The Daily Telegraph - 06.08.2019

Ashes after World Cup joy

Across the picture, though,

England’s denuded bowling attack

was a factor in Australia’s victory.

Jofra Archer was absent, Mark

Wood is injured, Anderson lasted

four overs and Moeen’s confidence

is shot. Smith feasted on these

inadequacies for his 286 runs and

needs to be tested more at Lord’s

and beyond, particularly by

Archer’s bounce and pace.

The most unforgiving England

fans will lambast this side for being

flat, for ceding so much ground at a

venue where Australia had not

beaten the home country for 18

years (hence the “fortress” tag), for

collapsing on the fifth day to a

251-run defeat. But the traps for

winning teams can be even bigger

than for losing ones and several of

Root’s team fell straight into

one here.

The Cricket World Cup final was

on 14 July, 17 days before the start

of the Edgbaston Test. Say the

celebrations lasted, well, several

days, as they were entitled to. Not a

long session on the booze, but

trophy celebrations, official visits,

commercial engagements.

All this after a draining six-week

quest to win a home World Cup,

and a final of outrageous drama, all

the way down to the final ball.

Buttler confessed in a recent

interview that he might have

struggled to play cricket again had

England blown their chance. Then

came a shoehorned Test against

Ireland. The ones who played in

that were doubtless struggling to

adapt. The ones who missed it

leapt straight from super over to

Ashes Test.

To scoff, you need to have no

idea about the cost of winning, of

what trying so hard for so long can

do to players physically and

mentally.

Although Root dismissed it as an

“excuse”, the concertina effect of

World Cup win and first Ashes Test

was visibly hard to deal with,

especially for Buttler, Bairstow and

Moeen. Stuart Broad, who was able

to prepare himself specifically for

the red-ball stint, was England’s

best bowler with six wickets (five

for 86 in Australia’s first innings).

The glow of fulfilment radiating

over Lord’s three weeks ago was

the light by which many scripted a

renaissance for cricket. It was

England’s chance to strike back at

football with a stellar generation of

players, hard-working and

admired. But these big sweeps in

history tend to be mythical. The

next challenge is soon upon you: in

this case, with a different team, in a

different game, with an infirm,

all-time-greatest, England bowler

and a Don Bradman-esque batsman

with a point to prove.

It came as no shock to see

England buckling under the

weight of this intensified

expectation. With four Tests to go,

to despair would be absurd.

Losing will alleviate the

summer-of-joy hype and allow

England to put that seminal World

Cup day at Lord’s to bed.

Paine will not

be satisfied

until series

wrapped up

By Tim Wigmore

Tim Paine warned that Australia

have come to retain the Ashes, not

just the opening Test, after crush-

ing England at Edgbaston.

“We’re over here to do what most

Australian teams have struggled to

do, and if we can do it, we’ll be

spoken about for quite a long time,”

the Australia captain said. “That’s

what’s driving us – to come to

England in these conditions is diffi-

cult for us, as it is for England in

Australia – and there’s a big five

weeks to come.

“We’re here to win the Ashes;

we’ve been quite clear on that for

some time. We’re obviously happy.

We’re certainly not satisfied with

that and tonight will be a different

feel to most Test wins we’ve had.”

Australia’s victory came in spite

of collapsing to 122 for eight on the

first day and England taking a first-

innings lead of 90. “We felt behind

in the game for three days, so the

way we stuck at it and kept grind-

ing was a real credit to our boys,”

Paine said. “The last two days we

played superb cricket.”

With Steve Smith and Nathan

Lyon to the fore, Australia have

now won six of their past seven Test

matches against England, alongside

a draw in the Melbourne Test in

2017-18. “While Steve is scoring

runs and Nathan is taking wickets,

we’re a pretty dangerous cricket

team,” Paine added.

