ARCHER THE SUPERHERO RIDES TO ROOT’S RESCUE
For one horrible hour yesterday England were so shocking that Joe root’s decision to bowl in this pivotal third Test looked to have blown up in his face and the Ashes appeared to be slipping from his grasp.
The umpires had controversially and surely wrongly taken the players off for bad light with the floodlights shining at Headingley and when they returned after tea, England seemed to be striving too hard to make up for lost time.
So inaccurate were Chris Woakes and, in particular, Ben Stokes that 79 runs flew off the bats of David Warner and Marnus Labuschagne in only 13 overs. The mutterings began about what was looking like an almighty English cock-up.
So bad did England become that manof-the-moment Jofra Archer almost became a symbol of their shoddy day when he was chastised by Woakes for a lazy piece of fielding that saw one Australian run become two.
Yet just when England were most in need of salvation, who should the captain call? The man who has become his very own Aussie- buster, Archer. That’s who.
How could this remarkable newcomer follow his World Cup final super over and the most terrorising of Test debuts at Lord’s? By taking six wickets as Australia spectacularly blew their hard-earned advantage. That’s how.
And the scary thing about a performance that sent Australia crashing from 136 for two to 179 all out on another day shortened by rain is that Archer did not seem to be anywhere near his best, certainly not in terms of the extreme speeds he reached at Lord’s.
Perhaps Archer, in only his third first- class match in a year, was simply feeling the effects of the 44 mostly brutal overs he sent down on a debut that only finished on Sunday.
or, far more impressively, perhaps, as Archer suggested afterwards, this was a wise cricketing head on inexperienced shoulders assessing conditions, going through the gears and realising that probing accuracy was more important here than raw pace.
Whatever the reason, it was only when Archer forced David Warner to edge a beauty through to Jonny Bairstow to take the second of his six wickets that he came close to touching the 90 mile per hour mark that was almost a given at Lord’s.
After that he revved up to become near-unplayable again as an Australian side missing the best batsman in the world, Steve Smith, showed just how vulnerable they are and England dramatically seized the initiative.
Now, with sunshine promised for the rest of this match, England will never have a better chance of piling on the runs today and gaining the series-levelling victory they simply must earn here if they are to achieve a come-frombehind Ashes triumph.
If this was yet another day when Archer announced himself as a very special talent, then the contribution of experienced Ashes campaigner Stuart Broad was almost as significant.
root smiled ahead of this Test when he said Broad was rather enjoying going under the radar in this Specsavers series while taking 10 wickets in the first two Tests and leaving Archer to soak up all the headlines and all the attention.
It was the same story here as Broad — who, it should be remembered, came into this Test summer far from certain of keeping his place — was brilliant again. He ensured root did not regret the gamble he took when he looked up rather than down at the toss.
Time and again Broad beat the bat while bowling fuller than ever before and at a decent pace, too. Time and again Warner in particular rode his luck.
After Archer had sent back Australia’s new opener Marcus Harris, Broad got in on the act to dismiss Usman Khawaja with a rare bad ball and the help of a review. The veteran then produced a stunner to take Travis Head’s off-bail.
Warner had battled hard to finally reach double figures in this series. During England’s indisciplined hour, he twice benefited from wild fielding to earn two lots of five overthrows as his 100 partnership with Labuschagne came up in only 21 overs.
But after surviving the second of three incorrect decisions by Chris Gaffaney that were overturned by technology when he was wrongly given caught behind off Broad on
61, Warner fell to Archer without further cost to England.
The umpires had been far too quick to take the players off during a frustrating morning and early afternoon — cricket cannot afford the embarrassment of stopping play for bad light under floodlights — but Gaffaney and Joel Wilson stayed on when they again looked at the light with Australia 138 for four.
That was all the encouragement Archer needed, fortunately bowling Matthew Wade off his glove and thigh pad and then mopping up the tail once Chris Woakes had got in on the act by trapping Tim Paine, again with the help of a review.
Through it all Labuschagne, Smith’s concussion sub at Lord’s, showed Australia how to do it with proper Test batting in English conditions and seemingly relishing taking several hits to his body.
It needed a full toss that clattered into Labuschagne’s pads and sent him crashing to the ground from Stokes to eventually do for the man who warmed up for this Ashes with a productive spell at Glamorgan.
That left who else but Archer to have the final word with his first ball from the Kirkstall Lane End where fast bowlers have traditionally flourished at Headingley.
Root brought him back to claim Nathan Lyon on the stroke of the 7.30pm finish.
What a display again from Archer and what a day for England this eventually turned out to be.
If the sun shines today and the ball does less on this flat pitch then they really should be able to score enough runs to put this Test out of Australia’s reach.
And then the Ashes really would be ignited.