The art of being Travis Head

Bemoaning after watching your team being manhandled by Travis Head has become a recurring exercise for many in the cricketing world. Stokes' England are the latest victims of another assault of an innings by the South Australian. The English fast bowling brigade that made the Aussies run for cover on the first day was mercilessly mauled on the next afternoon by one man who was prepared to be brave like he always is. He is in the cream of cricketers who inevitably show up at the big games. Labelling him as the most clutch cricketer in the world would not be irrefutable. What he has achieved since the home Ashes in 2021 is scandalous.

In 2021, Pat Cummins had bowled England out for 147 in the ashes opener in Brisbane. Head walked in at 189-3 and it quickly became 195-5 with a couple of quick wickets at the other end. Knowing that a fourth innings chase would have been very difficult, Australia had to get a big first innings lead. The South Australian scored at better than a run-a-ball on his way to a counter attacking 152 to bury England in the dirt. In completely contrasting circumstances, Travis walked in at 12-3 after England asked Australia to bat first in the final test in Hobart. Stuart Broad and Ollie Robinson had the ball on a string and none of the Australians could lay bat on ball. Another swashbuckling hundred was to follow to help Australia get to a respectable total which eventually led them to win the test and the series 4-0. Next on his radar was India, twice in 2023, both in ICC Finals, both of which I had the fortune or the misfortune to witness live. Firstly, at the Oval in the World Test Championship Final, he resurrected Australia's first innings with a blazing 163 to bat India out of the game. Australia scored in excess of 450 which also included a century from Steve Smith. India could never recover from it as they lost the match by 209 runs. After less than three months, Australia's World Cup campaign had gotten off to the worst possible start with heavy defeats against India and South Africa in the first two matches. Head missed the first five games but recovered from injury to return to the side as Australia faced the Kiwis in a crucial encounter in Dharamsala. He marked the start to his World Cup with a 67 ball 109 to provide Australia the kickstart to post 388 which turned out to be a match winning total. He had a quite next couple of games, probably waiting for a big occasion. Australia finished third in the league to avoid India and set up a semifinal showdown against South Africa at the Eden Gardens. Proteas batted first in very tricky circumstances and quickly found themselves tottering at 24-4 in 12 overs. Klassen along with Miller steadied the ship as South Africa looked on course to a respectable total until Cummins handed the ball to Travis Head. Unsurprisingly, he took removed Klassen and Jansen in the same over with some agricultural off spin bowling to put the onus of scoring entirely on David Miller. Then with the bat in hand, he stroked a fluent 62 off 48 balls in pursuit of 213. His innings meant that the rest of the batters had very little to do even though the South Africans were superb with the ball once Head got out. Next up India, by far the best team in the tournament, in the Final. In the first innings, he brilliantly caught Rohit Sharma running back from cover point. It completely sank India's innings to get restricted at 240. It was not a mountain to climb but looked like one after Australia were reduced to 47-3 thanks to Jasprit Bumrah. Another wicket could have handed India the momentum and probably the World Cup. It was Head who continued to take chances when the ball was swinging round corners. It paid off and won Australia the World Cup with a memorable 137 in the cauldron of 110000 Indians. Fast forward to December 2024, all of Australia was pounding the team after the heavy loss in Perth. The South Australian stood up with back to back hundreds in Adelaide and Brisbane to swing the momentum back in Australia's favor. And now he has done it again in the very first match of the series which could go a long way in defining the series in completely different ways for England and Australia.

Travis Head is a maverick and the kind of stuff he produces with the bat is scarcely believable. It is madness most of the times but there is a method to it. He seems immortal when in the zone but the guy is also vulnerable and all the more relatable for it. His game often isn't a visual feast or suitable for framing but the fervor to win matches for Australia makes his batting an acentric odyssey. Travis Head's batting is an experience which is arduous to put in theory. Maybe it boils down to simplifying the game, probably the oldest cliche in any sport. Head has a limited range of shots and all of it is the conventional scoring areas. He very seldom scoops, reverse sweeps or plays the lap behind the wicket. His batting is based predominantly on four shots- the fierce cuts behind point hit with tremendous power often splitting third man and point, the liquid whip like drives through cover point hit with a vigorous bat speed that make the fielders think twice before putting a hand in its path to the boundary, the flick through midwicket which is often thin, supple and graceful, often when the bowler tries to overcorrect after being hit through the off side and the pull shot, primarily placed in front of square rather than behind it. He is not a six hitter but he is very good at moving around the crease and exploring various empty pockets in the field. Some of the shot making could be seen as bravado and credited with stupidity but with a steady bunch of batsmen around him, Australia can afford to have a free spirit like Travis Head in the team. 

