If only Rob Key had been born in Dubbo rather than Dulwich, then he might be on the verge of an international recall. Key is 36, a year younger than a couple of the Australia squad and only a year older than their latest Test debutant, Adam Voges.
Key, who toured Australia 13 years ago, stroked 87 against this much-vaunted attack. Perhaps Key’s most memorable innings on that unsuccessful Ashes tour of 2002-03 was a plucky 47, England’s top score in their first innings at the Waca in Perth. The pitch here in Canterbury has very little in common with that strip of turf in Western Australia. Then Brett Lee bowled fast and the ball flew; here Mitchell Johnson bowled fast and the ball flopped. Key, summoning up the knowledge and skill gleaned from 17 years as a professional, dealt with the problem without too many alarms.
This was something of a surprise since Key has been struggling this summer. He is the club captain but his early-season form has been so dire that he dropped himself and took to the second team, handing over the captaincy to Sam Northeast. This match is part of his rehabilitation on the sort of pitch which has not been sighted by Kent batsmen in their Championship campaign.
To a grateful public and administration, Key averted humiliation after Australia had declared on 507 for eight from almost 125 overs during which it is hard to recall a solitary bouncer being bowled. Kent really have been accommodating hosts.
In the morning Steve Smith completed a century before retiring himself out, after which the Australian middle order flickered rather than caught fire. Matthew Hunn finished with a five-wicket haul, something to be very proud of given the nature of the opposition and the pitch.
Then it became more interesting. In raced Mitchell Johnson and from the last ball of his first over Daniel Bell-Drummond, stranded in front of his stumps, was lbw. The Kent hierarchy shuffled nervously. But Key held firm with a little help from Joe Denly and Northeast to enhance the prospect of four days’ cricket.
Reassuringly Key was able to pick up the pace of Johnson, the fastest bowler on view. Ryan Harris troubled him occasionally.
On 21 he edged what seemed to be a regulation catch but neither Brad Haddin nor Shane Watson at first slip moved a muscle as the ball sped for four, the only one of the 15 boundaries Key hit to come from the edge of his bat. In the end he could not resist the wrist-spin of Fawad Ahmed. Having taken him for three fours in an over he heaved and was caught at midwicket.
None of his colleagues was as convincing against an attack spearheaded by Johnson. Denly batted pleasingly, as he usually does, until a wanton pull against Peter Siddle was edged to the keeper. Northeast, who has just signed a long-term contract with the club and who is the solitary Kent batsman in form this summer, delivered a brief cameo before being undone by Johnson’s extra pace. Meanwhile Ben Harmison, in his first outing of the summer, was bowled off the inside edge.
There remains much debate over how the Australians are going to juggle their pace attack. It may become a positive process of elimination based on the premise that “it’s impossible to leave him out”. On the evidence of Friday’s play it is not possible to omit Johnson, which has been mooted in some quarters (though probably not by the Kent batsmen). In the end it may boil down to a choice between Harris, who was unlucky here, and Josh Hazlewood, with Siddle almost certainly on the sidelines, now that KP, whom he dismissed 10 times – more than any other bowler in Test cricket – is no longer in the picture.
