The Ashes Daily: Head blasts Australia to two-day win after another England batting collapse

0:00Oh, well, a start, that is from Crawley. Chris Wokes nails it for four. The Ashes alive. And Test cricket alive. Ice in his veins. Pat Cummins has led his team to a famous victory. Yeah, he's done! He gets his very top landing. England's captain, Ben Stokes. While he is there, England have hope. Put the beer away. Put the champagne on ice. 24 years of pain in Australia. Finally, they're beaten at home by England. Welcome to the Sky Sports Cricket Podcast. Two days of this test done. We're usually at this stage looking forward to crucial day three. There won't be a day three or day four or day five.

0:44Michael Atherton, you said yesterday you have played in and watched and covered 20 Ashes series. Have you ever seen anything like those two days we've just witnessed? No, I don't think I have. I've just, as you were doing the Sky Sports News Cross, I was just listening to Ben Stokes, who'd gone down to do the post-match presentation with Isha Gua, and he said he was shell-shocked, or his team was shell-shocked. He was referring specifically to the innings of Travis Head and the effect that that had on him and his team. But I think generally, you know, the 50 ,000 people who are in here today would have been shell-shocked, because there is no way that you could imagine the game finishing today, really.

1:26And certainly at lunchtime, when England were effectively 100 ahead with nine second innings wickets in hand, you felt they were bossing the game. And, you know, they should have been able to shut the game out at that point. So to lose then within the next two sessions, losing nine wickets in the middle of the afternoon, and then a wonderful, brilliant, punishing innings from Travis Head. but it's staggering really. It's kind of ashes cricket but not as we used to know it. Fast forward, we will come on to the Travis Head 100. We'll come on to our England bowl. But let's go back to the batting and that 4-3-11.

2:03Should have been 5-3-11 if Kawadja had taken the catch. I said to you yesterday just over there, in Australia, in Perth, do you have to be careful driving on the up? If they are bowling 4th, 5th stump, outside that off stump, you surely have to be careful. Once is a mistake, twice is a, you're repeating the mistake, but to do it four times is just surely a massive error. Yeah, it's not the attacking intent that is the problem, because ironically, we've just seen it, haven't we, with Travis Head. When you can compare how he played to how Australia's top order tried to play in the first innings, where they were gutsing it out and trying to graft and grind, Head just blasted England away there.

2:46so it's not the attacking intent that's the problem but it's the execution of that attacking intent there were three big errors really the Pope, Brook and Root shots of all of a similar type as you say driving loosely outside the off stump to balls not particularly there to drive I think particularly Harry Brook who I know you've pointed this out many times in England where that front foot kind of doesn't go across to the line of the ball so he's quite static the ball's not there to drive and he's just throwing his hands at the ball now in England it can be a problem with lateral movement but if there's not much lateral movement there's not that much bounce either but in Australia as you know there's a bit more bounce so that can be very risky I thought Stokes got a good ball Duckett was playing defensively but those three shots there were poor shots in the middle of that dramatic collapse and the really disappointing thing is the way this England team have opportunities and don't seem able to shut out the game you know if you if you go back to the ashes in 2023 first test match at Edgbaston they bossed it for long periods lost that game by two wickets began to boss the Lords test match and then you know when Lyon was off the field and the short ball came they gave the wickets away to hook shots numerous examples the India test match at the over where they've got the game in the in the kind of palm of their hand and you felt that was the case how do you change that it's all well and good I keep saying they played some really good cricket they get ahead of the game they've got ahead by being positive how do they be smart as well you know they've got to be smart surely absolutely and that that is the issue we're getting sledged here it's not us you know we didn't lose nine wickets they're giving us some um yeah but you're right they've got to be smart as i say it's not the aggressive or attacking intent that's the problem but balancing that with a bit of cricket smarts um and trying to learn from those mistakes that when you have the game you know really try and close it out you know to lose a game like that today from where they were at lunchtime it's harder to lose that than actually getting a stronger position harder to lose it in two days by the way from that position if I thought I said to you they're going to be lost tonight that's incredible I'm going to add Crawley to that list as well I know what you said yesterday about opening the batting in a test match and the hype start with new ball in hand again but again that is a push on the up I said to you in the con box I said that's a ball again you would have played off the back foot.

