The Ashes Daily: Wickets tumble as England fight back on breathless day one in Perth

0:00Nas:Oh, that's that. That is from Crawley. Chris Wokes nails it for four. The Ashes alive and Test cricket alive.

0:08Ath:Ice in his veins. Pat Cummins has led his team to a famous victory. Yeah, he's done. He gets his four-time landing. England's captain Ben Stokes.

0:19Nas: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

0:32Ath:Well I reckon this is my 20th Ashes that I've been involved in either as a Player or as a Pundit, broadcaster, journalist, whatever And we've seen some remarkable Opening days but I don't think I've seen One quite as remarkable as that 19 wickets, England looking Slightly dead and buried by Middle of the day Come the end of it, they're very much In the box seat.

0:54Nas:Jeez you're old aren't you 20?

0:57Ath:20 ashes.

0:57Nas:You've done as many. Yeah. Have you had to rewrite, by the way? That's my only question to you. 172 all out. Were you saying ashes, done and dusted, same old story? And now England could well end up with a lead.

1:09Ath:It did look like that this morning, didn't it? Because Zach Crawley got out in the first over of the morning. So rewind four years ago to the Gabba. Rory Burns loses his leg stump to Mitchell Stark. It's that man Stark again taking over. But really, because of Commons and Hazelwood, they're absent, 600 wickets, they're missing. He's got to be the main man. He gets Crawley in the first over. He gets three in his first spell. He ends up with seven. England are whistled out in, what was it, 33 overs, effectively. A session's worth of cricket, which is their shortest completed innings in the basball era.

1:44Nas:Yeah, and I was talking to all the Australians who know this ground, who were out there this morning yesterday. They said it's a bat first pitch. The scores are virtually identical to the India test last year. 150-odd bowled out, 100-odd in the second innings. We're very similar to that, but the experts tell us this is a different pitch. You said it this morning. It's a drier pitch, and everyone understood why England batted first. It did do a bit. It didn't do a lot. It just did enough. It didn't swing. It just seemed, and obviously with it being Perth, there was a little bit of bounce and a little bit of nip.

2:15Nas:A word on Mitchell Stark. It reminded me of Stuart Broad back in 2015. England were without James Anderson at Trent Bridge. Broad said, give that ball to me, 8 for 15. Stark today without Cummins and Hazelwood, 7 for... He was quite brilliant. I thought England actually, some of their top order, I know they lost that Crawley wicket and we'll come on to that. I'll ask you as an opener. But I thought Duckett played nicely. I thought Pope looked less frenetic than he has done in the past. And I thought actually that Harry Brook just about got his tempo spot on, the way he counterattacked.

2:48Ath:Well, there's going to be a kind of clash of cultures, really, isn't there? England are going to try and take the game on, obviously. They scored at more than five and over. Brooks' innings was both full of bravura and was a bit baffling at times. Bravura. Bravura. Lovely word. I mean, he came running down the pitch second ball. England were four down in the final over before lunch, and he came running down the pitch at Mitchell Stark and hit him over extra cover. And then the first over after lunch, he came running down the pitch at Scott Boland and whacked him for six over extra covers. Amazing cricket shots.

3:19Nas:Yeah, but I have no problem with that shot at all from Harry Brook. It is one of his shots. Would you criticise Ben Duckett for playing a reverse sweep? No, I'm not criticising. No, I'm not saying you are, but... I think it is one of his shots and he gets a lot of runs with it. Absolutely. And he did get out of the Oval and England ended up losing that test against India. Got out in the warm-up game playing that shot. But it is one of his shots and it gets a lot of runs. Where I got concerned about England today was we did it in the podcast last week. They must have known what was coming. Harry Brook must have known what was coming.

3:48Nas:From plan A, which is to nick off, top of off, all that stuff, to plan B, chin music, bouncers. And still, Harry Brook sort of gloved one down the leg side. The tail seemed to take it on. They must realise these grounds in Australia are bigger than the ones in England. The ones that are going for six in England are going to get caught in the deep.

