Tea and Biscuits at The Ashes
Adelaide Oval, Day 5: Despite Buttler’s valiant stand, Australia win by a huge 275 runs and take a 2–0 lead in the 5 Match Series.
Adelaide Oval, Day 5: Despite Buttler’s valiant stand, Australia win by a huge 275 runs and take a 2–0 lead in the 5 Match Series.
Before we delve into the nitty gritty of the day’s play, can I direct you to (1) the reason why I’m sitting up through the night watching Test Match cricket and (2) my blogs from all four previous days in this 2nd Test Match:
A cricketing journey
Why I’m going to Australia at 2am this winter for lunch and why cricket memories never fail to make me smile.medium.com
Tea and Biscuits at The Ashes
Adelaide Oval, Day 1: Australia 221–2 and with their feet firmly on the throat of a tired looking England.medium.com
Tea and Biscuits at The Ashes
Adelaide Oval, Day 2: Australia 473–9d and England 17–2. Another Day. Another dominating performance from the hosts.medium.com
Tea and Biscuits at The Ashes
Adelaide Oval, Day 3: England 236 all out. Australia 45–1. With a lead of 282 runs, the hosts continue to pile on the…medium.com
Tea and Biscuits at The Ashes
Adelaide Oval, Day 4: Australia 230–9 declared. England 82–4. Australia need 6 wickets to win. England need a miracle.medium.com
Rather than a Session by Session re-cap, here’s today’s play and their notable timings in real time:
3.30am and a shrilling alarm awakes me from my slumbers and whereas yesterday I awoke to the mists of a Victorian England shrouded in a freezing fog, this morning was clear, crisp and clearly blooming cold!
4am and with a huge lead and only 6 wickets needed for victory, Australia start the day as they clearly (and correctly) mean to go on. Mitchell Starc opens the bowling to a ring field of 3 slips, a Gully and a loudly chirping set of Aussies in the close-in field. “The Goat” AKA Nathan Lyon opens the bowling from the other end to a brilliantly old fashioned and hyper pleasing field of 5 catchers and the wicket keeper around the bat, slips, gully, bat/pad. And Marnus Labuschagne incessant on the “stump mike”.
This, my friends, is Test Match cricket!
4.09am OLLIE POPE caught Smith bowled Starc (5).
Mitchell Starc was magnificent as always this morning and with only 9 minutes play gone he snagged Pope after he “set him up” by bowling across him, frustrating him and then pushed a delivery slightly wider and Pope didn’t have to play the ball, but he did, and nicked an outside edge to Aussie Captain Smith at second slip.
4.19am and Jos Buttler is the recipient of what is commonly known in the cricketing vernacular of a “life” as he edges the dangerous Starc through the gap between wicket keeper and first slip. There clearly should not be a “gap” between these two closest of catchers and the error, charged to wicket keeper Carey is perhaps the first genuine Australian error of the match. Being as we’re on the final day of a 5 day Test Match, this is high praise and indeed indicative of their supreme dominance all round.
4.52am BEN STOKES lbw bowled Lyon (12).
Against his natural grain, Stokes simply dropped anchor and tried to bat out the day defensively and his battle with “Gazza” Nathan Lyon was the morning highlight. Strangely, his dismissal seemed, at first, to be a non-starter. Rapped on the pads but the ball appeared to be heading down leg side and missing the stumps. This was clearly a view shared by both the Umpire and a reluctant Captain Smith who took an age before deciding to review the decision via DRS. Even whilst the technology unravelled, demonstrating that Stokes was, in cricketing parlance, “dead” and “out”, it certainly mystified me. Not from a biased point of view, it simply looked like missing the stumps but alas, it wasn’t. It was hitting the top of middle and leg stumps and Stokes, after a defiant defensive display, was gone.
4.57am and DRS again. Woakes is immediately caught on the crease and seemingly feathering a catch behind he immediately shook his head and confidently confirmed to partner Jos Buttler that all was well and the Australians were appealing in vain. They were, but the buzzing and chirping fielders were smelling blood in the water as usual.
5am Drinks Break. England are 105–6 and have added just 23 runs to their overnight total and far more crucially, have lost 2 of their remaining 6 wickets. Chris Woakes is new to the crease and still on 0 with partner Buttler on a dogged and reserved 9. Runs are irrelevant for either side. The only numeric of any importance is England’s 6 wickets. They have 4 left and these have to collectively bat for the rest of the day.
6am Lunch Break. England 142–6.
