England managed to score 302 runs in the first innings courtesy England’s inexperienced middle order batsmen James Vince, and David Malan – both scored solid half centuries. Vince scored 83 on day one whereas Malan scored 56. For Australia, Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins picked three wickets each and Nathan Lyon picked up two wickets in the innings. Many feel that Lyon’s bowling figures don’t do justice to his actual performance.
Lyon bowled subtle line and length and kept the English batsmen at bay, giving away runs at just over two runs per over. Former cricketers and pundits have hailed Lyon’s performance; in fact, former Australian leg-spinner Stuart MacGill had declared Lyon as World’s best spinner outclassing Indian off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin.
Lyon has already picked up 48 Test wickets in 2017 at an average of 22 runs per wicket, whereas on the other hand Ashwin has picked up 48 wickets in two matches more than Lyon (8) has played this year.
At the beginning of the year, questions were raised over Lyon’s ability to perform well in the sub-continent, but he completely dominated the proceedings in India and Bangladesh. Lyon had earlier said that wants to be like Ashwin, but MacGill feels that the Australian had overtaken likes of Ashwin and Herath by some margin now.
He said:
“I think Nathan is the best spinner in the world at the moment, I know the stats of someone like Ravi Ashwin might suggest otherwise, but Nathan is the only spinner in the world that does exceptionally well in Australia and away from home. That’s just good attacking spin bowling.”
“(Backing him) is the kind of approach Australia needed to take. In Australia we’ve got wickets where you can’t wait as long for the other team to make mistakes. You’ve got to tactically and skilfully make inroads yourself.”