Yep, cricket again. I did warn you. The one person who read my last Ashes diary said, “I only understood about 75% of what you wrote.” I’m hoping to drop that to 50% or so, this time around.

Second Test: England won by an innings and 71 runs. (Australia 245 & 304, England 620/5d.)</p>

I haven’t watched a whole lot of cricket, of course, so naturally I’m going to see an awful lot of things and think, “Boy, I’ve never seen that before.” But I’m starting to wonder if I’m not seeing an awful lot of things that I won’t see again, not for a long time.

Prior to the match, the talk was all about how the team that won the coin toss would have the advantage, because they could bat first and (presumably) score a thousand runs. History seems to favor high scores at Adelaide, where the pitch is apparently made from a particularly true-bouncing mix of concrete. All of the commentators predicted a draw.

Australia won the coin toss and went out the first day with murder in its hearts. And after about ten minutes, well, the match was pretty much over. Shane Watson opened the batting for the Aussies, with Simon Katich down at the other end waiting for his turn. On the fourth ball of the match, Watson took one off the leg, then tried to run a quick single. Katich, who must have been staring at somebody in the stands, was late setting off, and England fired the ball off the stumps to run out Katich. He hadn’t even faced a ball yet. It is perhaps the most ignominious way to be out, in cricket – a “diamond duck,” they call it.

Katich also partially tore an Achilles tendon during the match, and will miss the rest of the series. I can only assume that his car broke down and his house was overrun by termites and his daughter was knocked up this week, as well.

It wasn’t over for Australia. Captain Ricky Ponting, batting about four hours earlier than he expected, walked out to the middle and was gone first ball, edging one to a fielder behind. Five balls in, the Aussies were two wickets down.

When Michael Clarke edged one to an English fielder in the third over, then, it was just insult to injury. Australia had expected to score about 500 in its first innings; instead, they had two runs for three wickets, their worst Test start in about 800 years (or something similarly embarrassing.)

They went on to score 245, which looked like nothing, especially compared to the 517 for 1 performance the English had put on in their second innings in Brisbane. And it turned out that England – who usually fall apart in Australia – had no intention of doing so this time around.

Andrew Strauss, opening the batting, continued his new streak of ugly early dismissals, falling in the second over after leaving a strike right down the heart of the plate (to mix my sports metaphors). But after him came Alastair Cook and Jonathan Trott, and after Trott departed there was Kevin Pietersen, and that was truly all the English needed. Cook made 148, Trott 78, and then Pietersen put on a show, racing to 227, his highest-ever score. Ian Bell’s late 68 looked piddling in comparison, despite being better than all but one Australian batsman in each innings.

England finally decided they’d had enough early on the fourth day, leading by 375 runs, which led to the silliest part of cricket: watching one team, which has been getting beat like it stole something, try to delay for a couple of days an earn an undeserved draw. Occasional rainstorms didn’t help. Imagine if a baseball game had a four-hour time limit, no matter how much time Freddy Garcia takes between pitches, or how long it might rain for, and you’ll get the idea – frustration at the pace of play.

To give Australia credit, they fought well all day, getting to 238 for 3, but – on the very last ball of the day – the match took its one final big turn. Pietersen, bowling for England despite being a terrible bowler (“I’m the original pie-chucker,” he said afterward, which sounds great despite me being unfamiliar with the term), picked up a from-nowhere wicket to turn the tide. To go back to baseball, this is like bringing in your rightfielder to pitch, and having him somehow strike a guy out on three pitches.

England got a couple of wickets early on the fifth day, as well – those coming earlier this evening – and from there it was one long laugher. Even the Australian commentators spent most of their time giggling at Aussie bowler Doug Bollinger’s comedic batting. “He should have his own blooper reel at the end of every match,” said former Aussie bowler Shane Warne. He took one delivery hard off of his right butt cheek, which prompted much laughing. He also managed to get nailed with the ball while standing at the non-striker’s end; Peter Siddle drove a liner back at his batting partner, and Bollinger ended up fending it off with his own bat while trying to get out of the way. “No, Dougie!” cried Warne. “Save those shots for the other end!”

For all of the laughter, Bollinger ended up with 7 runs and was not out, which was better than four other Aussie batsmen – including fellow bowler Ryan Harris, who was dismissed first ball in both innings. Harris is currently just barely ahead of poor English bowler Stuart Broad, who is out of the rest of the series with an injured abdominal muscle. Broad was out first ball in England’s first innings in Brisbane, and didn’t bat in their second innings there or their only innings in Adelaide – and will go down with batting figures in this series of no runs, one ball faced, one minute of batting time.

Perhaps nobody has batting figures quite like England bowler Steven Finn, who – despite playing both matches – has yet to face a ball in either one. So far, his entire batting contribution is to stand around at the non-striker’s end for a grand total of four balls. Meanwhile, his teammate Alastair Cook has batted for – this is absolutely true – just over twenty-two and a half hours.

The third test, in Perth, doesn’t begin for over a week – next Wednesday, to be precise. At the moment, everyone – English media, Australian media, everyone – is racing to bury the Aussies. There were a few commentators, pre-series, that wondered if the home team had enough good bowlers to take the twenty wickets required to win a match; so far, they’ve managed all of 16 in two matches. England could clinch at least a series draw – and therefore retain the Ashes – with a win in Perth, and so Australia’s under the gun already.

They’ve got nine days to get things figured out on the bowling end – and to figure out how to get more than two runs for their first three wickets.
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