England Win First Ashes Test Cricket Match

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Day five (close): England (215 & 375) beat Australia (296 & 280) by 14 runs.

Jubilation: James Anderson leads the celebrations after the third umpire gave Brad Haddin out Photo: GETTY IMAGES
By Telegraph Sport, and agencies
2:48PM BST 14 Jul 2013
26 Comments
James Anderson secured victory for England by 14 runs in the first Investec Ashes Test in a gripping encounter against Australia at Trent Bridge.

Tireless Anderson (five for 73) bowled 13 successive overs on an agonising final morning, his burst of three wickets for six runs helping to give him 10 in the match.

But in the end it needed yet another DRS referral, in this epic contest dominated by them, to ensure England's pace linchpin ended the late heroics of Brad Haddin (71) in a 10th-wicket stand of 65 with James Pattinson as Australia were bowled out for 296 just after lunch.

There were unmistakable echoes of Edgbaston 2005 – when England famously prevailed by just two runs in similar circumstances – by the time Anderson had Haddin caught behind off an inside edge after Aleem Dar had initially given the Australia wicketkeeper not out.

Anderson's accomplice this morning, after almost an hour had elapsed with no joy – and plenty of concern for any Englishmen in a sold-out crowd – was Alastair Cook, with three catches at first slip.

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It was only right that captain should properly reward his pace linchpin, after asking near superhuman efforts of him from the Radcliffe Road end.

It was with the third ball of his eighth over that Anderson struck for the first time today when he had Ashton Agar flashing the first catch to slip, to end a stubborn and increasingly threatening seventh-wicket stand of 43 with Haddin.

Then, in a second consecutive wicket maiden, Mitchell Starc went for only a single when Cook again provided the safe hands for a similar dismissal off another expansive outside-edge.

Cook needed two opportunities to see off Peter Siddle the same way, dropping the Australia number 10 on 10 but taking an even better catch diving two-handed away to his right to put England within one wicket of their 1-0 lead in this Investec series.

That, however, was a mere preface of what was to follow when Pattinson joined Haddin with a highly-improbable 80 runs still needed and England by contrast banking on just one more mistake from the last pair. Instead, it was home errors which kept the tension climbing into the afternoon, as Haddin's wicket might twice have ended the match in England's favour before lunch.

First, a Jonny Bairstow direct hit from cover would have run the Australian wicketkeeper out for 61, with 39 runs still needed; then three runs later Steven Finn, whose two overs cost 24 today, was unable to hold a tough diving chance on the deep square-leg boundary from a Haddin sweep at Graeme Swann.

Survival had been the only obvious intent from Agar and Haddin, when play began on an initially cloudy morning which required the use of floodlights. They duly came through more than half-an-hour against the old ball, before England decided - two overs after it was available - it was time to take the new one.

The tourists had mustered only 17 runs in 11 overs to add to their overnight score, and England were still strong favourites.

But as the skies brightened, Haddin judged the hardness of the ball could work to his advantage as well as England's on a slow, worn pitch.

Cook deployed Anderson in unaccustomed mode with wicketkeeper Matt Prior standing up.

The seamer still had enough energy to continue with the new ball but had Haddin coming at him by then - lofted shots over cover bringing him a two and then a boundary in the same over.

Even as partners seemed surely to be running out at the other end, when Anderson eventually had to have a breather, Haddin cashed in to pass a defiant 115-ball 50 with a rush of boundaries off Finn.

He kept the outcome of this remarkable match uncertain till the last.

When the end did come, it was in the most fitting if slightly awkward circumstances that Haddin had to go via DRS, after a series of contentious decisions - principally involving Dar and third umpire Marais Erasmus - underpinned so many of the thrills and spills here.

Yay!  
A bit close though! 

wjk wrote:Yay!  
A bit close though! 

Hi wjk, I have not got Sky Sport so have been watching the highlights every night , nailbiting stuff. Was really looking forward to watching tonight and saw the article in the Telegraph.  

Well done England.

You must watch it tonight, Panda. It was excellent.   

wjk wrote:You must watch it tonight, Panda. It was excellent.   

I'm just watching it NOW.

 Oh right. Enjoy! 

