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Hello everybody, Welcome to The Unplayable Podcast.

We're catching our breath after a manic day of Test cricket.

Twenty wickets feil.

Both teams had a good bat, well, a short bat, and then they were all out.

It's the fourth Test, Australia hold a forty six run lead and they're starting their second innings on the start of day two.

My name is Joshnathinker.

Louis Cameron's with me.

All a bit of a rush at the end of the day today given how many wickets fell.

So where do we begin dissecting this one?

Yeah, well almost it feels like we're back to the first day of the series right where we had a similarly kind of frantic moment where you're trying to process, you know, what you think after so many wickets fell in a day.

We had nineteen on day one of this series in Perth.

We had twenty today it would have been twenty one if Jacob Bethel had hung on to a low one hander in the last over the day.

It was weird.

Someone came over to us, Josh and asked the question, you know, is the crowd happy with what they've seen today?

And I think they are, like, you know, they saw entertaining cricket.

No point was it dull, but it did kind of feel like we were robbed of the opportunity to watch some good batting as well as some good bowling.

Definitely, And well, I guess that's because the pitch was doing plenty, wasn't it.

We heard that the curator had left ten millimeters of grass on this pitch, which wasn't unusual for this sort of wicket.

But there was plenty of movement earlier, and Michael Nsa said, especially with that new ball if you got it in the right spot.

So it was going to do plenty.

So tough work for the bat is only a couple of guys got out of double figures.

In fact, there were eleven players who were dismissed in single figures across the two innings.

Harry Brook was the top scorer for the whole day with forty one and Michael Nsa with thirty five for Australia, so not much to look at on the batting card.

It was crazy, yeah, I mean it felt a bit like a Sheffield Chield pitch in all and see like these are the kind of wickets that you get a lot in domestic cricket where teams pushed for results and teams have to bat aggressively to score runs and it can flatten out after you know, you have to get through a tough first day.

One of the interesting bits I heard from Alissa Heely she said she was out in the middle before play.

She said she kind of ran her hand over the pitch and she could feel the grass kind of lifting up with her hand, which I thought, was you know, really telling because from Afar you looked at it and it had a nice kind of brownish color from you know, obviously tinges of green, but it wasn't like a green mat that you kind of saw for the Gabba Test a couple of years ago against South Africa, you know that just looked green and grassy the whole way through.

This one kind of gave the appearance of, you know, potentially you know, just being a good fair wicket do a bit day one, flatten out by the end of day one and you're on for some good cricket.

Remember the last Test we had here against India went to the fifth day and was pretty balanced.

A bit early Sam Con was ramping Boomera.

But you know it did again feel a bit like that when Harry Brook was now playing like a man possessed.

But I mean I think England have you know, well some of England's batters have basically looked at this Australian bowling attack and gone, well, these guys are not missing their lengths and they probably thought, well, we've played on three flatter wickets and them and we couldn't really you know, what their high score of the series was in the in the low three hundreds.

We had to we just have to try something differently, and I think Brooke kind of embodied that today.

Question without notice.

So we're heading for another two day finished here.

Do you think or will we get into a third for this one?

Because it's shaping up a very similar situation to Perth.

Yeah.

Well, Michael Nissa, who was sitting right where we're sitting a few minutes and a few moments ago, we're again in the in the in the press conference room, which is an interesting spot at the MCG because ye're between the two dressing rooms.

So we're hearing a bit of applause from the England dressing room.

So I'm not sure what all that's about, given they probably don't ever holdleave.

To it, maybe to a FINALES meeting or something like that.

Yeah, yeah, possible.

Possibly.

What was the question again, two days tests?

Two day tests?

Yeah, yeah, Michael Nice was sitting here and got asked a good question about whether there were divots in the pitch, right like, because this can be the danger you leave too much juice.

And at day one you kind of get little indentations on the wicket.

When that pitch kind of hardens up under under a baking sun, you know, good luck because it gets even harder to back because the pitch gets quicker.

And then there it's not a not an even surface.

It didn't seem to think, so I don't think it was a juicy wicket.

I think it was just a grassy wicket.

And then you know, just some of the balls that we saw were just jagging, jagging a mile.

We can go into some detail on that, but two days I mean, look, look it could, especially if it does quicken up and Australia kind of get off to a you know, if England takes some early wickets tomorrow, then you know it's game on.

