Second day definitely belonged to Australia. Every batter got at least a start, and England dropped a fair few.
Anyone know why Australia are playing Inglis as a specialist batter? Is he the best batter in Australia (apart from the top 5 playing here, of course)?
AUS v ENG 2nd Ashes Test Brisbane
Day2
ENG all out 334
AUS 6-378 Weatherald 73, Labuschagne 65, Smith 61
Good Test cricket continues. AUS ahead on the day and the match.
At one stage AUS were 3-291 and looking capable of batting another two sessions, putting up a 150 plus lead tomorrow and shutting ENG out.
Instead Green played a shot which might have been acceptable in the last over of a T20. Smith followed with an excellent catch by Jacks and ENG were back in the game. A series of actches of varying difficulty went down. Unbroken partnership by Carey & Neser provided a useful 44 run lead.
5x50 run partnerships made for a pretty good batting display.
ENG were bowling too short for too long. Yes, they managed to weadle out Smith who had a ton there for the taking. But 70% of the days runs came behind square.
The ENG approach to win the Ashes with 5 quicks above 140k looks busted.
Wood is out injured. Archer is short of work and match fitness. Stokes is yeoman hearted but looks like he’s bowling hurt. Carse is down on pace and very expensive. Atkinson has been a tad unlucky.
Yes.
Notionally a keeper/batter but he has been scoring runs in all formats.
Was an option to open if they wanted to retain Head @ #5.
But why he batted below Carey eludes me.
That’s what prompted my question.
Great summaries.
This is the bit that alarms me - Archer is clearly toiling, but still being bowled for 20 overs today, and doutbless more tomorrow. How many will we get out of him in Melbourne?
Unlike Australia we did pick a spinner, we just didn’t use him. This in itself is ridiculous - we have spent two years being told that Shoaib Bashir is our preferred spinner for the Ashes, he’s got the skills, his extra height will extract unpredictable bounce from Australian wickets etc. etc. Never mind how true that is, that was the clear plan and he has had match time.
Then we have a batting failure in Perth, visibly panic and pick Jacks not because he’s a better spinner, and certainly not on teh back of his red ball experience which is minimal, but because he’s a better batter at no. 8.
Nothing says “we have faith in our top 6” more than picking bowlers for their batting.
Unfortunately, bowlers picked for their batting also have to do a bit of bowling, so Jacks duly got one over, went for 9 and got hooked immediately, leaving the seamers to run themselves into the ground in teh third innings of the series.
Bazball is not, we’re told, about mindless slogging. It’s about confidence, backing yourself, playing the positive option and sticking to your gameplan. Except when it’s not.
The Ashes test is being pretty handily upstaged by an incredibly fascinating last day in the Christchurch test.
West Indies’ statistically challenge batting lineup (highest batting average is Tagenarine Chanderpaul at 29.x) and the longest tail in test cricket are threatening to post the highest fourth innings score in 94 years (since timeless tests were abandoned) and pull off an improbable escape.
At the start of day 5, Bet365 wasn’t even taking bets on this game. I’m guessing they could set the odds short enough on a NZ win to balance their book. Then 3.5 hours ago they had the draw at 40-1 and WI win at 70-1. It’s now 15-4 and 8-1.
Yes, an incredible performance. Kemar Roach getting 50 from 110 balls and then 8 from the next 120 is *magnificent *.
Given the context of, as you say, a long run of poor performances, this is a real statement. Hats off.
AUS v ENG 2nd Ashes Test Brisbane
Day3
ENG 1st all out 334 Root 138*, Crawley 76; Starc 6-75
AUS 1st all out 511 Starc 77, Weatherald 72, Labuschagne 65, Carey 63, Smith 61; Carse 4-152, Stokes 3-113
ENG 2nd 6-134 trailing by 44 Crawley 44, Pope 26; Neser 2-27, Boland 2-33, Starc 2-48
Well that day went to the AUS plan.
The scenario on the cards before Green’s act of indolence/ indulgence on Day2 came into play via the grand work of the tail order on Day3. Keep ENG out in the field and sun as long as possible. Try to get their 2nd innings starting under lights against a new ball.
Accomplished with a solid tail wag around an innings of quality from Starc. It included 13 boundaries but of even more value was the 141 deliveries. Finished up a very solid scorecard with no hundreds but the lowest score was 13 (with 22 sundries). Indeed Doggett’s 13 is the all-time Test record highest lowest score.
At 6:05 the music finally stopped with AUS leading by 177. ENG were metaphorically and physically cooked. 35 overs to negotiate.
However they made a decent fist of their response. Opening partnership of 48. Total reached 1-90 before the weight broke and ENG lost 5-38 and their middle order. Stokes and Jack are still at the crease but ENG likely need another 250 to give them a chance. And the pitch is yet to develop the significant gremlins needed to make a nasty run chase fraught.
AUS v ENG 2nd Ashes Test Brisbane
Day4
ENG 1st all out 334 Root 138*, Crawley 76; Starc 6-75
AUS 1st all out 511 Starc 77, Weatherald 72, Labuschagne 65, Carey 63, Smith 61; Carse 4-152, Stokes 3-113
ENG 2nd all out 241 Stokes 50, Crawley 44, Jacks 41; Neser 5-42, Boland 2-47, Starc 2-64
AUS 2nd 2-69
AUS win by 8 wickets.
The bare bones and outcome don’t tell the story that this was a good days cricket.