Having won and achieved so much while still being 31, Travis Head is already revered all around Australia. He seems to have mastered the three challenges that every sportsperson faces- the borderline terrifying motivation to train, making peace with the limitations of your game and the control of emotions. Live sport is the last appointment living left to us and many people find refuge in it to escape from the pressures of work life. Cricket needs personalities like Travis Head if it is to sustain beyond the shortest format in the long run.

Bazball to 'Dumb'ball

The unravelling of England in the bright sunshine on the Western Australian coast has sparked the same old discussions that the media are used to after every Brisbane test for the last 14 years. For an England team to lose in Australia isn't a big deal but the manner in which it all happened was quite telling of the ugly side of Bazball. After being 105 runs ahead at lunch on day 2 with 9 wickets in hand, anyone who says they put their money on Australia winning by evening must be lying. If ever the match was to finish on day 2, it had to be England bowling Australia out for another sub-150 total to win the test. It should never have been the other way round. Boland looked in rhythm against England for the first time since Hobart 2021. Duckett got out to a decent delivery and what followed next was to have a direct impact on the result. Pope was trying to drive on the up for an hour and he finally edged one to Alex Carey after playing & missing for about 15 times before that. Harry Brook came in at number 5 and nicked the third delivery he faced to Usman Khawaja, again trying to drive Boland on the up. Joe Root was watching this from the other end but didn't seem to understand any of it as he also dragged one onto his stumps while trying to play the same bloody shot off Mitchell Starc! Stokes again fell to Starc as England collapsed dramatically to be 104-7. Gus Atkinson and Bryden Carse played a shot on almost every delivery to add 50 more runs before the final three wickets fell to three horrible shots. The sequence of the last three wickets was bad but not worse than that of Pope-Brook-Root. It looked as if they are trapped in a fever dream. Once is a mistake, twice is a choice and choosing do the same thing expecting a different result is madness. Playing against this England side must feel like interacting with a man who is shouting his guts out with noise cancellation headphones on, they just keep doing the same thing irrespective of what you do! The compulsion to play at every ball has led to their demise many a times in the last couple of years and yet they are reluctant to change. Is it because they genuinely believe that going harder is the correct option or because they just do not want to admit their mistakes? What Travis Head did is probably what England dream of. He played at a strike rate of almost 150 but did not play a single drive on the up. He pulled, cut and only drove half volleys. 

England played all their cricket in the last 3 years with this Ashes in mind. They built a team, especially the fast bowling group, specifically for Australia and it worked wonders on the first afternoon when they had Australia running for cover. With a crucial lead of 40 runs, England were the clear favorites going into the second innings against an Australian team having a debutant opener potentially patterned by a makeshift opener. Being over 100 runs ahead at lunch, England were an hour of good batting away from having Australia at their mercy. England's self destruction meant Australia were chasing 204, the highest team total of the match if they were to get there. Travis Head again stood up when the chips were down as he always does in important matches for Australia and won them the test single handedly. 

Only Australia in world cricket play pink ball tests and win almost all of them. England have got 11 days before Brisbane to prepare for the toughest test on this tour while being 1-0 down. Australia will potentially have Cummins back if not Hazlewood as well which adds to the degree of difficulty. If Stokes' team doesn't bring nuance to their batting approach, it is going to be 2-0 to Australia when the teams head to Adelaide. 

