England's new fast-bowling consultant Shane Bond believes the way the team bowled on the first day of their warm-up match against a Cricket Australia XI in Townsville is the template they should follow during the Ashes series.
England took nine wickets on the first day of the final match before the first Test at the Gabba next week and created several more chances during the 90 overs in the field. But perhaps more importantly for their Ashes prospects was how the seam bowlers were able to strangle the CA XI and keep control of the run rate for most of the play. True, the calibre of the Cricket Australia batsmen is nowhere near what England will face when they play Australia next week, but it was still a good effort.
Chris Woakes, who took 6 for 54 and is looking back to his best after injury, was the most expensive of the three seam bowlers England chose for this match but he conceded just three runs an over and both Stuart Broad (economy of 2.06) and Craig Overton (1.78) were similarly frugal. During the Tests, without the extravagant seam and swing that is often found in England, the visitors' attack will have to rely on that same discipline and control to create pressure as well as generating whatever movement they can squeeze out of the Kookaburra ball.
"The ball doesn't move as much," Bond said. "The pitches are harder. You have to set your fields differently. Listening to the boys about England, they know there's always something in the wicket. Here, you won't get that sideways movement or massive amounts of swing. If it swings it won't be there all the time. You have to find different ways to skin a cat. Our bowlers are quality and they get bounce, which is massive. If we can get it to go off the straight just a little bit, we are accurate enough that we can cause trouble."
A disciplined approach with the ball was a key component of England's win in Australia under Andrew Strauss's captaincy in 2010/11. Then, Steven Finn was dropped after the third Test, despite being England's leading wicket-taker in the series at that stage with 14 victims, because he was proving too expensive. James Anderson, rested for the match in Townsville, was a key component of that 2010/11 attack and he will again be important in delivering the similar tactics which head coach Trevor Bayliss and Bond want to adopt this time round.
Bond, who played 18 Tests for New Zealand in a career ravaged by injury, was hired by England for the first two Ashes Tests following Ottis Gibson's resignation as bowling coach earlier this year. It was felt that Bond's specialist knowledge of what it takes to bowl with the Kookaburra ball in Australia could help England's bowlers but he will take up his post with Brisbane Heat for the Big Bash after the Adelaide Test. Given former Essex head coach Chris Silverwood will take up his permanent role as England's bowling coach in January, it means the squad will not have a bowling coach for the final three matches of the Ashes.
By then, though, Bond hopes he will have been able to impart enough of his thinking on England's bowlers. "I've got a pretty good understanding of the way the game is played over here and it's about instilling little bits of that in the guys," Bond said. "England play the game differently to what we do in this part of the world. It's about getting them to understand that. They need to understand what attacking looks like and align our strengths to different fields and match them up against their batsmen."
England's fast-bowling strengths that Bond alluded to will be very different to those of the hosts. The visitors do not have an out and out pace bowler, although Woakes can bowl sharply, whereas Australia will attempt to bombard England with the speed and aggression of Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc. It means that Joe Root and his bowlers will have to use different tactics - including a lot of patience - to take their wickets. Bond thinks England, with the help of the team's analysts, have made good progress in deciding what those tactics will be and in Anderson, Broad, Woakes and probably Overton have the bowlers to execute them.
"You know what you will get out of Australia," Bond said. "Starc will try to swing it back in and bowl over and across you, then go round the wicket and try to knock your off pole out. [Josh] Hazlewood will be accurate, then Cummins will mix his length and bowl short. We are different. We have to control their run rate and chip away at their batting lineup, and take it to day five."
