Week in Summary (02/12/24 - 08/12/24)

Picking up from where I left off last week, I'll be recapping this week's test matches. We had more drama in the second Border Gavaskar Trophy test, unsurprisingly, another dominant display from England in New Zealand, the second test between South Africa and Sri Lanka, and the end of the final test between the West Indies and Bangladesh. Once again, I'll be skipping over the white ball games we've seen this week in favour of focussing on the longer format (sorry again, Pakistan and Zimbabwe fans).

Australia vs India

Panic averted for Australia, for now at least. India's dominant display lead to a complete emotional collapse from much of the Australia sports press, but a dominant display of their own has put Australia back on level terms in this series, a position you would expect them to build from strongly at home. As we know, India have never come back from a thumping in Adelaide strongly to win a series. 2020/21? No idea what you mean...

Mitchell Starc set the tone of this test in a strikingly similar fashion to that in which he started the 2021/22 Ashes, as rapped Jaiswal on the pads, plumb in front, with the first ball of the game. That wicket will taste particularly sweet after some chat from the young star about Starc's pace, or lack thereof, in the first test. At the age of 34, Starc went on to take his best innings figures of 6-48, notably picking up the wickets of Jaiswal's opening partner, KL Rahil and Virat Kohli, as well India's top-scorer Reddy, Ashwin and Rana.

Rahul, continuing in his makeshift position as opener despite the return of his skipper, got off to another decent start before he failing to leave one and edging it to McSweeney at gully. Shubman Gill, effectively opening after Jaiswal fell to the first ball of the game, also got off to a handy start which he failed to capitalise upon, falling foul of some tight bowling from Scott Boland, in for the injured Hazelwood, who pinned him in front for 31. Only, Pant, Reddy and Ashwin showed any further resistance as Australia finished the job nicely to bowl India out for 180 on day one.

It looked a lot like this test could've gone the same way as the first after Bumrah got Khawaja for just 13, but Labuschagne and McSweeney each found some form at exactly the right time to put on a sensible and some bromidic partnership 67, from 153 balls mind you, to recover well from the early wicket. McSweeney finally got a decent score, eventually falling for 39 to Bumrah, and Labuschagne got a much needed 50+ score, just his fourth of the year, with a useful 64.

Smith's struggles continued, as he failed to escape single figures, but then came Travis Head's time. He blazed a stunning 140 from 141 balls before getting bowled by Siraj, which lead to a rather bizarre send off, reminiscent of Ollie Robinson after dismissing Kahwaja for a similar score in the Ashes last year, and some back and forth between the two, primarily in post-day interviews. There's always a bit of spice to look forward to in these matches between two of cricket's heavyweights.

India struggled to get off the mark again in their second innings. Jaiswal failed to reach a match aggregate of 30 runs for just the fifth time in his 16 game career, Gill and Pant both posted scores of 28, and Reddy managed to top score again with an identical score of 42. In his first four test innings, Reddy has scored 41, 38*, 42 and 42. Surely some kind of record in terms of consistency, with just 5 runs separating his high and low scores.

Captain Cummins was the pick of the bowlers for Australia as he bagged a 13th career 5fer, getting things started as he had Rahul nicking behind to Carey, although it was primarily Boland and Starc who went through the Indian top order. Boland did particularly to well to find the edge of Jaiswal, who had made a decent start this time around, for 24, as well as Kohli for just 11. Starc chipped in with the wickets of Gill and Pant, before Cummins cleaned up the lower order and Boland finished things off by dismissing Siraj, India all out for just 150.

This was the first time India have been all out for two totals of less than 200 since their loss to Australia at Indore at the start of 2023. The last time it happened against a side other than the Aussies was against New Zealand in Wellington in 2020. With a target of just 19 after two tremendous bowling displays from Australia, the openers had no issues this time around. It took just 20 balls to get the job done with no loss of wicket, and the series is now all square, and set up for a real thriller. The question now is whether Australia can capitalise, as one would expect them to when playing in home conditions, on this bit of momentum.

New Zealand vs England

The kiwis managed to largely put their fielding woes behind them in the second test against England, but still found themselves outplayed by Ben Stokes and his bazballers. A classy bowling display in the first innings saw England all out for 280, which would've been a significantly smaller number were it not for another ton from Harry Brook, supported once again by Ollie Pope. The rest of the England batting order struggled, but that one partnership of 174 proved enough to get them to a respectable total.

Matt Henry bowled extremely well for the reward of just two wickets, perhaps finding a little too much movement at times as he saw the ball going past the outside edge on a regular basis. Nathan Smith put his poor economy rate to one side as he picked up four wickets, including Joe Root with some assistance from an impressive, if slightly exaggerated, diving catch from Daryl Mitchell in the slips.

England then responded by simply out-bowling New Zealand. Carse was once again the pick of the bowlers with his pace, bounce and intelligent control of length, the particular highlight coming when he found the edge of Williamson, one of the current great test batters, after he got off to a handy start of 37 from 56. No other kiwi batter got off to a real start, and Gus Atkinson finished off proceedings with a test hat trick to add to his century and 10fer at Lords early this year, in what must be one of the more impressive first 6 months of a test career, particularly for a player who wasn't evening opening the bowling for his county when he got selected for his country.