Ashes 2013: England's Jimmy Anderson heading towards greatness
Michael Holding, the West Indies fast bowler who was known as ‘Whispering Death’, has a good yardstick for judging bowlers. Only when one has taken at least four wickets-per-Test over a long period of time, can they be considered ‘great’.

Star: Jimmy Anderson celebrates another Australian wicket in his match-winning performance for England Photo: AFP/Getty Images
By Simon Hughes
10:00PM BST 14 Jul 2013
46 Comments
Of quick bowlers Fred Trueman managed it, and so did Australia’s Glenn McGrath, the irrepressible New Zealander Richard Hadlee and the exceptional West Indian Malcolm Marshall.

With his 10 wickets, Jimmy Anderson nudged closer to that milestone. He now has 317 wickets in 83 Tests. He is on the verge of greatness.

Anderson’s second 10-wicket haul at Trent Bridge was very different from his first three years ago, against Pakistan, and illustrates how much he has developed in that time.

Those wickets were mostly top-order players dismissed using lavish, conventional swing with the new, or newish ball. Here virtually all his wickets were achieved by making a roughed up ball move one way or another.

This has been the major enhancement in his game – finding just enough movement in the air or off the surface with an older ball and utilising it brilliantly.

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In that sense he is peerless. No one else has his range of skills and adaptability, nor given his 13-over spell on Sunday morning, his stamina.

He cruised into bowl for an hour and a half, unwaveringly, unstintingly, with metronomic accuracy. In those 13 overs he conceded only three boundaries, and two of those were off the edge, as he probed away relentlessly around off-stump, insistent with his questioning of the batsman’s technique.

Like the great Hadlee – a similar style of bowler to Anderson – he is an indefatigible examiner.

Hadlee once said that an over was like having six bullets in a gun and you used each bullet strategically to get your opponent into a vulnerable position before nailing him.

Since Anderson has teamed up with England’s bowling coach David Saker, you can see him doing that.

On day four Anderson was moving the left-handed Chris Rogers around the crease, drawing him across his stumps with a succession of balls curving away delivered from round the wicket, trying to get him overbalancing and pinning him lbw with one that went the other way.

Eventually he got him with a cutter that had the same effect, causing him to chip a catch to midwicket as he fell over. Anderson signalled acknowledgement to Saker after that wicket.

On the final day, he immediately struck up a superb rhythm and began nagging away incessantly at Brad Haddin’s resolve. The pitch had gone to sleep, but there was just enough reverse swing to keep him watchful.

Anderson swung a few away, Haddin was resolutely behind them. He tried the odd inswinger. Haddin, hanging on the back foot fearing lbws, playing the ball as late as possible, defiantly kept them out. He gave him nothing to hit.

The ball he eventually dismissed Ashton Agar was superbly contrived, as it was proceeded by inswingers from round the wicket, forcing him to play, then a ball that was angled in on the same line but curved away and drew a fatal prod to one he could have left.

Reverse swing permits this kind of precise interrogation. It is more controllable than conventional swing. Once the ball is in the required state, you know as a bowler it will go the way you intend, and usually the degree too. Normal – ie new ball – swing is far less well behaved.

It is like a supermarket trolley. It has a mind of its own. Unless your release is exactly right, the seam in a perfect position, conventional swing is highly unco-operative. Start it on off stump and it will go. Start it on leg stump and it will not.

Anderson is at the forefront of England's ball management as they strive to get one side as worn and ragged as possible.

He is the one mainly bowling wobble-seam deliveries that land by the side of the seam rather than on it, he is the one who shies at the stumps from mid-on, deliberately bouncing the ball in the dirt around the wicket-ends, it is he who cradles the ball delicately between his thumb and forefinger as he is polishing it to avoid getting his sweaty palms on the parched leather.

On dry pitches, reverse swing is actually a more dangerous weapon than spin when employed by an operator as slick as Anderson. Graeme Swann will happily concede that.

He was, of course, indebted to the fielders for his match-winning performance, not just Alastair Cook’s slip catching but Ian Bell’s agility, too.

Twice he dived at extra cover and prevented a single to Haddin. It was this that persuaded him to chase a slightly wider length ball with a hint of inswing that induced the crucial edge.

He had taken all four of the wickets England required in 15 flawless overs at a personal cost of just 29.

Anderson might not be a ‘great’ quite yet, but, green pitch or bare, he has become, for Australia, Public Enemy No1.