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Rory Burns

The England Opening Batsmen slots may be a huge mess and still needs fixing, but Zak Crawley played well during England’s 2nd innings spell on 77 a few days ago in Sydney as he deserves to keep his spot for Hobart and go from there to make up regular numbers like this one. However, Haseeb Hameed is the ultimate disappointment after he was given so many chances through four Test matches down under and was taken down too easily by the Australian bowlers which clearly shows he has to go.

I would have liked to gamble on Jos Buttler in his place by giving the gloves away as he knows how to get off the mark with a few blocks + range of dynamic strikes, but he had to go home over a broken finger. Rory Burns will take over Hameed where he also didn’t do well in the first two Tests, but he did score 34 in England’s 2nd innings at Adelaide Oval just before he was dropped & deserves a recall with Crawley that would hopefully turn out well than the previous opening pairs.

As said earlier, Buttler had to go home over a broken finger that gives Ollie Pope a recall this time in his place as the Wicket Keeper. He made a whopping four catches behind the stumps even though he was a sub fielder for Buttler last week in Sydney, now the runs may still be required but at least Pope will have the other half responsibilities and try to get the Aussies out with his gloves on.

And the rest remains unchanged with David Malan, Joe Root, Ben Stokes & Jonny Bairstow in the batting department; The same goes with the bowling through Mark Wood, Jack Leach, Stuart Broad and James Anderson plus Stokes included as a fast-bowling all-rounder.

It’s only the final Test to just stick with the full squad England sent out to Australia beforehand, then come back home and look out for not just a couple of opening batsmen but also frontline seamers to back Broad and Anderson up.

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England made four changes to their XI ahead of the third test today at the Melbourne Cricket Ground v Australia.

Happy to see Rory Burns replaced by Zak Crawley after an unfortunate first two tests, it’s not just the mediocre batting numbers but he also paid the price for poor fielding too. Meanwhile, Haseeb Hameed stayed on despite plenty of fans suggesting that he should be joining Burns towards the chop, but at least Hameed scored a couple of okay double-digit scores & deserves to be tested with a different opening partnership of Crawley.

No need to change the top-order pair that worked so well in skipper Joe Root & Dawid Malan as they hope to make up damage to the Aussies, but hopefully the promotion of Ben Stokes at 5 would help England at least deliver them a century or two in order to stay in contention.

Jonny Bairstow in for Ollie Pope at 6, who hopes to be an upgrade to help stretch England’s run chase as Pope may have fired off well in the 1st Test at The Gabba but couldn’t keep it consistent ever since which saw him walk out the door. And let’s hope that Jos Buttler continues where he left off from the 2nd innings in Adelaide last week by hanging in there & blocking out these good balls but he’s also under pressure to improve his catching behind the keeping gloves too.

Ollie Robinson stays at No.8 who continues to shine with the ball and can bat a bit, while Stuart Broad’s return last week in Adelaide didn’t help much for England despite a fantastic 1st innings v Australia’s batting so they got Mark Wood back in his place at 9. Now it’s kinda harsh to pull the plug on Chris Woakes on this one when he too showed some late form with the bat on 44 & should’ve replaced Robinson at 8 but he hasn’t done much with the ball though as England opted for a frontline spinner in Jack Leach & James Anderson retains his spot at No.11.

Both openers are unfortunately gone early just a while ago with Root & Malan up to the task to turn England’s poor start around as they are 35-2.

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England may have been given a free run at the Australian batting attack with a few wickets earlier in the 3rd innings yesterday, but it doesn’t mean they are back in contention when being way behind as England are required to chase down 468 after Australia declared 230-9 not long before tea. Going into Day 5 & England now 82-4 with 386 runs needed to on the fifth & final day today at Adelaide Oval.

Gotta say that Rory Burns may have batted slightly better this time on 34 but he’s yet to find any decent numbers so far this Ashes tour + his fielding hasn’t helped much either as it’s most likely that he’ll be replaced by Zak Crawley for the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne, while Joe Root & Dawid Malan did the heavy lifting both as part-time spinners with support from the quicks including Ollie Robinson who picked up two wickets in Australia’s 2nd innings run.

And great to see Jhye Richardson snatch up a six during his short time batting at the tail end as well as pile up two early wickets that would hopefully see Australia reach the finish line first later today, it’s also wonderful to see Marnus Labuschagne & Travis Head secure their 50s while Cameron Green scored a handy 33 runs as the quickie all-rounder that extended Australia’s lead further in this test match.

All eyes now on the England middle-order of Ben Stokes, Ollie Pope & Jos Buttler to turn this unlikely challenge around if they can, the same goes for the Australian bowling attack to finish the job & go 2-0 up in the 2021-22 Ashes series with three more test matches left.

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Australia continued to pile up more runs on Day 2 where they’ve set up a good batting total in the first innings of 473-9 via declaration not long after tea before they finished their hard day’s of work a bit early due to lightning & rain with the ball at 17-2.

Plenty of good moments that began from Marnus Labuschagne who secured his sixth Test 100 after he was fortunate to escape Jos Buttler’s sloppy catch of his gloves & cashed into runs, although Travis Head & Cameron Green were clean bowled for low scores but it doesn’t mean Australia regressed when Steve Smith batted superbly as stand-in skipper even though he was gutted not to escape the nervous 90s on 93 & we also saw Alex Carey score his 50 on his 2nd Test match.

We also cannot forget Michael Neser & Mitchell Starc, who not only scored quick fire spells in the mid 30s run mark, but they also shared two early wickets with the ball that gave another advantage going into Day 3 tomorrow for Australia & make more damage on England’s best remaining batting card as Neser is settling really well at Test level after waiting his debut for a very long time even though he’s 31 now.

England on the other hand may have caught up with a few wickets on hand with great areas around the stumps including an excellent late spell from James Anderson (2 wickets) not long before tea, however, they continued to leak runs when the fielding continued to flop such as Ollie Pope at the back & Jos Buttler with the hit and miss catches behind the keeping gloves.

But the one player who disappointed everyone so far this Ashes series is Rory Burns having miscommunicated that overthrow for four as well as still being vulnerable to the Australian quicks & not delivering these numbers as required at Test level, nothing to say right now as if he continues that poor start later in this game then it’s time to go by the Melbourne Boxing Day Test.

England need Dawid Malan & Joe Root to rekindle that spark tomorrow which worked so well in their 2nd innings run last week as it’s going to take a lot of time.

#AUSvENG #Ashes #Cricket #MarnusLabuschagne #SteveSmith #AlexCarey #MichaelNeser #MitchellStarc #JamesAnderson #Australia #England

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