5:25I know he's a different player, different height, whatever, but to be so far out in front, it was a great catch, but it just lifts the Australians. And a special mention, we'll come on to start, Scott Boland, he improved from that first innings. He was full and he just dragged his length back and that's the length they were nicking. Yeah, I thought he bowled poorly actually in the first innings. He kind of pushed the ball up, you know, got driven down the ground. He didn't seem to hit the pitch with his normal gusto. And there were just signs before lunch that he was just starting to find his groove or his rhythm.

5:56He got Duckett given out LB. I know it was overturned on review. Hit Duckett on the arming. Duckett was trying to be aggressive by getting down the pitch to him because they feel they can knock Boland off his length. But he bowled well after lunch. And, yeah, just a dramatic collapse. Think of the first innings. What were they? 1-60. 5-12. 5-12 they lost. 5-12 today. And 4-3-11. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's unbelievable, really. dramatic collapses that are so punishing. And a word on start, Tempher in the match, in the absence of Cummins and Hazelwood. I know we touched on it yesterday, but again to come.

6:32I mean, you know bowlers, they want, what does Brodie say, he wants a couple of sleeps. He had one sleep, but he's back out there again, but he puts in a new ball burst. Yeah, and rightly the player of the match, I think, you know, they might have thought about Travis Head because that really was one of the great hundreds, which we'll come to perhaps in a bit more detail. But he carried that attack there. You know, there's no Cummins, there's no Hazelwood. That's 600 wickets out of the equation. He's got a debutant in Doggett. Boland, who's not really one of the main four unless there is an injury.

7:03So he's got to stand up in that situation. 7.58 in the first innings, three important wickets. You know, the big wickets as well, top-order wickets that he's getting. So 10th, I think Andy Zaltzman, the BBC stats man, said that's the first 10th in an Ashes series for an Australian bowler since Shane Warne in that great 2005 series. So they don't come along very frequently in Ashes cricket. So great performance by Mitchell Stark today and topped off by Travis. I know, on a pitch that every batter struggled. I mean, A, a blessing in disguise, Kawaja injury. He looked like the spot on, the right person to say, go on, you go and counteract.

7:43He's obviously done it before. It's a role that he knows. But I just said on Sky Sports News, he basballed the basballers. he showed them exactly what intent does to a bowling attack that was so brilliant in the first innings. Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. As you say, it was an interesting call, who to open, you know. They could have gone with Labashain again. I was just listening to Steve Smith and Travis Head who were talking out there as you were doing this. And they said that they had a random left field thought of throwing like a tail ender, like Nathan Lyon in almost as a sacrificial lamb just to keep that Labashane-Smith head 3-4-5.

8:21But in the end, they went for Travis Head. I think Michael Vaughan said on commentary he'd have sent Brendan Dogger on debut to face Geoff Reager. But Travis said he wanted to do it. As you say, he's done it before in white ball cricket. He's done it recently in test cricket. Uzman Khawaja's had five different opening partners in the last 12 months. And when they went to the subcontinent, Travis was pushed up because, you know, you get ahead of the game before the spinners start to come on. So he has done it. He knows how to do it. And it's a bit of a licence, isn't there, when you come in in that position to come and go after the new ball.

8:55He's actually on a run of low scores in domestic cricket, not in any particularly great form, but he's such a dangerous player. And I remember vividly before the 2023 Ashes in Ben Stokes' pre-series press conference, he was asked, which of the Australians do you kind of fear the most? and he said Travis Head. I'm taking that scoop by the way. Before that I went out to India to Chennai while you're on your yacht in Barbados or wherever and we flew out to do Ben Stokes and I said to Ben who's the one threat in the batting line-up. I thought he'd say Smith or Labushane or whoever. He went Travis Head and I was like Travis Head.

9:31At that stage it was quite a big shout and you can see why. If you remember he scored the most runs in the 21-22 Ashes, the Covid Ashes. He scored more runs than anyone else who's a player of the series. He's man of the match in that World Test Championship final, player of the match in the 2023 World Cup final. So, you know, he rises to the occasion and he's such a dangerous player. And what Stokes said in your wonderful, scoopy, exclusive interview is that he found him very difficult to set a field to. Not that Stokes was captain then, but the England team found him very difficult to bowl to and set a field to.

