Friday’s curtailed Ashes Test was proof that sport is secondary to the sense of belonging conjured by one of the great arenasFrom the darkness of a 5am late-summer Friday morning, a train charged down the spine of a country divided, past paddock and canal, wind turbine and sleeping houses. The only sound, as we passed from Manchester to the Midlands and beyond, was that of nothing at all, the lolling heads of grabbed sleep, the silent music of headphones. Even at Milton Keynes, where London workers piled on in ironed shirt sleeves and shift dresses, the train remained quiet. The silence of the railway carriage, it turns out, is a powerful thing.Just to the north-west of Euston station, where that...
England’s intimidating pace bowler has put Australia’s batting rock into a hard place and their duel may shape Ashes outcomeAt lunch Lord’s looked exactly as you picture it in the dark days of winter. The sun was out, the sky was blue and the bars were buzzing with happy chatter. You wouldn’t have guessed it, then, but there was a storm coming in.Australia were 103 runs behind, had five wickets in hand, and Steve Smith and Tim Paine were in the thick of a 50-run partnership. It felt as if England had 60 minutes left to win the Test. Then the tempest came. In the next hour Steve Smith, the best Test batsman of his generation, and Jofra Archer, the...
After taking his first Test wicket the debutant pace bowler gave Joe Root the quandary of asking for one more overA quarter to midday, after two days and eight hours of play, the crucial stretch of the second Test was finally under way. Steve Smith was in again.This series is going to ebb and flow with Smith’s form. If he carries on batting like he did in that first Test at Edgbaston, then the tide is only going one way. Related: Jofra Archer off mark for England but threat of second Test draw looms Related: Ashes 2019: England v Australia second Test, day three abandoned after rain – as it happened Continue reading...
The unsung hero of the Australian attack was preferred to Mitchell Starc and once again produced an efficient, unspectacular performanceIf you were writing an Australia-focused article about the second day at Lord’s, you would probably make your subject Josh Hazlewood: coming back into the Test side, taking the first three wickets, swinging Australia towards an excellent day.Failing that you would write about Patrick Cummins, his pace and bounce and aggression that likewise netted him three wickets in a bookend performance, stamping his dominance over fragile English batting. Related: Jonny Bairstow rescues England after afternoon mid-order collapse Related: Rory Burns counts his blessings amid England fragility at the crease | Andy Bull Continue reading...
Australia players taunt Burns that he is just lucky, but English left-hander simply knows how to exploit every opportunityThe way Gary Player tells it, it goes like this. He was practising his bunker game somewhere in Texas when “this good old boy with a big hat stopped to watch”. Player hit his next shot into the hole and the stranger said to him, “You got 50 bucks if you get the next one in.” Player did, so the Texan said he double it if he made three in a row. “Boy,” he told Player as he peeled a hundred off his roll of bills a second later. “I’ve never seen anyone so lucky in my life.”So Player fired back at...