If there is anything the last couple of weeks have shown us, it is this. When faced with a pitch with some freshness, life, and movement today's international lineup turn into the St. Theresa Elementary's Girls 5th grade squad. First it was England at Perth and then India at Centurion. Today at the MCG, England bowled with discipline and kept the ball up, and watched the Australian batsmen committed harakiri en masse. To put this in perspective, England's attack wasn't anywhere as menacing as the Steyn-Morkel combo in Centurion, but Bresnan wasn't quite the let off when Smith turned to Tsotsobe & Kallis.
There is little point in going over the dismissals, which were virtual action replays. In an extra-ordinary day, all 10 Aussie wickets fell with the batsman edging a well pitched up ball outside offstump to the arc from keeper to gully. Several fell jabbing at the ball away from the body as Australia folded for its worst Ashes total (98) in over 50 years. And much like South Africa, England had the best of the conditions, because no sooner had Ponting lead his boys out, than the sun came out... And Strauss & Cook showed how to bat on a pitch like this. A lot of balls were left outside off, many were let go on length, and England strolled to a comfortable 158/0 with an assist from a dispirited and undisciplined Australian attack.
Australia will have to bat out of their skins to save the Test, but as the first Ashes Test showed, you can get out of jail. In some sense, the massive Strauss-Cook stand at Brisbane is the difference between
the two sides being 2-2 going into T5.
Bharat
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