An all time epic amidst unprecedented chaos

    It was 42 years ago that the MCC members refused to clap for Sir Ian Botham in the long room when he got a pair as the England skipper against Australia. Botham gave up the captaincy and produced one of the most iconic performances at Headingley which started their juggernaut to win the Ashes. Four decades later, some MCC members have performed an act of embarrassment by abusing the visiting team members and another English captain should have been at the center of it all for the right reasons yet what has made the headlines is a very skillful piece of cricket which is doomed by some as against the spirit of cricket and the aftermath of it has been ugly. What the MCC has written in the books are laws of the game and not rules. Rules can be flexible and be flirted with. Laws have strict boundaries and if your actions are within those boundaries, what you are doing is completely legal. Therefore those that call the incident 'cheating' are pretty irrelevant in my opinion because what is within the laws of the game can not be called cheating. Both sides have been defended by experts and senior journalists in the last 48 hours. I don't think anyone who knows cricket has said that it wasn't out as it was a perfectly legal dismissal on every day of the week. The same people who were discussing the legitimacy of the dismissal on Sunday were suddenly bringing the spirit of cricket into the context on Monday. I think the two most important things missing in the conversation are the lack of game awareness from Jonny Bairstow and the cricket smarts of Alex Carey. Bairstow was regularly walking out of his crease without looking at the keeper or the umpire which was very naive for someone who is playing at this level for a decade. At the same time, it was a moment of real skill from Carey who had noticed Bairstow stroll out for a walk previously and just instinctively under-armed the throw to stump him. Nobody deserves the amount of abuse and criticism that the Aussies have received basically just for playing by the rules. It was the occasion that made it blow out of proportion and the exaggeration will have some nasty effects on the remaining tour. 

     What those 15 minutes of play overshadowed was quite staggering. The contest between bat and ball was very rich over the entirety of five days. Stokes won the toss and put Australia in under the clouds on a juicy pitch in London. English bowlers were completely anonymous in such bowling-friendly conditions and Steve Smith was outrageously good yet again in England. Australia scored well over 350 in the day and finished on 416 on the second morning. English top 3 found batting relatively easy on a sunny afternoon before throwing away three wickets for 34 runs towards the close of play. Familiar frailties resurfaced as England succumbed to another batting collapse to gift Australia a 91-run lead. After a couple of unfruitful sessions, England resorted to the short ball ploy and stayed with it for the next two entire sessions. An astonishing 98% of the deliveries were short and Aussies couldn't find a way to tackle it. A target of 371 was always going to be tough and the last thing England would have wanted was the top order to crumble. They found themselves at 47-4 thanks to a couple of crackerjack deliveries from Starc and Cummins. Though Duckett had looked good in both innings, everyone knew it all hinged on one man and that man was Benjamin Andrew Stokes. Duckett mistimed a pull and was soon followed by Jonny Bairstow which left England needing 178 runs short. The majority of the crowd was fuming and so was Ben Stokes. This was probably the best individual batting display witnessed by most of us who were present at Lord's. The control at the start was commendable, the acceleration was staggering and the ball striking was stunning. He scored 155 before finally mis-hitting one against Josh Hazlewood. It was very similar to Headingley 4 years ago. He probably would have needed to score in excess of 200 if England were to get over the line but if he had, it would have been bigger than Headingley for sure. Some of the sixes he hit at Headingley were mis-hits but not one out of the nine sixes at Lord's teased the boundary riders. He just kept doing it for more than 15 overs and put on 108 with Stuart Broad. There wasn't much left once he was gone and Australia wrapped up the innings fairly quickly to win the match by 43 runs. 

     Pat Cummins and his team have now won two close tests and buried some ghosts along the way. There is no doubt that Stokes' presence did make them nervous and Smith dropping a straightforward catch was perhaps the evidence of it. But despite of all the drama and the talk surrounding BazBall, Australia find themselves 2-0 up. It has not been comfortable by any means and England under a leader as inspirational as Ben Stokes can definitely turn up at Headingley a better team. For me, the concern for England is the pitches. Australians have not won in the UK since 2001 so England didn't need BazBall to beat Australia. More often than not the Aussies have been beaten by the movement and these flatter pitches are bringing Australia into the game more than it should. For two test matches in a row, James Anderson and Stuart Broad, 41 and 37 respectively, have been forced to bowl 20 overs in a day on dead and slow pitches. If they decide to play both of them again at Headingley on a similar pitch, they would be basically going on a hunt with blind dogs. I still think England's best chance against this extremely experienced and skilled Australian team is by producing wickets conducive to seam bowling. History tells us that when Australia gain the upper hand, they generally bury the opposition and it will be extremely difficult to stop this Australian side who just want it more than the English do. The narrative is so much in favor of Australia but if England somehow manage to win in Leeds and keep the series alive, it could end up as one of the greatest test series we have ever seen.

Pat Cummins' finest hour.

