Tim Paine still right man for the job for Australia in Ashes battle

Tim Paine was the right man at the right time for Australia. He still is.

Tim Paine on the ball during a game of touch rugby at The County Ground in Derby on Wednesday. Picture: Getty Images

The Australian team may have noted the road signs marking Brian Clough Way as the team bus takes them from their hotel in Nottingham to the county ground at Derby.

The former football manager is revered around here, after all he took both clubs from the second division to success at the top level domestically and in Europe.

They’ve built statues and stands in his honour and they plead with locals not to steal the road signs bearing the name of the man considered one of the game’s finest coaches.

Clough, like those on the team bus, did not have such a good time at Leeds.

He lasted just 44 days as manager at the Yorkshire powerhouse. Perhaps the Australians would nod in sympathetic agreement with author David Peace’s fictional Clough when he described memories of playing in that “hateful, hateful place; spiteful, spiteful place” in the book, The Damned United.

Clough’s family and friends, including Yorkshireman Geoff Boycott, strongly disagreed with Peace’s depiction of their mate and the Australians would strongly disagree that their memories of that Test match are the same.

But for a minute there …

As the exhaust from Ben Stokes’ magnificence caught in their throat, they would have struggled to summon any generosity or appreciation of the experience.

“Hateful, spiteful place, speckled in their phlegm …”

That’s the fictional Clough again.

Appreciation might come later, but will always be tinged with the frustration of knowing that they were on the wrong side of history. They were Foreman and Stokes was Ali.

Not exactly the way you want to be remembered.

That Leeds Test was a feverish time. The August heat intense, but the normal English summer has resumed and the team seem happy to be one-all in the series. Not as happy as they would be were they two-nil, but they know this is a five-match series and have emphasised that point from the beginning. They are confident they have played the better cricket.

Tim Paine and Alex Carey were on the bus rushing past the Brian Clough signs on the way to and from Derby yesterday and will be again today. Matthew Wade too. Carey called in because the other two wicketkeepers are in the squad won’t keep in this game.

Carey didn’t make the Test squad and has been playing in Sussex.

Usman Khawaja has been called up from No 3 to captain for the first time and will open the batting. He is assumed to be in competition with Marcus Harris for a place.

The loud of voice are calling for Paine’s head. They say Carey is your man for the keeping job. Or Wade. Especially Carey. They like the cut of the kid’s jib.

And why not?

There’s a lot to like. He was a leader at GWS before he was abandoned. He has a record for catches at South Australia as a keeper and he made great shapes as a batsman at the World Cup, where he scored a couple of critical half-centuries and a few that ran close to the same.

The real Brian Clough had a way of dealing with suggestions he was the top of his field.

“I wouldn’t say I was the best manager in the business,” he would say. “But I was in the top one.”

Every argument about the wicketkeeper is based on batting. There’s some sense in this but mostly madness.

When it comes to wicketkeeping Paine could say the same as Clough. He is in the top one. His batting needs to improve in this series, but that’s the third of his tasks behind gloving balls and leading a team that was so recently leaderless and in crisis.

Peter Nevill might have an argument to keep, but he does not appear to have been invited to the debate.

And Carey just isn’t ready. He is a work in progress. He made errors in the World Cup, the people that know this craft say he is a work in progress — and that seemed to stall. Possibly reverse. His Sheffield Shield record came because he had great reflexes, not great technique, and the South Australian bowlers were not exactly testing him with their pace.

You cannot afford to have anybody but your best wicketkeeper behind the stumps in Test cricket. A dropped catch or two can cost you way more than most keeper-batsman will ever contribute with their second skill.

And captaincy? Take your Clough mind back to the end of the second day. England out 67. “Hateful, spiteful” voices demanding Joe Root’s head. The same dumping scorn on England cricket.

The pack has moved on.

If you are of a mind to reappoint Steve Smith you might have to cool your heels for a while because his driving ban lasts until the end of March. The vice-captains, Pat Cummins and Travis Head, aren’t really in the race just yet. It is too hard for a fast bowler whose mind, no matter how sharp it is, is scrambled by the task and too early for Head. Carey hasn’t played a Test.

Paine’s not batting at his best, the team has not been brilliant with the DRS but it is one-all in an away Ashes. It was so close to two-nil and they lost a game in which Steve Smith was nothing but a spectator.

“I drool when I watch Arsenal and it has nowt to do with my age, because I recognise a team and a manager who, a bit like me all those years ago, have turned simplicity into an art form.”

That’s the real Clough again, that’s what he might have said about Stokes in that last partnership. See ball. Hit ball as hard as you possibly can. Look for a single at the end of the over. Make everything devilishly complicated for the opposition.

Mistakes were made. Things could have been done better in the moment, but the arithmetic for Australia is simple.

Paine is your man. He got them here from hell. Swallow your spittle.