The Re-Structuring Of The County Championship - Let's Fix What Isn't Broken

 

Fixing What Isn’t Broken: the ECB takes things out on the County Championship

 

September 10^th 2015

 

There is a persistent myth among fans that nobody watches the County Championship and that nobody is interested in it. This mainly seems to be spread by people who never attend and is rarely contradicted: after all, who is going to contradict such a self-evident fact? The fact that this perception exists that it  does not matter because nobody cares, makes the Championship vulnerable.

Anecdotal evidence though, suggests something different. What few figures are published on attendances suggest that they have been increasing steadily in recent years. County commentaries on the Internet and on Digital Radio were for some years limited to Surrey and Middlesex but, after a period of expanding gradually, were finally extended to all official games played by all First Class counties and, in 2015, even to occasional Minor County matches. Each county has its loyal listeners, many from within the county borders, others, exiles who can finally follow their team; radio stations are reported to be surprised and delighted by the listening figures. When you listen to the different counties you hear that there are listeners all around the world, many not even British, who tweet, e-mail and follow their team with passion. The CricInfo “County Cricket Live” page claims (and they should know) that several hundred fans are logged-in at any one time following text updates and chat when there is a County Championship round in progress.

Why does cricket not sell itself better by actually publishing reliable attendance figures?? Surely the technology exists to count how many people come into the ground? Administrators might just have a surprise from the figures that they obtain!!! [OK, perhaps the ECB prefers people not to know that the Championship is actually quite popular with the fans]

As a resident abroad, my own attendance at county cricket is limited to occasional days at Championship games but, on the occasions that I have attended in the last few years, I have almost always been surprised by the size of the crowd. Even on a cold Sunday in May last year, at lunchtime Lord's disgorged an amazing number of people into the walkways around the ground.

My impression is that the situation that held sway back in the late ‘70s and early '80s, when I attended more regularly, has inverted since. Then, even a mid-week Gillette/Nat West Cup game attracted a sizable crowd, while a visit to Lord's for a CC game (Middlesex v Gloucestershire), revealed an almost empty ground - I could, quite literally, count the spectators on my fingers; now, at least the impression that is given, is that Championship cricket is, at least for some counties, better attended these days than the One-Day Cup (let's face it, even the Final hasn't been a sell-out for years).

When one-day cricket started in the 1960s, it was the saviour of the counties. Grounds that were empty for Championship cricket filled for the Cup matches – to the delight of counties, the coffers swelled as a result. As a kid, my great hero was Mike Proctor and the image of him was roaring in to bowl in Cup games almost from the Jessop Tavern at Bristol, backed by a noisy, baying crowd. Now, games are played in near silence in front of empty stands. A surfeit of games and the number of meaningless games in the Group stages reduces all tension and interest and spectator interest seems minimal. In contrast, Championship crowds are swelling and the better-supported counties boast of having several thousand fans in on some days (5000+ is said to be not unusual for big days and big games), yet official attendances are never published.

Football, even rugby, carefully document how many people come through the turnstiles. Despite figures suggesting the Championship attendances have increased steadily for some years (radio commentary must have a lot to do with that), not only do attendance figures not get published, on the rare occasions when they do for the Championship as a whole, the members who have paid for the cricketing equivalent of a footballing season ticket, are not even counted!!! Can you imagine an official Premier League attendance being given as 1500 because the 20 000 fans who came using their season ticket are not officially present because they did not pay at the gate???  It is bizarre.

Yet another shake-up of County cricket is promised for 2017. I would write “threatened”, but well-placed sources say that it is a done deal. The loser is understood to be the one competition that players, clubs and fans say matters most and actually works fine: the Championship itself.

Speculation has been rife all season. At one point a move to three divisions of seven teams seemed likely. This would have required three extra teams in Division 3 and they were even identified as being likely to be Ireland, Scotland and a combined Devon and Cornwall team. Each team would play the others in its division home and away, for a total of twelve games. Concern centred around the viability of Division 3 cricket – likely to be semi-professional, with the danger that sides stuck in Division 3 for a prolonged period would not survive – and whether or not twelve games would be enough to be a true test of the Champion county of the land. There was also the issue of just how much First Class cricket, if any, would be played during the summer Test series. This summer was bad enough, with a virtual hiatus in the Championship meaning that, potentially, the selectors might have to call up replacements based only on T20 and 50-over form. There was a danger that reducing the number of Championship matches by 25% to fit in more limited overs games would damage the Test side more than help it.

