'He's got another 10 years': Hosts revel in Root's revival

There were a couple of day-defining moments in yesterday's Ashes opener at Edgbaston, and England's reinstated keeper-batter Jonny Bairstow bore close witness to both.

The first arrived bang on the day's mid-point when England skipper Ben Stokes handed in his wicket in pursuit of his team's newly acquired 'Bazball' philosophy, and Bairstow joined immediate past captain Joe Root with the score a decidedly wobbly 5-176.

Even allowing for the team's pioneering approach to the Test game whereby no match situation is too daunting, no task too hopeless, it's been a while since England have bounced back from a similar brink in an Ashes battle to wrest control.

The last time they were able to more than double their final total from such a tricky position was at Old Trafford in the fabled 1981 'Botham's Ashes', due to the game-changing deeds of their former champion allrounder.

In that match, 'Old Golden Bollocks' as Botham became known to his teammates for his ability to singlehandedly carry his team in the days before 'Bazball' was born, they rallied from 5-104 to post 404 and win by 103 runs.

So when Bairstow joined his Yorkshire teammate and long-time friend Root in the middle of the dry, sluggish Edgbaston pitch midway through day one, the prospect of pushing towards 400 and declaring in the shadow of stumps was the stuff of fiction, even in England's current fairytale era.

"You grit your teeth and you've got to dig in for a period of time," Bairstow said at day's end, having counter-attacked in a 121-run partnership for the sixth wicket with Root that put Australia's bowlers on the back foot and England suddenly in the driver's seat.

"Then you try and find a way to put pressure back on the opposition.

"Some days it won't work, some days it won't come off but if you keep believing and keep trying in the same fashion that we believe we're able to, then hopefully more often than not it does.

"To get up to 393 after being 170-5 was something we would have taken."

Bairstow admits to having "a few nerves knocking about" when he took strike, given Australia had grabbed two key wickets – Stokes and wunderkind batter Harry Brook – in the space of eight deliveries, but mostly because he was playing his first Test innings in almost a year after a shocking leg fracture.

However, once he "found my flow", the runs came at a rate that had the Edgbaston crowd baying as he closed in on, and then drew level with Root to whom he had gifted a 37-run head start at the beginning of their union.

While Bairstow describes his 102-minute stay in which he scored at a run-per-ball as "really enjoyable", he took even greater pleasure in watching Root manipulate Australia's bowlers into gaps at will, find regular boundaries with deft timing and embellish with occasional flourishes such as reverse sweeps and audacious ramps.

The significance of Root's hundred, which arrived barely two overs before Stokes called a close to England's innings, was evident in the high-spirited leap Root performed on posting triple figures and the trademark fist pump that hasn't been seen in an Ashes contest since his previous century eight years earlier.

In the four intervening contests between the two historic rivals – three of which Root captained, in 2017-18, 2019 and the COVID-19 summer of 2021-22 – Bairstow has peeled off two hundreds and looked set for a third before he was stumped while charging at Nathan Lyon amid his team's late-innings run frenzy.

So he delighted in his former skipper's long-awaited Ashes moment, that he slightly tongue-in-cheek reckons might now embolden the 32-year-old to hang around for a further decade in the Test game.

"It's brilliant, it's really special," Bairstow said of Root's unbeaten 118 off 152 balls. "As someone who's known him for such a long time, been through thick and thin, ups and downs and experienced lots of different things together, it is an absolute pleasure to be out there and at the other end with him.

"He is a fantastic player, he's a fantastic talent and he's probably got another 10 years in the game.

"He'll be after 25,000 runs or something stupid, when he's 55 and he's still playing.

"He's been fortunate to captain his country, and held his head so high to do so during possibly the hardest period of time we've had to deal with through COVID, and the way he conducted himself through that, he's really reaping the rewards coming out the other end of it.

"That wasn't an easy time, and you see the smile on his face, you see the cheeky little grin he has and when his legs bop around, there are some special traits he's got and it's hopefully the first of a few this summer."

