Siddle's experience could master Dukes, Lord's

The post-mortem conducted on Australia’s first Test performance that careered off the rails like a malfunctioning funicular has identified all manner of faulty component parts that contributed to the eventual pile up at the bottom.

Struggle to come to grips with a slow pitch. Inability to prevent runs with the ball. Inability to find runs with the bat.

Failure to grasp vital chances. Caught out by England plans. Unable to execute plans against England. Trying too hard to constantly attack. Finding England’s constant attack all too trying.

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But Peter Siddle, the bowler rated by teammates as the best-performed in the pre-Test warm-up games and toughest to face in the Cardiff nets and therefore a definite chance to play at Lord’s come Thursday, has a refreshingly honest take on what vexed Australia’s quicks in Wales.

In essence, the dark-red Dukes-brand ball that the Australians had hoped would swing like Carnaby Street circa 1966 was suddenly doing so to such an extent that – rather like that epoch of excess – they lost their bearings and found it difficult to regain control.

Whereas England’s seamers were able to harness the movement, keep a tight rein on Australia’s habitually free-scoring batsmen and then utilised the conditions subtly rather than being seduced by what was on offer and being punished for the zeal.

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“I think we just get too excited sometimes as bowlers,” Siddle said today following his team’s arrival in London, where preparations for the tour’s centrepiece – the Lord’s Test with all its pomp and pageantry – begin tomorrow ahead of Thursday’s scheduled start.

“It doesn’t matter if you’ve played here (in the UK) a lot or if you haven’t.

“Once you see  (the ball) start swinging you want to swing it even more, whereas in English conditions you probably want to go the other way where you can stand it (the seam) up a bit more and it will swing for you rather than try to force it.

“You’ve just got to be patient here. That’s the big key in England.

“The wickets are probably going to be a bit drier and a bit slower, so you just have to take your time and be patient.

“And the wickets will come, as we did see in Cardiff.”

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While wickets fell with a clatter in Wales – 40 of them across less than 12 sessions with both teams surviving just 70 overs each in their respective second innings – England’s batsmen were able to maintain a scoring rate above four runs an over throughout.

By contrast, Australia managed barely three-and-a-half but tellingly lost a bulk of their wickets to overtly attacking strokeplay.

So if they are to bounce back at Lord’s, they must find a method of being positive but not reckless with the bat, and settling on a similar equilibrium with the ball.

Which is why Siddle, long renowned for his capacity to maintain impeccable control and exert that pressure that invariably delivers wickets, is now being touted as a potential addition to the starting XI as doubts over Mitchell Starc’s fitness persist.

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Starc was troubled by soreness to the back of his right ankle during the first Test and was limping noticeably on the third day, although Siddle indicated the left-arm quick had “pulled up pretty well” in the two days since that match ended with England victorious by 169 runs.

However, it will be the workload he is able to sustain at training tomorrow and Wednesday that will ultimately decide his availability.

Should he fail to recover sufficiently, Siddle looms as not only the next in the pace-bowling pecking order but also the ideal replacement given the form he showed in earlier matches against Kent and Essex.

As well as his practice form in Cardiff where skipper Micheal Clarke revealed “nobody could lay a bat on him in the nets”.

Cut from the Test team after last summer’s opening Test against India in Adelaide, when he was replaced by previously uncapped seamer Josh Hazlewood, Siddle returned to domestic cricket with his KFC BBL franchise the Melbourne Renegades and Victoria in the Bupa Sheffield Shield.

He then utilised the period when many others were pursuing opportunities in the lucrative Indian Premier League to hone his skills in English conditions with county team Lancashire, before joining the Australia touring party in the Caribbean where he did not play a Test.

But the 30-year-old, who is the most recent Australia bowler to claim a Test hat-trick when he achieved the feat against England in Brisbane on his 26th birthday, believes he has regained much of the pace that went missing just prior to the time he did likewise from Test cricket.

And more importantly, he is now bowling with the sort of rhythm and control that characterised his days as leader of the Australia attack early in Clarke’s captaincy, and which has installed him as the most economical of the current Australia Ashes squad members over that time.

With the exception of allrounder Shane Watson, who is also under scrutiny heading into the second of five Tests even though his accurate wicket-to-wicket style of bowling is sorely needed.

“I'm feeling strong and fit, and I've got good rhythm,” Siddle said today. “I’m hitting the bat hard, and the ball is coming out well.

“I’m probably never going to bowl 145, 150kph again – that’s past.

“But I think what I’ve got now is a good skills set, being able to build pressure and I’ve got a lot more tricks in the bag than I have in the past.”

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The other variable that might well work in Siddle’s favour when it comes to deciding on the Lord’s XI, now that the Ashes holders are one-nil down and cannot afford to let another Test slip, is the venue for the second match.

The pronounced slope at Lord’s – the boundary on the north-west side is around 2.5m higher than that on the south-east – means bowlers with little or no experience at the Home of Cricket can become unnerved by the way the ball behaves due to the slight diagonal bearing of the pitch.

Mitchell Johnson has spoken in the past about how it affected him in a forgettable Test performance there six years ago, while Hazlewood has never represented Australia there and nor has Starc.

Given the waywardness Australia showed with the ball in Cardiff, the prospect of having bowlers lose their calibration due to topography as well profligacy might mean Siddle’s experience there in previous Tests, in county games and in last year’s Lord’s bicentenary fixture might prove decisive.

“It does take a bit of time to adjust to,” Siddle said of the unique and historic venue.

“It just plays on your mind a little bit, so I think it’s just that consistency of line and length that is the key on that (Lord’s) wicket.

“If you do stray that little bit more on leg side if you’re bowling down the hill, it can get whipped away and go down leg.

“So it’s just little things like that and I think my skills set suit the English conditions, but probably Lord’s a little bit better.”

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