The Ashes Diary (7 page)

Eddie Cowan was on a king pair. Any time that’s the case, you’re nervous, but he worked his way through it. Meanwhile, Chris was given out, caught behind off a big turner from Swann, but immediately reviewed it. Even though the English fielders were carrying on, we felt pretty safe. When someone like Chris reviews a caught-behind decision that quickly, you know he hasn’t hit it. Sure enough, the ball might have made a noise when it grazed his pad, but it was nowhere near his bat.

Ed and Chris worked well together for an hour. Now it looked like this could be the big partnership we needed to build our innings around. Finn came on, but Ed hit him and Swann for some nice boundaries. Chris brought up his First Test 50, and we were all very pleased for him. It’s been a long time coming, to say the least!

They got close to tea. When the tension is so high, and the batsmen are locked inside their bubble of concentration, an interval is often the last thing they need. Replacing Finn after three overs, Cook brought Joe Root on to bowl a couple of overs of what looked like some pretty regulation off-spin. Chris dealt with his first over easily, but then, on the third-last ball before the break, which Root gave a bit of air, Ed edged his off-drive to first slip.

Never a good waiter, I was eager to get out there. Chris and I were on the edge of the boundary five minutes before the umpires and the Englishmen came out to take the field. I was happy to make a statement of intent. I was very nervous, it goes without saying, but this was the type of situation I train for and live for. We needed exactly 200 to win.

Root had to bowl two balls to finish his over, and I was lucky enough to get one on my pads to turn away and get off the mark. No matter what the situation, getting that first run takes the edge off my nerves.

Cook went straight to Anderson and Broad, which was what I’d expected. Broad’s first ball to me was a long hop outside off stump, but I was still a bit rusty and chopped it down past my stumps.

Chris and I set about building a partnership. It was very hot and muggy, with a feeling of rain in the air, but the clouds weren’t coming in our direction. When Anderson came on, he covered the ball and bowled reverse swing both ways, which is something not many bowlers can do. I had a good sighting of how much the ball was doing. In that over, though, I played a couple of very positive forward defensive strokes, which can give me as much confidence as hitting a four. More, sometimes – I’d rather play a solid forward defence to mid-off than nick a four through second slip!

With the ball keeping low and getting soft, and the heat, it still felt like we were back in India. Broad got one past me that kept a bit low. I told myself to keep watching the ball and playing straight. The one that was on the stumps and kept low was the one to look out for.

After a nervous first 15 minutes, I called for some new gloves. My inners were soaked through. But I could feel my confidence rising. We have placed so much emphasis on defensive batting, and my balance was good as I kept out the dangerous balls. Broad slipped down the leg side a couple of times and I wasn’t quick enough to get my bat on them, but leg byes were as good as runs. I then hit a solid on drive, again to the fieldsman, but in such a way that I got the sense I was going to have a good day.

In the 43rd over, after I’d been with Chris for half an hour, Anderson hit him on the body. Two balls later, Anderson got him. He bowled one with a scrambled seam, and Chris chipped the ball to mid-wicket.

It was a blow, but I have full confidence in the rest of our batsmen. Steve Smith and Phil Hughes batted positively in the first innings and were seeing the ball well. Steve is a fidgety partner, but I don’t mind that. My nervous energy is always high early in my innings, and being with a guy who’s on a similar wavelength doesn’t bother me.

The runs weren’t coming easily, though. Broad gave me one on my thigh that I was able to turn away fine for a boundary. Against Anderson, Smithy chased some wide full outswingers and hit them beautifully. The English fielders oohed and aahed, but I told Steve to keep watching the ball and backing himself.

Swann came on for Broad, and while I was getting ready to face him he stopped the play to move his fieldsmen around in a painstaking kind of way. This is often just a ploy to disrupt your concentration and make you play at the other team’s tempo. My response is to think, ‘No, you’re going to play at
my
tempo.’ So when he was finally ready, I stepped off to the side of the wicket to take off my helmet and wipe the sweat off my forehead and out of my eyes. It actually was pretty tropical. I never thought Nottingham could feel like Sydney in summer!