10:07And you can see why, because, you know, there's very little margin for error. And the first thing is they ball well by tucking him up here. But if you don't get that quite right, you know, he has a go there. Anything wide, he'll slap. He stays a bit leg side of the ball. He's very, very dangerous, and he can get away from you. And those openers, you know, think Sawag or Slater and Gombay and Hayden. As a captain, they're the ones you worry about, because they're the ones, if they're in for two hours, they can take the game completely away from you, as he did. How do you think England bowled? And how do you think Stokes went about the captaincy?

10:43I think England, they were not as potent as the first innings. Now, whether that's the match situation, whether that's the effect of Travis Head, whether that's the pitch slightly flattening out, maybe a combination of all those factors, maybe the psychology of coming on to bowl when you've just lost nine wickets in a session. And then you go searching for wickets. Searching for wickets. So they certainly didn't look as threatening. You know, we stood here last night and said that Australia were rattled by England's bowlers. And they were. That's not, you know, rewriting history. They were rattled in the first innings.

11:21But again, you know, Hedge showed the value of an aggressive approach and attacking approach, which is why England want to play that way. They know that if you do it well, you can get on top of bowlers very quickly. So, yeah, such a dangerous player. Let's throw it ahead a little bit. I mean, we've just been here abused by various fans, England, Australia, whatever fans. It's going to happen now. They've got a long period of 13, 12, 13 days before the next 13 days before the next test match. What do they do? How do they regroup? Because one thing this England side have done, they went 2-0 down in the last ashes and they fought back.

11:57They have shown a lot of character, but doing that in England is different from doing that in Australia. And doing that after today and these two days. I mean, what I would say is that you've seen enough here in Perth to know that they'll get opportunities. If they bat well and get enough runs, I think they've got the ammunition in the bowling attack to create opportunities. So that's the first thing. And, you know, they've been hammered today, but there's been enough evidence in the game that, you know, they'll get wickets in the right conditions. The real issue is really what do you do now for two weeks because of the nature of the schedule?

12:36You know, when we would have gone off to play a state game and, you know, always get brilliant things out of a state game as well. But it provided a focus and a chance for people to get runs. You know, England are on the back of very little preparation as it is. and now this just a two-day game means they've basically got two weeks before the next test match. Would you play anyone? There's a two-day game, Prime Minister's 11, Canberra. Yeah, there's a two-day game there. But it's a pink ball test. It's a pink ball test in Brisbane. So the relevance of it is, well, there is no relevance really, but I would certainly be asking some of the batters like Crawley, who's on the back of a pair, you know, do you want a game?

13:16Do you want a hit in the middle? Will you feel better for a hit in the middle? and if that answer is yes England were not planning to send anybody to this Prime Minister's game in Canberra it was going to be for the Lions only and England were going to go to Brisbane and get their pink ball prep done but I would certainly be saying anybody who wants to play, there's an opportunity there to play but it's just how you focus people's minds in a two week break, that's an unheard of length of break on a tour really. And everything's going to be pulled to pieces and pulled apart and scrutinised if they play golf.

13:50Here you go. We did the podcast before this series, and I left thinking the one thing I asked you, my final question was, you know, how do England win in Australia? We're not experts on that, by the way. But how? And I thought the one thing I would have said was make a plan for if you do lose the first test. I know if that's negative, it seems negative, but that's what happens out here. It very quickly spirals out of control. That's why now from the last 16, they haven't won one in Australia and only drawn two because you can imagine the Western Australian newspaper tomorrow. You can imagine everywhere they go.

14:24So it is going to go like that. So make sure you do realise that it is going to get tougher, but how you react to this is going to be, you've got to react better than our England sides did, than previous England sides did. You've got to be better in your reaction to this loss. Yeah, I think they're of a type of strength enough of character, the likes of Stokes and McCollum. They're not going to be pushed and pulled and swayed by opinion. The real frustration is, you know, after one day yesterday, you sensed that people were just starting to turn a bit on the Australian team. You know, you mentioned the Western Australian newspaper.

