He scored just one run but in his match-winning stand with Ben Stokes, England’s No 11 became the owner of cricket’s most famous pair of spectacles since the days of David SteeleWell, his running between the wickets borders on the diabolical. It is not straightforward to find a fresh slant upon Ben Stokes’s innings of the century – and possibly any century. However, he is not the first great player for whom there is considerable scope for improvement in this department. Denis Compton was in this category, so too Geoffrey Boycott and in this generation Kane Williamson – peerless batsmen yet sometimes harum-scarum runners.At Headingley Jos Buttler had to go and but for a Nathan Lyon fumble, which – as...
After a dizzying day in Leeds it is hard to imagine anything this year in this sport or any other eclipsing Ben Stokes’s display hereOh hell, just call it all off now. Forget the Premier League, cancel the Rugby World Cup, bin the world athletics championship and whatever else we’re supposed to get excited about in the coming weeks and months. And for goodness sake, junk the Hundred too. They’ll all pale after this Headingley Test, when Ben Stokes, that most unlikely saint, worked the second of the two miracles he needs for his canonisation. This was the innings of his lifetime, and everyone else’s too, certainly the best anyone has played for England since Ian Botham overturned odds of...
The ECB hierarchy concentrated on winning the World Cup, and while that mission was accomplished the ruins of England’s Test batting was there for all to see at HeadingleyThere used to be thousands of lamplighters in London; these days there are just five left. British Gas keeps them on the payroll to work the stretch of Kensington Palace Gardens where English Heritage refused to install electric street lights. So they just about outnumber the surviving members of another of England’s dead professions, Test batsman, a job whose essential requirements seem almost entirely alien to this generation of players, who have been weaned on white-ball cricket and whose best players have spent the past two years worrying about nothing much other...
Once Australian attacks would have looked to fight fire with fire but at Headingley control and precision proved crucialFor Australia’s fast bowlers, this year’s Ashes has been all about versatility and balance. Like one of those Chinese tile puzzles, pieces have been slotted into and out of place in a careful and deliberate line of progress towards an eventual aim. The right components have been employed at the right time. The same has applied on the field, where tactical approaches have shifted with the moment.Take the short ball. The past two Ashes series in Australia have been dominated by bouncers on pitches suited to bowling them, and the Lord’s Test this year was dominated by Jofra Archer’s scone-botherers on a...
England’s lack of specialist red-ball batsmen and collapse to 67 all out against Australia meant the six-wicket hero of the first day of the third Test did not get his hoped-for restDay two in Leeds was meant to be one spent at leisure for Jofra Archer. You know, feet up, chatting to colleagues, perusing the match-day programme, enjoying buzz of the England dressing room while the guys paid to bat are knocking the shine off the ball.Archer had been craving this the previous evening, too. Having rocked up 20 minutes late on the first morning due to some issues with the local road system, and then backed up his head‑banging Lord’s show with a six‑wicket exhibition of more measured slice...