With the slowness of the wicket, it was hard forcing the pace against either the seamers or the spinners. The bounce and spin were varying and they were drying us up, waiting for us to play a false shot. I’d been keeping Swann out for a few overs when he bowled a looping full toss, knee-high, outside my off stump. I swung at it too hard and under-edged it towards mid-wicket.

It was difficult to find any rhythm. I played some off drives against Anderson and then Finn, but both squirted away behind point – safely, but not where I’d wanted. Patience, patience.

We got to the halfway point in the chase, 3/156, a little milestone. Then Broad came on from the Radcliffe Road end to replace Finn. He bowled me a fullish ball that wobbled a bit outside my off stump and went through a touch low. I played forward, and thought I felt my bat brush my pad on the way through. The English went up in a huge, excited appeal, but I wasn’t worried. First, I wasn’t sure if it had carried to Matt Prior, and second, I didn’t think I’d hit it.

The umpires conferred on the carry – a worrying sign, because if I hadn’t hit it the carry wouldn’t matter. They referred it to the third umpire, and we waited. I spoke to Smithy, who said he hadn’t seen or heard a nick.

While we waited, Kevin Pietersen challenged me. ‘I thought you were a walker.’ I turned around and said, ‘I’m not walking because I didn’t think I hit it.’

I still wasn’t worried, even when third umpire Marais Erasmus sent down the message that it had carried to Prior, and Aleem Dar gave me out. I immediately referred it for the edge. We watched on the big screen, and I felt good – there was no white mark on my edge on Hot Spot. But the English had got a message from their dressing room, and they were beginning to jump about and celebrate. Soon enough, the third umpire upheld Dar’s decision, and I was off. Pietersen sent me on my way with some choice words.

Back in the dressing room, the television showed there was the finest of marks against my edge. The third umpire has a monitor that is very high-definition, much more than the big screen we watch on the field, so that explained why we hadn’t seen it from the middle. Nothing I could do about it now anyway – I was out.

People were going to compare my action with Broad’s the day before, I knew that. There would be the usual declarations that ‘you always know if you’ve hit it’. That’s not true – not in my years of playing cricket, anyway. Sometimes the nick can be so fine that I haven’t felt or heard it, or it’s been my bat handle clicking as I played the shot. Sometimes my bat has touched my pad, or boot, or the ground. Sometimes I haven’t been sure if I’ve jammed the ball into the ground or it’s bounced before I’ve hit it. Sometimes I haven’t been sure if the ball has hit my bat before my pad, pad before the bat, or a whole jumble. There are literally hundreds of situations where you don’t know for sure. And in a Test match, under the highest pressure, you’re not thinking or perceiving as clearly as you are during a relaxing hit in the backyard. My point is, there’s a lot of uncertainty, and the reason we need umpires is not just because players don’t want to be honest, but because they
don’t know
. That was me today. I wasn’t certain, so I asked for the review.

The upshot was that I was in the pavilion now, with no turning back. Nothing I could do about it now. I’m pretty good at putting these things behind me, but it was a challenge after the previous few days.

At any rate, I had to stay cool for the boys’ sake. Smithy was LBW to Swann the next ball; luckily it seemed definitive, so we hadn’t paid a price straight away for my using our last unsuccessful review.

Neither Hadds nor Hughesy had faced a ball, but they were both out there, starting from scratch. A few minutes later, the rub of the green went against us in a different way. This time, Swann bowled around the wicket to Phillip, spun one savagely, and hit him on the pads. The English appealed excitedly, but Kumar Dharmasena gave him not out, indicating that the ball pitched outside leg stump. That was certainly the way it appeared to me: the ball had turned a great deal, and was going to hit middle. That and the television replay suggested it had pitched outside leg.

But this time, the third umpire overruled the onfield umpire. The only common denominator was that it was another decision in England’s favour. When the wicket-to-wicket blue strip was laid on the TV replay, it showed the ball pitching right on the outside line of leg stump. Not much we could say about that. Our eyes had deceived us.

I moved Ashton Agar up to number eight, which he’d certainly earnt with his first innings. He and Hadds had some nervous moments in the last half-hour, but got through Anderson’s return for the last three overs, and brought us to stumps at 6/174. Before going off, Hadds found Ian Bell to shake his hand and congratulate him on his century, which is typical of our vice-captain.

