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When Chris Broad suggests it will be ‘tricky at the Gabba, because all eyes are going to be on him’, it hardly needs explaining that he’s talking about England’s troubled opener Zak Crawley.
The second Ashes Test begins in Brisbane on Thursday, and Crawley’s pair at Perth – dismissed sixth ball in the first innings, and fifth in the second, both times driving at Mitchell Starc – has led to renewed scrutiny of the management’s apparently unshakeable faith.
Fifty-three players in Test history have scored more runs as opener than Crawley’s 2,841, yet none has done so at a lower average than his 30.22. Unless he manages 39 runs in Brisbane, that figure will drop below 30, and the calls to drop him will grow louder.
Broad, father of Stuart, is uniquely qualified on the subject of going in first in Australia. Among England openers to have scored a minimum of 500 runs here, he boasts the highest average – 78 – thanks to three centuries on Mike Gatting’s victorious 1986-87 tour, and another at Sydney during the Bicentennial Test a year later.
What advice does he have for a player who has come to embody Bazball’s foibles, both good and bad?
‘When I was in a bad trot, I broke the innings down to the first 10 minutes, second 10, third 10,’ Broad tells Daily Mail Sport. ‘Once you get to half an hour, you might be into a bit of a rhythm, then you can look at another half an hour, and so on. But in that time, I was letting the bowlers bowl to me, whereas he’s clearly going after the ball.’
Fifty-three players in Test history have scored more runs as an opener than Zak Crawley’s 2,841, yet none has done so at a lower average than his 30.22
Crawley was dismissed by Mitchell Starc in the first over of both innings in Perth, with the Aussie left-armer taking this superb caught-and-bowled in the second
Chris Broad averaged 78 as an England opener Down Under - but remains one of the rare success stories
Broad is a fan of the intent shown under Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum, so his criticism is not filtered by rose-tinted specs. But he says England in general and Crawley in particular need to pick length better on Australian pitches.
‘That’s the critical factor,’ he says. ‘If it’s short, great, you can have a swing and hit it to the boundary. If it’s very full, great – wherever it’s bowled, have a hit.
'But some of the shots I’m seeing are against length balls, and there is a massive gap between where the ball bounces and where the batter is playing it. In that time, the ball can deviate just enough to catch the edge. They’ve got to be much better at picking length.
‘Zak has been inflexible in his career to date. I’ve seen him score big hundreds, so he can do it. He’s just got to get over that first hour’s play. And on pitches that do a bit, like Perth and Brisbane, he is more vulnerable than any other batter in the team, because he just goes hard at it all the time. Sometimes you just wish he could change his attitude a bit, and let the bowlers bowl to him, rather than going after the ball all the time.’
Even Broad, though, failed to score a hundred at the Gabba. In fact, no England opener achieved the feat until Mark Butcher in 1997-98, on their 16th visit to the venue. Since then, only Alastair Cook and Andrew Strauss have joined the club, during England’s epic second-innings 517 for one in 2010-11.
Butcher, who averaged 61 from six first-class innings at the Gabba, including two with England A, remembers telling himself to be positive, though not as a Bazballer might understand the term. But he also recalls the gameplan he tried to respect in Australia.
‘There were two things we talked about,’ he says. ‘The English shot – the punch off the back foot through extra cover – was a no no, and so was driving on the up against the new ball. Those were your golden rules.
‘It’s either straight back down the pitch, or it’s the cut and pull and nudge off the hip. The only time I think I drove through extra cover at all was when leg-spinner Stuart MacGill was on and got a little full.’
Mark Butcher drove through the covers once spinner Stuart MacGill went too full at the Gabba - but otherwise it's straight or square
Butcher celebrates his century in 1998 in Brisbane - a ground where he averaged 61
Like Broad, Butcher stresses the importance of staying positive. First, because it gets your feet moving. Second, because getting bogged down in Australia makes you a ‘sitting duck’. And, like Broad, he enjoys England’s intent.
But Butcher adds: ‘It needs to be tempered with a bit of care and attention. There are certain things you give the opposition bowlers. That area is yours, no problem, I’m not messing with it – but I’ll take you on if you’re outside of that.
‘We’ve been talking about Zak in and out of the commentary box for his entire career, really. And you’d bank on him getting out like he did in Perth. You have to play for your off stump, and because the ball can bounce at the Gabba, and the bounce is true, it can go over the top of the stumps.’
Butcher would like to see Crawley revert to the approach that brought him 65 from 126 balls against India at Headingley in June, when he and Ben Duckett gave England’s chase of 371 the perfect start with a risk-free opening stand of 188.
It seemed to herald a new era of grown-up Bazball, only for Crawley to average 24 in nine subsequent innings since.
‘If he plays the way he played Jasprit Bumrah at Headingley, and gets a bit of luck, which you need as an opener in Australia, he can make runs,’ says Butcher. ‘He was much tighter around off stump, played with the full face of the blade, and played the ball closer to him. If you ally that with his shot-making ability, then he’s got a chance.’
Crawley’s broader problem is that Australian pitches are not as flat as they once were, which makes his tendency to hit through the line and drive on the up a weakness, not the potential strength for which England had budgeted. And the long gap between Tests means pundits need something to talk about.
Former England captain Nasser Hussain summed up the conundrum on Sky Sports: ‘England believed Crawley would go well in Australia because of the type of player he is, but he’s going to have to really dig deep and work it out. You can’t be driving at Mitchell Starc in the first over of an Ashes Test.’
Crawley’s broader problem is that Australian pitches are not as flat as they once were, which makes his tendency to hit through the line and drive on the up a weakness, not a strength
Crawley and Ben Duckett have a blueprint for how to handle Australian conditions - their opening partnership against India at Headingley this summer
One former England opener, who asked not to be named, did not mince his words: ‘Zak’s game is a mess, really. It has been from the very start. He’s played 60 Test matches and still hasn’t got any better.’
And if the timings work against him during Brisbane’s day/night Test, and he ends up batting against the pink ball under lights against the in-form Starc, life will not get any easier.
‘You have to be more careful on Australian pitches that do a bit more, like Perth and and the Gabba,’ says Broad. ‘Those length balls outside off stump: leave them alone!
‘Brisbane is hot and humid, and bowlers don’t like running in and seeing a ball go through to the keeper when they’ve expended a whole load of energy. If you can’t hit it for runs, leave it – because you’re only going to get yourself out.’
