Oz captain: ‘We’re here to win back the Ashes’
Tim Paine says Australia will keep a lid on celebrating one of their great rags-to-riches performances despite having taken a big step towards a drought-breaking Ashes series victory in England.
Nathan Lyon (6-49) and Pat Cummins (4-32) sealed a 251-run defeat of England at Edgbaston before tea on the fifth day of the first test yesterday, putting Joe Root’s team on the back foot with a first Australian win in a series opener in this country since 2005.
A monumental result on various levels, it was the biggest victory margin ever for a team that has been behind by 90 runs or more on first innings totals.
The Australian squad will travel to Worcester for a three-day tour match starting tomorrow before heading to London for the second test at Lord’s next week.
While England are licking their wounds after man-of-thematch Steve Smith’s glorious two centuries in his return test inspired Australia to a stunning turnaround at Edgbaston, lessons of the past have convinced them not to get ahead of themselves.
Four years ago Australia celebrated hard after a 406-run annihilation of England in the second test at Lord’s, only to be thrashed in the following matches at Edgbaston and Trent Bridge and surrender the Ashes in a fourth consecutive series loss to the old enemy abroad.
They are eager for history not to repeat. ‘‘You’ve got to keep a lid on it,’’ Paine said. ‘‘There’s still four tests to go and we aren’t here to win the first test at Edgbaston – we’re here to win the Ashes.
‘‘We’ve been clear on that for some time. We’re obviously happy to win the first test. It’s a huge step in the right direction, but we’re certainly not satisfied with that. Tonight will be quite a different feel to most test wins we’ve had. We’re over here to do something that a lot of teams from Australia have struggled to do.
‘‘And we realise that if we can do it, it will be spoken about for a hell of a long time, and that’s what is driving us. In England in these conditions [it] is difficult for us as it is for England to go to Australia. There’s a big five weeks ahead.’’
They have so far handled those conditions well, including the much-discussed atmosphere for the test comebacks of Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft at Edgbaston. Paine received plenty of air time for his provocative pre-match assessment that he ‘‘could name you 15’’ more intimidating grounds. He said yesterday it was ‘‘bluff’’, one that has played rather well.
Smith is among the players who won’t figure in Worcester, although the obsessive trainer may be hard pressed to take a break. The tour game shapes as an opportunity, though, for fast bowlers Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood to issue a reminder to selectors after being left out in Birmingham.
‘‘I wouldn’t argue with [Smith’s] preparation,’’ Paine said. ‘‘He’s the best player in the world in test cricket at the moment. He’s probably the best ever statistically, and while he’s at the crease I think our team’s got real confidence.
‘‘I thought Peter Siddle digging in with him [in the first innings] was crucial. Then for the majority of the game I thought we bowled pretty well – and today I thought we were superb with the ball. Having someone like Steve in controlling the game certainly helps.’’
Lyon rose to the challenge brilliantly on the last day with the second five-wicket haul of his career in a fourth innings of a match, passing 350 test wickets on the way to put him in a club that only Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath and Dennis Lillee have membership among Australians.
His complete hold over England counterpart Moeen Ali – he now has dismissed him nine times in 11 innings – was a mere sideshow yesterday as he knocked over most of the top order including key man Root.
‘‘The ball is coming out as well as ever,’’ Paine said. ‘‘He’s a bit the same as Smithy, I feel like every test match or series they seem to get better which is astonishing at their age. But I think if you come and watch both of them train you see why they keep improving.’’
Peter Smith is the father in the background. He is the big body who stepped forward and laid a comforting arm on his son when Australia’s cricket captain wept in public. It is Peter who kept loading balls into the cricket machine when his son, Steve, was wandering tearfully through the long night of the soul.
It is a strange image. There is Steve Smith, the disgraced captain of Australia, the man whom then prime minister Malcolm Turnbull called ‘‘a shocking disappointment’’, quite broken, a world in ruins. And his father starts loading balls into a bowling machine. Come on, son, this will take your mind off cricket for a moment.
Looking back Peter Smith said, ‘‘You work on what you can control, what you can do to help. Putting balls in the ball machine, things like that. You have to work on that only and that’s what we did. Worked on what we could control.’’
I wonder about the Steve Smiths and the Tiger Woods of this world. They’re still playing games. They seem to be eternally caught in the twilight of their childhood. Like Peter Pan they never quite grow up. And that is all very well, but unfortunately the world is full of Captain Hooks, louring father figures who will tear them apart when things go wrong.
Cricket Australia systemically and ruthlessly infantilised Steve Smith. There was a talent manager. They invested in youth. Promising players were coddled at a young age and brought up to know nothing but cricket. They were taught that there was ‘‘an Australian way’’.
The baggy green was sacred. And so these young men grew into what their masters had made them. Winning was everything. Cheating was a word that became flexible. Professionalism, cheating, what’s the difference. So long as you’re winning, lads. The only boundaries that young Steve Smith knew were on the edge of
the cricket pitch.
And then the inevitable happened. One day the television cameras caught Smith and his mates doing something that someone from long ago said they weren’t supposed to do. Lots of cricketers had done similar things before, but this was a moment in time when the world was into moral outrage, trumpety, trumpety, trump.
So Smith was publicly shamed. And all the people who had taught him not to know right from wrong ran for cover. The corporates were saving their own skins. Prime ministers were standing on soap boxes. So poor little Smudger tells the world, ‘‘It was a failure of my leadership . . . I will regret this for the rest of my life . . . I hope in time I can earn back respect and forgiveness.’’
Sixteen months later Steve Smith cover drives the ball to the boundary for his second century of the match and raises both arms in the air. Commentator Nasser Hussein tells us that redemption is well and truly complete. And perhaps it is, perhaps Smith has fled his demons like Tiger Woods outran his chasing Furies at Augusta in April.