After play, I did something a bit unconventional. Normally, the captain’s press conference is after the end of the match. Each day before then, the media manager brings out one outstanding performer, or the coach, to talk about each day. It’s not expected that the captain will talk to the media during the match. But I knew there would be a lot of debate about my dismissal, and I wanted to nip it in the bud. I told our media officer Matt Cenin that I would be happy to be the chosen player to talk about the day. In interviews, I repeated that I had thought I’d missed the ball, but accepted that I’d hit it. I wasn’t prepared to enter into any discussion about the merits or otherwise of the system. I’ve got enough to think about. But the bottom line is, it’s the same for England and us, we all know the rules, and they apply equally.

When the boys were in the dressing room, I told them we had to believe we could win. This Test match has been a rollercoaster, and we are due for some ups. After our first innings, we know anything is possible. Six wickets down is probably two more than I’d have liked to be at this stage, but Hadds is just the guy for this situation, having made lots of runs against England in the past, and we’re all aware of what Ashton can do. Starcy, Sidds and Patto are all genuine number eight or nines who have made good runs in Test matches. We don’t have any bunnies. The pitch is playing well enough for a fourth and fifth day. We just have to believe.

Sunday 14 July.
Nottingham.

Test cricket’s a great game. I don’t say that to be flippant: it really is. We have just played in one of the best matches of all time. People will talk about it for years. One day, we’ll talk about it in that way too. But for now, as captain of this team, it hurts too much to be philosophical. I feel wrung out.

So much happened over the five days of this match, but there was a full Test’s worth of action in the two and a half hours that were played today.

I was a spectator, like most people. My emotions stayed fairly level, because I was confident from the start that we could win, and as I felt the excitement rise as the other boys began to believe it.

The plan for Hadds and Ash was not to hurry or panic. The pitch was playing well enough as long as you didn’t lose patience. A lot of balls were hitting the inside half of the bat, so they had to play straight. Guys like Brad and Ashton, who like to get on with the game, will get too impatient if they just block for over after over, so they also had to hit the ball hard when it was there to be hit. It’s a fine line. But at least there was no problem with time: all day to score 137 runs.

The weather had cooled down, but it was still sunny, after an early mist had burned off. Cook started with Swann and Anderson, and they bowled tightly. Hadds normally bats well out of his crease, so Prior stood up to the stumps for Anderson to keep him in check. Hadds got the first runs of the day when he late-cut Anderson, fine of gully.

After his freewheeling first innings, Ash showed that he has more than one game. He steadily kept Swann out before lapping a nice fine sweep for two. The Englishmen continued to slow the game down, calling a groundsman on to thump down the ground while Ash waited for Swann to start an over, but Ash has an old head on his 19-year-old shoulders, and responded with a lovely late cut.

Hadds bases his game on a solid defence, before he can be more expansive and show his superb attacking style. After a lot of blocking, he took a big swipe at Swann and hit a four, and then tried to be positive against Broad when he came on. Meanwhile, after Ash jammed a four through slips, Cook put a third man on the boundary, a sign that he was getting concerned about leaking runs. There were a few moments of panic – Ash went for a second run on a bye, and could have been run out by a direct hit from the fielder, and Hadds had our hearts in our mouths whenever he went over the field – but then Ash cut a beautiful four off Broad, and we were getting close to bringing the target down to 100.

Anderson was bowling unchanged from the Radcliffe Road end, and just on the hour he bowled a very good ball that nipped away from Ash. Only a batsman seeing the ball well would have touched it, and the edge went to Cook at a wide first slip. These things really drive you spare. There was nothing to say that edge should have gone to the keeper or slip or right between them, as the one from Bell had done on day three. Anyway, Cook grabbed the chance.

Since the first day this has been a hard wicket for new batsmen, no matter where in the order they play, on both teams. Mitchell Starc had had a long bat in the nets this morning, and I put him above Sidds because England had surprisingly taken the second new ball. I thought that Mitchell, being a very fluent attacking batsman, might be able to score runs quickly and change the direction of the game. But Anderson was again too good – amazing stamina, too, with all the bowling he was asked to do – and Cook took another catch.