The Ashes Daily: Root and Brook put England on top on day one in stormy Sydney

0:00Oh, that's 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, go! Down, he gets his goal. And in 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.

0:31Nas:Welcome to the Ashes Daily podcast. We've been forced inside because there may be a storm just about to hit outside. The day has been called off after 45 overs. Michael Atherton, you've been fairly critical of the quality of cricket in this Ashes series. What did you make of the quality of cricket in those 45 overs?

0:52Ath:I thought it was a pretty good day for England, having lost the three wickets in the first hour. That was an excellent partnership between Harry Brook and Joe Rue, which we'll come on to in some detail. I thought Australia's bowling was only OK. I mean, they're obviously missing Cummins and Hazelwood and Lyon. Stark's done incredibly well to get through five tests, but you feel he must be feeling the pinch a little bit. And then an all-seam attack, so no spinner to go to, which is not quite unheard of in Sydney, but I don't think it's happened here since the late 19th century for Australia.

1:25Nas:1888, have I got that right? I mean, it's incredible. We spoke yesterday about the pitches we played on here. And you think of Shane Warne and Stuart McGill and Nathan Lyon and go all the way back to Richie Benno and the spin as this country's produced. And the spin on this ground, not to have one, is quite incredible for Australia.

1:42Ath:I mean, obviously the conditions have changed. You know, it used to be slow, low turner. I was listening to Steve Smith talk in his press conference and he was saying that right at the start of his career, there were those kind of pitches and it'd be a very different type of cricket. You know, you'd get games going deep into the last day. You'd have a lot of reverse swing. You'd have catches in front of the wicket and you'd have a lot of spin. But he said for the vast majority of his career, they've really not been like that and they've become more extreme towards the latter few years of his career.

2:12Ath:And I got the sense actually listening to him that Australia weren't going to play a spinner. It was just the way he was talking didn't seem to me that Australia would play a spinner. And that might be a part reflection on Todd Murphy as well. Obviously, if Nathan Lyon was fit, I imagine he might have played. Not that Todd Murphy's a bad bowler, of course, but he's not Nathan Lyon. So a combination of factors. But it means that the cricket that we've seen has been a bit one-dimensional, hasn't it, throughout the whole series. I think the Melbourne test was the only test in Australia, only Ashes test in Australia, where there hadn't been an over of spin.

2:45Ath:And I think this has been the series where there have been least overs of spin in an Ashes series. So it's been that kind of cricket, really. And I don't know, looking at the pitch today, you wouldn't say that it offered enough for five seamers. But that's not to say that it's going to turn on the last day either. We've got to wait and see how it plays. I mean, what did you think of the decision, both on Murphy and England's not to play Bashir?

3:13Nas:I think you have to be careful. I mean, the forecast is for it to be hot. And you have to pick a side for the first day, but also for the last day. I've made that mistake myself at times. I look down at a ground and a pitch, and you just judge it on day one. You have to throw it ahead. But I think both captains feel that with the heat, actually what will happen here is that the cracks will open up. They're saying it's quite dry and cracked underneath, and that will mean up and down bounce. And that's when you want your seamers. I just want to give you a quote from Crash Craddock, actually. someone we know, a broadcaster and journalist out here, and it shows they're not happy in these parts.

3:45Nas:Enough is enough. Richie Benno would be rolling in his grave for Australia not to choose a spinner for the first time in 140 years at the SCG is a dreadful indictment of the pitches and policy. Spin bowling is officially dying in Australian test cricket.

4:03Ath:Well, what's happened, and this has been a gradual thing, is that the pitches have become more uniform and less varied, and that's partly because of the drop-ins at the multi-sport grounds like Brisbane, Adelaide. And if Sydney, which used to be the outlier in terms of spin, if that's gone more the way of the other grounds in terms of grass being left on the pitch, then there is that lack of variety and that's not necessarily a good thing for the game because if you've got a five-test series, what you want to see throughout that showing is the whole range and variety of skills. You know, we talked about that at Melbourne.

4:40Ath:The fact that it was a two-day game meant that you didn't see a lot of batting, a lot of spin bowling. And we're not going to see much spin bowling here. But, you know, that's the decision they've made. And, you know, it just looked a slightly one-dimensional attack, didn't it? Once you got over the threat of Mitchell Stark, who bowled those two spells, one in the morning with a new ball, one after lunch, you just felt then it's a diet of right arm, kind of medium pace or medium fast pace. and just not that much variety.

5:09Nas:Having said all of that, you'd say just judging today, it was probably a normal test match pitch in conditions where it does something for an hour and then it flattens out. Not something that we have seen throughout this series.

