Australia aim to wear down English hope Jofra Archer at Lord’s

England are hoping Jofra Archer will be the bowler to bring them back into this Ashes series at Lord’s.

England’s Jofra Archer will step into the breach of injured paceman James Anderson in a high-pressure atmosphere at Lord’s tomorrow night. Picture: AFP

England are hoping Jofra Archer will be the bowler to bring them back into this Ashes series at Lord’s but the Australians remain unconvinced about the young quick’s ability to play five-day cricket.

The 24-year-old is tall, fast and talented. Born and raised in Barbados, he only qualified to play for England on the eve of the World Cup and he has limited experience at red-ball cricket.

Archer, who is expected to make his debut at Lord’s in place of the injured veteran Jimmy Anderson, has not played a first-class match since September and those he has played have been in division two. It is not to say he isn’t highly talented, but the Australians believe he does not have the miles in his legs to be consistent across the five days of a Test.

Archer played a four-day club game last week — his first since last summer — taking six wickets and hitting a century, but Justin Langer raised questions about his experience in the long form yesterday.

“I’m really curious about how Archer is going to go,” the coach said. “He’s played one red-ball game in 11 months. He’s a very skilled bowler and a great athlete. But Test cricket is very different to white-ball cricket. Like we’ve talked about a long time, we’ve got to keep wearing them down, and get him back into his second or third and fourth spells. Just curious how he’s going to go like you are with all fast bowlers. But he’s a very talented cricketer. It will be interesting to see how he goes.”

Captain Tim Paine made a similar observation in his column for The Australian today.

“We’ve studied him closely and seen him in white-ball cricket,” he wrote. “We know he is an exceptional talent with good pace, but it’s another game of cricket and he is another good bowler but he is yet to be tested over five days. Ask any of the quicks and they will tell you backing up to bowl long spells over that period is very different to be bowling in shorter formats.

“So, it is up to us to make sure he bowls a lot of overs and put him under a lot of physical and mental pressure.”

Australia have taken a conservative approach to batting and bowling in this series and Steve Smith will lead the slow advance against the bowling attack, blocking contentedly until the opposition attack is worn down.

The second Test approaches with Australia’s selectors in the same agony of indecision about bowling places that saw them make a “gut call” while standing pitchside on the morning of the first day at Edgbaston.

In that case Justin Langer and Trevor Hohns were going back and forth on whether to go with Peter Siddle or Josh Hazlewood. When the side arrived they told Hazlewood that he would be standing aside for Siddle, who has considerably more experience in England through the county system.

Langer admits it will take courage to change a winning XI, but that they have a whole squad approach to the series with the bowlers.

“We are also very aware that it’s a five Test match series, and we’ve got to be as good at the back end as we are at the front,” he said. “It’s easy to be good at the front end and that’s what I said after Edgbaston, we’re not here to win the Edgbaston Test, we’re here to win the Ashes. We have got to make sure we manage it and plan it well so we are as good in the fifth Test as we are in the second Test.”

Siddle was the most economical bowler in both innings of the first Test and conceded the least number of boundaries. It is a critical statistic.

Lord’s looks to have defied expectation with the wicket apparently dry and flat despite the team calling in Archer for his debut. England captain Joe Root described a lively wicket for the Ireland match at the same venue last month as “substandard”.

Langer sought out Cameron Bancroft and James Pattinson ahead of tomorrow’s match to discuss the way they went about the first Test, noting that Bancroft, who is normally a reliable fielder, dropped two catches in the tour game at Worcester.

“He is probably just trying a bit hard at the moment,” the coach said. “It’s one of the challenges for James Pattinson (also) actually, he set himself to play back in the Australian team, he set himself to play Ashes cricket. He’s ticked both of them off and now he’s going to have to reset his goals, and a lot of young people don’t do that well. They go ‘I’ve done it now’ and they forget to reset.

“I’ve spoken to Patto about it and I’ll say the same thing to Cameron Bancroft. He’s come back in and now he’s trying too hard, he’s achieved that goal, he thought it might have taken a lot longer. He just has to reset his goals, clear his mind and just relax a bit, he’ll be fine.”