Marsh the centurion as butter-fingers England rue missed chances
Ashes Day 11: Headingley, Yorkshire.
Ashes Day 11: Headingley, Yorkshire.
Thursday 6th July 2023
Australia 263 all out
England 68–3 (trail by 195 runs)
Act One: England win a morning session “Cup Final”
With the changes to both teams largely as expected (Moeen Ali, Chris Woakes and Mark Wood returning for England), Scott Boland pleasingly for this fan of his bowling replaced a rested Josh Hazlewood and with Cameron Green suffering from a tight hamstring, his replacement Mitchell Marsh was the only surprise inclusion for an Australian team who lost the toss, yet received the outcome they desired anyway. As is the ethos of Ben Stokes and his English cricketing revolutionaries, rather than winning the toss and batting on a quick looking wicket and even quicker looking outfield chock full of runs, he instead inserted Australia into bat in a Test Match immediately dubbed by ex England opening batsman Mark “Butch” Butcher as a “Cup Final”. With England having to win every remaining Test Match in this Ashes series from here in Yorkshire through to Manchester and London in the coming Summer weeks, they “won” the first mini-session of a Cup Final that will see a victor in four, possibly five days time, and they started incredibly brightly in their pursuit to keep this premier sporting occasion alive well into July of this English Summer.
Stuart Broad yet again triumphed in his personal duel with Australian opening batsman David Warner as the 37 year old from Nottingham snagged an edge from the bat of the 36 year old battling batsman from Paddington with just the 4th delivery of the morning and at 4–1, the dangerous Warner was gone and soon replaced by Marnus Labuschagne. Australia’s dogged South African born number 3 would receive a cricketing “life” when on 16 he got the faintest of inside edge’s that Jonny Bairstow spilled diving full length and back to his left. It was a tough chance but eminently catchable, however his drop would only cost a further 5 runs as Labuschagne presented a returning Chris Woakes with a deserved wicket and a simple edged catch through to Joe Root at 1st Slip. The fall of Labuschagne’s wicket reduced the visitors to 61–3 just inside the final hour of the opening session and after another returnee, Mark Wood, had smashed the leg stump of Usman Khawaja clean out of the ground as he pleasingly pinned back his ears and roared in to bowl in an England shirt once more. I have long advocated the return of Mark Wood to the England team and have more than a soft spot for the 33 year old from Ashington and it’s so good to see him, in the cricketing vernacular, “steaming in” to bowl in the cricket whites of England once again.
With 3 invaluable scalps under their belts approaching the Lunch Break it was already England’s morning and it was about to get even better. But yet another dropped catch, Bairstow once more and even easier than the one he spilled minutes before, this time granted an extra “life” to the dangerous Travis Head who would end the morning session unbeaten and not out, but the same could not be said for Aussie talisman Steve Smith. 22 carefree runs flowed from the bat of the ex Australian captain on the occasion of his 100th Test Match before he inside edged a simple catch through to Bairstow, giving Stuart Broad his second wicket of the morning.
From 85–4 at the fall of Smith’s wicket, Travis Head and Mitchell Marsh tiptoed their way to a lunchtime score of 91–4 and although England “won” the session, if they’d held their catches they would have dominated an opening session and with 6 Aussie wickets snagged, could have been in a prime position to dictate and shape the entire Test Match to come. Presenting an extra cricketing “life” to Travis Head isn’t a wise sporting choice and no-one ever means to drop a catch. One hopes, writing this in real time as I am today, that this dropped catch doesn’t come back to haunt England in a series already full of them.
Act Two: “Goobers”, dropped catches, and “Test Match Special”
Today’s lunchtime guest for the BBC radio institution that is “Test Match Special” was England national football team manager Gareth Southgate and whilst I’m pleased his cautiously negative management isn’t in charge of my Premier League team of choice, he’s always refreshingly honest, illuminating even, and a damn good listen. Whatever your allegiances and whether you follow the national football team or not (I don’t), it was rather lovely to hear a genuine cricket enthusiast and amateur player himself mirror the memories I hold of watching Test Match cricket throughout the English Summer months of our combined teenage years. Ian Botham and Bob Willis from Headingley in 1981 through the painful struggle that watching Geoffrey Boycott and Chris Tavare batting together often was, before onward to the current crop of revolutionaries who play a very different brand of cricket indeed, he was a great listen as I whiled away the 40 minute break in play and prepared for a second session of play I wouldn’t be watching but rather listening to, and via the quintessential English indulgence of the thrills and spills of live cricket on the radio.
Sadly for England, again, “spills” was the ultimate word for this afternoon session, along with “regrets”, “dropped catches” and “missed opportunities” as yet another dropped catch, this time a “goober” according to Phil “Tuffers” Tufnell on radio commentary (or simple regulation catch dropped by Joe Root at 1st Slip) reprieved a returning Mitchell Marsh on just 12, and nearly 2 hours and 112 remarkable runs later, Marsh was finally dismissed on the cusp of the Tea Break. The comeback kid who so often haunts England when he’s fit and picked to play crashed over a hundred runs in the session alone in a partnership of 155 with Travis Head, reaching his century from just 102 balls received and with a stunning 74 runs coming from boundary 4’s and 6’s. The 31 year old from Attadale near Perth finished with a match changing and run-a-ball 118 containing a total of 17 boundary 4’s and 4 boundary 6’s as he completely flipped the complexion of the match at the Lunch Break as well as relegating a usually free scoring Travis Head to playing second fiddle.
