Victory on a knife edge

So, having turned TMS off with Australia needing 20 runs to win I headed off on a family day out too stressed to listen any further.  On a pitch most pundits said Australia would struggle to post more than 250 runs they rattled along on Sunday morning imperious to the supposed gremlins that lurked in the pitch.  With only the outstanding Anderson posing a threat Brad Haddin accumulated runs in an alarming fashion causing the panic stricken England captain to start setting ODI type fields to try and prevent the flow of runs.  Steven Finn, almost a hat trick hero in the first innings froze in the bubble of Australian pressure and his confidence visibly crumbled as did his Skippers confidence in him.  Yet, England were fortunate.  Anderson was there.  I remember telling Brownie years ago that Anderson wouldn't amount to anything in test cricket.  How wrong I was.  I can honestly say I don't think I've ever seen a finer swing bowler in test cricket.  I think he's even better than Akram or Younis.

So what have we learned from this first game in the series?  I think England have really had an escape here.  Were they just slightly starting to believe their own hype?  Really this game should have been out of sight when Australia were 117-9.  When Aghar walked to the crease the England bowlers all decided to remove the brains and bowl utter dross at him.  It was only with the introduction of Broad they finally resorted to some short stuff.  As brilliant as Aghar's debut innings was it has only highlighted was complete rubbish is being written and talked about in the game of cricket at the moment.  Geoff Boycott said his name in the same sentence as Gary Sobers, Damian Martyn said he should be batting in the top six and numerous pundits kept referring to him as the Boy Wonder.  Talk about building some unrealistic expectations on the lad.  I watched the Sky coverage the other day and found myself becoming increasingly irritated with the bland platitudes of Sir Ian Botham and then switching to TMS I had to put up with everyone's friend Phil Tufnell.  Boy, do I miss the insight and thinking of Christopher Martin Jenkins.  One pleasant surprise this week on TMS has been the commentary of Glenn McGrath.  On a personal level I can't stand McGrath.  I hated him for all the times he kept getting England batsman out and then running down the pitch shouting 'Woohoo'.  It happened a lot you see.  On the Radio though I couldn't help warm to him, he actually talked about mindsets, he gave some insight.  Something Phil Tufnell can't even achieve on Question of Sport.

TMS Charm Offensive

Phil Tufnell amuses himself

Further ticks in the McGrath column post career is that he isn't endlessly jumping up and down on Twitter like a hyper active school boy telling the world how he would restructure Australian cricket like everyone's favorite botox junkie Shane Warne.  Thankfully he's off somewhere playing Poker so we've been spared is self satisfying smugness for the time being.   Off course he's just waiting for Darren Lehman to call him anytime now.............

Hats off to Ian Bell for a rather classy century.  Hopefully he's got the 'only scores when it doesn't matter' monkey off his bat.  When Bell bats like he did in this game you really do wonder why he's not a really dominant force in test cricket.  Saying that, you look at his test stats and you have to say they are not too shabby:

Mat	Inns	NO	Runs	HS	Ave	BF	SR	100	50	4s	6s	Ct	St
Tests	89	152	20	6059	235	45.90	12284	49.32	18	35	712	24	73	0

The vilification of Stuart Broad has annoyed me this weekend.  I know, I am getting grumpier as I get older but hear me out.  International cricket is a professional sport, its not a game of moral dilemmas.  There is nothing in the laws of the game to say a batsman must walk.  That is what the Umpire is there to do.  He decides.  Ok, sometimes they get it wrong, that's what DRS is for.  Clarke has learned a valuable lesson about using DRS.  Something he has openly conceded post test.  In an ideal world of fluffy bunnies and fairies it would be great if every professional sportsman played with heart bleeding honesty but on planet earth that his just not going to happen.  Let's not crucify someone for doing what the vast majority of his peers do all of the time.  In this game we had Clarke and Haddin nicking the ball and then standing their ground.  I don't have a problem with this.  Geoff Boycott said, '...the Aussies invented not walking' well they didn't Geoff and that's a mute point anyway.  It's not an eye for eye.  WG Grace famously refused to walk nearly all of the time.  So goody two shoes Adam Gilchrist decided to walk, good for him.  Matt Hayden is a self purported man of God but was apparently one of the nastiest sledgers in world cricket.  The moral compasses are all over the place here.  Cricket is not a moral game.  It has laws and umpires that enforce them, end of.

Moving on to Lords next Thursday England have stuck with the same 13.  It will be interesting to see if they stick with Finn on his home ground or bring in Bresnan.  Looking at the England team there are some concerns going forward.  I though Swann bowled well below par in this test and the expected disintergration of Australia at his hands in the fourth innings just did not happen.  The way Pattinson dismissed for six was very telling.  Root and Bairstow despite their obvious talents are yet to establish themselves in the side so are potentially vulnerable and under greater pressure than the other batsman.  We all know that the Australian top order is vulnerable and surely Clarke has to come up to number three?  Poor Phil Hughes played the best innings I've seen in play in England and it gets completely overlooked by the world in general as Wonder Boy Aghar stole the headlines.  

On a different note, spare a though for Yorkshire coach Jason Gillespie who's father died very suddenly this week.  Gillespie has being quietly doing a rather brilliant job at Yorkshire and has been granted compassionate leave.