The Ashes: England on the brink after two days in Adelaide
WERE it possible to take a mid-match break in Noosa, no doubt England would be busily making arrangements.
After two days in Adelaide they were in need of clearing their heads yet again, their hopes of winning the Ashes now seemingly over.
Their return to work - following a pre-match break on the Sunshine Coast - has not gone well, the holiday snaps already starting to fade.
For Noosa, read noose as the rope tightens around England’s necks, squeezing the life out of Bazball as if it was hooded, trembling nervously above a beckoning trapdoor.
At the end of the most pivotal day of the series so far, with England 2-0 down and no margin for error in this third Test of five, Ben Stokes and his players had a condemned look about them, with no court of appeal to which they could plead.
Stokes, of course, was not of a mind to go down meekly on the walk to the gallows, an unbeaten 45 from 151 balls in 40-degree heat, despite suffering from cramp, an example to his players.
Yet much damage had already been done when he came to the crease with England 71-4 and their best batsman, Joe Root, having just fallen to Pat Cummins for the 12th time in Tests, caught behind as he pushed half-forward.
Indeed, it was difficult to disagree with Alex Hartley’s assessment on Test Match Special.
“That’s the end of the Ashes, for me, that,” she said, as Root trudged off.
“It’s done, it’s dusted. Australia… give them the urn.”
On the plus side, England did not collectively give it away as they staggered to 213-8 in reply to Australia’s 371.
As “Zalts” also told us on TMS, England lost six of those eight wickets to defensive strokes, whereas the Bazball average is around one in four; a 50 per cent shift, in other words.
In a way, the tourists could not do right for doing wrong, their attempt to rein things in, as they had promised to do, a wiser strategy than going hell for leather.
On the other hand, the Adelaide pitch, lacking the same bounce as Perth and Brisbane, might have been better suited to the original template; either way, England did not have the technical skills to cope with Cummins and fellow returnee Nathan Lyon, who leapfrogged Glenn McGrath and into second position on Australia’s all-time Test wicket-taking list with 564 behind the late, great Shane Warne (708).
Zak Crawley, the first man to go, received a superb delivery, Cummins kissing the edge with one that cut away.
Ollie Pope did give it away, flicking Lyon’s third ball straight to mid-wicket, his ongoing struggles difficult to witness, not helped by a management that is setting him up to fail at the heights of No 3.
When Lyon struck again with the final ball of his first over, striking the top of Ben Duckett’s off stump with one that turned to beat an unconvincing defensive shot, England had lost 3-5 in 15 balls to slip to 42-3.
After Root’s departure, Stokes and Harry Brook added 56 for the fifth wicket, the Yorkshireman playing nicely for 45 from 63 balls.
Brook was selective with his attacking shots - the most memorable a six over cover when he advanced to Scott Boland - but he fell to a good one from Cameron Green, who did him in the channel with one that took the edge.
Jamie Smith was at the centre of yet more Snicko controversy, first when the technology judged that he was hit on the helmet and not the glove when he was caught at slip off Cummins, although the ball dropped short of the fielder; then when he was given out off an under-edge when he pulled the same bowler, the spike, however, not matching with the image.
“Snicko needs to be sacked,” Mitchell Starc could be overheard saying on the stump microphone, the former Yorkshire fast bowler having earlier recorded a fine half-century before becoming part of Jofra Archer’s five-fer as Australia’s last two wickets added another 45 inside nine overs at the start of the day, a passage of play that set the tone.
When Will Jacks was caught behind by Alex Carey, standing up to the stumps off Boland, who then bowled Brydon Carse, England were 168-8, still more than 200 behind.
Credit to Stokes and Archer - the latter chipping in with 30 from 48 balls - for adding 45 from that point, but England were really clinging on at the close.
Afterwards, Marcus Trescothick, the batting coach, was wheeled out for the post-match interviews just as David Saker, the bowling coach, had been on day one.
When coaches speak to the media during the Test, rather than the players, it invariably means that the side is struggling and that the coaches are trying to take the heat off those players.
But just as there was nowhere to hide in Adelaide from the punishing heat, so there is little escape from that which accompanies a spiralling Ashes tour.