Day 4 @ Leeds - Sunrise stole my title!
I wanted to call today's post, "The Empire Strikes Back". It's clearly the best of the nine Star Wars movies and any opportunity to integrate its reference into other areas of life, need to be taken.
Well, it wasn't a surprise but 250 wasn't enough and Bazball lives! Just like Emperor Palpatine in Episode 9 - I can't even remember what the name of that abomination was, though it wasn't as bad as Episode 8 - fancy just taking your star ship and running it through another at lightspeed, I mean that crap was so poorly written oops. Sorry, I got caught in a nerd rant there.
Listening this evening from Ball 1 - thanks family for being exhausted from a massive day on the slopes, there seemed to be an air of inevitability about it. Wickets fell regularly, but it always seems that England had done just enough. D#$%it went early in the day - a relief given his performance in the last test, this time dismissed by a rockmelon of a delivery, full and swinging, to be leg before for 23. The Leeds crowd expected to see their local lad come out at 3, but Moeen strode out instead. Some believe Donny had not finish listening to his pump up play list, while others believe that he needs to face bowlers that are more tired, where his lack of technique is more effective. Moeen didn't last long before Tony toppled his castle, and there was some hope for the insomniacs watching down under - 2/60.
Out came Dud to a massive cheer - surely his scalp was one that the Aussies needed soon if there were to stand a chance. Spider & Dud continued to deal in boundaries, and the Aussies bowling seemed to help facilitate it - length seemed to elude the pace attack, and there was no sign of Dan Murphy to spin his web of intrigue. Enter The Bison. From the outset he moved the ball, and a change of Duke before the 20th over (right on schedule) encouraged even more movement. After another boundary by Spider, he tried to do the same but didn't get to the pitch of it, and an easy catch to AC had me whispering an absolutely blue send off to Crawley (so as to not wake the rest of the family just metres away, all exhausted from their last day on the slopes) - 3/90 with a new hope.
Now Donny made his way out, keen to make amends for his first innings failure. He began as tentative as a Liberal minister currently employing a female aide. A few prods and pokes mixed with an occasional instinctual big woolly swing across the line. Passing the halfway mark in the run chase in just over 25 overs and three down kept Aussie fans thinking "Oh well, at least we're 2-1 up in the series". That was until the Postman caught Dud's gloves on an attempted hook and the ball was safely taken by AC - 4 down and Aussie fans were fist pumping and telling their partners "We're back!" while they politely replied "Yes dear" and continued scrolling through social media streams about travel or cleaning, or a combination of the two.
Cometh the man, cometh the hour. We've seen this story before. Instead of a slightly younger version of Dick Smith joining Bent Spoke at the crease for a run chase at Headingley as in 2019, it was now someone that relished swinging as much as an unemployed 58 year old in Nyngan living in a commune. Either one of this wickets would be prized. Tony re-entered the attack and looked tired. His pace was down, his line was off. But like a green and gold miracle, Starc produced a ball that any cricket captain would sum up as "S#$% gets wickets", Bent tickled one down the leg side for AC to take another tidy catch (whose work with the gloves has patched over the fact that his batting has been below par of late) and the Poms were 5 for 161. And when Tony rattled the castle of Ron Weasley (I cannot believe it's taken me this long to make the connection when Ron was the Gryffindor keeper in Quidditch - face slap emoji) Starc has his fourth and the Lions were on the ropes at 6/171 and needed 80 runs to keep the Ashes alive.
Not so Woakes came in to join Donny while there faint sounds of "3-0" coming from the apartments around me. While there was false strokes and balls just falling short of fielders, these two were getting the job done. And the "genius" of Bazball was that it was happening rather quickly, so that the Aussie brains trust did not have time to adapt. Perhaps spin would work - oh, we'll give it a goo next over. Should I stop bowling short, oh, next over. I'm not sure my barrage of half volleys is working to a batter who just broke the record for the least balls to bring up his first 1000 runs in test cricket... And that's the beauty of Bazball - though you have to be in with a sniff for it to work. Despite being 80 short, England still scored a run a ball until Donny skied one to try and create a S. Waugh / J. Gillespie Sri Lanka moment when Postman stood strong to be part of Tony's 'michelle' (5fa) and send Donny on his way for what could be match-winning 75. Despite being 7 wickets down, there seemed to be an inevitability about the conclusion, particularly when the quicks persisted in the 'Leg Theory' approach. Woakes and Wood (the eventual MOTM for his 7 wickets and 40 off 16 balls!) hit the remaining runs rather quickly.
There will be a lot of analysis that occurs with this result - mainly because there is a week and a half until Old Trafford. But I'll allow one of the greats, Glenn Mitchell to summarise:
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