlers are greats, but they seem wise to the fact that the 65th over can be as important as the first. Graeme Swann was mauled in his first few overs, but didn’t go to pieces. Steven Finn’s second spell was an improvement. James Anderson has returned to Australia to show that he’s not wholly reliant on swing and that he shouldn’t be typecast as the cannon fodder of four years ago.

Mike Hussey knows you’re sometimes up against it too; that there are occasions when you’re under pressure personally and the scoreboard doesn’t look too smart.