It was in 2005 that Australia almost won a test they should never have won and now 18 years later, they have ended up on the right side of the result when they never looked like having the advantage in the match until the final hour of the last day. Whether it be Bill Woodfull in the 30s or Bradman in 1948 or Bobby Simpson in 1964 or Greg Chappel in 1977 or Allan Border and Steve Waugh through the 90s or as latest as Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke in the 2000s, Australian captains have a very rich history of rising to the occasion and standing up tall against the adversity in the face of it all. For the first time since the late great Richie Benaud, Australia have a bowler captaining the side in an away Ashes series. England are never an easy side to beat at home and their newly adopted approach to test match cricket must have had the Aussie captain thinking hard considering the fact that he is the leader of a very strong bowling unit. The test match started with Zak Crawley creaming Cummins through the covers and concluded with Cummins dabbing one down to third man for a boundary to win one of the most famous test matches in recent years. But all that happened in between these two boundaries was equally as exciting and enthralling if not more. Even after having witnessed it for the last 18 months, it was hard to believe that England really 'bazballed' Australia on the first day of the Ashes. Though England have won consistently at home, they never really dared to bully Australia until this series. England came out all guns blazing and kept the advantage for the entirety of the test match until the final hour. A rampant English side scored at a rate of over four runs per over in both innings and kept Australians under tremendous pressure with attacking fields throughout the first innings. Warner, Green, and Carey all chipped in but Australia needed someone to really play through the innings if they were to get to 281. Likewise in the first innings, it was Usman Khawaja who decided to just play within himself and not commit any mistake. When Robinson had knocked over Green, it almost looked as if what stood between England and the victory was Usman Khawaja. Once he was dismissed by the English skipper, soon followed by Alex Carey, all the journalists must have started writing narratives for an English victory. Not many believed that 54 runs were gettable for Australia's number 9 and 10. One of them had had a tough couple of years with the bat in hand and the other one doesn't really think he can bat. Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyon both had unfinished business with this English team and Australia had some ghosts to bury at Edgebaston. Pat Cummins was the leader of the attack 4 years ago when Australia allowed Ben Stokes to score 76 runs with Jack Leach and Nathan Lyon happened to be the person who fumbled the easiest of run-out chances at the very end of that innings. Australia went into day 5 at the same ground around 18 years back needing 105 with 2 wickets in hand and fell agonizingly short despite brave efforts by Shane Warne, Brett Lee, and Michael Kaszprowich. I guess both these results will never be forgotten but Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyon have ensured that they do not have another narrow defeat on their CVs. 

When Root came in to bowl the first over in the last hour, Cummins smoked him for 2 sixes over mid-off and made it clear that he wasn't thinking about a draw. He drove Robinson through the covers and slapped Stuart Broad through cover-point on his way to an incredibly special knock. The Australian skipper showed tremendous faith in his partner and never hesitated to take singles whenever offered. He came to the middle when Australia required 72 to win and scored 44 of those to take his side home. On the other hand, Lyon never looked as comfortable as Pat but he hung in there. He seemed vulnerable to every delivery as the English bowled into his body with five fielders patrolling the leg side fence. He nearly holed one out to Stokes at square leg. But once that had happened, he put the pull shot to the bed and started to leave everything. For a puller as compulsive as him, it must have been extremely difficult to not play that shot. After negotiating the early barrage, he played two shots that I don't think he will forget in this lifetime. First he played an off-drive to Stuart Broad as soon as the second new ball was taken and then a couple of overs later he flicked one over mid-on to bring the required number of runs down to single figure. That was easily the shot of the innings for me considering the situation, the pressure, and the flair resembling a certain Viv Richards! 