Other formulae were even more alarming. A two-division Championship with fewer matches. Imagine, nine teams and twelve games: you play everyone in your Division once and some sides home and away. The result would be to remove all credibility from the Championship. Imagine two sides in Division 1: one plays Middlesex, Yorkshire and Durham twice, the other Worcestershire, Hampshire and Somerset, all at home; which would be more likely to end up as Champions? Throw in a couple of weeks of rain in early season and the Championship would become a lottery, decided by the fixture computer. John McEnroe summed it up nicely when he screamed at officialdom “you cannot be serious”.

However, the formula that the ECB has apparently come up with is a hybrid. Fourteen games rather than twelve. Two divisions. These two points may be a sop to fans and players to convince them that things could have been far more radical and much worse. Eight teams in Division 1. Ten in Division 2.

You can do the maths yourself. In Division 1 each side will play seven rivals home and away. Integrity is preserved and, as there is usually one side in Division 1 that is so far off the pace that it is embarrassing, all the reform does is remove that whipping boy team. It is unarguable that Division 1 will become even tougher: there will be fewer easy games and every team will either be fighting for prize money or fighting against relegation to the last game. Talent will be concentrated still further and, it was stated that Sophia Gardens will be the only Test ground not to see Division 1 cricket in 2016 (that assumes though that Hampshire are not relegated this year, something that is looking increasingly unlikely as Somerset tighten the noose in their relegation clash).

Division 2 though becomes a nightmare.

The suggestion is that one team will be promoted in 2016 and two relegated. This will not please sides that have ambitions to get out of Division 2 quickly (e.g. this season’s two relegated teams, only one of whom at most can get promoted straight back).

In 2017, Division 2 will be at the tender mercies of that faceless machine. Ten teams. Fourteen games. Sides will play everyone else once and five sides home and away. Imagine your “joy” at discovering, as you could have done this season, that you got Lancashire and Surrey home and away and Leicestershire, Kent and Derbyshire (the bottom three sides) only away. The difference between a benevolent fixture computer and a malevolent one may be as many as fifty points. It also means more strong sides in the division and a greater opportunity for the fixture computer to decide which side(s) will get promoted or, at least, to influence which ones they are rather too much for comfort. Yes, it is only Division 2 but, if it is your side that is stuck there, hoping to scramble its way out, the fact that the Championship itself will stay pure will be cold comfort.

As of today, although Surrey and Lancashire are well clear at the top of Division 2, just 25 points (one more than a maximum points win) separate Northamptonshire in 3^rd and Kent in 8^th. In recent years the trend has been for the Division 2 table to be tight like this behind a single, dominant team, with as many as six sides having a chance of promotion almost to the end; years like 2015 where promotion has been clear since half way are though real exceptions. A stronger Division 2 will make the battle to get out even tougher, which may itself be no bad thing; however, for sides like Kent and Leicestershire who have fallen on hard times and are trying to get back into the top flight, it is seriously bad news, as their task has just got even harder,

When the more ambitious Division 2 counties with aspirations to play in Division 1 realise how much tougher it is going to be to achieve that aim and how hard it will be to stay in the top flight, the turkeys may realise finally that they have voted for Christmas.

A petition is circulating at https://www.change.org/p/england-and-wales-cricket-board-to-maintain-a-16-match-county-championship?recruiter=374854840&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink to maintain a sixteen game Championship. In six days it has garnered almost 1200 signatures. With the word being that the change to the Championship is agreed and will happen, only a massive outpouring of indignation could perhaps stop it, sadly, that is quite clearly not happening, Maybe people do not care enough after all. The one competition that almost everyone agrees works well is going to suffer in an attempt that many fear is futile to fix the two that almost everyone is agreed do not work properly.

