Gutsy Burns has silenced his doubters
In a summer when Test openers have generally enjoyed the lifespan of a mayfly, Rory Burns has come dangerously close to spreading his wings.
It is too early to say whether England have found a successor to two other left-handers who placed substance over style, Andrew Strauss and Alastair Cook. But Burns has out- performed his fellow openers on both sides in this Ashes to such a degree that only two conclusions are possible.
The first is favoured by those who saw his first-innings 133 in the first Test at Edgbaston, angrily totted up the plays and misses — more than 40, by some reckoning — and decided Burns owed rather more to luck than he did to skill.
One or two decent judges predicted he would not make another half-century, as if he was the first opener to make ugly runs in English conditions.
The second conclusion is that Burns’ first-class career doesn’t lie. He earned his Test debut last winter after five straight 1,000-run summers for Surrey, and averages 42. When critics grumble about the domestic game’s failure to produce serious run-getters, they have had to doff a respectful cap to Burns.
Against an attack including Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood, two of the best fast bowlers seen in England for years, and in conditions apparently designed to persuade top- order batsmen to take up another profession, he has comfortably outscored the five other openers in this series.
Between them, England’s Jason Roy and Joe Denly, and Australia’s David Warner, Cameron Bancroft and Marcus Harris have managed 297 runs at an average of 11, compared with Burns’s 370 at 41. Of the five scores of more than 50 made by an opener, Burns has three.
‘He has played brilliantly,’ said Jos Buttler yesterday. ‘One of the big things that impressed me straight away was that he just acted like an international cricketer.
‘As much as the runs he’s scored, it’s the character he’s shown. Opening the batting in England is probably the hardest job you can do, so I think he’s had a fantastic series.’ It said much for the progress he has made that his dismissal for 47, tamely miscuing a pull off Josh Hazlewood to short midwicket, felt like an anti-climax.
For Warner, who somehow scraped together 61 in the first innings at Headingley, but has otherwise scored 2, 8, 3, 5, 0, 0 and 0, it would have been a triumph.
Burns has prospered, too, while working out how to counter Australia targeting his right armpit, a plan that has regularly brought about his downfall.
But, by their own admission, they overdid the short stuff in the first innings at Old Trafford, where Burns gutsed it out for 81.
More than any innings this summer — certainly more than the Edgbaston hundred — that began to suggest that England’s search for a reliable opener, unafraid to look quirky while laying the foundation for the aesthetes below, might finally be bearing fruit.
These are early days, and Burns’ Test average is still the wrong side of 30. But promise he showed last winter — kickstarting England’s second-innings sweepathon in Pallekele, then a sensible 84 in Bridgetown — is starting to resemble the rule, not the exception.
There is another tentative reason for excitement. A debate sparked by Root’s second failed Ashes campaign has centred on the identity of his successor.
While England’s plan is to allow Root the chance to regain the urn in Australia in 2021- 22, it is inconceivable that he can survive a third disappointment.
Burns now has the chance to put himself in pole position to take over when the moment arises.
He led Surrey to the title last season, and is seen as unfussy but authoritative. The way he has adapted speaks of a sharp mind.
And as England’s middle order squandered the riches of 130 for two, Burns’s latest contribution grew in stature. Improbably, it has been the story of his summer.