4:06Ath:So, 172 then all out. I mean, they're in the box seat. They have the advantage. but it seems to me that they did leave a few out there. There was quite a dramatic collapse at the end when they tried to take on the boundaries, as you say, and hold out. I mean, it felt to me like 250 ought to have been attainable in those conditions.

4:26Nas:I thought 250 was a par score with the nip and the bounce, not a lot of swing, slow outfield, big outfield, so the balls wasn't rushing to the boundary for four. I thought they were below par, not because of how the top order batted, but because they gifted. Was it five for 12? They lost at the end there. that's somewhere they've got to and I always think with the bouncer I remember when I had a problem with the bouncer it was not saying I'm not hooking I'm not hooking it's amazing how many times you say you're not doing something you end up doing you have to tell yourself what exactly are you going to do when they go to that plan b on these bigger grounds what are you going to do not what you're not going to do I would say duck out the way they may see it differently going back to Crawley as an opening bat did you is it different batting in England than batting at at the Wacker in particular and now here you and he batted at the Wacker but here with the bounce outside that off stump driving on the up the ball that he played the first ball of the last dashes where he drove on the up and nailed it for four is it a more risky shot here yes that ball at

5:25Ath:Edgbaston was a fuller ball from Pat Cummins that was pretty much a drive ball and he went for it with conviction this was a long way from being a drivable length it was it was the kind of ball I would have been looking almost to play back to. And as you say, with that extra bounce, Stark wasn't really swinging it. He was pushing it across the right-hander. I do feel for openers on the first morning of an Ashes like that, though. I do remember what it's like. It is the most nerve-wracking experience. The most nerve-wracking experience. And I'm not defending the shot for that. I'm just trying to remember what it felt like.

6:05Ath:and it wasn't a good shot, it was a poor shot. I thought Duckett looked good, I thought Pope looked good as he had at Lylac Hill. Root just got one early on that squared him up a little bit. Stokes was set up beautifully by Stark, a couple outside the off stump and then pushing one back. So Stark, brilliant. Doggett, what do you think? On Deb, you reminded me of Jackson Bird a bit, the way that he bowls.

6:26Nas:Yeah, you were sitting up next to me and mentioned that. I see that, he looks like a very useful bowler. He's very experienced, 31 years of age, comes in in good nick, good form, wickets under his belt for a number of years now. I think he looks at, he's not Cummins, he's not Hazelwood, but I think he's a very useful addition to these, you know, a couple of good wicket on debut and then another wicket at the end there. I thought he bowled pretty well and your mate Scotty Boland couldn't quite, he looked like he was just a bit full. What he does very well is manages to hit a length and hit the deck hard.

6:59Nas:I think he was a bit far. I think some of that was because of Duckett. They'd obviously done their plans and their homework for each of those England batsmen. You think of Stokes. That is how Stark gets Stokes. He's got him out 10 times, five times bold. That's how you get Stoke. You think of Brook now with the bouncer. I think they had planned with Duckett to go full and straight. Boland didn't quite get it right.

7:20Ath:I think there are opportunities there for England. When we come to the second innings, you'd imagine the pitch will get a bit easier for a day maybe. and you know if they can handle Stark they've got the debutant dog it was obviously reasonable but not Cummins or Hazelwood as you say Bowling struggled a bit today so you kind of sense there's a bit of an opportunity there.

7:38Nas:Well India did get 490 in the third innings here.

7:42Ath:Get ahead of the game.

7:42Nas:What did you make it for all the ifs and buts about England's batting that was some bowling performance.

7:47Ath:I've not seen them bowl better with a new ball I don't think under Stokes and McCollum I thought Archer was absolutely brilliant today either side of at either side of the break and fully justified all the care and attention they've given to try and get him back to test cricket. I thought Gus Atkinson looked sharp and accurate. Kars obviously came on then and got the big wicket of Steve Smith. I thought Australia looked a bit rattled by the fast bowling, which has obviously been England's plan all along to bring bowlers with enough heat to try and get on top of Australia's batsmen and to take 20 wickets in these conditions.

