Hurt after Lord's? Don't despair
There's plenty of hope for England, because old scorecards never lie
Andy Zaltzman
21-Jul-2015
Grounding the bat is for gnomes • PA Photos
When England suffer a defeat to Australia of the magnitude of their 405-run disembowelment at Lord's (a margin of victory that was detected, digested and beamed back to NASA by the New Horizons probe on its onward journey from Pluto), there is a tendency to assume that Armageddon, and/or another Ashes defeat, is now inevitable.
Ben Stokes' run-out, for example, his first failure of an encouraging series with the bat, was the kind of momentary loopiness that, had England been 520 for 4, would have been giggled away as a one-off outbreak of slapstick inattention. With England 52 for 4, however, and sinking to an unremitting drubbing, it became a symptom of a team in a sudden but irreversible spiral of decline, a general national malaise, and the gradual collapse of humanity in a universe now geared to instant gratification rather than the more rewarding hundreds of millions of years of gradual geological and biological evolution.
Whilst it can be argued that England's performance was, statistically and technically, one of their most inept in Ashes history, and that several players are now walking to the wicket accompanied by giant metaphorical animatronic question marks that are audibly barking, "Well then?" as those players take guard, this column would rather look on the positive side of England's Lord's hyperglitch. For the following reasons:
1. England were tremendously unfortunate with the pitch
England had the misfortune to be trapped on a treacherously, deceitfully, unpatriotically capricious surface, a 22-yard chameleon which betrayed them repeatedly through almost four whole days of competition.
England had the misfortune to be trapped on a treacherously, deceitfully, unpatriotically capricious surface, a 22-yard chameleon which betrayed them repeatedly through almost four whole days of competition.
The pitch was as flat as a demotivated pancake for the first 149 overs of the game, before becoming awkwardly tricky for exactly 90.1 overs. It then miraculously sedated itself during the ten-minute break between innings, mutating like a traitorous Superman into a docile, bowler-sapping blancmange for the next 49 overs.
Then, at the 288.1 over mark in the match - always a pivotal moment - and within approximately 18 seconds of Michael Clarke declaring to leave the game apparently evenly poised, with England needing a simple 100 runs per session to win, the pitch transmogrified once more, this time into an unplayable magma-spewing poison-wreathed cobra pit. It remained so for the next 222 balls, before flattening out once again on a wicketless fifth day.
One should perhaps give some credit to Australia's backroom tactics wonks for reading the precise moments at which the wicket would metamorphose from turtle to tyrannosaurus, and one should certainly sympathise with England for their unfortunate timing - had they batted in those opening 149 overs, and then again 90.1 overs later for 49 overs of carefree run-scoring, before running through Australia like a hippopotamus in a nursing home on that climactic last-37-over minefield, then the result would almost certainly have been very different.
2. England have carefully and lovingly cultivated a culture of inconsistency in recent times that renders all defeats essentially meaningless
"Momentum, schmomentum" is the official team slogan on Alastair Cook's new England. It is inked into the flaps of their pads, knitted into their woolly socks, embroidered on their hearts.
"Momentum, schmomentum" is the official team slogan on Alastair Cook's new England. It is inked into the flaps of their pads, knitted into their woolly socks, embroidered on their hearts.
Admittedly this culture of inconsistency has developed since England achieved a striking and arguably counterproductive level of consistency on their last tour of Australia 18 months ago. But they have, for only the second time in their 138-year Test history, alternated wins and defeats in six successive matches.
They showed the collective brilliance they are capable of in Cardiff. There is no need to keep rubbing it in everyone's faces when three more matches in the win-lose-win-lose-win-lose sequence will be sufficient to steal the urn from under Australia's confused noses. The fourth-Test part of this challenge looks well within their capabilities. The third- and fifth-Test sections may well be trickier. But - remember Cardiff. And Lord's in May. And Grenada. And forget Barbados, Leeds and Lord's in July. Please.
3. England are working the statistical precedents to place themselves in a position of mathematical impregnability
The previous occasion was a sequence involving the final four Tests of the 1909-10 series in South Africa - and, crucially, the first two Tests of an Ashes series (in 1911-12). This provided a springboard for a 4-1 series win. An identical result is now surely inevitable. STATISTICS NEVER LIE.
The previous occasion was a sequence involving the final four Tests of the 1909-10 series in South Africa - and, crucially, the first two Tests of an Ashes series (in 1911-12). This provided a springboard for a 4-1 series win. An identical result is now surely inevitable. STATISTICS NEVER LIE.
Furthermore:
- England's 37-over innings was their joint eighth shortest all-out innings in a home Test, and their most rapid dismissal in England since the Headingley Ashes match of 2009, when they were blasted out in under 34 overs on the first day - a humiliation which presaged an URN-CLINCHING VICTORY at The Oval.
- Lord's was the first Ashes match in which England have been four wickets down for less than 50 in both innings since the MCG in 1903-04 - another series in which England WON THE ASHES. (Admittedly they had already triumphed before the match in which this happened, but the point stands.)
- The last time England were bowled out in exactly 37 overs was in Perth in 2010-11 - before they went on to win the next two Tests and RETAIN THE URN.
- It was the quickest England have been bowled out in any Lord's Test since both innings of the 1888 Ashes showdown, when they were skittled in 47 and 50 four-ball overs (all out 62 and 53). They went on to win the remaining two Tests that summer by an innings, and ROMP TO ANOTHER ASHES VICTORY.
