Month: June 2025

Just after 6:30 yesterday evening Jamie Smith hit Ravindra Jadeja for six, his second such blow in the space of four balls to take England to a five wicket win just after the last hour had been called (there had been rain early in the day, hence the late running of proceedings – in England at this time of year there was absolutely no danger of the light closing in). In truth, for all the size of the target England had been set (371), they never really looked in trouble. This post looks back at the match and some of the other classics that the Yorkshire ground has produced over the years.

INDIAN VULNERABILITIES

At 12:30 on day two India, put in to bat by Stokes, were 430-3 and a total somewhere north of 600 looked likely. Then a collapse set in, and India ended up with 471, still a big score, but a lot less than it might have been. England fought their way almost to parity, managing 465, in the course of which it became obvious that India’s bowling menace began and ended with the great Jasprit Bumrah (the only bowler to have over 200 career test wickets at an average of under 20 a piece). The second Indian innings was remarkably similar in structure to the first – at 333-4 they looked to have wrested the initiative right back, but again they suffered a collapse, the last six wickets going for 31 to make them 364 all out, leaving England to score 371 in the final innings in just over a day. I missed most of the final day’s action (all bar the last hour or so of the chase), but I can tell you that Duckett and Crawley launched the chase with a stand of 188, and that the nearest India came to creating worry was when Duckett (149) and Brook (0) fell in very quick succession to make it 253-4, 118 still needed/ Root and Stokes put on 49 together for the fifth wicket before the skipper was out, and then Smith joined Root for the denouement. This passage of play, most of which I was tuned in for, saw the Indian bowlers horrifically exposed, and it has to be said also saw some undistinguished captaincy from Gill, new to the job at this level. It became clear that he was pinning all his hopes on the second new ball, but it was also clear that England were scoring freely enough that by the time he got to take it he would have very little to defend. In the event Bumrah was off the field when the new ball became due, and Siraj took it from the Kirkstall Lane end, which would have been Bumrah’s natural end to bowl from, and such was Gill’s trust in the capacities of either Krishna or Thakur that he used Jadeja, the spinner, from the other end. Jadeja had found some turn, but he had claimed only one wicket, and even before the Smith onslaught on him that ended proceedings he had been conceding runs at closer to four than three per over (the Smith fusillade pushed that ER over four). Neither Sudarsan, debuting at number three (presumably to avoid him having to occupy Kohli’s former slot one place lower down, which Gill did instead) nor Nair, restored at number six, managed many runs, and from number seven downwards, save for a couple of big hits by Jadeja in the second Indian innings, runs were conspicuous by their complete absence. Bumrah, Siraj and Krishna are all really number 11s, and number eight is probably a position too high for Thakur, though the latter’s medium pace is a very doubtful asset – in this match he was neither economical nor threatening – his two second innings scalps were both down to batter error, not to good bowling. Until this match, in all of first class cricket history (and some 60,000 matches are officially designated as first class) no team had lost a match in which they had had five individual centuries (Jaiswal, Gill, Rahul and two from Pant). If India are going to have as weak an 8-11 as they had in this match they cannot have someone of Jadeja’s type at seven (he is worth his place as a test match number seven, but he is a conventional player by nature, not an explosive one, and with limited time available due to the weakness of the tail an explosive number seven is needed).

ENGLAND STRENGTHS

In the only innings in which they were required England’s 8-11 contributed far more than their Indian equivalents with the bat. Also Josh Tongue, though he did not do very well against the top and middle order did exterminate the Indian tail very swiftly in both innings, emerging with a match haul of seven wickets (and England have often struggled to deal with opposition lower orders in recent times, so if Tongue can do this on a regular basis he will be very useful to England). In terms of that run chase I would say that this was the match in which Stokes/ McCullum England reached maturity – while they scored those 370 runs at a good rate they were also fundamentally disciplined – Duckett, famed for being averse to leaving anything actually declined to play either of the first two balls of his innings on this occasion. Even the Smith blitz at the finish was calculated – the calculation being that although there was a small amount of turn for him Jadeja actually posed little threat. It was not an exciting finish, because by the time the game had reached that stage England had long since been out of any danger. This was not a ridiculous bish-bash-bosh involving a large measure of fortune, it was an absolutely ruthless hunting down of a target that the side knew they would reach so long as they were not bowled out. The match aggregate of 1673 runs for 35 wickets was a record for any match between these two sides. Full scorecard here.