Definitely England chasing a you know, a small total in the last innings.

Who knows what could happen?

Yeah, absolutely could.

If I was holding tickets for day three of this tea, it's let alone day four, I'd be pretty nervous.

The apologies to my parents who got in late with their requests for this Test match and I could only get them day four, So not looking great for their hopes of seeing.

So I've got family members in the exact same boat.

So good luck to them.

I want to let's go back to five forty eight this afternoon.

Lewis too much team.

There are many days where you could say let's go back to five to forty out or who either team?

Well, I was actually talking about the clock five forty eight ps.

Yes, yes, So England have taken the last so I have lost their last wicket, which means we've only got two minutes left of batting to come.

And this is my liquor.

Land choose to that moment in fact, because we didn't know which Ossie Opener would come out for that one over to face.

We were thinking, or do they keep Travis Head in the sheds or do they go with a night watchman.

As it turned out, we saw Scott Bowland walk up the race and there probably were still seventy thousand fans in the g at that time, to raucous applause.

He had to face all six balls, only caught it slip and then he got a four away of the final ball.

It was a great theater at the end of the day, not that we needed anymore, but it was a great way to.

Finish Steve boy your heart out the final day or a final over sorry final ball boundary from Scott Bland.

This wasn't quite quite as elegant as stroke as what would managed off Richard Dawson.

I think that's good.

Well those years ago, that was two three ashes, I think, but yeah, he'd been given a life, you know, having edged that one, and he was just hanging on for dear life Scotty.

But that was I felt like the loudest roar of the day was, you know, of all things a guy he nearly faced out of Maiden.

It wasn't for that for that, Nick, and yeah, just a really nice moment.

It's an interesting one from the night watchman's perspective because you made the good observation that when England went to seventy and I think that was a wicket of Ben Stokes or Will Jackson, potentially we saw Jake weatherilld on the on the pitch.

He you know, Australia celebrated the wicket and was shadow about him, so he was clearly expecting to.

But then they've got back to the change rooms after Green gets that final wicket, and you know, obviously someone you know, Jake's probably asked for a night watchman.

You know, I guess Travis has probably said, oh, I'll go out, But you know, I'm just doubted that the non striker's end.

It would have been interesting.

It'll be interesting to find out exactly how that little that little bit played out.

Yeah, definitely, And I guess from Head's point of view, he can come out because with only one over a manning, if a wicket falls, that stumps that's right.

So he's not going to take a single left ball and hits it into the gap.

He's gonna say no, and just that the non striker's end so low risk.

Thereforehead and I guess that explains to some of the fancy would have been watching why he was the one and not necessarily risked because he was at the non striker's end.

I'm my own thinking.

We've now had five different Australian openers in this series.

We had Weather, old Head, Kauwadi did it one innings in Perth, Laboushine did at one innings in Perth.

I don't think we had Quadri in Perth.

Yeah, oh no, you're right he didn't.

So of all the you know, because he is remarkable.

That whole thing about who's going to partner?

Was he in Perth in the first Test?

And then they've had four or five different openers and so we've had Head, Weather, alled Lavishane for one innings and now bowling, so it's only four and none of them have known it was been quite.

That's pretty remarkable stuff.

So let's go back to the start of play.

Ben Stokes won the toss, chose to bowl.

England had three wickets in the first hour.

We were saying in the press box we didn't think they'd bowled super well.

But they certainly got their lines and lengths right in the second session, especially Josh Tungue magnificent.

We get to get rid of Steve Smith with a full ball that did a lot.

In fact, he was the pick of their bowlers today with five fur and finished off the innings with two in two as well, so when he hit his stride he was close to one playable on this bitch.

Yeah.

I thought England's opening bowlers, especially the first four or five hops, were awful broaden cast in particular, lots of balls on the thigh pad, lots of balls down leg side, questionable tactics in terms of cast, trying to bowl beautiful in swingers back into the left and on a pitch that you know is going to be doing everything, just stand the same up Webb'll seehim.

Whatever you can do to just you know, bash a length and eventually they got there.

Atkinson warmed into it in the back half of that first spell and then Tongue really came on and showed him how to bowl.

So he gets said earlier bit of luck with strangling Jake Weather all down the leg side, but then the lengths he hit to get Martus Labushane and Steve Smith out perfect full length deliveries, probably both around the four or five meter mark away from the batter.

