Ashes: Australia dash Ben Stokes heroics to go 2-0 up amid chaos

Australia lead the Ashes 2-0. It was the result almost everyone expected when Day Five began at Lord’s following a fair reflection of a Test in which they consistently outplayed the opposition.

But for a few fevered hours, things could have been so different. With Ben Stokes in the middle, he and England believed that maybe another miracle was on the cards.

In 2019 he produced two: dragging England to a World Cup final win at Lord’s and then rescuing the impossible in that extraordinary Ashes win at Headingley. Today he attempted to combine the two, almost pulling off something even more unbelievable in the process.

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The day began with England needing 257 to win, Australia six wickets – a proposition made a little easier by the fact that the last four of those would not look out of place batting at no. 11.

Crucially for English hopes Stokes and Ben Duckett started well, the latter having about as good a Test as possible without actually managing to make three figures. The fun, though, really began with Jonny Bairstow, or in fact with his dismissal.

‘Bairstow run out (Carey) 10’ the scorecard will simply read forever, the actual events will no doubt inspire rather more words. It was one of those perfect cricketing moments in which whatever opinion on the subject you held you could quite reasonably claim to be right and also fairly be accused of being wrong.

You can see why Bairstow was aggrieved and yet he was not hoodwinked by any Australian skullduggery, Carey caught the ball and in essentially one motion threw it towards the stumps – by the time it hit them Bairstow had wandered out of his crease. He was out.

It might have been a big dent to England’s hopes of victory, but it ignited a normally fairly tepid Lord’s crowd – ‘sanctimonious indignation and claiming of the moral high ground in an otherwise heavy defeat’ a much more comforting and familiar hat to put on for England fans than the rarely worn ‘winning against Australia’ one.

Enter, perfectly on cue, Stuart Broad. The grandmaster of stirring up the opposition, the pantomime king, finally given a stage perfect for his talents. It was as if England had taken the frustration Jack Leach had caused Australia by cleaning his glasses so regularly during Stokes’ Headingley innings and crafted an entire cricketer out of it – Broad performatively putting his bat behind the crease at any opportunity, with a word too for any Australian fielder who would listen.

One over with Broad at the other end was enough for Stokes too to pull the emergency lever. He literally threw his bat at the first ball of the 54th over, the willow landing just short of square leg, before proceeded to do so in a more metaphorical and, it should be said, effective fashion.

Cameron Green was unfortunate enough to be the man most in Stokes’ crosshairs. His ninth over went for 14, including three fours smashed into the leg side – a result the Australians would have gladly taken again in the next over had he known what was coming.

Stokes was on 78, Australia had every man back on the boundary, it would not prove enough. There was a four down the ground, the Josh Hazlewood misfield an added treat for an increasingly febrile crowd, and then the passage of play that had an entire ground beginning to believe they might be on the verge of witnessing something special.

First Stokes smeared Green over mid-wicket for six, the next ball he just cleared the rope at fine leg, Mitchell Starc fumbling the ball over the boundary as an atmosphere enhancing bonus, then he mowed the ball over backward square leg. Six again. Three in a row. A remarkable century brought up in the most astonishing fashion.

While Stokes was at the crease, Lord’s and England believed, Australia looking increasingly ragged as the extended morning session wore on – Pat Cummins untying and retying his shoelaces as lunch approached just to make sure his side didn’t have to bowl another over.

But there is a reason miracles do not happen all the time and this would prove to be one that even Ben Stokes couldn’t quite pull off, eventually he skied Hazelwood up for Carey to catch and as he sadly trudged off the pitch to a standing ovation, so England’s hopes of one of the most improbable victories departed too.

The final three would add just 26 more, courageous at least until the very end but totally outmatched.

The series then moves on to Headingley, three Tests remain. England must win them all if they want to reclaim the Ashes, Australia just one for their first series win on these shores since 2001. Anyone making any confident predictions for how they might turn out though clearly hasn’t been watching what’s happened so far.

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