Ashes 2013
Australia feast on thin bowling
September 9th
[10:00 CEST]
Yesterday I missed my entry because I was travelling. As it turns out, it was a
good day to miss. The 2nd ODI was very one-sided and England must
now change the balance of the side for the rest of the series or risk a 4-0
humilliation. As many feared, the bowling did not have enough depth to hold
back the Australian batting once it had settled and some of the bowling figures
were pretty eye-watering: Finn, 2-68; Tredwell, 1-60 from 8 overs; Stokes,
0-66. It was as much of a massacre as many people had feared beforehand. The
combined 5th bowler (Tredwell and Root) went for 1-73 and Ravi
Bopara’s 2-57 looked positively respectable by comparison. The situation cried
out for Eoin Morgan to have an extra front-line bowler to back up the new ball
thrust but, after Finn started with a very respectable 5-1-25-1 and Rankin with
4-0-18-0, leaving Australia 49-1 after 10 overs, apart from Ravi Bopara’s
gentle seamers, there was nothing else to retain control and rein-in the
batsmen.
Michael
Clarke showed that he is a class act with a century made at better than a run a
ball, dodgy back or not and, in partnership with George Bailey, put on 155 in
21.4 overs, after England had made the best possible start by removing Shaun
Marsh with the fourth ball of the innings without a run on the board. A
partnership of 60 in 12 overs from Finch and Watson set up Australia, who just
sailed away. At 116-3, with Watson and Finch dismissed, England had the chance
to keep Australia to a chaseable total, but the support bowling leaked runs like
a sieve and, even when both Bailey and Clarke were out quickly near the end, 32
from the last 22 balls of the innings sent the final total way past anything
that England could hope to chase.
The one
bowler to come out with real credit for England was Boyd Rankin, who enhanced
his burgeoning reputation even more and is now probably just one or two solid
performances from the Ashes squad for the winter. However, his two wickets came
late and were only able to restrict the damage rather than allow England to
wrest back control.
Ben Stokes,
whose reputation has been growing, was given a lesson on how tough cricket is
at this level with 0-66 as first change and, batting at 8, with the cause
hopeless, 5 from 7 balls with the bat. If there is not a feeling that bowling
him as first change is asking a lot of him, there should be.
Although
Pietersen, Morgan and Buttler all scored good fifties, both Pietersen and
Buttler showing real defiance, England were holed beneath the water line, with
only Steve Finn of the rest of the batting order scoring more than Ben Stoke’s five.
No one made the major score that England needed to make a challenge and, when
Morgan and Buttler were going well enough at 154-5 that there was a chance of
at least getting close, the fall of three wickets in eleven balls finished
England off.
Australia
were better, were hungrier and were better balanced.
The only
crumbs of comfort were the fact that Fawad Ahmed was the most expensive bowler
of the day, going at almost 8-an-over
and the fact that England managed three fifties in their chase to Australia’s
two. That though is slim pickings for a day where they were a distant second.
England have
to select the extra bowler for the third game, a day-nighter on Wednesday, at Birmingham.
With only two to choose from, they need to take a punt on Chris Jordan – we know
that it will not be Overton, because he has been released to play for Somerset.
Unless England win the match, they will need to win the last two games just to
tie the series, which looks pretty unlikely. It is time to take a risk changing the balance of the side.
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