In a nail-biting contest that took place on day four at Headingley, England was successful in containing a furious Mitchell Starc and regaining a one-game lead in the series.
In a nail-biting 4th day at Headingley, which saw England record a dramatic triumph to maintain the series intact at 2-1, Harry Brook’s fearless 75 ran circles around the five-wicket haul of Mitchell Starc. Brook’s innings was the deciding factor.
At Headingley regarding Day 4 of the series, England prevailed in a nail-biting drama by holding off a furious Mitchell Starc and gaining a one-run advantage in the series.
After wreaking havoc at the start of England’s innings, Starc came back to send back the England hitter with Harry Brook bringing England near to victory. At that point, the hosts needed barely more than 20 runs to win the game. Starc sent out the England batter.
After Australia continued to take wickets at regular intervals, the batsman who put England’s effort together was the half-centurion. From 171/6 following the break for lunch, Chris Woakes and Brook moved England toward success with a half-century currently stand, but Brook’s aggressive pull shot almost let Australia regain the game. Chris Woakes and Brook pushed England closer to victory than Australia.
In the following over, though, Mark Wood dispatched Pat Cummins for a key six, and then in the following over, he crushed Mitchell Starc’s half-volley for four runs, putting an end to any concerns of an Australian recovery.
In the earlier part of the day, Starc’s rapid strikes during the day missed to create the breakdown that Australia was hoping for in the initial game of day four of the match. In the tenth over of the innings, Starc was able to get Ben Duckett out by catching him in front of the wicket. Duckett had been a problem for Australia in the last test match.
England sent Moeen Ali in at No.3 in a surprising move with Harry Brook, who played at the spot in the first innings, moving down below Joe Root to No.5.
However, Moeen’s plan failed, and he was bowled out by Starc for five runs after Starc had cleaned him up.
Joe Root teamed up with Zak Crawley, who had a positive attitude, and the two of them rebuilt England. The partnership went off to a fast start, but shortly after Australia appeared to be losing control of the match, Mitchell Marsh hit with a ball bowled at medium pace.
The seamer got a piece of the leading edge of Crawley’s bat, and England was already down to their third wicket without having reached triple digits.
When Brook first started playing, he was quite reserved, which was not typical of his play, but he quickly shifted gears as his self-assurance increased.
The middle-order hitter smashed 3 boundaries in just two overs to boost the ante after scoring 1 off eight deliveries and 8 off sixteen deliveries respectively earlier in the innings.
Cummins, who was bowling for Australia, got Root out for 21 by bowling a short ball along the leg side that the batter edged to the wicketkeeper. This was a breakthrough for Australia that went against the flow of the game.
Brook proceeded to go straight at the bowling as well as raced into the forties when Australia attempted an over of spin just before the break. This was despite the fact that the wicket occurred quite close to lunch.
When England appeared to be on track to an easy victory before the lunch break, things suddenly changed after the interval when Starc removed Ben Stokes along with Jonny Bairstow in rapid succession. This caused England to fall behind very quickly.
The two massive punches had the visitors on their back foot while England remained a bit away, but Brook remained in perfect shape and proceeded to prepare for his attempts. They were able to build a rapid partnership that tormented the opposition thanks, in part, to the additional batting alternative down the order that they had in the form of Woakes.
Brook finished 1000 test runs, being the fastest player to reach the landmark in terms of deliveries faced, and he reached his fifty while Woakes was also beginning to find his way at the other end. Woakes was also beginning to discover his feet at the opposite end.
When Brook was ejected by Starc at a vital stage in the game, the partnership was broken, but England was able to keep their composure and secure the victory.
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Aon Ali has graduated from the Institute of Engineering and Technology, Multan in 2012 and then he started his career in a local News agency as an IT manager. Later on, he started creating news reports for the sports category. Since he is fond of cricket, so most of his work is in the coverage of news related to local cricket events.