He gets one that just nips away from Marnus Labushane.

He pushed too hard, he's caught behind, and then to Steve Smith, the jags the other way comes back in off the scene, bowls him for nine off thirty one.

Interesting stat that was on the Fox broadcast at the time that ball nipped back.

I think eleven centimeters by the time from a four meter length.

That's that's a lot of same movement, So it was eleven centimeters by the time it passed Smith's bat by Tommy hit the stumps, hit middle something just about halfway up in a deva fourteen centimeters away from where it would have gone without deviation.

I always kind of look at that as a pretty good indication because when you watch the you watch those replays, and they showed them without deviation, it's always the purple line and it's always going through the middle of the bat of whoever was whoever was swinging the bat.

So yeah, that's impossible to play.

Yeah, Tongue didn't play the first two tests of this series, but he's come in and made an instant impact and now he's probably also going to be seeing the ben Stones.

Look give me the new ball as well, because bride Cast was very ineffective with it today and tongue Can has shown that he could pitch it up, get it in the right spots and even move the ball around.

So there's definitely going to be that conversation as well.

We will give Cass a little bit of credit though, because he did execute an excellent run out today of Cameron Green that sort of sparked him and he collapsed Frustralia.

They lost their last four wickets for nine runs after that, and there was a good piece of athleticism from the big fil.

Another puzzling decision for Cameron Green in while brighton Cass is bowling right.

So we had the one at the Gabba when he was on forty off just about as many balls backs away tries to him through the off side gets bold.

Well hear he'd done really well with Michael Nissa to kind of get get Australia back to on track and it looked like they were probably going for you know something at least with the two in front of it, you know, a two hundred score and he's on the back foot, so he's camp right back and then he kind of looks to Nissa for a bit of guidance on you know, is this a run quick single that we can take.

I wouldn't blame Nisa in that situation, like you know, Nissa, he's looking at Nisa to think, well, can you make it at your end?

It's on Green to think whether he can make it from his end, and he would have had to set off absolutely straight away given the weight was all all the way on his back shoe.

But yeah, credit to cast.

You pick up and throw and hit the non strikers and stumps.

You know, you can see why they like brighton cars like he's an athletic bowler who bowls wicket taking deliveries, who's a good batter and a good fielder.

But you just feel like they haven't quite read the conditions right.

And then the scheme of things in Australia only made one, five two.

He's gone for forty two off his twelve os.

It doesn't look terrible, but just the way Australia Bold was just absolutely relentless.

None of those guys gave him an inch.

And I think like that selection could really come back to haunt them.

A guy like you know, I'm not saying that he's a world beater and he would have changed a series for him, but a guy like Matthew Potts, it really surprises me that we haven't seen him before in this series, let alone on this pitch that's Taylor made for a guy who from what I've seen in test cricket, he hits nibbles the ball around at about one hundred and thirty low one thirty Columbus per hour.

That's what this pitch is perfect for.

That's why Michael Nisa was the best bowler today on it.

Scott Bowland probably and Josh Tungue, you know, not far behind him, but they needed those kind of guys.

Atkinson's also that guy, you know, slightly quicker but just hits a good length.

He got into his work and you know he wasn't perfect, but yeah, you just feel like even though they've rolled Australia for one hundred and fifty two, like the amount of seed movement that the balls were getting that might have been slide overs.

Well, as you said, Australia got one fifty two and when Mitch Stark was out there it looked like he didn't want to be batting out at any time at all.

He wanted to be bowling, and for good reason, because after he was out for one of six, Australia got the new ball in their hands and had England in all sorts very early.

They were four for sixteen after eight overs.

The wickets went stark nissa, stark nissa to get things underway, and either side of the tea break.

So at the end of the Austrain innings and the start of the England innings, both sides lost eight for twenty five in sixty seven balls total carnage.

We were on the live blog trying to collectively that've lost eight for sixty that's right, collectively, so the combined scores.

We were trying to keep up with the updates on the live blog and trying to describe all these wickets and adding the videos and all those sorts of things.

It was pretty tough work.

Not going to lie, but yeah, it was just you can understand why Australia so Kender get out there and bolted absolute carnage.

And you saw kind of both ways of attacking from a batting perspective, both methods not working.

I mean, Joe Route a painful fifteen ball.

Duck barely plays a shot.