The pressure was unimaginable, the theatre created by a packed edgbaston crowd was special and the way Pat Cummins played the situation was staggering. He was laughing and joking with Nathan Lyon at the change of ends. On the grandest of stages, the man in charge of his team made it look a lot easier than what it should have been. More importantly though, the emotional side of things was very gripping. Remember Pat Cummins had left the India tour midway to see his mother who unfortunately passed away shortly. He didn't play any part in the IPL and the first real cricket he played in over 3 months was against India at the Oval where he was brilliant as well. He went on a run as soon as the ball touched the fence but very soon realized that there was an equally emotional man at the other end. He went and hugged Nathan Lyon, his great friend from New South Wales, and a long-time teammate. These two go back a long way, as long as the last time Australia chased a target of more than 250 which was way back in 2011. The man hitting the winning runs was Pat Cummins and the next man in was Nathan Lyon! Cummins said he took his dad to Villa Park to watch Bruce Springsteen after the conclusion of Day 1 and his happiness was visible to have his dad and his brother with him. The picture of him having a beer with his dad and video-calling someone back home was adorable. Cummins is one of the very few Australian captains that the media likes and everyone seems to look happy to interview him. Someone described him as 'one of the nicest Australians' to have come to the English shores. He himself said that this was the best test match he has been a part of and it is probably true. This summer was always going to define the legacy of this Australian team which has been very successful both home and away. It is going to be an extremely difficult challenge for Cummins to get through all the test matches especially if the pitches are flat and he has to bowl 20 overs in a day like he did at Edgbaston. If he keeps his body intact and wins this series, the first test could go down as the defining moment in his glittering career as an Australian test captain. But irrespective of what happens in the series going forward, this was definitely one of Pat Cummins' finest hours. 

England arrived in Brisbane but didn't turn up at the Gabba!

England came storming back on the back of two wonderful unbeaten innings from Joe Root and Dawid Malan in the second half of day 3 after being blown away by a breathtaking innings from Travis Head. At 220-2 with only 58 behind in the 2nd innings, the English were looking to take a respectable lead and put the test match right in balance. Everyone still knew that it was advantage - Australia going into day three but hope is the most annoying virtue to match with, isn't it? The great trio of Strauss, Cook, and Trott did the unthinkable in 2010 when they batted forever, and here was Joe Root looking to replicate something similar with the support of a pretty dodgy batting lineup. Despite very high hopes and optimism from the media, what Dawid Malan said in the press conference at the end of day 3 turned out to be vital as the match was decided in the first hour of play on the morning of day four. He himself fell victim to Nathan Lyon who finally got the monkey off his back with his 400th test wicket as he had Malan caught at silly mid-off. Cameroon Green was to produce a peach from the vulture street end soon after to have the English captain Joe Root nicking to Alex Carey. After the departure of Ollie Pope, Jos Butler and the immortal Ben Stokes tried to steady the innings but a length delivery from Pat Cummins got too big on Ben Stokes as he edged one to Cameroon Green at gully. With the Aussie quicks steaming in and Nathan Lyon bowling on a shoeless outside the off stump, it is needless to mention that the innings ended rather quickly. With only 20 to get, Marcus Harris fittingly finished the demolition job with a crisp cover drive off Mark Wood as the Aussies celebrated a resounding win at the Gabba. They were heavy favorites to win the first test but this win is a bit special because of all the off-field antics that were going on with Australian Cricket. Even though the fortress was breached last summer by the Indians, these three and a half days showed that Brisbane still remains a happy hunting ground for Australia where they are very difficult to break down. 

Joe Root had the luck of the coin and he decided to go with the tradition which is to bat first at the Gabba. After being undercover for the whole week, the pitch was a green carpet with plenty of moisture laid out for the quicks. On such a wicket, England had to bowl first to assist their stronger suit. Despite the iffiness in techniques against the moving ball and no first-class practice prior to the test match, Joe Root chose to bat and England were to have a disastrous first day against a world-class Australian bowling attack. The Brisbane crowd embraced the occasion and the noise after the theatrics of the first ball from Starc was something to cherish for the Australians who are still going through strict restrictions because of the pandemic. There was so much respect for both Adam Gilchrist and Alex Carey inside the circle when the 'baggy green' was presented before the start of play. Everyone knew that his debut might have come at the expense of one of the more embarrassing chapters in Australian cricket but Carey had waited his time and as a result, he was to have a very good day behind the sticks. Patrick Cummins walked out in the middle wearing the captain's blazer and walked out at the end of the play as a proud fast bowler having taken five English wickets to bowl them out for 147. English batsmen should have known by now that Pat Cummins is not looking to hit you on the pads or hit your stumps. He is looking to make you uncomfortable with deliveries above your hips and have you nicking behind. 

