First Ashes Test. Edgbaston.

[K]

If the Oz batting were half competent, they would have been batting for at least a session or two on day two, when it was slow and flat. If the pitch keeps getting worse, even a mediocre spinner like Moheen will be difficult and some balls may scoot along the ground and get wickets bowled or LBW.

[Pies4shaw]

Well, that's quite unfair. The Australian batting was half competent - the end Warner was at and the end Smith was at.

Anyway, unless the umpiring gets better, we're going to have to start thinking about reviewing the bowled decisions as well as the lbs.

[K]

Warner's innings was very flaky. He nicked a ball down leg that they did not review. His play was tentative.

Head looked okay -- more fluent than Smith when they were batting together in session 1 -- but then got himself out. Khawaja's defence is dismal, as is his fielding.

And Oz's collapse happened while the oppo was down an opening bowler.

[Pies4shaw]

It's not a collapse until Smith is out.

[Jezza]

Smith enhances his reputation as Australia's best batsman since Bradman

[K]

Don't tell P4S, Jezza, but Smith is not in Australia's best three batsmen since Bradman.

(And the best Test batsman in the world today is not playing in this Test on either side.)

----------------------------------------------------

And some good news: if things get really ugly in the first session today, we can always switch to 7FLIX and watch The Sound of Music instead.

[K]

Odds:

England 72%
Draw 14%
Oz 13%.

Ouch. The money thinks even the draw is more likely than an Oz win. A draw would require either a day or more of rain, or the pitch to go into reverse at the end of day three like Benjamin Button, or at least two more bowlers to break down, never to bowl again.

[K]

Stokes 50 and out.

Cummins gets the breakthough, Paine the catcher.

England 5/282.

Healy: "I think we've been bowling too well. Bowl short and wide and you get the wicket."


Flat-track bully Bairstow is the new batsman.

[Donny]

5/282. Burns 127*, Cummins 2/71.

[K]

England take the lead.

Warne reckons 250 would be hard to chase, but how can Oz get that sort of lead?

[K]

That was allegedly Burns's 40th play and miss of his innings.

I wonder what the record is?

[K]

Athers tells us 40% of Bairstow's Test dismissals have been bowled.

That's a clear sign of a defective technique.

Nasser described during the WC how Bairstow's front elbow comes away, making his shots very bottom-handed.

[K]

Finally, Lyon gets Burns out nicking, more than 100 runs after he had him LBW but didn't review. No play and miss that time.

[Donny]

Lyon claims Burns for 133.

6/296.

[K]

And Lyon bowls Moeen in the same over!

It's funny. Pattinson hit Root's stumps and the bails stayed on.

And here Lyon knocked Moheen's off stump right out of the ground!