5:20Ath:Well, I was just going to say that. One of Ben Stokes' bugbears about commentary and punditry is he thinks we always judge backwards and in hindsight. And, of course, it could have been very different today. Both Root and Brooke could have got out for none. Root had a big whoosh at his first ball, which he couldn't nick to the keeper. Brook's second ball was an inside edge that just went past Lake Stump. They both played brilliantly after that or beautifully after that, apart from when Australia went to the short pitch ploy against Harry Brook, where he lost the plot a bit, and he was so lucky, really.

5:52Ath:I think it was the 31st over, so we're about seven overs after lunch, about 40 minutes after lunch, when Smith said to start, right, we're going to go short at Brook. and at that point it's a bit like that dismissal of harry brooks at the gabba the match situation then calls for just a bit of nous stark at bowl four he's got maximum two overs left he's put put everybody out on the on the fence on the leg side i think at that point you can just say to yourself let him blow himself out for two overs and the main threat's gone and we can tuck into the rest but he went for a big whoosh that went over nearly to fly slip he then top-edged one that fell unbelievably luckily between three fielders and of course he could have been out any

6:36Nas:stage in that over so you know is that is one bit of harry brooke yeah i'd like him to put away we saw it at lords in the last ashes series when there's literally eight men back leg side offside to carry on, to backing away and carry on pulling and hooking. I don't know what's... And it's actually not just a Harry Brook thing. I've noticed throughout this series, the duck and the sway has just gone out of the game. And we played with someone who got a Test 100 on this ground, Mark Butcher. You bounce Mark Butcher, he would just duck under the way and that's it. Bowlers would get bored of bouncing Butch.

7:11Nas:Whereas if someone keeps hooking...

7:13Ath:It's the match situation. You know, Stark was nearly done. They're in control of the game. They've put on 100 at this point. And the rest of the attack doesn't look that threatening. And the pitch is obviously good. And until, you know, at this point, the weather overhead conditions are still good. Everything is in your favour. Why then give a sniff of an opportunity? So that was the, you know, if you're being critical, that was the area where we would be critical, or I would be critical of Brook today. But an excellent partnership still that has got England into a strong position. Sounds like we're whinging now because we're whinging about lack of spinner and that.

7:49Nas:But let's be honest, that partnership, apart from that, the two lads, the two Yorkies, number one, number two batters in the world, apart from that little spell, they play beautifully.

7:59Ath:They did. And the whinge is interesting because it goes back to what Ben Stokes says about, oh, we only talk in hindsight. So if we're going to be if you're going to be like that, you know, say Harry Brook charges and nicks it first ball and we're critical. And Ben Stokes says, well, it's fine margins. It could have gone for six. You also have to go the other way. When things work out, you also have to say, well, it might not have worked out, particularly around that little 20-minute period when they went short at him. But as you say, I thought Root played beautifully today. He's not got many happy memories of this ground, actually, if you think about it.

8:35Ath:He was dropped here in 13-14. He was hospitalised on that very hot day in 17-18. He got two low scores when he was captain in 21-22. so he probably feels he needs to get something from the ground. I think just the lack of the less bounce here at Sydney plays to his favour. He played that run-down shot a lot more.

8:56Nas:It's when it nips and bounces, that's when that run-down shot gets him in trouble. When it's a little bit of a slow seamer by Australian standards, then he runs it off the face of the bat beautifully.

9:06Ath:I think 23 of his first 50 came behind square on the offside. and when he can play that shot, when it's working for him, he's such a lovely player because that's his kind of bread and butter. He can turn over the strike, things tick along, he doesn't get stuck and obviously Harry Brook got plenty of the strike then as well and when they bowled full at Harry Brook today, I thought he looked excellent. I thought his play off the front foot, both defensive and attacking, was very good indeed.

9:37Nas:And that's a good combination because if Root is rotating the strike, Harry Brook is never going to score slowly, so that's constant problems for the opposition captain. So that partnership was wonderful, and all the England fans would have really enjoyed that. Let's go back to the first hour. Firstly, not in hindsight, but just when that coin came down, having not played a spinner to bat first. I mean, we've not had a close look at the pitch. It looks the right decision now. Would you have done that as well?

10:06Ath:Well, it looks the right decision to have batted first, and it was a beautiful morning. not like that now with the storm clouds around. If it had been, you know, those heavier overhead conditions right at the start, you might have thought twice about it, but it was a beautiful, fresh day. We'd had overnight rain, but it just felt like a batting morning. And there was a bit of movement there, as you'd expect on the first hour in Australia, but it wasn't excessive. There was a tiny little bit of swing for Stark and Nisa. A little bit of seam, wasn't there?

