World Test champions Australia have excellent bowling options, a run-filled middle order and a top-drawer all-rounder in Cameron Green - but there may be weaknesses England can exploit - watch The Ashes live on Sky Sports from Friday (9.30am on air, first ball at 11am)
Wednesday 14 June 2023 15:01, UK
When Steve Waugh captained Australia to Ashes victory in England in 2001 he could not have imagined that some 22 years later he would remain the most recent Baggy Greens skipper to do so.
Tim Paine really should have been the next in 2019. He will probably never shake off what happened at Headingley as England's Ben Stokes pulled off the heist of a lifetime and Australia crumbled.
If Paine's side had coped better under pressure, if Marcus Harris had caught Stokes, if the tourists had not burned a review that they desperately needed later on, if Nathan Lyon had not fluffed the chance to run out Jack Leach, Australia would have won. If...
Now it is Pat Cummins' turn to try and do what Ricky Ponting (twice), Michael Clarke (twice) and Paine could not. Paine at least stopped the rot by steering his team to a series draw - an Ashes-retaining one at that - but for Ponting and Clarke it was the ultimate pain of series losses. Ponting in 2005 and 2009, Clarke in 2012 and 2015.
Australia will feel they are long overdue a different outcome - and that they are well-equipped to produce one.
Their bowling attack, to start with, is one to envy.
An off-spinner in Lyon with skill, control and 487 Test wickets. A left-arm speedster in Mitchell Starc who can deliver thunderbolts and creates foot holes for Lyon to weave magic in.
Cummins leading from the front. Hazlewood offering accuracy and seam movement. Scott Boland, who has burst on the scene with 33 wickets in eight Tests at an average below 14, doing likewise. Whichever bowling combination Australia end up going with, it will pose England's Bazballing batters a formidable challenge.
Then there's the tourists' middle order.
Marnus Labuschagne, at No 3 in the batting line-up and No 1 in the ICC Test batting rankings, averages just shy of 57. He has reeled off 10 hundreds in 33 Tests since stepping in as a concussion replacement for Steve Smith during the 2019 Ashes.
Smith, at No 4 in the batting line-up and No 2 in the Test batting standings, averages a smidgeon over 60 and only the great sir Don Bradman (11) has more Test hundreds in England among visiting batters than his tally of seven.
Travis Head, at No 5 in the batting line-up and No 3 in the Test batting charts, was Player of the Series when Australia trounced England 4-0 at home in 2021-22, amassing a leading 357 runs with two centuries.
Head is the most Bazball of the Australia batters, adding oomph after Smith and Labuschagne's usual steadier pace, with his runs in that Ashes coming at a strike-rate of 86.02 and his 163 from 174 deliveries against India in the World Test Championship final struck at a strike rate of 93.67.
No wonder he was namechecked as an Australia dangerman by England captain Ben Stokes.
Then, at No 6, Australia have the triple threat of skyscraping all-rounder Cameron Green - a man who can bat defensively or destructively, bowl quickly and move the ball, and take sensational one-handed catches in the field.
Sometimes he defies his hulking 6ft 5in frame to complete those grabs, sometimes he pouches them because of it.
Australia's No 7 should not be underestimated either. Alex Carey is a fine wicketkeeper and a gritty batter, with his knocks of 48 and 66 not out against India last week proving very useful indeed as the Aussies claimed the World Test Championship mace.
The tourists were crowned the best Test side on the planet on Sunday but England will be looking at their Ashes opponents thinking there are weaknesses that their bruising brand of cricket can expose and exploit. Starting with the openers.
David Warner and Usman Khawaja are 36 and have struggled in England before, with Warner's average on these shores 25.74 and Khawaja's 17.78. Warner's average four years ago was a woeful 9.50 as Stuart Broad had him on toast.
Elsewhere, the difficulties Head faced with the short ball against India will not have gone unnoticed by England, while Ollie Pope says his side have been working on "quirky plans" that they hope can make run-machine Smith "uncomfortable".
From a lot of teams that would sound like bluster, but from Stokes' England you are inclined to believe it.
Plus, for all the praise we gave Australia's bowling stocks earlier in this piece, there are question marks there, too. Hazlewood has only played four Tests in two-and-a-half years. Boland is still a relative novice. Starc's bowling average in England is north of 30 and he went at in excess of five runs an over in both innings of the World Test Championship final at The Kia Oval.
And will Headingley 2019 still be in in the back of Australia's mind? They folded then and there were signs during the India clash last week that they can still wobble in times of adversity.
They looked a little ratty and rattled when Ajinkya Rahane and Shardul Thakur were thrashing runs on the third morning and a number of catches were grassed.
Ultimately, Australia had too much for India, as they do for most teams. But they are yet to be Bazballed.
England will not care one jot about the bowling attack at the other end. They have attacked New Zealand's Tim Southee, Trent Boult and Kyle Jamieson; South Africa's Kagiso Rabada, Anrich Nortje and Marco Jansen; India's Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj and Jasprit Bumrah.
The world-class attacks change. England's approach does not.
Australia may be the best attack of the lot but no one can be sure how they will deal with Bazball. Will they crush it or be crushed by it?
We are about to find out and it is going to be one hell of a watch.
Watch The Ashes live on Sky Sports Cricket from Friday. Build-up at Edgbaston begins from 9.30am with the first ball at 11am.