However, when the full implications of the change work through, do not be amazed if the same administrators who signed-off on the deal agitate to change things back… or, maybe, to try another formula for radical change.

Fifth Test, Day 4 – Too Little Rain. Too Little Defiance

 

 

Ashes 2015

 

Fifth Test, Day 4 – Too Little Rain. Too Little Defiance.

 

August 24^th 2015

 

In the end, despite several hours of heavy rain, it was not enough to save England. And England did not really deserve to escape either.

Had Jos Buttler and Mark Wood continued until the rain band that had been approaching for hours finally arrived, you might have made a case that such defiance between a desperately out of form batsman and a nightwatchman deserved some reward; as it was though, both fell in half an hour and, once again, left the task of rescuing England to Moeen Ali and Stuart Broad. The difference was that, with the nightwatchman used, they were batting 9 and 10 respectively and with only Steven Finn to come, everyone knew that it was hopeless. It seemed appropriate that, as the skies darkened, it was Moeen Ali and Stuart Broad holding the line. Had another batsman higher in the order supported Alistair Cook, this stand might well have saved the match; as it was, it just delayed the inevitable because the radar showed that the rain band would clear during the afternoon and that Australia would have plenty of time to finish things off before the next – and terminal – rain band arrived that would surely stop any play on Day 5. As at Lord’s, every time that England seemed to be getting back into the match, one – or more usually two – wickets fell quickly: here was no exception.

It is an indictment of some of England’s batting that Moeen Ali and Stuart Broad have been by some distance the most productive batting partnership for England in the series. Far too often they have had to save what they could from the ruins of a collapse, or lead a counter-attack to avoid frittering away an advantage gained. It is not what you expect your #8 and #9 to have to do time and again in a series.

However, it is an indictment of Australia’s thin bowling – as in 2013, the statistics hide far more than they actually reveal, essentially papering over a misfiring attack – that, when they needed to finish the job, they were unable to do so. In 2013 Australia had England 30-3 or 40-3 time and again, but England almost always escaped and set up winning totals. 2015 has been a similar story. Australian averages are padded by Lord’s and The Oval, but when the bowlers were desperately needed to show up, like their batsmen, they were found wanting.

Although Stuart Broad’s 134 runs @ 19.1 looks like a modest contribution, this was from a player whose confidence had been destroyed to the point that many fans questioned whether he should bat anywhere other than 11. Rather than being a walking wicket, he was a major obstacle to the Australian bowlers and an ideal foil for Moeen Ali. The failure of the bowlers to dismiss Broad quickly was indicative of how they failed to sustain pressure.

Michael Clarke can complain about the pitches prepared but, he cannot fairly blame the ECB for Australia’s failure to pick Peter Siddle and Mitch Marsh on two pitches where they could have been destructive! In this match they have shown what Australia have missed thanks to some rather dubious  selection policies.

Fifth Test, Day 3 – Australia Set Up a Race v the Rain for Day 4

 

 

Ashes 2015

 

Fifth Test, Day 3 – Slings And Arrows.

 

August 23^rd 2015

With England actually battling hard, rather than the expected rapid surrender, having a little bit of luck too would not have gone amiss. A side that has to fight back from such a dreadful start needs a little luck. It is one thing to know that a series of big no balls from Mitch Johnson have been going uncalled (both allowing the bowler to be more aggressive than he would be if the umpires followed the laws and denying the batting side runs), it is quite another when a batsman in good form gets given out from a ball that should have been called dead by the umpires. What luck has been going in this Test has almost all gone Australia’s way; the Australians would argue that this simply evens-out the previous two Tests and there is an argument for that.

It seems to have been a feature of Test cricket over the last 25 years that the side on top has tended to get most of the marginal calls falling in its favour. However, there is also a school of thought that you make your own luck and, in the two Tests that Australia has dominated in this series, they have done that in spades with thoroughly ruthless cricket that has made their miserable performances at Cardiff, Edgbaston and Trent Bridge look even worse.

