The Woods 4 overs is a mystery, especially when Eng needed something different from an early stage. No-one's saying he's injured, don't know what the issue is. Somebody on BBC said Stokes was treating the game like a Broad/Anderson testimonial. Many a true word... Surely not!
Commentators reckon they held wood back. Reason being,Root was bowling into the rough near lefties off stump. When they played the ball this also landed in the rough , breaking it up further. This apparently enhances the chances of reverse swing, which is what would have helped Wood. Then the rain came and a wet ball is not conducive to swing! Or play for that matter! How true this is I have no idea, but I do think that was the gist of what they said
Hmm, and it ended up 135/0. Wonder if with hindsight they're thinking Wood should have had a little go with the new ball?
Openers Have Their Eye In & Heads Down Refreshing The Nuances Of The Partnership- - Reminiscent Of Langer & Hayden - There Is Wickets In The 1st Session - Aussies Will Whip To 239 By Stumps No Wukkin Furries
it seems unlikely, but it is possible. what it would involve is for the team batting second to win the game but have a tiny first innings lead. as an example, team 1 scores 100, team 2 gets 101, team 1 gets 110, say, leaving team 2 to get 110 to win, but the winning runs come from a 4 or a 6 and they get more than the 110. team 2 would need to have a first innings lead of 1 to 5 runs. team 1 would then have to outscore team 2's first innings. if the first innings lead was 5 runs, team 2 could level the scores in their second innings having reached five less than team 1's second innings, and then a 6 would make theirs the highest total of the four while giving them the win. okay, i've checked and it hasn't happened yet. in all instances where a team has led by 1 to 5 runs after the first innings and gone on to win the games, the second innings totals for each team have been lower than their first innings totals, and the number of runs from the winning shot has never been enough to make the winning team's second innings total higher than the losing team's second innings total.
all tests where teams batting second were 1-5 up after 1st inns won game: +5 1st inns lead 1982 sri 218 eng 223 sri 175 eng 171/3 2001 eng 185 aus 190 eng 162 aus 158/3 +4 1910 eng 203 saf 207 eng 178 saf 175/6 2000 pak 269 win 273 pak 219 win 216/9 +2 1958 pak 408 win 410 pak 318 win 317/2 2004 win 224 eng 226 win 94 eng 93/2 so, as mentioned earlier, the second innings scores were lower than the first innings ones and the fourth innings totals were less than the third innings totals. no team batting second has won with a first innings lead of 1 or 3 in 2003 australia and west indies both scored 240 in their 1st innings. australia then made 417 and the west indies scored 418/7 to win, so no innings was lower than earlier ones.
I said before the series started that I was worried about us taking 2nd innings wickets and not a lot has changed.....even before his wicket taking ability fell off a cliff Andersons record in the 2nd innings has been weak for years, Robinson and wood are made of balsa wood and can't be relied on as you get late into back to back to back tests. With no front line spinner that's a lot of pressure on broad. We may still win tomorrow but for all the back slapping and championing of our approach we're looking closer to a 3-1 loss than a 2 all draw. Bearing in mind we've not lost a home ashes series in a generation its not a great place to be.....looking ahead to India well not have Broad, Woakes won't tour and Anderson maybe shouldn't.....god knows who our seamers will be!
anderson's returns this series have been very disappointing, though the first two pitches were batting paradises and the next two weren't, until england's 592. i'm inclined to think he might have done well at headingley, for which he was "rested", although his old trafford figures didn't back that idea. perhaps some consolation in being the most economic bowler in the series. i gather his record in india is good, but it may be his last chance. who would have thought that joe root's bowling average for a series would be better than both anderson's and broad's? perhaps this final innings will change that.
It goes without saying that we need an early breakthrough this morning, then who knows? There's still a lot of runs for them to get. If they do they'll thoroughly deserve the Ashes. If we take the ten wickets then I'll have no hesitation arguing that we won the series 2-2.
Decent start. Makes you think what might have happened at Lords if Woakes at played at Lords given his record there.
Aussies whinging about the ball being changed late yesterday. Didn’t moan too much earlier in the series when they’ve had the ball changed to their advantage.