10:35Nas:Let's talk about the ducat dismissal, because he's had a difficult tour. He looked like he was getting in a bit of rhythm. I saw Greg Blewett do a good piece in The Zone for Seven about his back just coming across. He's sort of getting a bit squared up and his back coming across. These are the sort of things you highlight when you're getting out and nicking it, and you don't highlight it when you're smashing it around England. Or is there a slight technical weakness just on that four-stump line? Because he's had a couple of good balls, but he's also had a couple of dismissals out there that he feels he could have played better.

11:04Ath:I think it's the angle from start because it starts to come in. And if you think, there's a couple of occasions in this series where he's turned the ball a bit too soon and kind of got a leading edge. And it was a, listen, the ball that got him out, it did a bit, but I thought it started on a line where he can leave the ball. But of course, he's not somebody who does leave the ball and he's had quite a bit of success doing it his way, which is a pretty unorthodox way for an opening batter. the danger was always here in Australia with that little bit of extra pace and bounce than you would get in England that inability or lack of desire to leave the ball was always going to find him out and it has found him out in this series he's had an interesting series against Stark I think he scored it quicker than a runner ball against him but he's got out five times to him as well

11:52Nas:and Crawley again a start looked good one that just nipped back very similar to his second innings dismissal in Melbourne

11:58Ath:yeah I thought he was looking pretty good actually he looked pretty calm He didn't look frenetic. He was leaving the ball on length quite well, playing the line. And then he got one. He was quite a long way across his stumps, wasn't he? As though he was determined to kind of play for his off stump. But then Nisa ran one back and got him LBW. But, you know, I thought he looked pretty good until he got out.

12:22Nas:Bethel took quite some time to get off the mark. And Boland just worked him over with round the wicket, over the wicket, just mixed it up. just for him as a left-hander would know just to find out where your off stump was. Is that something he could have left on length or do you think that was just too good a ball to leave?

12:39Ath:It was a pretty good ball. I mean, you know, I suppose to most dismissals you can always say I could have done something. There are very few balls that you think, well, that's absolutely unplayable. But I think equally on the other side of it, I'd say it's a pretty tight line. It was certainly a tighter line than Ducats and it nipped and bounced and he played the line and feathered it. You know, it's the kind of delivery that you can get at the top of the order. In Australia, I wouldn't be overly critical of that. And again, he looked small, absolutely small sample size at short innings, but he looked pretty composed.

13:18Ath:He got a cracking bouncer from Mitchell Stark, actually. We were all ducking in the press box.

13:22Nas:He played it really well.

13:24Ath:I think he does like to have a go. So I think one or two teams and one or two people who've watched him have said he's a bit compulsive.

13:32Nas:He'll fit him well in this England side then.

13:35Ath:I wasn't surprised to see his start, but it was a cracking bounce, and in the end he played it pretty well.

13:40Nas:And Australia, I know we've said it's a one-dimensional attack. What did you make of them, their body language, how they kept going today?

13:49Ath:I've never played against an Australian team that is not keen to win. I know Andrew McDonnell made those comments before the game about it being, you know, just another test match, world championship points at stake. I was chuckling about that because I got here very early today. I thought it's going to be chaos outside. So I was here about eight o 'clock, two and a half hours before play. And I've never seen crowds like it, even at Lourdes. You know, when they snake around down the Wellington Road, I think there was more people here today. Thousands of people. So this notion that it's just another test is nonsense.

14:21Ath:this is an ashes test match, England against Australia, and everybody had come in to watch it. And Australia, I thought they were OK. I didn't think they were exceptional, not particularly bad. Bit one-dimensional, but OK. I wouldn't say more than that.

14:36Nas:On that note of the crowds, and I've seen a couple of tweets that have been made, and just try and explain that last bit there. Because from where I was sitting, the rain wasn't falling. You could see the sunshine coming over. It looked like they should be starting and playing. And then all of a sudden it was announced, that's it for the day, it's called off.

14:54Ath:I can't explain. I think there was, from what I understand, a lightning threat. And my experience here in Australia is that they use their radars far more than we do in England. The ground staff take far more note of the radars and what's coming than perhaps we do in England, where we basically look up, if it ain't raining, we'll get the covers off, whatever. And I heard that there was a lightning threat. but I agree with you. It looked for the last 45 minutes as if we should have been playing, really, and then it got too late to get the ground ready for the starting time. But hugely disappointing for the crowd that only 45 overs were bowled, but it looks like we're going to get...