Australia has raised eyebrows with its anti-Bazball measures in the first Ashes Test at Edgbaston, but all the spread fields and conservative bowling could yet add up to a famous win.
That's the trap Australia has fallen into at Edgbaston. Spread fields and conservative bowling have been dismissed as unimaginative and cowardly. A run rate of 3.32 an over is archaic and inadequate. Something is happening here Mr Cummins, but you don't know what it is.
In Birmingham we have two teams racing to the same distant finish line. They may be taking different routes, but for now their estimated time of arrival is almost identical.The great misconception of this match is that the way Australia has played has come by accident, forced upon them by the swashbuckling English. It assumes Pat Cummins and his side came into this game hoping to blast England away, only to be immediately spooked and sent running.
That has meant spread fields to protect boundaries and long stretches of seemingly aimless cricket. Wasted time is time well spent for Australia, because it only serves to make England's trigger finger that bit itchier. Even right at the end of the day, when Stuart Broad had Edgbaston in the palm of his hand it felt like Australia was one wicket away from submission, Scott Boland held his nerve. They had lost momentum, but not yet the match.Should England take seven more wickets and record the victory then everything will have been worth it — the early declaration on day one, the coughed-up wickets throughout day four, all of it a means to a thrilling end.
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