Add thelocalreport.in As A Trusted Source
Ashes winning captain pat cummins suggested Australia England’s ‘baseball’ philosophy has been dismantled after watching them “shut up shop” in Adelaide.
Cummins missed his team’s victory Perth And brisbane with back problems, but returned to provide the finishing touches as the hosts took a 3–0 lead with two games remaining.
In the first two Test matches, England had to pay a heavy price for consecutive wild shots, due to which the England captain had to face defeat. ben stokes Begging your side to show more fight and determination.
Stokes himself reacted to the early loss of top-order wickets with the slowest half-century of his entire career in the first innings, reaching his half-century in 159 balls. His scoring rate was 3.13 in excellent conditions on the second day and dropped to 3.35 throughout the game.
For a team that is known for all-out aggression, this represents a significant drop in gear.
And this is not lost on the victorious Cummins, who said: “He seems to change his style quite a bit from game to game. It can happen in overseas conditions, where you are always trying to find a way that works.
“On day two, I thought it was amazing. The temperature was over 40 degrees, it was hot, it was a very flat wicket and they closed the shops for half a day, so I was very happy.
“I’m sure they’ll talk about it and come to us with different plans for Melbourne and Sydney. I’m just glad we stuck to our guns and were able to play what we play best, which has worked.”
Having recently returned to the team, Cummins admitted that he may have to sit out the last two Test matches now that the main objective has already been achieved.
With spinner Nathan Lyon also set to miss the Boxing Day and New Year Tests after suffering a hamstring injury on day five in Adelaide, there are bound to be more changes to a team that has kept winning despite a long list of injury withdrawals that have also affected Josh Hazlewood, Usman Khawaja and Steve Smith.
“We had a lot of aggressive preparation (for me) knowing there was an Ashes to win. Now it might be a case of ‘it’s done’ and let’s reassess,” he said.
“I suspect I’ll play Melbourne and we’ll have conversations about Sydney. When the series was live, it was, ‘Let’s take a risk and go at it’.”
Of Lyon he said, “It’s not good to see someone on crutches, it’s not a good sign for a Test match a week away.”
Australia will look to a trio of back-up spinners, with Toddy Murphy, Matt Kuhnman and Corey Rocchioli all competing for the role.