It looked as if Chris Silverwood had predetermined that they will get out of Brisbane the best way they can and keep both Anderson & Broad fresh as daisies for the day-nighter at Adelaide which presents them with the best chance of winning a test on tour. They actually rested Stuart Broad and said Anderson was not 100% fit which might not necessarily be the truth. Adelaide might be the focus all the way through for England but they had to play what was in front of them and in front of them was a green mamba which was ready to spit venom as soon as a red cherry was being pitched on it. The pitch did what it promised and the England batsmen were found wanting, almost like rabbits in the headlight.

The pitch would obey the English too as the Australians were made uncomfortable by Ollie Robinson early on and David Warner was half a second late while facing Mark Wood. Even after the departure of Marcus Harris, England needed a few more wickets in quick succession to have some chance of staying relevant in the match. The bowlers created enough chances but they had only themselves to blame for not capitalizing on the opportunities as David Warner was given life three times- Bowled off a no-ball by Ben Stokes, dropped at third slip by Rory Burns and then a missed run out by Haseeb Hameed at short leg. England's fielding and especially slip catching had to be on point which unfortunately wasn't the case. David Warner would eventually get out on 94 but he, along with Marnus Labuschagne took Australia into the first innings lead. With a lead of around 50, the test match looked slightly in Australia's favor but an incredibly counter-attacking innings by Travis Head was about to hurt England a great deal. Playing the innings of his life, this was probably the coming of age of Travis Head as a test match batsman. A first-innings lead of 278 was going to be enough for England in most weeks and this week was no different. 

The familiar frailties of English top order resurfaced once again as they struggled to handle the moving ball on a juicy surface. The bad part about this is that they selected their best top six for this test and failed to deliver. So these England batsmen apart from Root and Malan have no choice but to improve. The technical side has to be sorted before the test series begins as any technical turnaround is almost impossible to achieve in the space of three days. But what can be tried to change is the mental aspect of it. The easiest way to put it is that on Australian surfaces, you can neither be a blocker like Hameed or Burns nor you can go 'smash-bang-wallop' which works in England more often than not. The perfect example is Joe Root and if the rest of the pack tries to emulate his mindset while batting, we will see an improved batting display at Adelaide.

Despite the pace of Mark Wood, Australian tale scored more than 100 runs which proved crucial in burying England in the first innings. Unlike this time, England didn't have an out-and-out quick bowler when they toured Australia four years back. Mark Wood is a genuine fast bowler who was bowling in high 140s and yet he couldn't remove the tail. Another point that was emphasized by Geoffery Boycott in 2017 was the lack of a proper spinner. Jack Leach is a decent spinner but he has to deliver more than he did at Brisbane. He looked out of sorts and was taken to cleaners by David Warner and Marnus Labuschagne. Ben Stokes' fitness looked a bit iffy which is a big worry for Joe Root. Was that because of the tiring weather conditions and lack of match practice or was it the case that he just wasn't 100% fit, we will soon get to know come December 16. We know that James Anderson and Stuart Broad will play the second test. It feels like England have to win in Adelaide if they have to avoid another demolition and a potential whitewash against a rampaging Australian side. Australia in contrast will most definitely go into the second test unchanged. If Broad and Anderson can swing the pink ball around corners and their batsman are good enough to put 400 on the board in Adelaide, we might see a different result in the next week. 

 

Jofra Archer is one of a kind!

