Key events
Two types of citrus. Whilst I pad through to the kitchen briefly to sort some marmalade on toast and a caffeine hit you should definitely get stuck into m’colleague Geoff Lemon’s take on Nathan Lyon’s batting:
A statement from the MCC to have with your Kenco. The custodians of the Laws of Cricket have served to clarify matters in relation to that Starc/Duckett catch/non catch”
In relation to the below incident, Law 33.3 clearly states that a catch is only completed when the fielder has ‘complete control over the ball and his/her own movement,’” the organisation tweeted. “The ball cannot touch the ground before then. In this particular incident, Mitchell Starc was still sliding as the ball rubbed the ground, therefore he was not in control of his movement.”
Preamble
James Wallace
Hello and welcome to the final knockings of this second Ashes Test. Never a dull moment eh?
Yesterday saw a short pitched barrage from Ben Stokes’ England side that would have made Douglas Jardine proud. The mid-pitch blitzkrieg did the job in the end, not before a hobbling Nathan Lyon limped out to the middle to add bizarre coda to the end of the Australian innings that was ultimately worth 15 more runs to their total.
Set 361 runs to win, England were swaying on the ropes at 41-4, Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc ruthless with the new ball. The two Bens – Duckett and Stokes – managed to shore things up for England, the clearly hindered captain happy to play second fiddle to a pugilistic Duckett.
More drama arrived just before the close in the form of your friend and mine – the controversial catch. Duckett toe-edged a short ball to fine leg where Mitchell Starc took a fine diving catch. Or did he? Replays showed Starc dragged the ball along the turf after pouching the ball and third umpire Marais Erasmus was happy to chalk it off the wickets column. The Aussies were spewing and England were left still clinging on to the urn with about half a pinkie finger.
At 114-4 and still needing a further 257 runs to level the series 1-1 the odds are stacked against them. Exactly how they like it?
Jim here with the call for the end of this match. Are we about to witness more remarkable/controversial/scarcely believable scenes in this Test match? There’s only one way to find out.