- One of the many curiosities of this series so far has been that in neither Test has any bowler on the winning side taken four wickets in an innings. This is a relatively rare occurrence in Tests, and, prior to this series, had happened only once in Ashes matches in England - the 1896 Old Trafford Test, when England's legendary paceman Tom Richardson took a heroic 13 wickets in 110 five-ball overs, including six in an unbroken 42-over second-innings spell that almost brought England victory. He ending up on the losing side, clutching the record for most wickets by a losing bowler in a Test (which he still shares with Javagal Srinath, Merv Hughes and SF Barnes), presumably twitching his resolutely 19th-century moustache in a manner than must have screamed to his team-mates: "Anyone else fancy having a go?" Nevertheless, England went on to The Oval for the deciding Test, and won to CLINCH THE ASHES.
You may be sceptical of the importance of contrived statistical coincidences dating back well over 100 years. But take one look at David Warner's moustache. That is the facial hair of someone obsessed with pre-First-World-War cricket. These stats will be keeping him awake at night.
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Queen in practising-umpiring shocker
As if the tribulations of a 1990s-nostalgia-fuelled Lord's splattering were not sufficient to cast a gloomy rolled-up newspaper over the once-happily-buzzing bumble bee of the English summer, the nation has been rocked even further to its cricketing core, after grainy 1930s home-movie footage emerged of the young Queen (née Princess) Elizabeth practising umpiring signals with other members of the royal family.
As if the tribulations of a 1990s-nostalgia-fuelled Lord's splattering were not sufficient to cast a gloomy rolled-up newspaper over the once-happily-buzzing bumble bee of the English summer, the nation has been rocked even further to its cricketing core, after grainy 1930s home-movie footage emerged of the young Queen (née Princess) Elizabeth practising umpiring signals with other members of the royal family.
The 17-second film clip appears to show the then-small proto-monarch being trained to signal a bye by her mother and her uncle, the future King Edward VIII (a skipper renowned for the most notorious premature declaration in British history).
Buckingham Palace sources have denied that the Queen ever had a genuine interest in becoming a first-class umpire, let alone officiating at Test level, although it is reputed that the Queen Mother had a "proper schoolgirl-style crush" on inter-wars umpiring megastar Frank Chester, and celebrated the resumption of Test cricket in 1946 by having a full-back tattoo of HG Baldwin and JA Smart marching out of the Lord's pavilion to umpire in England's first post-war Test.
The Sun, the alleged newspaper that claims to have published the controversial footage to highlight the difficulty young girls faced in progressing to the highest echelons of umpiring in the mid-20th-century, is rumoured to have further footage in which Her young Majesty umpires a game in the back garden at Windsor Castle, played with a sceptre as a bat and a stuffed corgi as the stumps, and gives the Duke Of Snutterbridge out lbw, despite what appears to have been a clear inside edge.
England's top three: off with their heads
England's top three wickets have averaged 25.90 per partnership this year, equating to an average innings start of 78 for 3. This is currently their second worst such figure since the First World War. Only 1989 has been worse, when England's third wicket fell on average at 61, the Ashes were lost, not to be regained for another eight series over 16 years (KEEP QUIET ABOUT THAT STAT PLEASE) and the selectors went through top-order batsmen like Silvio Berlusconi through legal loopholes.
England's top three wickets have averaged 25.90 per partnership this year, equating to an average innings start of 78 for 3. This is currently their second worst such figure since the First World War. Only 1989 has been worse, when England's third wicket fell on average at 61, the Ashes were lost, not to be regained for another eight series over 16 years (KEEP QUIET ABOUT THAT STAT PLEASE) and the selectors went through top-order batsmen like Silvio Berlusconi through legal loopholes.
At one point, the selection panel were so excitably trigger-happy, and the form of English batsmen so variable, that they sent two solid county openers to a mad scientist in the Alps, in an effort to surgically stitch together a hybrid super-opener from the best bits of each batsman (and have assorted spare body parts left over to try to extend Ian Botham's career). The hope was that this would double the average of the two county stalwarts, but in the event the Frankenstein's grinder remained a solid mid-20s-averaging player, as was the fashion at the time, albeit with a bionic throwing arm, a terrifying growl, and after a minor administrative error, a beak. (The technology, inevitably, advanced, and was instrumental in Cricket South Africa's creation of Graeme Smith.)
Australia's top three: horrifically prolific
As a javelinically pointed contrast to England's top order struggles, the 616 runs scored in the match by Rogers, Warner and Smith constitute the third-highest match aggregate by a top three in a Test. Hunte (260), Kanhai (25) and Sobers (365 not out) scored 650 against Pakistan in Jamaica in 1957-58, all in the first innings; and Brown (10 and 1), Ponsford (266 and 22) and Bradman (244 and 77) totalled 620 at The Oval in 1934. A match in which Australia secured the Ashes, not to lose them again for 19 years. KEEP QUIET ABOUT THAT ONE TOO.
As a javelinically pointed contrast to England's top order struggles, the 616 runs scored in the match by Rogers, Warner and Smith constitute the third-highest match aggregate by a top three in a Test. Hunte (260), Kanhai (25) and Sobers (365 not out) scored 650 against Pakistan in Jamaica in 1957-58, all in the first innings; and Brown (10 and 1), Ponsford (266 and 22) and Bradman (244 and 77) totalled 620 at The Oval in 1934. A match in which Australia secured the Ashes, not to lose them again for 19 years. KEEP QUIET ABOUT THAT ONE TOO.
Rogers and Warner also became only the second opening pair to put on 75 or more in both innings of a Lord's Test. The previous pair to do so were Tamim Iqbal and Imrul Kayes, for Bangladesh, in 2010 (with stands of 88 & 185).
Andy Zaltzman is a stand-up comedian, a regular on BBC Radio 4, and a writer