Cricket 2014

 

Good, but misleading?

 

June 14^th 2014

 
 

You would normally accept 575-9d from 22-2. Bell, Moeen Ali and Prior made good runs. Joe Root made a superb double century. Broad, Plunkett and, more briefly, Jordan hammered runs at around a run a ball, with Broad briefly having the fastest ever 50 in Tests in his sights. Even Jimmy Anderson hung around to help Root to his double century. It looked pretty good.

That said, the bowling was friendly (and even then, several batsmen succumbed to short balls) and the life that the pitch had had for an hour on the first morning had gone. It was not like facing Mitch and the Rhino at the Gabba. However, it was a start. Batsmen have to make runs against what is thrown at them and if it is easy pickings, still have to take advantage (remember how the Australians said that they would end Scott Borthwick’s career at Sydney, but he ended up taking four cheap wickets instead as batsmen played him on reputation rather than on merit?)

It was good to see Plunkett, Jordan and Broad show that if they get the chance against tired bowlers they are capable of scoring quick runs and turning a useful score into a good one. Good sides destroy average ones by doing this.

However, when Sri Lanka batted suddenly the England batting looked less special. There was an LBW that was overturned on review. There was a catch behind that may or may not have been fair (when it goes to the TV umpire you know that the foreshortened telefocal shots will always cast doubt on whether or not the ball has carried). Chris Jordan came on to bowl and took a wicket third ball. Liam Plunkett comfortably passed 90mph and was hostile, but the long and short of it is that Sri Lanka reached 140-1 by the Close.

It is not impossible that they could pass England’s total comfortably and leave the hosts to bat to avoid defeat on a pitch starting to deteriorate on the last day.

Were that to happen, the laughter would resonate around the world.

England are still a long way ahead and it would only take a couple of quick wickets in the morning to turn the match situation on its head. Even so, when a Sri Lankan fans posted on CricInfo that he could see triple hundreds coming for both Sangakarra and Jayawardene, he was just expressing a view that Sri Lanka have the batting to win this match still – incredible as it may seem – on a pitch looking more and more like a bowlers’ graveyard. England need to dig deep today to wrest back some control.