England’s chances were just about ended when Michael Clarke brought on Steve Smith who, immediately trapped the previously unstoppable Alistair Cook. Cook looked set to get a century and Jos Buttler was accompanying him with a determination – despite being obviously horribly short of form and confidence – that suggested that the two would reach the Close together. With heavy rain forecast from Lunch on Day 4, a battling draw was beginning to look quite possible. Credit to Michael Clarke: he has made some big calls in the field and got them almost all right. Knowing that rain was on the way, he had to make something happen and did: had England started the 4^th Day with Cook and Buttler together there was a real danger that the partnership could kill Australia’s chances

The tone for the day had been set in the morning by Moeen Ali and Mark Wood who used up time and added runs, frustrating Australia. The value of that partnership may yet become evident if it does rain, It gave the captain something to work with. Sadly though, until Jos Buttler, no one was able to stay with him. Lyth (yet again), Bell & Root all reached double figures, without any of them reaching 15: Lyth must know that this was his last innings for England. Jonny Bairstow fought for a while before edging into short leg’s helmet and being caught on the rebound.

Heavy rain is approaching London and likely to arrive mid-morning. It offers hope but, to escape, England’s remaining batsmen will have to fight hard. And at least two of them will need to make a 50. And Mark Wood, sent in as nightwatchman, is going to have to spend a fair time on his day job.

England need to show that they deserve to save this match.

Day 4 looks set to be a race between Australia and the rain.

Fifth Test, Day 2 – A Sadly Inevitable England Disaster

 

 

Ashes 2015

 

Fifth Test, Day 2 – A Sadly Inevitable England Disaster.

 

August 21^st 2015

 

“It is already beginning to look uncomfortably familiar to The Oval 2013 and to Lord’s 2015. Australia building up a huge 1^st innings score against an England side that has visibly turned the intensity down a notch or two. It would not be an enormous surprise if, by the 3^rd Day, we are talking about a potential follow-on.”

Oh my prophetic soul! It was sadly inevitable and utterly embarrassing. In a series where the two sides have taken turns to be utterly incompetent, today it was England’s turn and the result was as bad as anything Australia have produced. The result is that yet another Test should end on the third day unless, incomprehensibly given the bad weather forecast for Days 4 & 5, Michael Clarke decides to bat again.

There is still the possibility that England can turn this around. With rain forecast for days 4 & 5, every minute of resistance is vital. Sadly though, the feeling is that this match will end today with a second, huge defeat in the series for England, this time by an innings. At The Oval in 2013, England fought back from a pretty poor first two days to produce the memorable finish, but this game looks more like Lord’s.

Can a side ever have won a series 3-2, despite suffering two defeats as humiliating as Lord’s and the one that will surely come here today or tomorrow? For Australian fans it will just convince them, as in 2013, that there was something very underhand about the manner of their defeat when they have seen themselves so superior in two matches. The truth though is that these are, as I suggested before the series, two extremely vulnerable sides that are both far from top class: Australia’s away record has been awful for several years and England are extremely inconsistent.

Through the series, England’s plan of counter-attack when losing wickets has come up trumps more often that it has failed. At different times, Ben Stokes and, together, Moeen Ali and Stuart Broad have turned the game on its head. Even at Lord’s, with England 30-4, first the Cook/Stokes stand and then the Cook/Ali stand threatened to wrest control from Australia. After a steady start, Cook and Stokes had put on 145, both were approaching a century and the runs were flowing freely with the bowlers looking short of ideas; another hour and England would have been right back in the match. However, as in the later Cook/Moeen Ali stand, before things could escape control completely, a wicket came. Both times it was Mitch Marsh who struck the vital blow.

Here, once again, it was Mitch Marsh who applied the killer blows after Peter Siddle had shown that not selecting him for the previous two matches may well have lost Australia the series. Starc and Johnson huffed and puffed, but when Siddle came on as second change, he made the ball talk and then Mitch Marsh removed three of the four batsmen who have led England resistence in the series. Not that a talking ball was needed to shift Adam Lyth: confidence shattered, a series aggregate of just 105 runs, Lyth knows that whoever does go to the UAE and South Africa, he will not be with them. A similar crisis is building around Jos Buttler: his figures are even poorer than Lyth’s.

