BROAD’S GREIGHT BALLS OF FIRE
Surely not even this great Trent Bridge ground has seen anything like this. Not an Australian innings obliterated before lunch in the time it takes to complete a football match by one of the truly great spells of Ashes bowling from Stuart Broad. It was simply the most incredible, stupendous session of Test cricket I have ever seen.
This was the day when england, led by the magnificent Broad with magical f i gures of eight f or 15, demolished Australia in just 94 minutes before Joe root put their collapse in context by racing to another sublime unbeaten century.
It ended, gloriously for england, with Alastair Cook perfectly placed to push for another rapid victory and with one hand firmly gripped on the fabled urn.
Above all, it was a dream of a day of which the england supporting majority among the 18,000 lucky spectators will always be able to boast: ‘I was there’.
Surely there is no way back for Australia from this, not from the wreckage of dismissal for 60 in just 111 balls — or 114 if you include the no balls — before conceding a lead of 214 by the end of another breathless, turbo-charged day of modern Test cricket.
Those who have tickets for Sunday or Monday then you might be well advised to seek alternative entertainment because it is unlikely to get that far again.
It will take a miracle for Australia, such firm favourites before this series, to get out of this mess and stop england pulling off the most sensational of series victories with a Test to spare. The Ashes are assuredly coming home.
Test cricket? This made Twenty20 look positively pedestrian, more bonkers even than anything that happened at edgbaston and destined to go down as one of the most remarkable days even in this great ground’s long and rich history.
Australia could not even last a whole Twenty20 innings, blown away in 18.3 overs by the perfect storm of Broad reaching new heights, outstanding catching in the slips and complete ineptitude from shell-shocked Australian batsmen.
Broad, leading the england attack on his home ground because of injury to Anderson, began the day on 299 Test wickets yet just 94 minutes after taking the field in this fourth Investec Test he drew level with Fred Trueman on 307.
There is little to add to statistics that saw Broad reach his milestone with the third ball of the day before storming to figures that will be etched in Ashes history, with his first five wickets coming in a sensational 17-ball spell.
Broad simply bowled intelligently, full and with a perfectly executed plan for each batsman, on a seaming pitch, and let the Australians push and prod their way towards oblivion. Jimmy who?
Then root, destined to become not only england’s next captain but also one of their greatest batsmen, hit an eighth Test century that, so sweetly, was reached with a cut for four off the bowling of his old adversary David Warner.
The fact that Warner, the most part-time of medium-pacers, was bowling at all on the first day was a sad reflection of how bad Australia were, so poor that it is hard to see how Michael Clarke’s captaincy can possibly survive this.
yet t o ponder Australia’ s incompetence is to take attention away from a rampant and quite brilliant performance f rom an england side who are maturing rapidly and breathtakingly under Trevor Bayliss and Paul Farbrace.
This is undoubtedly the Ashes of extremes, from england’s high of Cardiff to the depths of a 405-run defeat at lord’s to victory in two and a half days at edgbaston. Impossible to predict? It has been impossible to believe.
Nobody deserves more credit than Broad, the man who so often rises to the big Ashes occasion, the bowler whose devastating spells won Ashes Tests at The Oval in 2009 and Durham in 2013. Now this, the best and most clinical yet.
From the moment Chris rogers, such a rock for Australia in this Ashes, edged to Cook at first slip and then Steve Smith found root at third to complete the day’s first over Australia were trapped in Broad’s web.
Clarke, prickly after losing the toss, moved down the order to five in a desperate attempt to regain form but little could he have imagined that he would be at the crease for the ninth ball of the match after Warner fell to Mark Wood.
Two more Australians were to disappear before their captain, Shaun Marsh’s comeback being short-lived and Adam Voges falling to an incredible diving catch by Ben Stokes that stood comparison with Andrew Strauss’s famous grab of Adam Gilchrist here 10 years ago.
ye t nothing s u mmed up Australia’s capitulation more than the demise of Clarke, who looked frazzled throughout before aiming a wild drive at one of the few bad balls Broad, who pitched the ball up intelligently and made the most of the green tinge to the pitch, bowled and edged to the safe hands of Cook.
The Australian captain had spoken passionately about his desire to battle through his chronic lack of form before this match but the end is surely nigh for a great cricketer who looks destined never to win the Ashes in england.
And so it went on, with Steven Finn getting in on the act to claim Peter Nevill and extras pipping Mitchell Johnson by one run to top
score with 14. That just about put the lid on a desperate, spineless Australian display.
It was not quite the perfect day for England. Adam Lyth fell cheaply again and faces being replaced at the Oval by Alex Hales while Ian Bell and Cook also succombed to an improved Mitchell Starc.
But a much-vaunted pace attack was erratic and inconsistent again and Australia must have rued their decision not to pick Peter Siddle here and to leave out one of their seamers in Mitch Marsh rather than the hapless Voges. Australia could do nothing to threaten Root, who ended unbeaten on 124 and with licence to bat Australia out of this game and the Ashes today after adding a match-defining 173 with his Yorkshire team-mate Jonny Bairstow.
This was as one- sided a day as anything produced by the great Australian teams during their long run of Ashes dominance.
Yet it was delivered by England. And that means, with the urn within reach, it will never be forgotten.