Day two report
And so, the day is done. I’ve been here for four hours without seeing a ball bowled. One of those days. They’ll be back for more tomorrow, when there’s a chance of morning rain but it should be over in time for play to get under way at 11am. With two days to go, the draw looks very much the most likely outcome. Adam Collins and Tanya Aldred will take you through Saturday. Have a great weekend. Bye!
STUMPS: Australia 341-5
It’s all over (for now)! The umpires have given up on making it back out today, and everyone has been told to go home.
Stumps!
— Women's CricZone (@WomensCricZone) July 19, 2019
Play called off for today in Taunton.
Australia will resume tomorrow on day three at 5-341.#Ashes
I’m awaiting the coup de grace, but in the meantime play remains a notional possibility. Here in the meantime is a picture of someone in Taunton with an umbrella.
I have an update! It’s still raining.
Geoff has emailed again. “They’re done,” he reports. “It’s just started absolutely tipping down.” It might take half an hour or so before it’s official confirmed.
It is, I’m told, pouring in Taunton. Geoff Lemon reckons I should “put my feet up and mix a piña colada”. I do quite like a piña colada, as it happens, but drink them approximately once a decade and absolutely never have the ingredients required to make one at home. This is something I should probably improve on in future.
I’m afraid I have no cricket to write about. Here, though, is Rory Carroll on the state of the sport in Ireland, who play England in a Test at Lord’s next week:
Another update from Taunton, and it’s not good news: the rain has intensified, and play looks extremely unlikely to restart as currently scheduled in four minutes.
Well, we were due to start again in ten minutes. Guess what...
— The Cricketer (@TheCricketerMag) July 19, 2019
It is raining again. This time, it's heavy enough that the members of the Australian team playing a spot of Aussie Rules have headed inside. The big covers are back on.
WOMEN'S CRICKET HUB: https://t.co/N1fq0zmzZi
NEWS! Tea will be taken at 3.40pm, and the umpires hope to resume play at 4pm.
Looking at the forecast I’d be surprised if there’s any more play today. It looks like it’ll rain until well after 6pm, though at the moment it looks very light: there are still players on the outfield, and only a few spectators are bothering with brollies.
Is is raining again in Taunton, and the proposed restart has been abandoned:
Drizzle returns and the proposed restart is postponed ☔️
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) July 19, 2019
How the morning session went down >>> https://t.co/ZuC2ua2hIx#ENGvAUS pic.twitter.com/VjcyAYXpVy
Pictorial evidence of umpires inspecting the pitch at Taunton:
And so it is. Play will restart in seven minutes, unless it doesn’t.
Latest news from Taunton: Play is due to begin in 10 minutes at 3.20pm local, but the rain is just starting to fall again... #Ashes pic.twitter.com/cjgbynegcU
— cricket.com.au (@cricketcomau) July 19, 2019
Waiting for news, though unless the meteorologists are way off key, the rain is about to resume and last for about three hours. Strictly speaking it should already be raining.
Here is a picture of some umpires.
The umpires are out on the field for a pitch inspection with the covers having been taken off.
— Sky Sports Cricket (@SkyCricket) July 19, 2019
🤞 for some play in Taunton soon. Watch live on Sky Sports Cricket. pic.twitter.com/xhe4BKBywQ
Geoff reports that the England players are warming up on the field, playing a bit of football. The central pitch cover is still on, but the rest have been packed away. The pitch inspection should be imminent.
Hello world! So if you could send your emails and stuff here, I’d be much obliged. News from Taunton is:
- It is no longer raining!
- A pitch inspection has been scheduled for 3pm BST
- My rain radar thing suggests it should start to rain again at about 3pm BST
- So best not get too excited
Updated
The outermost covers are being mopped up by the mopping machine, and will be very gradually removed. The rain has stopped for now. But we’ll still be a fair way away from any action. Given the lull continues, perhaps now is as good a time as any for us to hand over the rainy baton. Simon Burnton will let you know if there’s any further play, with Australia well on top in the match and England’s hopes of a win disappearing by the minute.
I think the rain has stopped. Yes, here come a few groundsmen, popping their little heads up like tulips in the spring. They like to stand around the pitch cover and chat. It’s an important part of the process. In the meantime, I’ve been busy rewatching the Soweto Gospel Choir singing Bluey.
