CRICKET ASHES SERIES:AUSTRALIA NEEDED wickets yesterday to stay in the series and they managed them.
Four in fact. One was the nightwatchman Jimmy Anderson and another was Paul Collingwood, who try as he might (and goodness how he tries) batted with the footwork of a man who has his bootlaces tied together and made only 13. So far so good.
Then they took the wickets of Alastair Cook and Ian Bell. Unfortunately, by the time they managed this, Cook had progressed from his overnight 61 to 189, while Bell made 115 before he succumbed to Mitchell Johnson shortly before stumps, the 12th time he had passed 50 against Australia but his first time to three figures.
With Matt Prior weighing in with a merry unbeaten 54, the perfect innings at the perfect time, it meant that by the time bad light brought play to a premature close with five overs remaining, England, at 488 for seven, already had a first-innings lead of 208, and with only six sessions remaining, more than a sniff of the total Ashes victory they crave.
The phenomenon that has been Cook remained true to the last then. He was in sight of becoming only the second Englishman after Wally Hammond to score two double centuries in a series when he drove loosely at a wide ball from Shane Watson, by a distance Australia’s most challenging bowler, and Mike Hussey took the low catch well.
It would have been an astonishing performance from one of the giants of the game (which of course Cook may yet become). But from a young man whose credentials even to be a Test player were queried during a difficult last summer it has been astounding: 766 runs from seven innings in this series, for an England batsman in Ashes series in this country, puts him behind only Hammond, who made 905 in 1928-9.
Further, besides Hammond, only Neil Harvey (834 against South Africa in 1952-3), and, inevitably, Don Bradman, twice (810 against England in 1936-7 and 806 against South Africa in 1931-2) have made more in any series in Australia. Even though all but Bradman against South Africa, which came from five innings, had nine innings: Cook still has one more possible innings to play.
There is more. His innings completed yesterday lasted 488 minutes which takes his total time at the crease for the series to 11 minutes over 36 hours, longer than any Englishman, or anyone else for that matter, has batted in any five-Test series.
He has scored more than 1,000 first-class runs on tour, which might have been commonplace in the days of long trips and numerous state games but less so now: 15 innings in all.
There are those who might claim him to be fortunate, first in the no-ball that reprieved him on the second day when he had 46, and again yesterday, when on 99 and looking for the leg-side single for his hundred, he turned a ball from the left-arm spinner Michael Beer straight but low into the hands of Phil Hughes at short-leg. In a split second of excitement the fielder appeared to claim the catch before the realisation he might have scooped it on the half-volley: he signalled his uncertainty.
Cook, meanwhile, stood his ground, whereupon the umpires referred it and the evidence was conclusive. Shortly after Cook acknowledged the applause for the 16th century of his Test career and he now has 100 on four of the main Australian Test grounds.
His partnership with Bell may yet prove to be the one that pulled away from Australian hands any hope of redemption in the final match, a glimpse into the future of England batting for five or six years at least. Cook is barely 26 and Bell 28.
Yesterday, Bell looked in control from the moment Collingwood desperately tried and failed to hit his way out of his personal desperation, and he made his way to the middle. There is authority to him now and a presence where once there was only timidity.
The time was when he hung fractionally inside the line and nicked to slip, but no longer. His defence is straight and certain, his judgment outside off-stump impeccable, his capacity to play the ball late unrivalled by any on either side and his strokes classically elegant.
It took Johnson, from around the wicket to remove him, an edge just carrying to the beleaguered debutant captain, Michael Clarke, a lone sentinel in the slips. By then though, he and Prior had compounded the work done with Cook by adding 107 for the seventh wicket at better than a run a ball.
As with Cook, however, his innings was not without its controversy. Bell had made 67 when Watson found some bounce and movement into the batsman, which appeared to catch the inside edge on the way to Haddin. The umpire, Aleem Dar, the very best in the business, believed that to be the case and raised his finger.
Bell hesitated, consulted Prior (who judging from his recommendations when wearing the gauntlets may not be the best of judges) and then asked for a referral.
Hotspot, which has taken on an omnipotent status despite doubts about the capacity to show heat from some surfaces, showed no white area on the edge of Bell’s bat, conveyed to Dar by the third umpire, Tony Hill, leaving the umpire to uphold his decision or otherwise.
In the absence of incontrovertible evidence to the contrary Dar decided to give Bell the benefit of the doubt, the legal principle of innocent until proven guilty. The Snickometer, not used because of time considerations (and itself far from infallible) showed a quiver as the ball went by the bat.
Here the moral maze becomes unfathomable. But if Bell was genuinely uncertain, which he might have been, then ICC, rightly or otherwise, has given the batsman the means to challenge the umpire and there can be no quibble. If on the other hand he felt a touch then he has to live with himself.
Guardian Service
