The Second Ashes Test is set to begin on Thursday morning, as England and Australia once again lock horns after the visitors suffered an embarrassing 169 run defeat in the opening Test at Cardiff last week.
Much of the focus in the lead up to this Test has been on the Australian team selection, with it appearing as though there will be two changes for this Test. Brad Haddin is due to miss out on the final XI because of personal reasons, and his fellow New South Welshman Peter Nevill will make his debut in his place. Nevill will be expected to atone for Haddin’s errors behind the stumps; which included Joe Root second ball during his innings of 134 at Cardiff.
The second change is likely to happen in the middle order, where it appears as though Shane Watson’s time is finally up. After a run of just 3 fifties in 18 innings, his batting has regressed substantially, and to see him falling LBW twice last week was almost comical, particularly after he chose to review them both… unsuccessfully. His replacement will be Mitchell Marsh, who is in red-hot form with the bat after two blitzkrieg half-centuries in the Aussie’s warm-up matches earlier this month. Whilst his bowling is considered inferior to Watson’s, it is worth noting that Watson has only picked up 13 wickets in his last 22 Tests. Marsh will struggle to do worse than Watson has done for the last 18 months.
Off the field, matters have surrounded so-called ‘beergate’, after James Anderson revealed that Michael Clarke and his Australian team turned down the offer of a post-match beverage from Alastair Cook. It is something England have been keen to do recently, and they enjoyed drinks with the touring new Zealanders after both Test earlier this summer. They also shared drinks with Australia after every Test in 2005, although Ricky Ponting did say that this friendliness may have contributed to the loss of the series. Since then, it has traditionally been at the end of the Ashes series, that the sides will congregate in England’s dressing room to relax after a game.
England will more than likely head into Lord’s with an unchanged XI, and why not? Each player played their part in at least a small way at Cardiff, and the manner of the victory clearly shows there is no need for any sweeping immediate changes. The pitch at Lord’s whilst having more pace and carry than Cardiff, is still likely to be on the slower side. England will be pleased to negate any threat from the likes of Mitchell Johnson and Mitchell Starc.
The match looks set to be another battle between two aggressive sides, with the main question being how will Australia respond to the this new aggressive England that we have seen in the three Tests thus far this summer? The Australian way is to fight fire with fire, so it would not be a surprise to see Clarke and his men come out at Lord’s and look to match England’s scoring rate. However, over attacking Moeen Ali was one of Australia’s biggest faults during their two failed batting attempts. Batsmen got start in both innings for the visitors but they need some of them to go on and make a match defining score in the mould of Joe Root, if they are to level the series here.
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Click to ClaimJon is one of Howtobet4free’s co-founders and as well as producing content for the site also helps run the @howtobet4free_ Twitter account and Cheltenham Festival Facebook page. Jon works in Marketing and Communications in professional sport.