Here’s @JoffBush’s Bluey theme by the @SowetoGospel Choir this morning. It’s beautiful 💙🦴 pic.twitter.com/ixw7eGPjYO
— Daley Pearson (@Daley_Pearson) July 19, 2019
Still raining, though it’s lighter. I’d guess that with the less bountiful resources for the ground staff here, we’d take an hour to get a restart even if the rain stops. The time is 13:53 BST! Exciting.
If Harkarn Sumal prayed as indicated, then it worked. But somehow I think Harkarn came to a different conclusion by the end of this letter.
“Okay, I’ll do it. I’ll break the emergency glass, unfurl the scroll of parchment that sits behind it, and read the old words aloud. ‘Is it cowardly to pray for rain?’ Not to give us a sneaky boost in our search for a draw that would clinch the Ashes, which was the hope when the words were first written 14 long years ago, but to avoid the fully warranted pasting that we’re going to get here. The absolute state of this game. If the weather holds out, I see a declaration about an hour before the close today. Then our shell-shocked top order will have to traipse out and show some real gumption. We’re already playing for pride now as far as I can see. Still, it’s red ball cricket, and a good chance to measure where we stand in the grand scheme of things when there’s nowhere to hide.”
Very sorry that I missed this perverse missive earlier.
“Got to say, given how unenjoyable this is, I’m really enjoying it. So much of women’s sport seems to have to combine the contest itself with trying to promote the brand. Great we have reached a point where the Aussies can just grind out a huge total without having to think about the wider effects. I’d like to see them declare at about 6-550 before lunch tomorrow, Perry 276 not out. Old skool, Bill Lawry sort of stuff.”
Oh, Peter Salmon. Always swimming against the current.
We’ve had a bit of an email glitch this morning, so I didn’t receive a bunch of emails in the first session. Apologies for that. I’ll sort through a few now.
First, Romeo. Not just a famous romantic lead (too obvious) but a very fun song by Basement Jaxx. (Also in an English cricket connection the album it was on is named Rooty.)
Anyway, Romeo says, “Do you think I would be safe in saying Ellyse Perry is one of the greatest of all time?”
Well, yes. Because when you talk about all-rounders, you talk about someone who could hold their place in a team on either discipline. But where someone like Jacques Kallis may have done that as a third or fourth seamer, he wouldn’t have been the first. The greats of the 1980s –Imran, Hadlee, Kapil – tended to be great bowlers who were good batsmen. Perhaps good batsmen with great moments.
But aside from Garfield Sobers, I can’t think of anyone who was genuinely in the conversation for the very best in the world, at least in the best three or four, in both disciplines at the same time.
Perry is.
Maybe Keith Miller was? Maybe Botham for a hot minute, but his batting was usually more revelatory than dependable. Maybe a few of the pioneers of the late 1800s. Maybe Unaarrimin in the 1860s and 1870s. But very few.
I regret to inform you that it’s now hammering down rain at the ground in Taunton. Heavy and looking set-in. We’ll keep you updated but any return to play will be at the least delayed by a fair margin.
Lunch - Australia 341 for 5
The juggernaut rolls (very, very slowly) on. This is the steamroller scene from Austin Powers. In whites.
“A side that is reaping the benefits of professional development and most importantly; backing from the top rung of the ladder: CA and its various corporate sponsors versus a side made up of fellow professionals... but that’s where the similarities stop, don’t they.
“In this present Australian team we have some players who are just generationally [sic] brilliant, confirming that what Australia is doing with women’s cricket is successful.
“This is not a put down of English women’s cricket but a fervent wish that the ECB via its commercial sponsors and media obligations can and should do more to support the game. That can surely financially support more than 15 women who make up the squad that is currently selected. The money needs to go out to the counties and to those players who sacrifice far more in some circumstances than their counterparts in the men’s game.
“No DRS in an Ashes Test? Surely we could pass the hat around to pay for it. Ridiculous it’s not there.”
132nd over: Australia 341-5 (Mooney 7, Jonassen 4) Mooney trying to repeat the dose against Gordon, as the clock ticks down. Defending from the crease. Two short legs and a slip in place. Lots of chatter on the field. Trying to dial up the pressure. But they may as well dial up some take-away. Mooney does it comfortably, and the umpires tip the bails off. Lunch time!