A PLACE OF HEISTS
AND HORROR SHOWS

Headingley has long been a ground noted for generation stories. Here are brief mentions of a few of the other classics

The 1948 Ashes match at Headingley was in some ways a precursor to this one – England reached the dizzy heights of 423-2 in their first innings, before then falling away to be all out for 496, Australia replied with 458, England declared on the final morning at 365-8, and Australia made the target of 404 look a stroll in the park, knocking it off for the loss of three wickets.

The third match of the 1981 Ashes at Headingley was Ian Botham’s first back in the ranks after he had bagged a pair in the drawn match at Lord’s and resigned the captaincy just as the selectors were making up their minds to demote him in any case. Mike Brearley, restored as captain as a way for the selectors to buy themselves a bit of thinking time, actually went so far as to check with the all rounder that he actually wanted to play. Bob Willis, then 32 years old and with dodgy knees, also nearly missed out (an invitation was actually sent to Mike Hendrick and then revoked). Australia batted first and scored 401-9 declared on a pitch on which as Brearley told his bowlers “a side could be bowled out for 90”. Botham had taken 6-95 in that innings, has first five-for since before he had become captain. Botham also scored 50 in England’s first innings, was they managed a meagre 174. Australia enforced the follow-on (aversion to doing so is a recent phenomenon), and at first all went well for them. England were 41-4 at one point, then 105-5 when Willey departed. At 133, when the previously impenetrable Boycott was trapped LBW it looked done and dusted, and two runs later when keeper Bob Taylor was dismissed it looked even more so. However, Botham and Dilley now shared an exhilarating stand of 117 in just 80 minutes, Chris Old helped the ninth wicket to add 67 more, during which Botham reached three figures, and even Bob Willis at number 11 provided some support for the reinvigorated all rounder. Many of the England team had checked out of their hotel that morning and now had to book back in for another night – among those who had to do was a certain IT Botham, by then 145 not out. Even with this amazing turnaround Australia still needed only 130 to win, and with lunch on the horizon they seemed to have matters under control at 56-1, just 74 short of the target. At that point Bob Willis was put on to bowl from the Kirkstall Lane end, with his test career on the line. He started by producing a sharp, straight bouncer that Trevor Chappell, who resembled a test class number three in name only, could only fend away for a catch. Then right on the cusp of the interval he struck twice more, removing skipper Kim Hughes, caught in the slips by Botham and then Graham Yallop, caught at short leg by Mike Gatting. Thus at lunch on the final day Australia were 58-4, needing 72 to win, and they suddenly had 40 minutes in which to contemplate the fact that the job was not yet done. After lunch Old rattled Border’s stumps to make 65-5, and then John Dyson, who had been in since the start of the innings essayed a hook at Willis and succeeded only in gloving the ball behind to make it 68-6. Marsh also took Willis on, and Dilley did well at deep fine leg to both hold the catch and keep himself inside the ropes. That was 74-7, and one run later Lawson popped up a catch for Bob Taylor to make it 75-8. Ray Bright and Dennis Lillee staged a late fightback, plundering 35 in four overs, but then Lillee miscued a drive at Willis and Gatting at mid-on ran and dived forward to take the catch and make it 110-9. In the next over Alderman was dropped twice by Old at third slip, but then Willis, summoning up the energy for one more over, his tenth off the reel, produced a yorker that sent Bright’s middle stump cartwheeling, and England, at one stage 92 adrift with only three second innings wickets left had won by 18 runs, only the second time in test history a side had won after following on. Willis, who had been so close to missing the match, and who had been put on for that final spell as a last gamble by Brearley, had taken a ground record 8-43 for the innings.

The 2001 match was a slow burner – it was not until the final innings, with England needing 320 to win that the story happened. That story was Mark Butcher, who was normally a fairly staid batter, suddenly for this one innings batting like Adam Gilchrist in a blue helmet. Butcher in that amazing knock savaged an unbeaten 173 and England won by six wickets after being behind for most of the match.

The 2019 match was one of the great heists of all time. Even with Stokes’ incredible innings it also took Australia burning their last review in the closing stages, which meant that when they found themselves facing a decision a few moments later that would have been overturned they could not send it upstairs.

The match that ended yesterday evening was a worthy addition to the above list – one of only three in which all four innings have been over 350 (Adelaide 1929, and the 1948 match mentioned above being the others).

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…