The injured Australia spinner went out to bat knowing it would be his last contribution to the match and possibly the AshesIt happened in a way that felt organic, even though you knew that it was coming. Applause that started around the players’ steps in the Lord’s pavilion and spread across the ground, ripples reaching the edge of the pond. Once there it turned back inwards, building in volume, sound becoming a more manifest wave, lifting people from their seats row after row. For a few moments, the whole place glowed.If you had predicted a standing ovation for Nathan Lyon before the second Ashes Test, it could only have been for his imminent 500th Test wicket. Instead he moved to...
England could still snatch victory from a difficult position. but a good team doesn’t get into this position in the first placeTouring England is supposed to be hard. There is always something to surprise you. Blameless days followed by mornings when the ball suddenly seams and swings. Sudden Arctic afternoons to shock players from warmer climes. Scattergun rain delays that send you off the field and drag you back, like: I’m sorry, did I break your concentration?In this context, matches can surge against a visiting team, backed by a crowd getting on top as a session breaks away. Mark Butcher at Headingley 2001. Ben Stokes at Headingley 2019. Ian Botham at Headingley 1981. Take your pick. Continue reading...
James Anderson and Stuart Broad toiled but were unable to unsettle Australia’s openers in the second Ashes TestThere are moments in every Test when you know everything’s in the balance, and the game is about to take a turn one way or the other in this very next stretch of play. Listen, and you can hear it in the crowd, look, and you can see it in the posture of the players. Here at Lord’s it came at 20 to one on Friday afternoon. The match had been slipping from England ever since Ollie Pope was caught out the previous evening, but had run through their fingers with alarming speed on Friday morning, when they lost six wickets for 46...
Ben Stokes’ side could be forgiven for their unwavering commitment to Bazball if it meant winning 10 out of 11 TestsAnd frankly, is this not what the people want? Australia may be on the verge of going 2-0 up after enduring the worst of the conditions, the loss of their champion spinner and an out-of-form No 3 batter. But these are mere details, and the men of Bazball do not trouble themselves with details. Could they have gone harder? Could they have lost their wickets in even more perplexing ways? Could they have thrilled us even more? When cornered, don’t back down. Double down.For all the wildness and weirdness of the darkening evening, this Test turned on the slapstick of...
One of the batting greats showed his class again for Australia at the home of cricket with a century full of balance and defianceIt seemed fitting that even Steve Smith’s celebration of another brilliant, gripping sui generis hundred should become a little bit clipped and fraught and fussicky. The hundred had arrived in the right way too, with one of the thrillingly unbound, but still perfectly balanced cover drives that had decorated his innings.Smith’s cover drive is a remarkable thing. It shouldn’t really be possible. He is already opening his body up the other way as the ball is delivered, closing his left shoulder, gripping the bat hard with his bottom hand, shaping for the default leg-side nurdle. Continue reading...