8:25Ath:So they really kind of softened Australia up and then Botham or Stokes or whatever you want to call them nipped in at the end there. I mean, it was a scene-stealing performance, five wickets at the end, a bit like he did at Lila Kill. I think he got six for there with a load of long ops. And he kind of nipped in really on the back of some brilliant fast bowling earlier on. I'm not taking anything away from Stokes' wickets there. But I thought, you know, Australia was softened up by England's four fast bowlers initially.

8:57Nas:We've watched Stokes for a number of years now, and you just sense that feeling. It's not a one-off. He just does it all the time. He will rock up and he'll bowl a drag down, and Travis Head will hit it. To the one man that's there, you can see Travis Head's reaction. How have I done that? Well, so many batters have done. He just has that aura, as Beefy did. It's an excellent comparison with both of them. Even to when I started playing, when you faced Beefy, and he was just bowling little dobbers with Stephen Rhodes standing up at Worcestershire. And Beefy's aura as he ran in, maybe because of what I grew up watching Beefy, the aura almost got wickets.

9:30Nas:And in the end, the aura in the ashes was what made Botham the cricketer that he was and what Australia feared. Stokes definitely has that and had that today.

9:38Ath:I tell you what I really enjoyed about the day as well was just the pitch allowed for pace and carry, quality fast bowlers, a bit of physical threat. We saw Kars whacked on the helmet, Green whacked on the helmet, Smith and Labashain hit on the elbow. A bit like playing at the Whacker over the river there. A bit of physical threat. It's the kind of cricket that I really love watching. Fast bowlers on top, pitch offering a little bit for them. Batting, hard work but not impossible. You could get runs as Brook did. Brook got that a half century. But I thought it was a dramatic day because of that and much more enjoyable.

10:13Nas:And catching as well. If you're going to have quality fast bowlers, which both sides have, catch well behind the wicket, catch well in the deep. If you look at history of England's ashes, and maybe even England's ashes on the first day with Scissorhands, Vaughan at the Gabber or whatever, catches get put down. And in that atmosphere, there's a load of England fans here today. It was a brilliant atmosphere. If you take your catches, that just lifts everything. So you have no debate about five seamers at all. You think that was the right thing and the toss was the right thing. I've had a couple of texts.

10:43Nas:Our old mate Butcher texted me saying five seamers. He was just saying five seamers and batting first. What do you reckon about that?

10:49Ath:It's just a little bit counterintuitive, isn't it? You normally five seamers. Well, OK, let's give our bowlers first use. I don't always necessarily agree with that because the most helpful conditions might be towards the end if the pitch cracks or something. I mean, so I didn't think Bashir was going to play. I thought it was right that he didn't play. Everybody's saying it's a bat first pitch. I hadn't actually gone out to the pitch this morning. but all the former players who'd been out there said it was much drier than last year and it's a bat first pitch. And he went for it with conviction, as he does.

11:20Ath:And in the end, that five fast bowler policy has certainly paid off today. I mean, test cricket is a long game. Five days, we'll see how it plays out. But England have the advantage right now. I thought Australia looked a little bit rattled against the pace. And in the end, what started and what looked like could have been a grim day for England has proved to be a very good one.

11:38Nas:Yeah, and what did you make of that little Khawaja thing? A little bit of a miscalculation. Maybe he didn't see that collapse coming. He's off the field as an opener. That's a very dangerous thing to do.

11:49Ath:And it's unsettling, isn't it? Because Labashane has to come out and open. Smith's at three. So England, what England will want is to put pressure on Wetherald, who got a second ball duck. All great openers start with a duck. Wetherald got a duck today and Coadge is off. And it means that they get at Smith and Labashane early. They've got them where they want them. So that worked to England's favour. But an amazing day, 51 ,000 in the ground, a record crowd for the first day or any day of a Test match here at Perth. An unbelievable atmosphere. When we were stood out, sat out on the gantry, you kind of forget about it, don't you?

12:23Ath:In the press box behind the glass windows. It just reminded me of what Ashes cricket here in Australia is like. It's like nothing else, really, and it's a real test of character.

12:33Nas:And I got you a flat white with no coffee.

12:36Ath:Flat white with no coffee. It was a flat white milk. Thanks very much.

12:39Nas:It was a great day, a great day for the Hussein and Atherton Daily Podcast.

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