In the hour between the drinks and lunch break the visitors scored 37 runs and again crucially, lost no further wickets. Woakes scored the majority of the runs in this session with 28 and Buttler, that normal slapper, dasher, swisher and wielder of a batting magic wand is, dare I say, “dug in”, dogmatic and doggedly still in and playing entirely against his natural type, and at lunch has 16 runs to his name.
Nathan Lyon has bowled the entire two hour session for the Australians and it’s been a joy to watch despite my early morning English loyalties. He’s had 4 sometimes 5 catchers around the bat, David Warner and Marnus Labuschagne chattering and chirping away loudly and the freedom to be ultra, Australian pleasingly, ultra attacking. The hosts ended the session with spin from both ends and that blooming pest Labuschagne and his “leggies” (leg spinners) adding to the incessant pressure and bleating from the Goat at the other end.
Fascinating Test Match cricket all round and here’s the kicker: There are but a handful of overs before a new ball is available to those hungry Australian sharks. Should Woakes and Buttler fend off the twin spinning advances of Lyon and Labuschagne, next up will be the ultra fast pace of Mitchell Starc and probably Cameron Green. I predicted last night that England would survive until either 30 minutes before or after lunch. I’ll revise that to an hour and a half into this afternoon’s session and after Starc has had a few overs with a brand new ball.
7.03am and the 50 Partnership between Woakes (36) and Buttler (21) and the new ball has been taken. Game on.
7.33am CHRIS WOAKES bowled Richardson (44).
Damn.
On the 5th ball of the over Woakes creamed a magnificent cover drive for 4 before Richardson bowled an almost identical follow up ball but this one ducked in towards the Englishman’s pads and crashed into the top of middle stump. It was, quite emphatically, a beautiful delivery and ended Woakes’ stubborn refusal to get out.
7.40am Drinks Break. England 166–7. Australia need 3 wickets to win.
7.49am Robinson presents a tough “caught and bowled” chance to Michael Neser who just fails to hold onto the return catch in his follow through.
8.35am OLLIE ROBINSON caught Smith bowled Lyon (8).
With just 5 minutes until the Tea interval and hope springing irrationally in an eternal direction, Nathan Lyon fizzed a spinning delivery that caught the edge of Robinson’s bat and his stoic resistance came to an end. The end is nigh now for England.
8.39am DRS again as Stuart Broad “padded up” not playing a shot and with the Australians leaping like tigers around the bat, Captain Smith appealed the not out decision but the Umpire was correct with the ball tracking over the stumps.
8.54am DRS again, and again with an under pressure Stuart Broad as he successfully reviews a Leg Before Wicket decision from the Umpire as he’d inside edged onto his pads and was clearly not out.
8.57am Tea Interval. England 180–8.
Defying expectations and my dire prediction of the game being all over 2 hours ago, England are still alive and thanks in a large part to Jos Buttler’s dogged 25 runs from 196 balls. The task now is simple and just as impossible as the task was at the start of the day. But now they have just 26 overs in which to simply survive. Perhaps just over two hours under the Adelaide floodlights. It’s faintly incredible that England have made this as much of a contest as they have, and with 2 hours of play still left, they still have a miraculously long hope of saving and drawing the Test Match.
9.26am JOS BUTTLER hit wicket bowled Richardson (26).
For those of you hardy souls who may read this and not thoroughly understand cricketing terminology, “hit wicket” is an incredibly rare type of dismissal and so rare it’s equally in keeping with both this Test Match and Buttler’s incredible, back to the wall innings. Hit Wicket? Your luck is well and truly out!
England 182–9. Australia have 23 overs in which to find the last wicket for the win.
9.42am JIMMY ANDERSON caught Green bowled Richardson (2).
And at 9.42am the Test Match is over and Australia have, despite England’s desperate rear guard defence, won by a comprehensive and thoroughly deserving 275 runs. It was hope rather than expectation for England this morning and for a batting team oft to collapse, they didn’t, and Jos Buttler batted superbly before getting himself out in such a surreal way. Plaudits fall to Jhye Richardson who cleaned up in this innings with 5 wickets for 42 runs and it must be stated that Australia, with Richardson and the busy Michael Neser in for their star bowlers of Cummins and Hazlewood, still won this Test Match comfortably and the portents for the remaining three matches do not look rosy for a tired and weary looking England.
I ended my blogs for the first Test Match with the ode of “it’s the hope that kills you”. England hoped and were very gallant in this last day defence but have barely won a session across 2 Test Matches now.
See you on Christmas Day Night!