The respite between Tests is brief but at least there is some scope for measured decisions. For Australia the key problem surrounds their best batsman, Steve Smith.
During the Lord’s match there was barely any time for their backroom staff to decide whether he should resume his innings on Saturday afternoon. Citing the fact Smith was desperate to get his name on the famous honours boards in the pavilion, a tradition that feels like an ancient rite when in fact these boards are a relatively recent innovation, he was allowed to return to the crease 40 minutes after retiring hurt, though he could not score the 20 additional runs needed to prod the engravers into action.
Now there will be a little more time to consider the priorities of the tour party. Number one, by a distance, is to ensure the wellbeing of every member of the team; number two is to retain the Ashes. By this measure it would be remarkable if Smith was allowed to play at Headingley on Thursday, even though it is a fair assumption he will want to. Objectivity must be hard to find in these circumstances, whether assessing the opinions of the player concerned, the coaching staff or the doctor who is an employee of Cricket Australia.
The first task is to establish whether Smith can possibly be 100% fit so soon after suffering the effects of concussion; the subsidiary one is to assess the impact on Smith if he plays and fails at Headingley having discovered he was not as fit for action as anticipated. That may easily affect his confidence and form for the rest of the series. Caution is likely to prevail and it probably should.
At Lord’s there was talk of a “McGrath moment” after Smith was forced to withdraw, a reference to the freakish accident with a stray ball in 2005 just before the start of the second Test at Edgbaston. The parallels are not that close. Fourteen years ago England won that second Test to level the series; at Lord’s this week Australia retained their 1-0 lead, which means they are much better placed than Ricky Ponting’s side. They require one more victory to ensure the retention of the Ashes. They are hardly in desperate straits – in fact their situation more closely mirrors that of the 1981 tourists as they head to Headingley and miracles were required to change the course of that series.
However, there has undoubtedly been a mood swing in this series and that has been triggered by the extraordinary Test debut of Jofra Archer. The numbers do not suggest anything too remarkable. In the match Archer took five for 91 from 44 overs, excellent figures but not ones that accurately reflect the impact he has had on both sides.
Joe Root now recognises he suddenly has a special weapon. His next step is to work out how to use it judiciously. Meanwhile Australia are aware of a major new challenge ahead.
In the 21st century the fear factor has diminished. The advent of ever more sophisticated helmets, chest protectors and arm guards has helped, although one consequence of helmets is that batsmen get hit on the head far more frequently.
County cricketers of the 70s and 80s would peruse the fixture list carefully to check when they were scheduled to come up against Michael Holding, Colin Croft, Sylvester Clarke, Imran Khan, Malcolm Marshall or Joel Garner. One or two might even plan their hamstring injuries accordingly – there were no tell-tale scanning machines around then. In pre-helmet days there was real anxiety that could easily tipple over to raw fear within the dressing room.
Fear has not felt like such a factor in recent times – perhaps that is partly because your correspondent has been reclining in the safety of a press box. But it is still possible to spot that frisson when it becomes apparent batsmen are arriving at the crease fearful of being hit by a cricket ball travelling in excess of 90 mph. The best can be “petrified” and that was the case in Australia in 2013-14 when Mitchell Johnson was at full throttle.
In his autobiography Kevin Pietersen admits to that feeling when waiting to bat. “A shudder ran through the dressing room,” he writes after a Johnson bouncer had smashed into the gloves of Jonathan Trott in Brisbane. “You very seldom hear people in your own team saying they are physically scared but our tail-end batsmen were scared.”
At Lord’s we had no way of knowing how the Australia dressing room reacted to the bowling of Archer on a slow pitch but it can be guaranteed this would have become a topic of animated conversation, especially after Smith and Marnus Labuschagne had been hit. In his first Test Archer created the same frisson as Johnson managed throughout an entire series six years ago.
Everyone now knows Archer hits batsmen frequently, 19 times in a brief international career that started in May. Opponents are still coming to terms with him as he appears to generate pace from nowhere.
At least Pat Cummins has the good grace to look as if he is busting a gut to bowl his bouncers. Archer glides in and then skips through the popping crease with his front foot barely touching the ground, like Marshall used to do. So the pace and skidding bounce comes as a shock. You need to be brave – and 100% fit – to face him.