The selectors have shown faith in Lyth. He scored a century against New Zealand, but eleven other innings this summer have produced just 148 runs. We all warned of the danger of dropping him straight into a summer of Test cricket against two very good attacks with almost no cricket behind him for months (would playing in the 3^rd Test v West Indies have helped?) The selectors have given him a vote of confidence: they could easily have dropped him for the 4^th Test and here would easily have suggested that they wanted to give someone else a try, but have resisted the temptation. Unfortunately, Lyth is shot. Most likely he will score stacks of runs for Yorkshire at the end of the season but, here, he seems to be in a nightmare that he is facing the Australian attack with no idea how to play them and then wakes up and finds that he is.

It has been suggested that Lyth has kept his place in part because no one else was hammering on the door. After a fabulous start to the season Alex Hales has gone off the boil until recently. A century v Warwickshire in a One-Day Cup match in the last week of July has given him a new burst of life and his recent scores have been 85, 9, 81, 58 &, yesterday, a murderous Championship 189 opening the batting. Hales is making a pretty convincing case just at the right moment. At the same time, albeit more placidly, Nick Compton was holding a Middlesex batting line-up together against Durham’s attack in conditions tailor-made for seamers, showing all the discipline and battle that England  were so conspicuously lacking in difficult conditions.

Jos Buttler had a good start to his England Test career and did some great things in the ODIs v New Zealand. He has also improved out of all recognition with the gloves, making some wonderful catches this summer but eighty runs in seven innings against Australia, scored at a rate slower only than Cook & Lyth, is not what England picked him for. He still averages almost 35 in Tests, with 5x50, but is having a nightmare series with the bat here.

Lyth and Buttler will have one more innings, as will England to set the record for the summer straight. Sadly though, almost no one expects a rearguard as determined as Brisbane 2010 or Ahmedabad 2012, but one is desperately needed. If England lose, as most expect, they should go down with a fight; if rain saves them, it needs to be because of backs to the wall resistance. Nothing less will do.

Fifth Test, Day 1 – Australia Restore The Art Of Batsmanship

 

 

Ashes 2015

 

Fifth Test, Day 1 – Australia Get it Right, but too late.

 

August 20^th 2015

 

In 2013, England shuffled their pack for a dead rubber at The Oval and were roundly condemned. Although Chris Woakes has come back from that humiliation, the story of the Test was of a young spinner who had being causing havoc around the country in county cricket and who, sadly, has never been the same again after the experience: Just look at Simon Kerrigan’s returns: 58 wickets at 22.0 in 2013, 44 wickets at 35.4 in 2014 and 30 wickets at 29.4 in 2015.

For The Oval 2015, England have resisted the temptation to blood a young spinner. Had Adil Rashid played – and the evidence on the first day’s play is that he would have been more valuable than a fourth seamer – any success would have been dismissed with the words “it’s only a dead rubber”. Similarly, with a more relaxed Australia likely to turn up, England knew that there was a danger of doing enormous damage to the confidence of a bowler who they know that they will need in the UAE.

Of course, nothing changes the fact that, like Adam Lyth, he should have played at least the 3^rd Test in the Caribbean early in the year.

First signs in this Test are not promising. It is already beginning to look uncomfortably familiar to The Oval 2013 and to Lord’s 2015. Australia building up a huge 1^st innings score against an England side that has visibly turned the intensity down a notch or two. It would not be an enormous surprise if, by the 3^rd Day, we are talking about a potential follow-on.

Alistair Cook’s decision to bowl was presumably based on the idea that in overcast conditions the Australians would bat like lemmings again. What no one could imagine was that Rogers and Warner would take care and self-denial to such extremes that Stuart Broad’s first six overs would go for just eight runs. It was if the Fred Boycott of Twitter (widely rumoured to be a former opening bat for a county the other side of the Pennine’s to Boycott’s own) had spent the intervening week and a half after the 4^th Test teaching the Australian openers two new shots: the block and the leave.

Given the way that the Australian batting line-up played against Northants, Alistair Cook could be forgiven for asking “why me?” It does seem a bit unfair that they suddenly start to apply proper, Test-match batting just to make his bowl-first decision look stupid when, at Trent Bridge, even Stuart Broad thought that the right decision was to bat.