In their second innings, England got their foot well and truly on the throat of the kiwis as they marched to a series-winning total of 427/6d. Zak Crawley's struggles against the skill of Matt Henry continued, as he once again fell without scoring a run against him. That match up is now one of very few highlights for New Zealand in this series, as Henry has now dismissed Crawley in all four innings for the cost of not a single run. Jacob Bethell, effectively opening once again after another failure from Crawley, got to within one boundary of a maiden professional century, before the nervous nineties got the better of him as some erratic shots eventually saw his demise.

Duckett also fell in the 90s after a game-breaking partnership of 187 with Bethell, before Joe Root's 36th test century, brought up with a reverse scoop no less, and yet another score from Brook rubbed more salt in the kiwis' wounds. Ben Stokes also got himself to 49, before declaring on 427 after Root's dismissal for 106. Joe Root now moves within 500 of Ricky Ponting's career total of 13378 test runs.

With a chase of 583 required to win, or batting out the best part of 9 sessions to draw, the fourth innings of this game looked to be a mere formality, compounded by an early collapse to 59/4 thanks in no small part to some very tight bowling from Chris Woakes, in what was certainly one of his finest spells away from home. Tom Blundell showed some fight and got himself to a much needed century at better than a run a ball, taking down Shoaib Bashir, before the young spinner eventually had the last laugh as Blundell attempted a scoop which Duckett read and ran behind his keeper to take the catch. Ben Stokes then finished off the tail with 3 wickets in just 14 balls as England locked in a series win to dispel the nightmares of their one run loss the last time their played in Wellington.

South Africa vs Sri Lanka

South Africa finished off this two match series with another strong display against what has been an impressive Sri Lanka side in recent times, putting themselves in a good position for World Test Championship final qualification by moving to the top of the table, for the time being.

First innings centuries from Ryan Rickelton, his first at this level, and Kyle Verreynne, plus another good score of 78 from skipper Temba Bavuma, saw the Proteas set a decent score of 358. Lahiru Kumara picked up four wickets but was rather expensive, and the same can be said for Asitha Fernando, whilst Vishwa Fernando and Prabath Jayasuriya kept things tighter for less reward.

Sri Lanka's first innings consisted of a series of starts but not much beyond that, which will surely be a cause for some disappointment. Only Pathum Nissanka got past 50, reaching 89 from the 157 balls he faced, whilst Chandimal, Mathews and Mendis all fell in the 40s. Dane Paterson bagged himself a maiden test 5 wicket haul as South Africa did well to keep the Sri Lankan batters in check and prevent too many big partnerships from building, and limited the total to 328 for a first innings lead of 30. Given the starts so much of the Sri Lanka batting made, they'll look back at this one with some regret.

With the game looking well poised going into South Africa's second innings, they too failed to capitalise on a series of good starts from their top 6 - they all got to at least 19 but only Markram (55) and Bavuma (66) managed to get past 50. Jayasuriya returned to his best wicket taking best, holding down an end and taking away figures of 5-129 from his 34 overs, but a total of 317 left Sri Lanka with the daunting prospect of chasing 348 to win the match.

The precedent for such a chase has been set. Sri Lanka pulled off one of the great fourth innings performances courtesy of Kusal Perera in 2019, the same year as Ben Stokes' Headingley miracle and in a strikingly similar fashion, also in South Africa, however the target proved too large this time around. Keshav Maharaj matched, or rather bettered, Jayasuirya's second innings performance to take 5-76 as Sri Lanka fell just over 100 runs short of their target. Captain Dhanajaya De Silva was this only batter to reach 50 - a significant point of concern for Sri Lanka going forward as they will need to a do a much better job of capitalising on starts and building big partnerships.

Sri Lanka are still in with a shout of reaching the World Test Championship final, which would be an undeniably massive achievement for a side who have struggled to return to their form greatness after the retirement of a host of all time greats, but will need other results to go their way as well as sweeping Australia next year. South Africa, on the other hand, have matters well and truly in their own hands. If they can win their two match series at home against Pakistan - which, given Pakistan's recent form when no industrial fans are involved, should be an achievable task - they'll most likely find themselves facing up against the winners of the ongoing Border Gavaskar Trophy at Lords in June.

West Indies vs Bangladesh

Bangladesh responded well to a battering in the first test to tie up the two match series, largely through the strength of their bowling in a low scoring affair in Kingston. Shadman Islam's 64 got Bangladesh to a seemingly disappointing total of 164, as Kemar Roach, Jayden Seales, Shamar Joseph and Alzarri Joseph all picked up wickets, but a maiden five wicket haul for the exciting 22 year old quick bowler Nahid Rana saw the West Indies collapse in a heap for just 146 after a decent top-order showing. Kraigg Braithwaite played a typical knock for 39 from 129, with Keacy Carty playing in a similar manner for 40 from 115, before numbers 4 to 11 all fell for single digit scores.

Bangladesh capitalised well on a first innings lead of 20 and the little push of momentum that can provide in a low scoring game, as they put on 268. Only Jaker Ali reached 50, falling just short of a maiden test century for 91, but another ahndy score of 46 from Islam and a quickfire 42 from 39 balls for skipper Mehidy Hasan Miraz allowed the Tigers to set a tricky total of 287.

After the fast bowling youngster Rana picked up five in the first innings, it was the turn of the more experienced left arm spinner Taijul Islam this time round, as he notched up figures of 5-50 on the way to bowling the Windies out for just 285, more than 100 short of their target. Braithwaite picked up the pace to score 43 from 63, and Kavem Hodge bagged himself a fourth career score of 50+, but the rest of the Windies batting struggled to get off the mark. Bangladesh tied up the two match series with a day to spare, and will be pleased with their response following a disappoint display in the first game.