Geoff Lemon's Blog, page 10
November 25, 2024
India beat Australia by 295 runs: first men’s Test, day four – as it happened
Travis Head’s defiant 89 delayed the inevitable in Perth, where India completed a crushing victory just after tea
8th over: Australia 19-4 (Smith 4, Head 1) A maiden for Siraj, bowling to Head, who is playing just about everything to the leg side, hopping about a bit just to keep the ball out.
7th over: Australia 19-4 (Smith 4, Head 1) A couple of singles from the Bumrah over, both batters nudging to the leg side, keeping out the threat.
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November 24, 2024
Kohli and Jaiswal put ruthless India on verge of crushing victory over Australia
Cricket probably doesn’t owe Virat Kohli anything. It has given him riches beyond imagination, influence beyond reason, recognition that has built into idolatry. But then, he has given cricket riches, both in the literal cash churned from his name and the intangible of what his story has added to the game. So if the game owed him anything, perhaps it was a lucky break, one generous chance at a century to ease the tension of a lean 18 months without one. Walking out with India two wickets down, 321 runs ahead, with Yashasvi Jaiswal immaculately set on 141 and Australia already wheezing, the game delivered one.
The third day of this first Test saw the real Perth appear. Not the mild impostor of the two days prior, with their gentle temperatures and occasional cloud. By the middle of day three, even in the shade, the heat buffeted up against you like a herd of cattle jostling through a gate. Horrible stuff to bowl in, more horrible still for players who knew they had let a match slip with a bad batting hour of their own.
Continue reading...November 23, 2024
India reap the rewards of patience after Australia hit the brakes | Geoff Lemon
Visitors ease away to a commanding lead as Australia fade to the point of missing small moments on day two of the first Test in Perth
Imagine you’re doing the Keanu Reeves bit in Speed. You’re on a bus that can’t drop below 50 miles an hour or it will explode. It’s high-octane stuff, even if the bus is running on diesel. You have to avoid collisions, do sick jumps, kindle a romance with Sandra Bullock. But then imagine there’s a change in script. Dennis Hopper rings up with a different idea. Now, the bus has a maximum speed. And that speed is 10 miles an hour. Chill.
It was this sort of change that came over the first Test between Australia and India on its second day. On the first day, Australia had taken all 10 India wickets for 150, then lost seven of their own by stumps for 67. But after the early exchanges on the second morning, the match morphed from fast-forward chaos to careful, considered, and conventional. The slowdown though was only good for one team. We are stretching the metaphor beyond breaking point, but even if this bus was only going at 10 miles an hour, it was driving inexorably away from Australia.
Continue reading...Australia v India: first men’s Test, day two – as it happened
Opening pair guide visitors to 172-0 after their bowlers dismiss Australia for 104 at Perth Stadium
There it is! Rana short and nasty, Lyon punches it, fist rather than bat, to gully for a looping catch, KL Rahul running in with his locks flowing. Lyon just couldn’t evade that, the ball followed him. Good fast bowling.
33rd over: Australia 79-8 (Starc 11, Lyon 5) Bumrah to Starc, nasty bouncer first ball that’s just over his front shoulder, Starc having to work to evade it. Then nearly getting a leading edge as Starc tries to clip across his pad to a ball angling away. Does make contact with the same shot next ball to midwicket. He’s rotating strike decently but how long can it last? Bumrah cuts Lyon in half. Surely a wicket comes shortly.
Continue reading...November 22, 2024
Festival of fast bowling leaves India on top after Australia collapse
There were no demons in the Perth pitch, but the hosts could not cope with the brilliance of Jasprit Bumrah
More than any pitch in the world, people talk about Perth. In our collective memory, it was always the Waca, fast and furious enough for decades of sequels. These days the city’s cricket venue has hopped from the western bank of the Swan to the east at Perth Stadium, but in our collective contemporary consciousness the pitch is still essentially the Waca, spiritually the Waca. It was literally formed from the same clay, and as per the story about beings created that way, one half of the pair might as well have been made from the body of the other.
So if you look at the scorecard for the first day of the Australia-India Test at Perth, you would very reasonably have one question first. What in the hell was the pitch doing? India all out for 150 in two sessions, then Australia stumbling to the brink in the third, needing an Alex Carey miracle on day two to save them from 67 for 7. Seventeen wickets in the day, all to pace bowlers. It must have been an untameable monster, no? A golem with the face of Dennis Lillee and eyes of desert fire, hungry for the taste of batting dreams?
