Both teams move to Adelaide after what turned out to be an one sided Ashes opener at Brisbane which has been a happy hunting ground for Australia for nearly three decades. England competed hard for the best part of three days and then it was all one way traffic after a familiar collapse in the 2nd innings. While Gabba has been a nightmare for the poms for too long, Adelaide has given them some good memories especially the batters. I have watched four ashes battles at the Adelaide Oval out of which 3 times England have gone on to score excess of 400. After a low score in the first innings, they did pretty well in the second innings in 2002 but lost the match. In 2006-07 they somehow how found a way to lose after scoring over 550 in the 1st innings. 4 years later, Andrew Strauss and his men produced one of the most memorable result for England when beat Australia by an innings courtesy of a big double hundred by Kevin Pietersen. Another three years later England produced probably the worst brand of cricket after receiving some thunderbolts from Mitchell Johnson. Adelaide Oval generally produces good batting wickets with true bounce allowing batsmen to play horizontal bat shots as well as drives on the up. The drop in pitch generally brings spinners into play which may prompt England to play Mason Crane to help Moeen Ali who is suffering a sore finger. We saw what Nathan Lyon did to India in 2014 when he took 12 wickets to spin Australia to a memorable victory. The third session under lights will bring James Anderson and Stuart Broad into play who have a great chance to extract some movement in the air or off the pitch. More than anything for England to win at Adelaide, it is absolutely vital that Alastair Cook and Joe Root get big hundreds in the first innings. If they lose at Adelaide, the dreaded word 'whitewash' will start being on everyone's lips.
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