And a suggestion that Haynes may have got an edge on the ball that got her out. Which leads into an email from Lee Henderson...
131st over: Australia 341-5 (Mooney 7, Jonassen 4) Marsh to Mooney, who is trying just to get through to lunch, blocking out an over bar one single.
130th over: Australia 340-5 (Mooney 6, Jonassen 4) Why would send Jess Jonassen in ahead of your debutantes? Surely the best plan would be to get them a hit, plus someone like Gardner could boost the total quickly? Not that JJ doesn’t deserve a chance to have a hit: I was there in 2015 for her 99 at Canterbury and it was an absolute gem of an innings. But still... the indications here are that Australia will just bat until they’re bowled out. Which could be tomorrow.
Jonassen will give some entertainment before then though, starting with an advance and a gorgeous cover drive from Gordon for four.
WICKET! Haynes lbw Marsh 87
129th over: Australia 335-5 (Mooney 5) Gone, last ball of the over. Finally the other Australian sentinel falls, and it’s another near miss for Rachael Haynes on the hunt for a Test hundred. Simple enough dismissal: shapes to sweep, misses, straightens down the line, hit in front.
Updated
128th over: Australia 333-4 (Haynes 86, Mooney 4) Just a single from Gordon, and it’s a triple Nelson score for Australia.
127th over: Australia 332-4 (Haynes 85, Mooney 4) One of the other considerations with women’s Tests being so few is that it can affect the tactics. Say you’re the Australian captain. You have Ash Gardner and Sophie Molineux on debut. If you declare now, they may not even get the chance to bat in their first and possibly only Test match. England could collapse twice, or rain could mean Australia don’t bat again. So do you bat on to give them the experience? Hard not to, when you don’t actually need to win the match.
Mooney adds three runs with a nice cut from Marsh. Good cricket, good save on the rope.
126th over: Australia 328-4 (Haynes 84, Mooney 1) It will be interesting to see how Mooney plays. She opens in the WBBL and is an attacking type, but one of the many drawbacks of playing so few Test matches is that there’s a huge amount riding on each innings when these women go out to bat. They know that one mistake here and you’ll be waiting two and a half years for the chance to even be picked in the next team. So it can obviously make players go into their shells. Haynes also wants to make sure that 98 doesn’t remain her highest Test score.
She advances to Gordon to lift four over mid-on. Mooney nudges a single to open her account.
125th over: Australia 322-4 (Haynes 79, Mooney 0) Perry was trying to get on with things, having just thumped Marsh through midwicket for four the ball before being caught. Beth Mooney next in.
WICKET! Perry c Knight b Marsh 116
Finally, her vigil ends! 329 Test runs between dismissals, spanning 2017 to the present day, and 116 runs in this match. She was trying to force the pace and fell that way, mistiming a full toss for the first time this innings, hitting it low to Knight at short midwicket. In truth Perry timed it as she did all day yesterday, but she just didn’t adjust her shot for the closer catcher.
Updated
124th over: Australia 315-3 (Perry 112, Haynes 79) Three more singles from Gordon.
123rd over: Australia 315-3 (Perry 110, Haynes 78) Now Perry wants to go! Hangs back to Marsh, once, twice, thrice. Then as Marsh goes a bit fuller, Perry dances down the wicket to turn it into a half volley, and lifts it gloriously for four! One bounce down the ground, good strike. Takes a single last ball.
Updated
122nd over: Australia 310-3 (Perry 105, Haynes 78) Perry advances to Gordon, but can’t beat midwicket. Then taps to midwicket and takes off for a quick single. Would have been run out! Sciver’s throw missed, and Perry gets away with it.
Now we have a someone named Gordon bowling to someone named Haynes. Whose nickname is Desmond. Lovely. This is the best cricket name pairing since I met the ICC broadcast manager: Lara Richards.
Updated
121st over: Australia 309-3 (Perry 104, Haynes 78) Laura Marsh in a double change with her off-spin. A couple of singles the only score. What is Australia’s game here? What’s the point? There’s a real lack of anything out there.
Updated
120th over: Australia 307-3 (Perry 103, Haynes 77) Kirstie Gordon on to bowl. Heather Knight hasn’t exactly swung the changes at any stage in this innings, despite the Australians enduring everything sent down. Knight hasn’t bowled her off-breaks at all, for instance. Gordon drops short but Perry can’t punish the wide ball. Charlotte Edwards has a theory that short and wide is Perry’s one weakness at the moment, and she didn’t time that at all. The chop shot limped to point. Gordon is better aside from that ball. Bowls a maiden.