Well, not really. There was coverage this week of young curator Isaac McDonald, belying a gruff exterior by saying how nervous he was about his surfaces before big matches. He might be struggling with his dinner looking at the scores. But from what could be seen at the ground, he has done nothing wrong. It was a pitch with good bounce and carry, lively enough to give some lateral movement: tricky while offering nothing in the realm of treachery. It provided a brilliant spectacle for enjoyers of fast bowling. Various batters coped for a time. But overall, none could cope for long enough although it should not have been beyond them.
Australia v India: first men’s Test, day one – as it happened
Thanks Marty, and good morning from Perth, as it is here. Lovely day, stripes of high white cloud, no precipitation in them, and strands of blue in between that mean we’re getting periods of sunshine. And it’s mild! Temperate! Not the anvil-busting Perth temperatures of legend. At least not until later in the week. Australia won’t mind bowling in the cool conditions.
The countdown is well and truly on to the first ball in this blockbuster five-Test series. Thanks for following along to this point – Geoff Lemon will now steer you through the rest of the build up and across the first half of the day’s play.
Continue reading...November 20, 2024
Rejigged India can draw strength from 2021 – but still face uphill struggle | Geoff Lemon
The visitors have some unfamiliar faces as they look to make it three series wins in a row down under
Arriving in Australia in the ember weeks of 2024, the Indian Test team is in an unusual position. They are, in a sense, defending champions. Starting in 1947, Asian teams toured Australia 30 times in a row without winning a series. Most of the time they didn’t come close: Australia won 24, six drawn. It was January 2019 in Sydney, after more than seven decades, that India’s run mountain while leading the series forced the home team to bat for a draw. India finished 2-1 and the impassable was overcome. Two summers later, thanks to the vagaries of a new touring program, India returned and did it again, this time sealing the same scoreline with a comeback run chase for the ages in Brisbane.
India became the subcontinent team that figured out how to win in Australia, taking down the first-choice home bowling attack both times in the process. Then last year, when hosting was reversed, Australia got swatted in Nagpur and Delhi to let India keep a grip on the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in the briefest time possible, just one more series win in India for a juggernaut that was unbeatable at home for a dozen years.
Continue reading...September 29, 2024
Australia learned lessons on white-ball tour of England – for good and ill | Geoff Lemon
The touring side acquired useful knowledge over the course of the T20 and ODI series but failed to find out more about some newer players
In the end, it was a strange way to end a strange white-ball tour. Steve Smith captaining a one-day match in Bristol in place of Mitchell Marsh, who was captaining in place of Pat Cummins, but whose previous absence in a T20 had been filled by Travis Head. Matt Short replacing Marsh as opener, having been replaced by Marsh a match earlier, after replacing Marsh for two games after Marsh had replaced Short from the T20s. Cooper Connolly getting his second game in Australian colours but still not getting a bat.
It was a strange game watching Australia race the clock and the autumn clouds, trying to face 20 overs of the chase before imminent rain ended the day, needing to stay ahead of the required tally to be awarded a score-projection win and take the series 3-2 should the clouds burst. Rain came four balls after the required overs were reached. A flurry of striking from Short, Smith and Josh Inglis had lifted them to 165-2, enough for the mathematicians to deduce that 144 from 30 overs was sufficiently within Australia’s grasp to deserve the assumption of reaching England’s 309. That omits the possibility of a change in trajectory like the one that England’s own innings suffered, but it’s the cost of doing statistical business.
Continue reading...September 28, 2024
AFL grand final 2024: Brisbane Lions defeat Sydney Swans – as it happened
If you’re new to AFL, Australian rules football or (trust me) “footy”, perhaps happy to dip in and out of the action across the season, or just here for Katy Perry and the rest of the pre-match entertainment, then we have the guide for you!
The grand final showdown between the Swans and Lions might be a puzzler for neutrals, casual fans and bandwagon jumpers, but Alex McKinnon helps you decide which team should win the hearts and minds of the undecided masses:
Continue reading...September 10, 2024
Australia and England edge towards next generations amid return of familiar foes | Geoff Lemon
Mitch Marsh will lead T20 and ODI squads filled with fresh faces out to make an impact in clashes with the old enemy where the stakes always rise
The impression is not borne out by fact, but it feels like a long time since Australia last played in England. So intense was the 2023 Ashes period, with both men’s and women’s series condensed into June and July, that the 13 months since have sensorily expanded in the mind. An unusual feeling given that international cricket now revolves around Australia, England and India playing one another on an endless carousel, though granted, those teams managed to meet in two different flavours of men’s World Cup in the interim.
Still, those Australia-England encounters both came in the pool stage and ended up suitably damp. A full series of three T20s and five one-day matches has more heft. Bilateral contests these days get criticised as pointless money-makers, meaningless without context. The World Cup Super League qualifiers created context for one-day cricket but was abandoned after a few short years. T20s have only ever been for exhibition.
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