The other pivotal point of day one came as Root was celebrating his hundred by taking the long-handle to Australia spinner and another close friend – from their days playing grade cricket together at Adelaide club, Prospect – Nathan Lyon, before Stokes' sudden declaration.

Despite what some of the breathless pundits might exhort, it's not the first time in Test cricket's 146-year history a team has declared their first dig closed before they've reached 400, having won the toss and batted.

Australia did it in no less an occasion than the 1980 Centenary match at Lord's, albeit on day two of that game, closing at 5-385 to try and avoid the inevitable stalemate result.

But perhaps the more relevant and recent comparison came with the arrival of day-night Tests almost a decade ago, when Test tactics suddenly underwent a change almost as radically visionary as 'Bazball'.

At Adelaide in 2016, South Africa made a similarly tactical foreclosure late on day one having reached 9-259 in the hope of snaring a couple of quick Australia wickets with the new pink ball before stumps.

It also proved unsuccessful as Australia made it to stumps at 0-14 – the same score as yesterday evening – and perhaps portentously, their newly installed opener Usman Khawaja then piled on 145 next day as his team eventually romped to a seven-wicket win.

But such parallels were lost in the giddy haste created by Stokes' decision at the scheduled time for stumps last night, which left four overs for England's new-ball pair Stuart Broad and Ollie Robinson to try and grab a breakthrough or two before resuming their attack next morning.

When asked how much forewarning he and his teammates had received ahead of the innovative skipper's declaration, Bairstow responded deadpan: "He sent a WhatsApp last night – I'm joking."

"I didn't know anything about it.

"I'm sure he (Stokes) had a couple of conversations with Brendon (McCullum, England coach) and the relevant bowlers that were going to take it.

"But one of them (Robinson) was out in the middle, so there can't have been too many people that knew about it.

"I definitely wasn't one, so it was a scramble to get the old tape (to protect his fingers) and pads on.

"But to be fair, when you're not expecting something it's sometimes the best form of attack."

The ploy didn't yield the results England had hoped as Australia's opening pair Khawaja and David Warner survived a couple of minor frights to make it safely through to day two.

But the nature of the pitch, upon which Lyon became the first spin bowler in almost 100 years – since leggie Clarrie Grimmett at Trent Bridge in 1930 – to take two wickets inside the first 40 overs of an Ashes series starting, suggests batting might become more problematic than England made it appear.

Bairstow was at pains to point out it's a different surface to the pitch prepared for last summer's Edgbaston Test in which India posted a similar first innings score (416) but ended up losing by seven wickets.

"I think the pitch is going to be interesting over the next couple of days," Bairstow said. "The lads made it look pretty good today because we went about in a way that didn't enable the Australian bowlers to settle.

"Hopefully with the skills set our bowlers have got, and with how relentless they can be with lengths and lines they bowl, we are able to exploit different things.

"It's slightly drier than I was expecting it to be.

"There's a few little bits of rough patches, and there's probably not as much carry as I was expecting.

"It's slightly different to India last year and that pitch (where England chased down 378 in the fourth innings thanks to tons by Bairstow and Root).

"But until both sides have batted on it, until there's been a couple of days of Test cricket it's difficult to actually put your finger on and make a relevant assumption of the wicket."

2023 Qantas Ashes Tour of the UK

First Test: Friday June 16-Tuesday June 20, Edgbaston

Second Test: Wednesday June 28-Sunday July 2, Lord’s

Third Test: Thursday July 6-Monday July 10, Headingley

Fourth Test: Wednesday July 19-Sunday July 23, Old Trafford

Fifth Test: Thursday July 27-Monday 31, The Oval

Australia squad: Pat Cummins (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey (wk), Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Josh Inglis (wk), Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitch Marsh, Todd Murphy, Michael Neser, Matthew Renshaw, Steve Smith (vc), Mitchell Starc, David Warner

England squad: Ben Stokes (c), James Anderson, Jonathan Bairstow, Stuart Broad, Harry Brook, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Dan Lawrence, Jack Leach, Ollie Pope, Matthew Potts, Ollie Robinson, Joe Root, Josh Tongue, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood