Ashes 2019: Weary England fail to find answers to Smith’s genius

Steve Smith has scored back-to-back Ashes centuries. Picture: AFP

The quip doing the rounds at Edgbaston on Saturday evening, after Steve Smith took a blow to the head from Ben Stokes as he aimed a hook shot to a bouncer, was about the absence of a possible concussion substitute for Australia’s champion batsman. The new regulations require a like-for-like replacement, but who could possibly measure up to the remarkable run-machine that is Smith? The miracle named Don Bradman, after all, has long since departed the scene.

The Bradman problem from decades ago, however, hovered over Edgbaston on Sunday morning as England’s captain and bowlers scratched their heads wondering quite how to outfox Smith, as he closed in ominously on a half-century after his first-innings hundred. If the nature of the problem was straightforward — it was Smith or bust as far as England were concerned — then the solution was more problematic: his defence had looked impregnable; his judgment impeccable; and his thirst to make up for lost time unquenchable.

As the fourth day stretched, the Smith problem moved from troubling to acute. He went to lunch within sniffing distance of his second century of the match; brought it up immediately afterwards with a crunching cover drive off Stuart Broad, and then settled down for more of the same, the mannerisms accentuated and, from England’s perspective, ever more exasperating.

Matthew Wade and Steve Smith. Picture: Getty Images

Down below the dressing room, on the outfield, were laid out a dozen pairs of Smith’s gloves — he carries 20 in his bag and likes to change them every half-hour or so — and as a message to the bowlers about his vaulting ambition to score as many runs as possible it was hard to beat. It was not until 15 minutes before tea, and the second new ball, that he made a mistake, edging a wide half-volley from Chris Woakes, but by then Australia’s lead was 241, the wobbles of the first day long forgotten.

Australia added another 156 runs afterwards, but in Test cricket not all runs have equal worth. England’s bowlers, ground into submission and a man down, tired in the final session, so that the lower order could play with the kind of freedom not granted to those above, when the threat of defeat loomed. England’s openers eyed the Australia dressing room warily: the speed of Matthew Wade’s first Ashes hundred and some lusty hitting from James Pattinson allowing a declaration with seven overs remaining in the day, the target an unlikely 398.

This then was new ground for Jason Roy, the more so when Nathan Lyon took the new ball from the Birmingham End, where Moeen Ali had failed to make inroads despite the plate-sized patches of rough hereabout. Ali had produced a beauty to bowl Tim Paine though the gate, but had bowled too inconsistently for his liking — his figures of 29-1-130-2 a reminder of how ineffectual he had been last series against Australia and how much Smith relishes off spin. Lyon will surely pose a greater threat on the final day.

That said, given the importance of the day ahead — losing a Test and James Anderson would be the worst possible start to the series — there have been worse pitches on which to try to save a game. There has been only one draw in the past 33 Tests in this country, a measure of the task ahead as England look to maintain their fine recent record against Australia at Edgbaston.

For most of the day, then, it was as though the intervening 18 months had not happened, and we were revisiting the nightmare of the last Ashes tour, with Smith ascendant, England’s attack consisting of a diet of right-arm medium pace and ineffectual off spin, and the batsmen awaiting the threat from a hungry pace attack.

Last year’s batch of Dukes balls, and English pitches, were supposed to change all that but from the moment the match began to change when Peter Siddle joined Smith in the first innings, score 122 for eight, Australia have scored 649 for nine. When Jofra Archer made brief appearances as a substitute fielder, Joe Root looked wistfully in his direction. Archer will get his chance at Lord’s.

England continued to be hampered by the absence of Anderson and a slow pitch but, more than anything else, the bowlers were battered into submission by the unwavering excellence and determination of one man.

Without Smith’s first-innings hundred, Australia would have conceded a match-losing lead and without his second, it is unlikely that Travis Head and Wade could have played with the kind of confidence that they showed, as the match turned decisively.

Australia had question marks over their batting coming into this match and, apart from the rehabilitation of Smith, runs for these Ashes debutants have been their biggest pluses.

Moeen Ali. Picture: AFP

If England’s think-tank had been trying to find solutions to the Smith problem, it is a fair assumption that the answer was not a Mike Brearleyesque lob (Brearley occasionally used to try to land lobs over the batsman’s head on to the stumps), which was inadvertently how Ali began proceedings, a ball looping so high over the batsman’s head that Smith aimed a tennis-style overhead smash. Ali bowled a second extraordinarily high full toss in the final session, too, an indication of his struggles.

Despite the dry surface, and the presence of the left-hander Head, Ali posed little threat through seven initial overs when he would have been at his most optimistic. Instead, Joe Denly’s leg spinners looked more dangerous and he may have snared Head on 46 when Jonny Bairstow missed a tough stumping chance, the ball scooting through low from a full length and hitting Bairstow on his shins, as he rose too stiffly and too soon.

Broad probed accurately at the other end outside Smith’s off stump, while Woakes was unused before lunch and infrequently afterwards, Root, perhaps, judging these un-English-like conditions not to be to his advantage. Broad induced a play-and-miss from Smith in the opening session, an event so rare that it brought a round of applause from the crowd, and a nod of approval from Smith. A squirted drive over cover shortly afterwards as he aimed through mid-on was Smith’s second misjudgment — and his last before his dismissal. He went to lunch two runs shy of his hundred.

Head edged a slower ball from Stokes, who was as wholehearted as ever, but Wade was quickly into his stride, driving Denly to the cover fence twice against the spin. Wade is a stocky, pugnacious type, a batsman who will give impetus to the innings whatever the situation, and an array of sweeps and reverse-sweeps against the spinners indicated his confidence and ambition. His half-century came in a lickety-split 70 balls and with the left-hand, right-hand combination and runs coming freely, Root began to look short of answers.

Root’s final act in this match will come as batsman rather than captain and he will hope to leave a reminder of his own talents, rather than being eclipsed completely by Smith, for whom two centuries in the same match was a first. Smith became the fifth Australia batsman to achieve this feat in an Ashes Test and in his past ten Ashes innings, he has registered 1,116 runs. Over a similar stretch, only one man — Bradman — has scored more heavily. The problem posed by Smith is obvious enough; the solution, for England, remains unclear.

The Times

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