Will it be third time lucky for Joe Root?

England's captain Joe Root is on his third Ashes tour to Australia

Joe Root was not asleep at the wheel when the Ashes were lost four years ago in Sydney, but he was asleep. Stricken with gastroenteritis and suffering from dehydration after debilitating bouts of vomiting and diarrhoea induced by sunstroke in furnace-like temperatures, the England captain had crawled on to the physio’s bed at lunch on the fifth day and given instructions to be woken up. When he was, the game and the series were over.

Twice now Root has contested the Ashes in Australia, once as a player, once as captain, and each time the endeavour has not finished well. Eight years ago in Sydney, he was dropped for the only time in his Test career. Four years ago, as Steve Smith lifted the replica urn, Root was lying stricken in the SCG dressing room, requiring James Anderson to complete the media duties. Root has played nine Tests in Australia, lost eight of them (mostly badly) and has yet to score a century.

If the Australian public got a glimpse that Root’s baby face does not reflect his toughness on that day in Sydney four years ago, as he vainly tried to stave off defeat with the mercury touching 44C, then they have not yet seen the best of him as a batsman. So far in Australia, he has played the role occupied by so many England top-order batsmen and captains of recent vintage: grimly determined and defiant, but in a futile way.

They have yet to witness the player who flowed with such grace and style and scored so dominantly last summer. If Root is to seize this second opportunity — and surely his last — as a leader here, then he is likely to need to be somewhere near his best. Think Michael Vaughan in 2002-03; not dogged but dominant, even in a losing cause. Root has it in him to play like that and if he can find this path against a top-class Australian attack, he can inspire others to follow.

The contest between Root, now vastly experienced as a captain even if he occasionally gives the impression of still wearing his L plates, and Pat Cummins, new to the job, will be fascinating. Each is the top-ranked player in their respective disciplines and Cummins has spoken at length about how Root occupies his thoughts, highlighting dismissals at the Gabba four years ago and Old Trafford in 2019 as examples of good planning coming to fruition.

Root has made a significant technical change to his game since he last faced Cummins, staying more leg side of the ball to open up his favoured areas square and behind square on the off side. Fluency and that famed ability to tick along almost unnoticed returned last summer as a result and he looked better for it, but the extra bounce in Australia’s pitches will bring some challenges if he maintains the alteration. The extra bounce makes those back-foot punches and glides to third man a little riskier.

Has an Ashes series ever had two more likeable characters at the helm? If these teams reflect the character of their leaders then the series will be hard fought but with mutual respect.

It was a particularly ill-tempered start to the tour four years ago, with Nathan Lyon engaging in trash talk during a remarkable pre-match press conference, when he claimed to want to finish a few careers. This time, there has been a noticeable softening. Of course, Australia have been humbled in the meantime, and are now reminded constantly of their responsibilities.

Lyon, the off spinner sitting on 399 Test wickets, and David Warner, the opening batsman, form part of the nucleus from four years ago. Both will have vital roles to play: Lyon to give ballast to Australia’s fine pace attack, and to show that last summer, when he took only nine wickets in four Tests against India at an average of 55, was an aberration; Warner, on the back of a good T20 World Cup, will want to banish memories of Stuart Broad and a horrible 2019 Ashes, and if he does so Australia’s batting will look significantly stronger and less reliant on Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne.

Whether Broad will get the opportunity to bowl at Warner immediately remains to be seen, but this will be his last Australia tour and a chance to wind a final thread into his colourful Ashes tapestry. It was here, remember, where the local newspaper, the Courier Mail, took such umbrage at his failure to walk in the 2013 Ashes at Trent Bridge that it refused to name check him in print. Broad recalled whistling along to 30,000 people singing “Broad is a wanker”. He loves the contest, and a few more with that attitude would improve England’s chances no end.

Broad is one of four all-time greats in England’s team, which, under normal circumstances, would give them a significant chance. But there are question marks over three of them: will it be a tour too far for James Anderson, 39 years old, and Broad, now 35 and coming off the back of a lengthy layoff for a torn calf? And how quickly will Ben Stokes ease back into action after his long absence?

It is a curious team that Root leads, with many of the rest unproven: 10 players are touring Australia for the first time.

If there is optimism to be found it is in the long-term weather forecast, which is for a cool and damp summer; in the absence of a match in Western Australia, where England fare less well; and in the potential for a second day-night game if Hobart is overlooked for the fifth Test. The Covid-induced schedule that has led Australia to play only four Tests in the past 12 months, losing two of them at home to India, could also work against the home team.

It is hard to remember a weirder or more low-key build-up, typified by the Ashes launch on Sunday, that featured a photo shoot with a handful of players surrounded by a giant inflatable Ashes urn. There has been little sense of the usual anticipation in a country fatigued by extensive lockdowns.

It is the players who matter, of course, and they are in situ at the Gabba, but journalists and radio and television crews remain largely remote, waiting for the contest to reach states with more porous boundaries.

Distance lends a certain detachment and it all feels a far cry from 15 years ago when, in anticipation of the home team’s response to defeat in the 2005 Ashes, Cricket Australia’s phone lines were jammed and their website paralysed by demand when tickets went on sale.

Still, when the contest is up and running, all that may be forgotten. The chance will exist for every player to create his mark on this long-running contest. No more so than for Root, aiming to become only the sixth England captain since the war to win here. There is an image of him in Sydney that comes to mind from four years ago: pale, drawn, exhausted, almost ghostlike. For his sake, it is to be hoped that this Ashes tour will be third time lucky and that he can see Sydney, for the first time, in a different light.

The Times