Lest we forget, Head was dropped when on just 9 and remains 39 not out at the Tea Break and Marsh was dropped on 12 before ending on 118. From teetering on the brink of a pleasing batting collapse at 85–4, their partnership of 155, albeit broken on the brink of the Tea Break, has cost a profligate, butter-fingered England team a mammoth 136 extra runs.
How costly will these runs be come Saturday afternoon or Sunday morning?
Act Three: England win their “Cup Final”. Just!
Well what an incredible day of Ashes cricket that was!
Inserted into bat, Australia teetered on the brink of calamity at 85–4 before being heavily thankful for their opponents profligacy with their dropped catches and a quite stunning innings saving spectacular century from Mitchell Marsh. From a recovered and powerful looking score of 240–5 at the Tea Break they rather wilted in the face of the express pace bowling of Mark Wood, collapsing to 254–9 before a crucial 13 runs from Todd Murphy for the final wicket pushed their 1st innings total to 263 all out.
In reply, Ben Duckett and Harry Brook fell cheaply as Aussie skipper Pat Cummins once more threatened to topple the top order of the England batting line-up and, with the storm having past, Zak Crawley dangled a loose bat to the bowling of centurion Mitchell Marsh for the tamest of dismissals as England then “shut-up shop” until the close of play on 68–3, and 195 runs adrift on 1st innings. Fittingly, Yorkshire’s finest Joe Root (19 not out) and Jonny Bairstow (1 not out) saw out the last knockings of another Ashes day for the ages but more importantly, remain unbeaten and not out overnight to start afresh tomorrow morning.
Some sobering thoughts in conclusion: (a) If England had held their chances, Yorkshire’s finest in Root and Bairstow in particular, they could and should have bowled their visitors all out for well below their eventual 263. As noted above, the dropped catches surrounding the two innings of Travis Head and Mitchell Marsh accounted for an extra 136 runs. How costly those runs prove to be only time will tell (b) Mitchell Marsh has barely played a Test Match in years but steps in during a late injury scare and smashes a century in a session! (c) Mark Wood too has been on the side lines for far too long and recovering from yet another injury niggle. Boy have the team, and this particular fan of his whole-hearted approach to the game, badly missed his infectious enthusiasm and raw energy for a sporting contest! 11 miserly overs and just 34 runs conceded as he ended the innings by showing the match ball to a Headingley crowd enthralled once more with a performance of never say die spirit, raw speed and a 5 wicket haul soon to be inscribed forever on the “Honours Board” (d) The back spasm injury that forced England’s Ollie Robinson from the field early in the second session of the day is a huge worry but sadly symptomatic of a young man who never seems fit enough for Test Match cricket or with any enthusiasm for those long days in the cricketing “dirt”. I’ve long joked that he has a face as long as a cowboy’s horse and I would have left him out for this Test Match in favour of the in-form Josh Tongue. Regardless, England could be a bowler down come the Australian 2nd innings and this will undoubtedly severely hamper their quest to bowl out their visitors a second time, and cheaply, in order to set-up a relatively small run chase for victory.
The final sobering thought belongs to England’s Joe Root who had a mixed day to say the very least. Dropping catches one minute only to snag a successful catch mere minutes later, he slammed the ball to the turf in anger as he finally held onto the catch that saw the departure of the dangerous Travis Head, but England’s habit of dropping catches is pun intended catching, as well as spreading throughout the team. This has to end if they are indeed to win this first “Cup Final” of three in the coming weeks, and Root, together with his great mate Jonny Bairstow, have to build an almighty partnership tomorrow morning, and at a home ground they know so well. Being greedy, one of these proud Yorkshiremen need to grind their way to a big century tomorrow or I fear a match that has seen 13 wickets fall today may well escalate quickly again with a familiar batting collapse tomorrow, with the match hurtling on toward a finish come Saturday evening, or Sunday morning.
HUGE morning session tomorrow and I for one cannot wait.
Postscript
“Uno Ashes”
Dad 3 (16)
Lad 5 (29)
Talking of comeback kids, I don’t how he does it, some David Blaine style sleight of hand perhaps, but I was on the verge of reaching the 100 points needed for victory in each of the first 3 games today (lost them all), lost the first session 4–1 before rallying slightly with a final session of 2–1 in my favour for a 5–3 defeat on the day, and now an already distant 13 aggregate games behind him. I’ve clearly taught my young apprentice well!
As can be said for the second of the games we played today just so I could watch some Ashes cricket! Tri-ominos (think dominos but with triangle shaped tiles) is a beautiful game of strategy and forward thinking for the biggest of scores to beat your opponent. Across two elongated games I had him beaten both times only to see the comeback kid sneak yet more victories from the jaws of certain defeats.
I’m now 13 games adrift at Uno and I fear what the aggregate differential will be come the end of this Ashes Summer.
Can I be the comeback kid next time please?
Pretty please?
Thanks for reading. For more cricketing fair, please refer to days 1, 3 and 5 from the 2nd Ashes Test Match at Lords last week:
Indiana Jones and a Quest for the Ashes
Ashes Day 6: Lords Cricket Ground, London.medium.com
Rain ends the England pain as Australia dominate at Lords
Ashes Day 8: Lords Cricket Ground, London.medium.com
Ruthless Aussies douse the revolutionary English fire
Ashes Day 10: Lords Cricket Ground, London.medium.com