Updated
Updated
119th over: Australia 307-3 (Perry 103, Haynes 77) Swat! That’s more like it. Haynes gets a ball from Sciver that isn’t really short, and she’s not exactly playing a pull shot – the arc of the bat across the line is diagonal, starting low and then lifting as it comes around her body. Lifting the ball over square leg for four. Haynes can motor in short-form cricket, so it would be good to see her tilt closer to that mode.
Updated
118th over: Australia 302-3 (Perry 103, Haynes 73) Perry takes a single from Ecclestone casually, while Haynes skips down and tries to slam an off-drive, but only gets one run wide of mid-off.
Updated
117th over: Australia 301-3 (Perry 102, Haynes 72) Sciver resumes to Haynes, who tries a few shots but can’t beat the field. To be fair it does look hard to time attacking strokes out there. The wicket is becoming pretty lifeless.
Updated
116th over: Australia 301-3 (Perry 102, Haynes 72) A bit more proactive in the over before drinks, with Perry advancing to Ecclestone for a run, then Haynes trying a big swipe across the line for a couple. Here’s hoping they lift the tempo after a bev. The 300 is up, if you didn’t read the line at the top.
Updated
Century! Perry 100 from 246 balls
115th over: Australia 297-3 (Perry 101, Haynes 69) Perry isn’t the type you associate with nerves, but she is getting nervous now. She steers to backward point and sets off for a run but gets sent back. Then again, the same process. Sciver bowls a third time. Perry flicks to midwicket and isn’t sure whether to run. She stutters enough, and so does Haynes, that midwicket throws at the non-striker’s end. And misses. And gets an overthrow to raise her hundred. Rather emblematic of England’s day. Two more singles follow.
More emblematic, though, is Perry as a player in women’s cricket. She becomes the fourth woman to make tons in back-to-back matches. All the more special given she’s waited nearly two years between those chances. She’s gone 313 runs without being dismissed, a record in the women’s game. And she’s still going and could go all day. On top of taking a seven-wicket bag the other week. She is a cricketer dominating like few have at any level in the history of the sport, let alone internationally.
Updated
113th over: Australia 294-3 (Perry 99, Haynes 68) Ecclestone has to pull herself together to bowl now, and again Haynes blots up most of the over before finding a run. Someone with her experience should be more aware in this context. Perry keeps the strike for herself this time though by driving one through cover from the last ball. One run away.
112th over: Australia 292-3 (Perry 98, Haynes 67) Oh, you have got to be kidding me. Dropped. Haynes is dropped, after this stubborn partnership has worn England’s fabric to frayed thread. There was the chance to end it. Error from the bat: Sciver bowled short, Haynes pulled in the air, straight to Ecclestone at square leg. Her weakness is her fielding, but that was as simple as they get. A bit of loop, just to her right, one she can take with a steady footing. And the ball just... pops out. England are going to lose by a million now. There’s nothing more deflating than that.
And once again, Haynes soaks up five balls of strike so Perry can’t get a clear run at her hundred. This isn’t great batting, either.
111th over: Australia 291-3 (Perry 98, Haynes 66) Perry doesn’t go for the milestone in the Nelson over. Content to do as she has done and drive a single from Ecclestone after advancing. Haynes does likewise. They’re just doing things at their own pace.
110th over: Australia 289-3 (Perry 97, Haynes 65) Now it’s Sciver to Haynes, who soaks up another over but this time she drives the fifth ball cleanly along the ground for four, rather than taking one. Perry gets strike for the next over.
109th over: Australia 285-3 (Perry 97, Haynes 61) With Perry closing on a century, it’s Haynes on strike as Sophie Ecclestone comes on for her first over of left-arm spin. She drops the ball into the rough outside the left-hander’s off stump, and Haynes defends four balls before taking a single. You’ll have to wait, Ellyse.
