Ashes hopes circling down drain after surrender

BEN

- BY RORY DOLLARD

Stokes watched his England side crumble in the face of Ashes pressure yet again in Adelaide but assistant coach Marcus Trescothick insisted the team had not let their captain down.The scene was set for a struggling batting lineup to finally make its mark in response to Australia’s middling total of 371, but instead of cutting loose they were cut down to size.

In sweltering heat of more than 40 degrees, and on a true day two pitch holding no demons, they scraped together a grossly underwhelming 213 for eight.

The entire top three was in the pavilion inside 10 overs and the rest were not far behind as Pat Cummins, Scott Boland and Nathan Lyon split the spoils in conditions that should have stretched them to the limit.

By the end of play Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pope, Harry Brook, Jamie Smith and Will Jacks all averaged under 30 for the series, a grim reflection of their collective struggles.

Stokes was only just above that mark as he finished on 45 not out, dropping anchor for 151 painstaking deliveries and ‘hitting only three fours as he banished the caricatures of ‘Bazball’ for the playbook of Geoff Boycott.

It came at a physical cost as he cramped up in the heat, limped between the wickets and dug deep in stifling temperatures, but Trescothick rebuffed the suggestion that the team had failed their captain by failing to match his resolve.

“lm not sure ‘letting him down’ is the right terminology to use to be honest. Everybody is trying 100 per cent and working as hard as they can,” he said after a day that took England ever closer to an irretrievable 3-0 scoreline.