Australian surprises were not limited to batting properly When it was taken as read that, despite a very lack-lustre display at Wantage Road, Pat Cummins was going to replace Josh Hazlewood, almost definitely bringing down the curtain on Peter Siddle’s career, it was Siddle who was picked. The fact that this was another grassy pitch and Clarke wanted to bowl first may have had a lot to do with this decision. For Cummins it is yet another set-back. A career already four years long has featured just seven FC matches, including one Test. Will he ever become a Test regular? Or will his career be restricted to ODIs and T20s when his body allows him to do even that?

The fact that the Marsh hokey-cokey continued, with the two brothers swapping again in the side was no surprise to anyone. The sequence has been “Mitch, Shaun, Mitch” – no prizes for guessing which of the two will play the 1^st Test v Bangladesh in a few months, but expect Mitch to be back for the 2^nd Test!

The one player who has not benefitted from the end of term feeling and the lack of intensity in England’s play has been Michael Clarke. Having arrived at the crease to a great ovation from players and crowd, there was a lot of talk about whether or not he would score the 172 needed to get his Test average over 50: realists would have noted that that would have required more than doubling his series aggregate in just a single innings. Another innings of a man horribly out of form was ended by Ben Stokes. Having edged behind, Clarke reviewed. Although there was only a feather, not picked up by HotSpot, the guilty look behind and the sound of a snick convinced most even before RealTime Snicko confirmed the noise.

At 186-3 there was a real chance that England could shake off their laxity and dismiss Australia for under 300. Steve Smith though is looking like a #1 batsman in the world again and Voges like a batsman. With the new ball due 2 balls into Day 2, England will need to split these two quickly or they could be facing a huge follow-on target.

Looking Back at the 2013 Oval Test

 

 

Ashes 2015

 

Fifth Test, Preview.

 

August 19^th 2015

 

With the final Test about to start, the whinging has begun. When, just a few months ago, we were told that there was no surface that England could prepare that would not play into the hands of the Australian attack, the British media are quoting back reports from the Australian camp of the fury of the Australian players that they have been forced to play on doctored pitches aimed at ensuring that England would win at any price. Pundits who saw England losing 4-0 at best are back-peddling. Whereas, in March, an Australian side that had beaten England 5-0 at home and then defeated South Africa looked to have no cracks and certainly not in English conditions,  the whole Australian side now seems to be creaking at the seams and the flow of talent that, six months ago seemed limitless, suddenly looks far less obvious: there are few good, young batsmen banging at the door to replace the likes of Rogers, Clarke and Haddin and it is not obvious that the bowlers currently in India with Australia A would have done any better.

Part of the problem has been in the personnel picked. Bowlers expected to thrive in English conditions such as Peter Siddle and Shane Watson have been marginal figures, playing bit parts at most. It seems unlikely that either will play again for Australia. Siddle is the type of bowler who would expect to play havoc on a pitch with some life in it, yet even with Josh Hazlewood out and doubts about the staying power and health of other bowlers, Peter Siddle cannot get a game.

Too many of the Australian team seem one-dimensional. Mitch Johnson is a particular case in point: much of the hype about him is down to just two series when he got pitches to his liking. Experience shows that a good fast bowler can be dangerous anywhere because he generates problems through pace and accuracy, hence the West Indian quicks were almost as deadly on flat, Indian pitches as on Caribbean trampolines. Contrast though Mitch Johnson’s figures in the countries where he has played most of his 70 Tests: he averages 24.5 in Australia, 25.3 in South Africa, but 38.4 in England and 40.1 in India. Compare that with Dennis Lillee who, despite first time out with Kerry Packer and then when injury forced him to reduce his pace and concentrate on movement and accuracy (although he was still pretty brisk in England in 1981, even recovering from pneumonia). Lillee averaged around 20 in England, Australia and New Zealand, while his only significant blip was in Pakistan.