15:01The headline this morning was mulligan, because they were talking about Khawaja's golf and he's back. And of course, they had such a bad first day. The mulligan implies that, you know, you kind of put that away and you're given another go. and you know some of the former players are starting to talk about selection and you could sense that if England had taken their opportunity here that they could have brought some real pressure to bear on some of these Australian players but that's all going to be fall by the wayside now and the pressure will come will turn and the spotlight will turn right on Stokes and his team so they'll have to show that strength of character strength of mind but I just don't know what you do now for two weeks you probably just say to the players there's four or five days to do what you want and then when we meet and when we gather we focus on on the next game.

15:50It is an excellent point about how it was just turning and it was even and also fans were just turning I was out last night with family and the Aussie fans were loving actually what a great day or what a what a side to watch that was brilliant with that bowling attack but they won't be like that now Now, just as a pundit, it's so difficult with this side to try and stay level. I mean, the thing with punditry or writing in a newspaper is to try and stay with this side. Because they're so like that, it is difficult. I know the people reading The Times this morning would have woken up with England in a commanding position.

16:22What's your headline tomorrow? That newspaper was landing on the doorstep, just as England were losing 5 for 11 in 16 balls. And the headline was, you know, the game is England's for the taking or something. I mean, you are a hostage to fortune here in Australia, particularly with the time difference. And as pundits, you're a little bit hostage to fortune with this team because they have great days and then they have terrible days. And, you know, they rise to the heights and then plumb the depths. And today was plumbing the depths. To lose in two days from 100 for one at lunch is staggering, really.

16:58And, you know, Ben Stokes said they were shell-shocked, as they will be. Any changes for either side? Let's start with England. I mean, who's under pressure there, obviously? Crawley is under pressure, but I don't see them changing after one test. Bethel could open, I suppose, but he's not had runs. He's not had any cricket. They're so invested with Crawley. I just don't see them making what would be seen as a panic change after one game. and Polk looked pretty good, didn't get big runs but looked okay and you can't see anybody else changing. The bowlers are fit, they'll play and I can't see Bashir playing in a pink ball game in Brisbane which again is going to be a fast moving game just like this.

17:46You wouldn't imagine that will last five days. And then for Australia there must be questions about Kawaja because of his back spasms but he's got two weeks to get over that. I mean, you could just say, we're going to open with Travis Head and bring in Mitch Marsh or whoever. Yeah, a good young middle-order player. I don't, yeah, I mean, that's obviously an option for them. But again, he's the only one. And then it's a question mark of whether Cummins will come back. Listen, he went on Fox, actually, for a commentary stint during, as Travis Head was approaching 100. And he said he was something like a half chance for Brisbane.

18:25I mean, he didn't sound overly... Does this change it? If they went 1-0 down, he might play. Absolutely. 1-0 up, they might just give him a bit more time. Right. And according to the Aussie journos who know their stuff, quite downbeat news on Hazelwood. I don't think he's expected to be right for Brisbane and might be pushed to be right for Melbourne even. So, again, it just reiterates what a missed opportunity this was for England in an Australian side without Cummins, without Hazelwood, and getting into a position where you're bossing the game, really missed opportunity. Incredible two days here at the Perth Stadium.

19:02Two bits of news. We've sacked our work experience lad who was on the camera yesterday that looked like we'd been tangoed or with the Barmy Army. So hopefully the pictures are a little bit better and hopefully in the next couple of days we are going to get Stuart Broad on who said this is the worst Australian side he's seen for a very long time. I bet he's getting some stick on Channel 7 right now. Something good came out of this game. Broad's getting some stick.

19:36Hi there, it's Dharmesh Sheff from the Sunday Supplement Podcast. Every week I'll be joined by some of the UK's top sports journalists to go beyond the headlines and unpick the big stories. Catch us every Sunday live on Sky Sports News between 9 and 11am with the podcast dropping as soon as we come off air. So if you don't already, give Sunday Supplement a follow wherever you get your podcasts, and I'll see you on Sunday mornings.