If you ever wanted to tell someone about the excitement and the thrill test cricket brings, you could not have choosen a better piece of cricket than Jofra Archer bowling to Steven Smith. There was so much hype around Jofra Archer before the World Cup started, he lived up to every bit of it. After the super over in the final and the entire world cup in general, his place in the ashes squad was never in doubt but with so much expectations there was just a factor of nervousness creeping in amongst the English supporters. Archer had played only a handful of red ball games so there were question marks about whether he could bowl for an entire day and then come back the next morning and bowl again. I think he has brushed everything aside and put all the doubts to bed with a scintillating debut at the Home of Cricket. England won the toss and batted on a tricky Lord's pitch. They dragged themselves to 258 and had Australia 4 down for not too many. Steven Smith was again stuck at the crease and was looking fairly comfortable having played some very good shots. Smith was batting on around 70 when Archer came on for another spell and hit Smith on his left shoulder immediately. Smith definitely looked a bit uncomfortable while facing Jofra. Batting on 76, Smith pulled Archer just behind square for a boundary. The next ball though, had something different written on it. Archer came steaming in from the pavilion end with the crowd right behind him and he bowled a 150 kph bumper. It was so quick that Smith just took his eyes off the ball and turned his head. That allowed the ball hit Smith right below his left ear. He collapsed to the ground like a sack of potatoes and just couldn't get back on his feet. That was horrifying to see having witnessed what happened with late Phillip Hughes less than 5 years ago. Entire english team ran to check whether he was ok or not and he definitely wasn't. Physios came running on the pitch and took Smith into the dressing room. It wasn't pretty and it surely wasn't enjoyable stuff. But till that point, it was probably one of the best spells of contest between bat and ball I have seen in a long long time. Jofra Archer was bowling thunderbolts at 90 miles an hour and nobody would have volunteered to face him in that mood. Smith played about 15 deliveries from Jofra Archer, a exilarating contest which lasted all but 45 minutes. England were tearing their hair out as to how to get Steven Smith out but I think they have found an answer and the answer is Jofra Archer. I have not seen Steven Smith getting so uncomfortable facing anyone, definitely not since 2015. Whether Smith will be fit for the next test is another question but I will be very surprised if he isn't looking for that bumper when he plays again. England have just found a bowler that they were searching for for the past decade, the one who can bowl 90 miles! Jofra has already sent sheivers down the Australian dressing room and he will cause panic and chaos in all of the dressing rooms in world cricket. I have seen Dale Steyn uproot Michael Vaughan on his debut at the Wanderers, I have seen Anderson tear apart Zimbabwe at Lord's, I have recently seen Bumrah terify South Africa at the newlands on his debut but what I saw in this week was the most frightening debut in at least the last 15 years of test match cricket!

4-0 A FAIR REFLECTION..

Only a handful of people would have thought that England will turn the tide in the final test of what has been a brutal Ashes series for them. Root won the toss for the fourth time in the series and chose to bat. Root batted brilliantly for his 83 before leg glancing one off Mitchell Starc straight into the hands Mitchell Marsh at square leg. Dawid Malan again showed tremendous character to get another half century. Lower middle order helped England post 346 which was not a bad score but wasn't enough by any means. As soon as England took the field it was all about Australian batting might. Khawaja smashed his first ever ashes hundred and went on to make it a big one. Shaun Marsh had a series to savour as he scored another hundred complemented by his brother Mitchell Marsh who also smashed his way to another scintillating knock. Steven Smith declared the innings with a lead of 303 which was clearly way beyond England's capacity. Australia's bowling chart was dominated by Pat Cummins in the second innings who took 8 wickets in the match. Joe Root grinded out another fifty but he was badly affected by dehydration and so couldn't continue. England lost comfortably by an innings and 123 runs to lose the urn and the series by a humiliating margin of 4-0.
Half the battle was won even before a ball was bowled in the series because of what happened to Ben Stokes. As soon as Ben Stokes did what he did it was very clear that he was going to struggle to be in Australia. I didn't think that England would have any chance of competing in Australia without Ben Stokes. Role of the specialist spinner was played by Moeen Ali who really is a batsman who bowls a bit. He had a terrible series. If England had any plans to play Mason Crane in Sydney then why didn't he play in any of the matches last summer? I think he should have played against the West Indies because for a 20 year old leggie to make his Ashes debut at Sydney in front of 50000 people with England already trailing 3-0 is a massive task. But I am delighted that he handled it pretty well. Actually him bowling to Mitchell Marsh late on day 3 and going past the outside edge consistently was one of the moments of the summer to me. Steven Smith has to get mentioned because of what he has done to England with his gritty batting display. He is almost into his eighth year of test cricket and bowlers around the world are still searching for the potential weakness in his technique. Smith scored 683 runs at an average of over 130 which is quite remarkable in itself. He definitely was the difference with the bat but test matches can not be won unless you take 20 wickets and Australian bowling line up lived up to the expectations. I don't know who's idea it was but to have Starc-Hazlewood-Cummins-Lyon playing for New South Wales in a couple of shield games was a masterstroke. The fact that all four of them hadn't played a single game together made it even more special because eventually that extra speed of 10-15 kilometers per hour made a huge difference. All in all it was a one sided Ashes series with a few interesting passages of play. It is very clear that Australia are much closer to winning in England than England are to winning in Australia because the gulf between the two countries in this part of the world is massive.