6th over: Australia 8-1 (Warner 4, Labuschagne 0) These days Labuschagne isn’t just playing the Steve Smith lightsabre leave, he’s playing almost a mock pull shot when he leaves balls outside the off stump. Shaheen is bowling quickly and testing him out around off stump, then drops in a sharp bouncer that makes the batsman hop. This is good partnership bowling.
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5th over: Australia 8-1 (Warner 4, Labuschagne 0) Abbas remains accurate, and Warner is quite happy to see off the bowler’s early overs and take plenty of time. Another maiden.
4th over: Australia 8-1 (Warner 4, Labuschagne 0) Nearly another wicket the ball after Burns goes, with Shaheen just beating the outside edge of Marnus Labuschagne. His bat clips the ground, and there’s a huge appeal in unison from the Pakistan team, but the umpire calls correctly and the Pakistanis don’t review.
Wicket! Burns c Rizwan b Shaheen 4 (Australia 8-1)
An early wicket for Pakistan, after bowling at this opening partnership for so long up at the Gabba. Burns opens his account against Shaheen by striding forward into a cover drive for four, so Shaheen shortens his length a touch, gets a perfect line just on off stump, and Burns is drawn into a little open-faced push. The ball kisses near the shoulder of the bat and takes the edge.
3rd over: Australia 4-0 (Warner 4, Burns 0) Swing and seam for Abbas, but he starts the ball so wide of off stump that it nearly lands off the pitch. He gets his line right after that and draws a thick outside edge from Warner, steered through the cordon for four. Back into the pads comes Abbas, inswing this time! Warner gets enough on it, but this is a very encouraging start for the bowler.
2nd over: Australia 0-0 (Warner 0, Burns 0) Shaheen Afridi, the tall, left-armer, to start from the Cathedral End. He’s a bit too wide across Burns, who leaves five balls and reaches for the last to steer it to gully, nicely timed and could have flown for four but it finds the field.
1st over: Australia 0-0 (Warner 0, Burns 0) During that delay, Warner and Burns were sitting outside the rooms in their pressed clean whites, playing rock-paper-scissors. Was that to see who would face the first ball? Warner ends up taking it, Abbas with the ball. Accurate immediately, from around the wicket to the left-hander and just moving away. Left, then he bowls closer to off stump and draws a couple of defensive shots. A maiden to start.
Brian Withington writes in. “Storm clouds over Hamilton have forced the players off and English OBOers scurrying for succour elsewhere. What could be better than the mighty Lemon covering a pink ball Test at Adelaide? Bring it on, maestro.” Well, I blush. All the attention is coming over here? The pressure.
“G’day Geoff, do you think Pakistan have more a fighting chance with the pink ball then they did in Brisbane?” asks Michael Hargreaves. “And with four quicks under 20 who can get north of 140 mark, do you think Pakistan should move their “Home” games at the UAE to our much maligned secondary grounds? Think Hobart, Canberra, Darwin and soon to be Brisbane would welcome a bashful speed brigade. Surly they’d get better crowds than three security guards and the WAGs.”
It’s not the worst idea, the latter. I guess it’s a longer flight from Pakistan to Australia. And Mohammad Amir rather put his foot in it when it comes to Pakistan being invited to host games in other Test countries, with his no-ball at Lord’s. And yes, hopefully they do have a chance with a combination of the pink ball, humidity, some life in this pitch, and Abbas.
Karl Winda Telfer leads an extensive opening ceremony of Indigenous dance, then the Qantas choir do their advertising bit, and now the teams come out for the anthems. The ground staff have covered the pitch with one small tarp, which is curious. It doesn’t look like it’s raining, but there is some very light drizzle I think. A few umbrellas (ellas, ellas) up.
The home team unchanged, while Pakistan have three expected changes: Imam in to open the batting with Azhar moving down the order and Haris Sohail dropped; one teenager fast bowler in Muhammad Musa to replace another in Naseem Shah (and make his debut as Naseem did last week); and most importantly, the seam genius Mohammad Abbas in for Imran Khan, to see if Abbas can replicate something like the brilliant form he displayed against Australia in the UAE a year ago.
Australia David Warner Joe Burns Marnus Labuschagne Steve Smith Travis Head Matthew Wade Tim Paine Pat Cummins Mitchell Starc Nathan Lyon Josh Hazlewood
Pakistan Shan Masood Imam-ul-Haq Azhar Ali * Asad Shafiq Babar Azam Iftikhar Ahmed Mohammad Rizwan + Yasir Shah Shaheen Afridi Muhammad Musa Mohammad Abbas
The first question is whether Australia’s top three can back up their big work from Brisbane. The second is whether Steve Smith will have to wait three days for a bat. The third is how he will bounce back from the first time he has ever made the outright lowest score in a full Australian innings.
There we are, convention holds sway. There’s a yellowish light through the thick cloud, so it might be hard to see the ball. A tricky session for the batsmen is coming up.
I also just realised I’m early. Forgot to change my watch to Adelaide time on arrival. Actually it was a deliberate decision, because I thought the extra half hour might help me be on time for things. It worked.
This is a Test match, so I’d love to see your correspondence. Emails come in to [email protected], otherwise you can tweet me at @GeoffLemonSport.
If you’re wondering, it’s not day five. It’s day one. We’ll sort out that technical mishap in the next little while. It will be very interesting to see what happens with the toss, with the cloud and the humidity. Though I can’t imagine Tim Paine bowling first after being bitten at the Oval.
Hello from the Adelaide Oval. The grand old girl has got her festive skirts on and is ready for another day-night Test. We had a traditional day game here last year at India’s request, but Adelaide is the new home of the pink ball and will revert to type here. What’s happening in Adelaide? Well, it rained a little bit in the last hour, but that has cleared up. It’s fairly warm and a little bit humid today so it won’t be uncomfortable for a crowd as long the sky juice doesn’t return. Both teams are out in the middlw arming up now, the Pakistanis with big rubber bands doing stretches and the Australians throwing their preferred flavour of football around. Smith has the rugby ball and Little Davey Warner, the walking contradiction, has the Sherrin.
Now the teams have got into their respective circles. Pakistan need to regroup after a thrashing. Australia need to maintain the charge. What’s going on in the Australian group? Applause over there, as though it were a cap presentation. Surely not a blindside Michael Neser debut? We can dream.
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