At last I think I’ve worked out what’s going on.
Truly to get to the bottom of this extraordinary series the watcher must forget whatever has gone immediately before. He must ignore the transient witterings of the pundits who proclaim this player finished and that team supreme on the basis of a batting collapse, a dead pitch, or a bunch of lunatics for selectors.
He must remember what he thought he knew before the series began, because anyone who manages to wake up from a five week coma tomorrow afternoon armed only with the knowledge that the teams stand at 1-1 following two one sided victories will be not in the least surprised.
Australia began the day 200 runs to the good with 7 wickets in hand. The received wisdom among all the so called experts was that England needed early wickets or they could kiss goodbye to chasing a total under 500. However, anything less than 500 would be a breeze. After all, look at South Africa in 2008 on this very surface.
The pitch had eased, the ball was middle aged and there was no sign of turn. Hussey and Watson were at the crease and a breakthrough was urgently needed.
For over an hour we witnessed the overnight pair, untroubled despite some good accurate bowling from Anderson in particular, make their way sedately to 177 and a lead of 251.
Then, out of nowhere, Tremlett pitched the ball up and Watson was trapped for the first time in this series bang in front. Up went the umpire’s finger but Watson lingered. His sour eyes narrowed, his lower lip wobbled and Hussey took pity. “OK mate, go for the referral.”
Truly the silliest referral in a series of pretty silly referrals ensued and confirmation that the ball was hitting the middle of middle stump was soon provided.
There then followed a passage of play that defies analysis. The technically challenged Smith who plays every full ball with his hands two miles from his body and his rear end backing away to square leg, was fed a diet of short balls which he could just about avoid or swat between the bizarrely positioned fielders 15 yards in from the square leg boundary.
To compound matters, the same “tactic” was employed to Hussey who has scored at will off short filth throughout the series.
As if things couldn’t get any more infuriating for England fans, the umpires kept giving the batsmen out when clearly the ball was missing the stumps resulting in the inevitable overturning on referral.
Smith’s marvelous impression of a man who’d made a pact with the devil continued via a shocking failure of Erasmus to give him out when clearly LBW, a deflected edge from his periscopic bat with eyes closed that flew safely into no man’s land, and numerous plays and misses.
Then, in an Ashes series of bizarre captaincy and even more bizarre plans, England alighted on Bodyline without the short legs. Tremlett came round the wicket and banged the ball at Smith’s chest. It surely couldn’t work, could it? Well, Smith is perhaps more inventive than I’ve given him credit for and he contrived to glove an innocuous ball down the leg side to Prior behind the stumps.
The floodgates then opened. Haddin played on, Collingwood snaffled Johnson (yes, Collingwood) and had Siddle dropped by Swann at extra cover. Hussey hung around with the tail, pulling to his heart’s content, but the last six wickets mustered a mere 57.
The massively impressive Tremlett took 5-87 and it would have been better had he not been ordered to bowl pointlessly short garbage to Strauss’ baffling plans.
Suddenly, a glimmer of hope. A target of 391 and half the commentary team, including the normally sensible Andy Zaltzman, believed England were on top.
What possesses these people? There is a reason for the rarity of 400+ run chases, and within 40 minutes all illusions were dashed. Cook and Strauss were undone by full swinging balls and the thought occurred that maybe, just maybe, England might have been better served pitching the ball up during Australia’s innings, what with nearly every wicket having being taken by catches at slip or LBWs. But hell, what do I know?
Pieterson rediscovered a technical flaw we all thought he’d ironed out 9 months ago by needlessly prodding at a wide, back of a length ball and steering to slip. To his credit he was absolutely furious. To his discredit, it was an atrocious shot that in stormier days would have resulted in a pitch invasion from the incensed England fans.
Though all was lost by this stage, Trott and Collingwood negotiated their way to 8 minutes before stumps before both finding even more clueless ways to get out. Johnson steered one across Trott who, not heeding the across part of the ball’s trajectory decided to try it out for size, rather in the manner of someone tempted by an evil genie’s voice to poke a passer by in the ear.
Not only was it a useless shot in every way, it had the further demerit of damaging Ponting’s finger. If he’s broken it, England won’t even have a walking wicket at number three to bowl at.
Collingwood, probably in sympathy for his teammates incompetence, unfurled an angled prod to a wide ball, the last of the day, to complete the humiliation.
But these events are not as unusual as they may appear. In the last four series between the two sides, a first innings lead of 81 is the second lowest. Every match contested is, viewed in isolation, dominated by one side or the other.
In fact, apart form 06/07, the sides take it in turns to implode as if some kind of anti-momentum were at play.
This at least bodes well for England at the MCG who will win by an innings and a gazillion runs before being polished off in 8 sessions at the SCG to leave the series 2-2.
In some seriousness, it must be noted that England once more fared terribly on a quick pitch against well pitched up swinging deliveries. This happened last year in South Africa and again at the Oval this English summer.
For reasons that are unfathomable, England tend to reign supreme on slow turgid tracks.
And another positive factor has been their ability, for only the third time in 19 away tests, to take 20 wickets.
Frankly it’s what we should have expected before the series began, and before the “experts” read all the wrong messages into the evidence of the first two tests.
So the series is back on with only the formalities of a massive defeat to be negotiated tomorrow morning. Australians will turn up in their millions to get into the MCG on Boxing Day and once more, reports of test cricket’s demise have been hugely exaggerated.
And for that, I suppose, we should all truly rejoice, even if took Mitchell flaming Johnson to bring it back to life.