England will invoke the spirit of 2005 today, with Alastair Cook determined to take the attack to Australia on the Edgbaston ground where they have their greatest success rate and where support for them is usually at its most fervent.
If England really are destined to lose this third Test — and with it any realistic chance they have of regaining the Ashes — then clearly they want to go down fighting now this series has reached crunch time.
It was here in Birmingham 10 years ago that England, who have won 51 per cent of all Edgbaston Tests, recovered from a thumping loss at Lord’s to win by two runs in arguably the greatest Test of all and set up a famous Ashes triumph.
Michael Vaughan’s side did it then with the sort of aggressive attitude that had been prevalent this summer in England’s cricket until they were spectacularly derailed by Australia at Lord’s in one of their most crushing defeats — by 405 runs.
Now Cook will give full licence to his batsmen to replicate the style with which England scored 400 on the first day of that fabled 2005 Test and, only last month, 408 for nine in the one-day international against New Zealand.
That means Jonny Bairstow, in the form of his life with Yorkshire, will try to treat the formidable Australian attack with the same disdain he showed county bowlers while scoring a double hundred and four other centuries this season.
Bairstow, 25, will return to Test cricket with a very different technique from the one that was found out by Mitchell Johnson and co in the last two Tests of the previous Ashes and with a high backlift that puts even Graham Gooch’s to shame.
He has not looked back since Yorkshire’s Australian coach Jason Gillespie told him to forget all about technique and just hit the ball, but this will be a very different examination from anything he has faced, even in the first division.
‘We’ve looked at footage of him and we know where we will have to bowl,’ said Australia captain Michael Clarke, who confirmed that wicketkeeper Peter Nevill will retain his place. ‘We just need discipline to put the ball there consistently. I hope the attack he’s about to face is better than county cricket.’
Two England batsmen under immense pressure, in opener Adam Lyth and Ian Bell, elevated to No 3, will also be encouraged to hit their way out of trouble and give England the positive start that has consistently eluded them.
‘It would be a fantastic 10-year anniversary of that game here to win now after what happened at Lord’s,’ said an upbeat Cook yesterday.
‘It would be brilliant to go 2-1 up and it’s an inspiration to know it has been done here.
‘Lord’s was an absolute disaster for us but it’s 1-1 and it’s a three-Test series now. We need to win two games to do something very special and that’s what’s keeping everyone going.
‘When you get on top here you feel like you have an extra man because of all the noise. But you can only cheer a side playing well.’
To do that, England will need their top order to fire and an attack that looks set to include Steven Finn for the first time in 23 Tests to take advantage of an Edgbaston pitch that looks sure to offer more movement than Cardiff or Lord’s.
Bell and Lyth, at very different stages of their careers, appear to have this third Investec Test and next week’s fourth at Trent Bridge to save their places or face an axe that, at least in the case of Bell, would almost certainly be permanent.
‘Belly’s scored a huge amount of runs for England, over 7,000 with 22 Test hundreds,’ said Cook of a man who has made just 128 runs in his past 12 innings.
‘Not many people have done that and he’s got to remember that.’
It is extraordinary that no Warwickshire player has ever scored a Test hundred at Edgbaston and there would be no better time for Bell — with a top score of 76 not out on his home ground — to end that long run.
The captain’s message was the same for Lyth, who is consistently being dismissed playing at balls outside off stump that he could leave alone, but who will be told not to go against his natural assertive instincts.
‘Adam’s got to play how he does for Yorkshire,’ said Cook. ‘That’s how he’s scored his runs over the last two or three years. He has to stay true to his game.’
The almost certain loss of the less than robust Mark Wood here is a blow, because he looks to the manner born in Test cricket, but clearly England feel they have to protect a bowler with a chronic left ankle condition.
If England are going to prevail at Edgbaston it will almost certainly be down to Stuart Broad, four wickets away from 300 in Test cricket, and Jimmy Anderson, curiously wicketless at Lord’s, taking advantage of a pitch that looks set to start green, not least because of the rain that has fallen here over the past few days.
‘I just want to see a good wicket,’ said Cook, who had called for ‘English conditions’ after Lord’s. However, he added:
‘But let’s remember that the best side won in Cardiff and then the best side won at Lord’s. Whichever team adjusts best here will win.’ If that is to be England then it will continue an extraordinarily inconsistent run that has seen their last six results go win, loss, win, loss, win, loss.
It is a sequence Cook would happily accept for the rest of this series.
‘Even considering the stress levels it would cause, I would take 3-2,’ he smiled.
Yet if Australia are dominant again and England’s top order suffer another failure, the consequences could be significant — not only for the likes of Bell and Lyth but also for a captain in Cook who surely could not survive another Ashes defeat.
The most atmospheric stage in English cricket is set and the stakes are high. – Daily Mail