Darren Lehmann’s bowl fast, score faster gameplan failed spectacularly in 2015 but Australia dominated this series through spectacular endurance at the crease
“Our plans worked perfectly.” One could imagine Darren Lehmann as a supervillain. That saurian monolith of a scone, complete with Blofeldian vasculature. Spinning around in a high-backed chair with that knowing squint. More likely to be stroking a bottle of white wine than a white cat – a crisp Riesling, perhaps, to cut through the third-session torpor? Come, come, Mr Cook, you derive just as much pleasure from crushing touring teams as I do.
In its inception, back in the dim mists of 2013, the Lehmann masterplan could be generously described as uncomplicated. Bowl fast, score faster. Aggression was the only way. It failed in England, worked a charm for the return Ashes a couple of months later, and failed more spectacularly in England in 2015.
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