That brings us back to The Oval and the 5^th Test. In 2013, England had largely dominated the series and went to The Oval 3-0 up. A couple of experimental picks and, popular belief is that the momentum in the series changed completely and set up the defeat that winter. Certainly, the Australian spin is that they played exciting, attacking cricket, set up a great finish and were unfortunate to lose the Test and the series having been the better side and having played the better cricket overall.

Like many things related to the 2013 Ashes, the spin placed on the events and the actual events themselves do not bear too much comparative scrutiny.

The Test suffered badly with the rain. Much of Day 2 was lost, as was the whole of Day 4. By late on Day 2 Australia had declared at 492-9, made at an impressive 3.8 runs an over. Watson and Smith both made big hundreds and, famously, the first spells of both Simon Kerrigan and Chris Woakes came in for some fearful punishment, mainly from Shane Watson.

England, conscious that they could not win the game, but could lose it if they failed to save the follow-on, set out to secure the draw and batted four sessions at a painful crawl of 2.1 runs per over. By the end of Day 3, 247-4 meant that the follow-on target was only 46 away.

When Day 5 started, it seemed as if the only conceivable interest was whether or not England would make those 46 runs. If they did, all logic suggested that the match would be dead.

Logic though, had a bad time… as it has had much of the time in this current series. Forgotten in the later events was the fact that England’s batsmen came out and blazed away until Lunch, aided by innings of 47 from 57 balls by Matt Prior and 34 from 24 balls by Graeme Swann. The Follow-On target was left far behind in a hail of boundaries.

130 runs came from 28.4 overs. 4.53 runs per over in the session.

Without this positive cricket from England, what came after would never have been possible.

With the game suddenly moving along more rapidly, Michael Clarke responded in kind. Australia went for quick runs too. 111 from 23 overs, at 4.8 per over, although 4-43 from Stuart Broad ensured that Michael Clarke probably scored fewer runs more slowly than he had hoped.

With overs to be made up, Australia could declare at Tea, offering a target of 227 from a nominal 44 overs.

Not many sides score even 150 in a session of a Test, even a long session. The assumption was that Australia would go all-out for quick wickets and brownie points and that there would be a 5 o’clock handshake with England maybe 50-3 and no result possible either way.

What no one could have expected was to see England come out and play positively, but not rashly. 14 from the first two overs.

Even the early loss of Joe Root did not stop the flow of runs. After 13 overs England were ahead of where Australia had been in their innings, both in runs and in wickets. A couple of quiet overs followed and then, Jonathon Trott cut loose. Consecutive overs went for 10 and 12 and suddenly England were 85-1 and cruising.

When Cook fell, Australia’s problems just got worse. In came KP with a licence to enjoy himself. The 50 partnership came in 48 balls, with 45 to Pietersen and just 7 of them to Trott. KP’s 50 took only 36 balls.

While the plaudits were for Michael Clarke’s adventurous/daring/attacking/brave (delete to taste) declaration, people singularly failed to appreciate was that everything Michael Clarke did that last day, England did just a little better.

Of course, the denouement has become famous. With 4 overs to go and shadows lengthening. With England ahead of the run rate and needing just 21 from 24 balls, the umpires called the players off for bad light.

How you saw that decision depended very much on your colours. The crowd were furious. The Australians saw it as natural justice  because to lose would have been unjust after their positive play.

Less comment has been made of the desperate efforts to waste time as the target approached, the constant claims from fielders that they could not see the ball and a careful “Ooops! Sorry! Lost my run-up” that almost certainly denied England at least one more over as it contributed to an interminable over that featured also a no ball, a run out (the fielder saw the ball then), an appeal against the light by Michael Clarke and a careful – and extremely slow – field re-organisation.

While there is certainly a case that, in a contrived finish, neither side really deserves to lose, legend has it that it was Australia’s 111 runs in 23 overs that made the exciting last day. That conveniently erases from the record the fact that, on that last day, England scored 336 runs in 68.4 overs, at a rate of 4.89 per over (three times as many runs at a slightly faster rate than the much-lauded Australian second innings).

Would that this Test at The Oval give us such an exciting finish.

[PS: Of course, having said that Pat Cummins would replace Josh Hazlewood, Australia have thrown a surprise by playing Peter Siddle instead. This is his first Test for a year.]