He's just thinking, get through, get through, get through slightly older ball, I'll be able to score.

Then he kind of plays a half hearted defense and he's out again.

You know, since that hundred and Brisbane, it's gone downhill for him in this series.

And then Brooke complete opposite approach.

You know, they were batting together for a bit and it was just chalk and cheese.

You know, you had when Brooke was on strike, you had a deep point and a deep long off and a fine leg and a deep square leg.

And then when Route was coming on strike, it was, you know, three slips of galley, normal kind kind of cricket.

You know, Brook, apart from the absolutely wild shot that he's played off Stark first up, after that, I felt like he kind of got his rhythm a bit and I reckon honestly, that was probably not a bad way to the bat on that pitch.

He had a couple of six as he got an enormous one over long off off Bowland I think was and you know, really hit his straps.

He hit the high score for the days.

So who are we to question how he battered, and you know, people will criticize how aggressively he batted today, but at the end of it, he got out playing a defensive shot off Bowlin, so maybe there was some merit in how he was approaching it.

Yeah.

Absolutely, Stark and Niss obviously did well off the top, but then Scott Bolin came in in front of that home crowd and didn't disappoint.

Nine overs on the bounce from him today, three for thirty and some really good delivery.

It's tough to play, including a crack to get rid of Brook that jagged in a long way.

It's probably maybe didn't them and bounced as much as Brook was expecting, and normally you would see that one of the top batters from the opposition review that decision.

Even out of a bit of hope, Brooke thought that's got to be out and just walked off.

And he was right.

I was thinking, like, surely, yeah, like he looked like the most dangerous batter.

They were already that would have been their fourth or fifth winking down, So surely you just use your three reviews because you're going to get the chance to use them.

But he knew that that was hitting the stumps half way up.

And yeah, if it wasn't for Atkinson again, you know he whacked twenty eight of thirty five balls, they wouldn't have even got into into triple digits.

Yeah.

Well it's England's lowest score in Test cricket since they were here last year.

That's a stat you uncovered Loo sixty eight they were bowled out for that day when Scott Bowling got six for seven last ashes series.

Yeah, and today I saw last ash of series and today one hundred and ten wicket fell today every twenty two point nine balls, so less than four overs total carnage across all facets today.

And yeah, Australia batting again.

And you think back to when the last time England fans would have been able to come to this to the MCG on Mass twenty seventeen eighteen, I reckon, you know, a wicket every twenty two point nine overs that would have been twenty three point three overs, twenty two point nine balls got into twenty three points.

Yeah, got yeah, yeah, terrible overs maths there, you know, like it was just the flattest weekend ever, right, so it's complete turned around for the MCG I know which one i'd prefer to watch, but I can also see the flip side.

If you've got tickets to day three and four, you'd be very nervous.

Just before we wrap up, Ji Richardson made his return two Test cricket.

In fact, it's his first Test match in four hundred and sixty seven days Louis four years almost to the day, but since that Adelaide Test he played against England.

What did you make of his return?

And yeah, hopefully we might get to see a bit more of him tomorrow with the ball.

That's right, Yeah, well only four overs so you can see what they've risked him here, Like they might have gone this wicked is really green.

We don't think it's going to go the journey.

We're going to get more use out of an impact kind of bowler like him as opposed Todd Murphy.

So it's hard to argue with that decision either way.

And the other side, I can't remember if we brought it up on this podcast, but he's throwing His remains an issue, like he still just can't throw properly after three shoulder surgery, so I know it's something he's worked hard on to try and get back that strop of strength, but what Bowling's find his shoulders really no good in the field, so they've obviously made a decisions.

They can kind of carry him in the field and they're just gonna if he gets a couple of wickets, you know what could be a two to two and a half day Test that'll probably justify the selection.

So early, soigns are good.

You know, pace was a little slower to kind of get up to start, but looked like he was touching that one forty mark by the end of a four over spell.

So yeah, I can't really judge him just yet.

And I know it's probably hard to judge as well on such a short innings England only about it for twenty nine overs.

But I can't remember him fielding a ball either, So maybe that's the way to go.

Just buy out the opposition quickly and you don't have to worry about him fielding.

I can't remember anyone fielding, to be honest.

That'll do us from day one here at the MCG.

You can catch us again after day two when the match might be over or may not find out tomorrow.

Sat and S