England had Australia right where they wanted them. Aussies went to the short ball in desperation. England pressed the self-destruct button by playing Bazball cricket. Instead of letting the Aussie bowlers run themselves into the ground they arrogantly tried to hit them out of the park. They should be picking their moments to play Bazball - you can't be that aggressive all the time against this Aussie bowling attack.
I do think they are better, but surely it is pretty clear that our collapse on day 2 was obviously down to our stupidity rather than their quality? That is when this match ran away from us and we have never really stood a chance since.
England pressed the self-destruct button plenty before Bazball. They just typically did so without having scored many runs. That's kinda the point: there are very few players in the England squad who can be trusted to face 100 deliveries without doing something profoundly silly along the way. It has worked against everyone else, but Australia happens to have the best test cricket side (by some distance) in the world.
I'm creaking and limping after not taking care with recovery, if he does more damage more fool him and his medical team.
It's been a vital and composed knock from the England skipper say the beeb as he reaches his 50 in 99 balls. Pity the other batters didn't get the message.
Half way there. But having lost two wickets too many. I think win predictor's 10% chance is about right.
I am slightly surprised Australia didn’t retract their appeal, given the shiny clean public image they’ve tried to portray since the sandpaper incident
Bairstow was silly but they should have withdrawn their appeal and warned him not to do it again. ****ers.
Yeah I thought they would withdraw their appeal, purely because of how bad it looks. But ultimately, it's a legitimate wicket. I can't complain at it. Not too dissimilar to a mankad (although I'd say I mankad looks even worse).