A century partnership over 37 overs between Stokes and Jacks was genuine Test standard gritty batting that erased the deficit and looked like they might pose an awkward tally to chase.
Then two absolute top shelf catches removed them both in the space of three runs.
Smith a low one hander to his left at 1st slip for Jacks.
Carey up the stumps for Neser @135kph for Stokes.
Highly recommended that you check the highlight reel if you can.
Apart from some theatrics the chase was completed with authority.
For the 3rd Test in Adelaide it would be expected that Cummings and Lyon return, making AUS stronger. Not sure what changes ENG can/should do.
ENG captain in 2002/03 Nasser Hussain has the less than enviable record of losing an Ashes series in 11 days.
To avoid that mark, the 2025/26 tourists need to 1) not lose and 2) play all five days in the 3rd Test @ Adelaide.
The latest quote to the media from their coach, feeding the beast when lying low under a flat rock might be more prudent:.
Well, the touring team has doctors and physios, all kinds and conditions of therapists and flunkies to carry their bags and top of the town accommodation and facilities at their beck & call.
So, compared to the average British backpacker flying here for R&R and avoiding the privations of a northern winter, they patently have.
Half-century? They only got up to 96.
This is true. Obliged.
Somewhere between draft and post the correct term “near century” went AWOL. Doh!
There are some really telling quotes coming through the interviews:
On overtraining, one feels like the captain and coach are on teh verge of a revelation here:
“I actually felt like we overprepared to be honest,” McCullum told Channel 7. “We had five intense training days and I think sometimes when you’re in the heat of the battle the most important thing is to feel a little bit fresh. I think the boys just need a few days off and probably need to change up a few of the training methods a little bit. I’m a horse racing man and you wouldn’t just keep doing the same thing with your horse – you’d send it around in figure eights or over the little jumps, just to switch it up a bit. So we’ll look at some alternative methods over the next few days.”
Stokes agreed with McCullum’s analysis. “There’s a great saying: are you going to train to train, or are you going to train to dominate? There’s a lot of training that you see go on where you’re just doing it for the sake of doing it,” he said.
“You’re doing it to look right, to be doing the right things, whereas actually you’re not achieving anything out of it. It might look good to the external world [but] wasting energy can be very, very detrimental. I understand that [people would think], surely if you train more you’re going to be better. But there’s that saying, and I like to train to dominate, as does this team.”
I can actually see the point here: if they spent 5 days doing physically intensive drills, I can kind of see that they might be flagging a bit when it came to match day. And it is a game of a mind, as all elite sports are, and there is a real challenge in finding a way of training that is going to give confidence and positivity. But look at that “train to dominate” bit again and compare this, in which Stokes about the problems they have not in “dominating” but in keeping level:
“Over and over again, Australia have managed to get through those periods and outdo us,” Stokes said. “I know it’s not a skill thing, because they’re all incredibly talented players. But if you can’t put it down to skill then you start to wonder, what is it? Do we need to start thinking about what mentality we’re taking into those pressure moments?
“Because when we’re on top we’re great, but when the game is neck and neck we’re not coming out on top on enough occasions to be able to challenge Australia. There is a saying that we have said a lot here, that Australia is not for weak men. A dressing room that I am captain of isn’t a place for weak men either.”
The two related points here are that
a) You can’t fatten a pig on market day. So no, Ben, this is not the time to start thinking about the mentality you’re taking into pressure moments, not by a long shot.
b) Yes, that’s exactly who your dressing room is a place for! I mean, I deprecate the high-pressure machismo of language like “weak men” which really won’t be helping anyone get their head right, but it’s clearly been the case for years that this England team was not building resilience and mental toughness! They have swung from the positive version: “don’t let second-guess yourself and try to play like someone you’re not, back your skills to see you through” to “it doesn’t matter if you get out swinging, at least you had a go”. No-one has been under selection pressure or under any compulsion to reflect on failures and adjust, no one has been encouraged to work on different skills. Big wins dominating weaker bowling are held as the default, losses to stronger attacks are handwaved away as one-offs, immaterial, not a reason to change a winning approach. Amazingly, this strategy of praising wins and excusing losses has led to a team with one gear and morale like a balloon - looks big and shiny, but goes pop under pressure.
Honestly, if after all this prep we have sent a team to Australia who are not mentally prepared for the fact that they can’t just blast it around and that losing actually matters then… whose fault is that?
Well n despite not in fact bowling with any real threat, Emgland have taken two wickets for 33 and the game is alive.
Also, it’s 20 past midnight my time and I really really mustn’t stay up much longer.
I hope you went to bed because Bad England showed up again and honors for the morning are even at 2/94.
Inglis playing as a specialist bat coming in at #7 just bothers me.
Well yes … but so long as it doesn’t bother Inglis himself I can live with it.
How fast is Archer bowling?
Has been above 140 for virtually all of his 15 overs in 3 spells so far.
A bit sharper periodically.
Archer dropped back to mid 130 in his only over with new ball.
AUS finish with 8-326 so marginally the days play goes to ENG imho.
An innings built around two solid innings by Carey 106 and Khwaja 82 (a late change with Smith being withdrawn). Not much movement for the seamers. Some evidence of spin for Jacks which might be foreboding. All batters caught were taken in front of the wicket. Three pretty soft dismissals that thwarted the innings momentum were what gave ENG the edge in a steady performance with the ball.
Good day. Record crowd. Going to be hot tomorrow.