He admitted that the absence of

James Anderson – confined to just

four overs in the match – had been a

significant boost to Australia. “I

would be lying if I said psychologi-

cally it did not make a difference to

our team and physically to theirs. It

is a big win for us, but they lost

their premier bowler so we have to

be realistic about it.”

In a sign of Australia’s fast-bowl-

ing depth, Josh Hazlewood and

Mitchell Starc were omitted at Edg-

baston and both could come into

contention for the Lord’s Test,

which begins a week tomorrow.

Australia have a three-day warm-

up fixture against Worcestershire,

beginning tomorrow.

“We think we have a lot of differ-

ent options for all different kinds of

conditions and have got a lot of

bases covered,” Paine said. “One of

the reasons we picked so many

bowlers is because we knew this se-

ries was going to be wearing on our

bowlers coming out of a World Cup.

We now have a decent break be-

tween Tests and have two world-

class bowlers sitting on the sidelines

raring to go.

“Once we get to Lord’s and see

the wicket we will make a decision

on what combination to go with.”

Statement of

intent: Tim Paine

says Australia have

plenty of bowling

options for Lord’s

minded concentration, this loss of

trust took up unwelcome head

space. Joe Denly’s wicket

demonstrated how unsettling

Wilson had become. When the

umpire’s finger went up, Denly, so

clearly out, still reviewed, at the

last possible moment. Any clear

thinking was cast aside even

though he had clearly nicked it.

The umpiring is not the reason

for Australia’s supremacy and

England’s despondency. But it does

not help. Those in positions of

administration, or adjudication,

know that their job is done best

when we do not realise they are

doing their job at all. Umpires

make headlines only when things

have gone wrong.

Solutions, then? Ricky Ponting

has called for the scrapping of

neutral umpires. It makes sense in

theory, but emotion, patriotism

and sport is often a proxy for much

more, which makes native umpires

an easy target when excuses are

sought. Instead, we should seek

the root of the problem.

Why is it that seven of the 12

umpires on the elite panel come

from England and Australia, so are

thereby ineligible for the Ashes?

India are not without means to

invest in developing umpires.

Should a more significant

proportion of each board’s

spending be mandated to the

cause? And for those boards

without such funds, is it not

integral to the global game that

any central investment is spread

more widely?

We talk a lot about diversity in

sport and this must extend to

umpires. The ICC says it is a work

in progress, but the process is

taking too long. Of the ICC’s 53

elite and international umpires,

none are women. Diversity is not

just a wholesome exercise in good

visuals, but core to performance.

Feel sorry for Wilson, or berate

him if you must. But this is a

product of an issue that has been

bubbling under the surface for a

while. The structural weaknesses

to Wilson’s misfortune are only

obvious now that it has reached the

most public of places.

Under pressure How the

top umpires have fared

S Fry

J Wilson

C Gaffaney

S Ravi

P Reiffel

R Palliyaguruge

A Dar

R Kettleborough

R Illingworth

N Llong

B Oxenford

M Erasmus

R Tucker

I Gould

H Dharmasena

M Gough

43%

40%

35%

34%

31%

31%

29%

29%

29%

28%

27%

27%

25%

24%

22%

0%

Percentage of decisions overturned by

current elite panel since 2017

Struggling Denly

Joe Denly has been shown more patience in Tests than

ODIs, but to what end? England’s everyman is becoming

a citizen of nowhere. A specialist batter, or a specialist

bowler? At present, Denly does not offer enough of either.

Unbeatable

Smith

How to dismiss Steve

Smith has reached

academic circles, goes

the rumour. The

question dominated

the Test. England need

answers, and quickly.

Missing Anderson did

not help, but bowling

Chris Woakes a bit

more might have

reaped rewards.

Root’s leadership

Smith without the burden of captaincy is scoring for fun but

Joe Root looks weary. Failing to bowl Woakes before lunch

on day four, but bringing him on straight after, spoke of a

man being told what to do, not leading those around him.

The Daily Telegraph Tuesday 6 August 2019 *** 7