108th over: Australia 284-3 (Perry 97, Haynes 60) Natalie Sciver on to have a bowl with her mediums. She had Healy nearly caught at midwicket yesterday. Bowls full and Perry drives her hard into the ground and bounces it back down the ground for four! A pragmatic sort of stroke. Sciver responds though with a beauty. Better length, just full enough to draw the shot but it swings, and beats Perry’s drive and her off stump by equally narrow margins. The TV folks are speculating she might have nicked it into Sarah Taylor’s shin pad, but I’m not sure she did. Sciver continues getting swing, but Perry flicks two runs square when the ball gets too straight.
107th over: Australia 277-3 (Perry 90, Haynes 60) Haynes comes to life, crunching a pull shot off Shrubsole but straight to the field. She’s very quick on the short ball in short-form cricket, is Haynes. Shrubsole hoops one in onto the pads, but well down leg side. In the end Haynes jabs a run off her thigh pad, and Perry taps one into the covers.
106th over: Australia 275-3 (Perry 89, Haynes 59) Brunt round the wicket to the left-handed Haynes. One slip and a gully in position. Point, cover, extra cover, mid-off. Packed off side field with only mid-on and midwicket plus a long leg on the other side, so Haynes walks across her stumps and works the off-stump line to square leg. Sensible batting. Perry has a more conventional field, with one less cover moved over to square leg, Shrubsole set quite deep to give Brunt the option of the short ball and protect her from Perry’s very good pull shot. Perry tries a steer to deep third but finds gully on the bounce.
105th over: Australia 274-3 (Perry 89, Haynes 58) Another maiden bowled, as Shrubsole works away at Perry’s off stump. This Australian pair look happy to just bat through this opening spell and then see where that leaves them as the day winds on. The beauty of playing without pressure to score.
104th over: Australia 274-3 (Perry 89, Haynes 58) Brunt bowls pretty straight at Haynes, trying to force her to play, but the Aussie v-c is comfortable defending from the crease. Blocks out a maiden.
103rd over: Australia 274-3 (Perry 89, Haynes 58) Perry goes past 300 runs without dismissal in Test cricket, following her 213 at North Sydney in her previous Test. She punches Shrubsole away through cover for four, a bit airily but safely. Shrubsole responds with a few decent deliveries, pitching up a bit more, including one that beats the edge.
Updated
102nd over: Australia 270-3 (Perry 85, Haynes 58) Brunt to Perry, and this is the key match-up. If England don’t remove Australia’s top gun then she’ll fly all day. (Oh god that’s an accidental plug for the awful remake featuring a Tom Cruise who is now made of plasticine and an Ed Harris who is so, so sad that he’s still alive, sentences to some sort of Promethean fate of having to play cranky admirals for eternity.) Brunt angles a ball in and hits the pad, but it’s going well down leg. Perry blocks out and then pinches a single to end the over with a straight punch.
Updated
101st over: Australia 269-3 (Perry 84, Haynes 58) Anya Shrubsole to start things off, and despite the heavy atmosphere there’s not much movement off the straight and narrow with this 20-over old ball. There is a chance though, as Shrubsole gives width and Haynes can’t resist slashing at the ball, getting a big top edge between gully and slip from the angled bat. Four runskis.
Good news, we’re going to get a start on time. It may rain later, but we’ll battle on for the start. It’s so humid here today, and very warm. Sticky, heavy atmosphere. Let’s play.
Here is your highly detailed local weather update: it was raining earlier. It is not raining now. It may be raining later. Give me a job!
If there was one thing that stood out on the first day, it was the ruthlessness of this Australian team, even through a couple of patches where England competed. There’s something ominous about the way Australia has played in this series. Luckily I already wrote about it for you last night.
Preamble
Here we go again. There have been a lot of last-chance moments for England in the past few weeks and here is another one. For the England women’s team to have any chance of winning their Ashes series against Australia, they need to win this Test. To win this Test, they need to rattle through seven Australian wickets, make 500 runs, then take ten more wickets. In three days. It’s hard, but so was landing on the moon, which everyone keeps reminding us about this week. (This match is admittedly less strategically important in a propaganda war against the Russians.)
For Australia though, it’s just a chance to bat and bat. Ellyse Perry is eyeing off a century, and that would be two in a row for the sport’s most obscenely gifted and hardest-working player. (That’s a winning combination.) Rachael Haynes has a fifty of her own and can see where that leads. And Australia don’t actually need to win, since a draw would deliver them the series trophy, but I’m guessing they’re still very keen to push for a result, not just bat things out.
As long as the rain stays away, get set for an eventful morning.