3-1. Thanks For Coming.

 

 

Ashes 2015

 

Fourth Test, Day 3: Quick and Clean, 3-1.

 

August 8^th 2015

 

It was brief and it was clean. Australia were in no mood for a fight.

Even before play started the reaction was happening.

Ricky Ponting reported that as many as eight of the touring party will never play for Australia again. Apart from Harris and Rogers, Watson, Shaun Marsh and Haddin look unlikely to be picked again. Voges and possibly even Mitch Johnson are other likely candidates, as is Peter Siddle (if he did not play here on a seamer’s pitch, where will he play?) Various other of the squad have been tried and found wanting.

Then Jim Maxwell reported that Michael Clarke had been taken aside last night by the selectors and told that he would not be in the squad for Bangladesh. Clarke asked around how to make a dignified exit in advance of his imminent sacking and announced his retirement as soon as the Test ended. It was good to see Michael Clarke being treated with the utmost respect by players and crowd. This Test series has been played in the right spirit, unlike the often very unpleasant 2013 and 2013/14 series.

In 2013 Australia could look to “doctored pitches”, a couple of marginal umpiring decisions and some bad luck with rain and some very uninspiring cricket from England as consolation. They could claim the moral high ground of having played the imaginative and innovative cricket and could suggest that the better side had not won.

In 2015, they do not have that comfort. Pitches at Edgbaston and Trent Bridge that, before the series, 95% of fans would say were tailor-made for the Australian seamers, have seen the Australians blown away. Man for man the unanimous opinion was that Australia were the better side in all departments yet, save at Lord’s where things did run to script, they were outplayed time and again.

After the disastrous winter, few people were willing to bet on any result better than a 3-0 defeat and most thought that it would be 5-0 unless rain saved England. What no one imagined is that the Australian batsmen would be so fallible against the moving ball and that their seamers would be so totally unable to exploit helpful conditions.

Before the series pundits looked at all the players that Australia had not selected and compared them with England’s threadbare reserves. A common statement was “heaven help England if Jimmy Anderson gets injured”: we he has and England managed their biggest win of the series without him. With four bowlers taking a 6-for in consecutive matches, England suddenly have an embarrassment of options. The decision on who gets dropped to accommodate Jimmy Anderson can be avoided by “resting” him for The Oval. Anderson, Broad, Finn, Wood and Stokes are certainties for the winter tour. This leaves three bowlers who lost their place through injury – Plunkett, Woakes and Jordan – fighting for probably just one tour place and even they have to watch for Footitt and Rushworth who are both very much in the mix too.

In contrast, Australia look at their reserves which, a few short weeks ago looked limitless, and wonder who, if anyone, might have done better. Pat Cummins has a fearsome reputation, but has not played a single match on tour – just 6 First Class matches in his career. Peter Siddle has barely played and looks likely not to tour again. Could Faulkner, Coulter-Nile and Pattinson have done better? One suspects, not.

Australia A are playing in India and doing well, but many of the squad have been tried at the top level and not convinced. Is Khawaja better than Clarke? Are Maxwell and Wade good enough? Many Australians seem to fear that they simply are not. The question of where Australia go from here, who leads their attack and who will fill the shaky middle order is as uncertain as it can be.

England still have uncertainties. The opener spot that has gone from hand to hand like a hand grenade with a dodgy pin since Andrew Strauss retired still has no owner. There are still doubts about Moeen Ali as spinner. And both Ian Bell and Jos Buttler have their critics, but at least nine places in the team look pretty well tied down for now. Moeen has not been hit out of the series and has taken some useful wickets as well as providing a formidable sting in England’s lower middle order. Buttler has improved tremendously as a wicket-keeper, even if he has struggled with the bat. Bell has come good and Bairstow has taken his chance.

All in all though things look so much better than they did and, wonder of wonders, Alistair Cook, who was perhaps two Tests from being sacked, has suddenly looked like a positive and innovative captain who has totally outthought Michael Clarke. If we cheer one thing from the series, that should be it. Cook’s revival has been amazing.