Pace, Power And Variation, The Deadly Trio Have It All Covered

- Derek Pringle

One of the things about pub talk, especially on cricket, is that you can get ahead of yourself as one England fan did at the Fox and Hounds pub in Bramhope during the Headingley Test.

In his haste to will England to winning ways, after just one day’s play, he said we’d have a 150-run lead on first innings and Jofra Archer would whip the Aussies out a second time. Simples, he opined. The series would be level.

Now ‘Caution’ is not naturally my middle name but it is when it comes to the Aussies, and I told him not to get ahead of himself before their fine bowling attack had done its worst. By way of logic I said any team that could leave out someone as fast and talented as Mitchell Starc had plenty enough to scotch predictions like his. But, he wouldn’t have it and his parting words as he toddled off into the night were – “We’ve got this one in the bag, son.”

There are few things more gratifying than a true-born Yorkshireman being wrong but not at the expense of England, at least not the humiliation they suffered in their first innings. By any metric, the Aussie pace-bowling trident of Josh Hazlewood, Pat Cummins and James Pattinson are formidable.

Maybe Archer announcing himself at Lord’s in a flurry of helmet strikes and upended batsmen caused us to forget their true potency, but it has been indelibly stamped here with Ashes-deciding consequences.