Marcus Harris and Michael Neser are keeping themselves sharp to spearhead Australia’s World Test Championship final bid if required, with both in-form players signing off from their county spells with striking hundreds.
Opener Harris achieved the notable feat of being the first Gloucestershire player since fellow Aussie Cameron Bancroft six years ago to carry his bat through a completed first-class innings, as he bowed out on Sunday with an unbeaten 122 in a losing cause against Durham.
While Harris was showing his grit at Bristol, allrounder Neser, who’s been having a superb season at Glamorgan, was helping himself to just the third century of his career in an extraordinary run-laden game against Sussex at Hove featuring his international teammates Marnus Labuschagne and Steve Smith.
After run-hungry Labuschagne had been left a bit frustrated by getting out for ‘just’ 138 in Glamorgan’s rearguard action on Saturday, Neser went on to bat the Welsh county to safety with a marathon knock of 123, lasting over four-and-a-quarter hours.
It helped Glamorgan, who had been 358 runs behind on first innings, to make the extraordinary total of 737 in their second knock – the fifth-highest second-innings score in the history of first-class cricket and 614 more than they garnered first time around. Their captain Kiran Carlson made 192 of them.
And with Carlson not in the mood for any frivolous declaration after their slog to battle back into the game, it meant the game ended in unlikely fashion with Steve Smith not only getting a bowl, but even taking 2-55 in his 10.5 overs.
Neser slog-swept Smith for six to bring up his century, so the part-time spinner wasn’t too unhappy, ending up with a sheepish grin at finally slipping one through his fellow Aussie’s guard with a yorker to end his excellent innings.
Neser was bowled by the 198th ball he faced, having clocked 15 fours and two sixes.
“He’s contributed really well with the bat this year for us on top of his outstanding bowling efforts. To top it off with a hundred, I’m delighted for him,” said Glamorgan coach Matthew Maynard of Neser, whose highlight with the Welsh county was his hat-trick in a career-best seven-wicket haul against Yorkshire.
Late in the day, absurdly as they were asked to score a nominal target of 380 off 14 overs, Sussex even came out to bat again for one pointless over, with Labuschagne having the dubious honour of taking the new ball to go through the motions.
More seriously for Sussex, though – and for England – was the sight of paceman Ollie Robinson leaving the dressing room on crutches and wearing a protective boot to protect his troublesome ankle which kept him out of second half of the match.
The good news for the Australian Ashes challenge, though, has been led in England this season by 30-year-old Harris, a safe pair of hands who’s compiled 457 runs including two tons and two fifties, averaging 57.12 while on county duty.
On Sunday, despite Gloucestershire’s 125-run defeat, he was immoveable, signing off by batting for just over five hours, while facing 195 balls and hitting 15 fours.
Renshaw rebounds after India nightmare
Matt Renshaw credits a moment of enlightenment on the Australia A tour of New Zealand with helping him to book a spot on the upcoming Ashes tour.
The 27-year-old left-hander, who was born in England, had endured a dire Test tour of India where he made scores of 0, 2 and 2 in two Tests. Only runs, and lots of them, were going to get him on the plane to England.
The Australia A tour started superbly for Renshaw against New Zealand A with scores of 112 and 78 at Lincoln while opening the innings.
With just one match to go, he was looking out for the release of Cricket Australia’s centrally-contracted players list and his mind started to play tricks.
“I had a little bit of a blip in the first innings of the second game. The contract list had just come out and I had missed out,” Renshaw told AAP.
“I had done a bit of thinking about that and was trying to predict stuff in my own head, but that didn’t really work out.
Matthew Renshaw. (Photo by Michael Dodge/Getty Images)
“That second game it got in my head in the first innings. I played a terrible shot and got out for two. I said to myself, ‘OK, that’s not why you play. Get back to why you want to play’…and I scored (140) in the second innings.
“Obviously India was tough mentally from the cricket side of things. I would have like a lot more runs but unfortunately that wasn’t the case,” Renshaw added.
“So I went to New Zealand with a mindset to enjoy my cricket. It can be tough when you know you have to score runs to get in a side, but I wasn’t thinking about that.
“I was just trying to enjoy myself. That is when I produce my best batting. The results over there were part and parcel of that.”
Renshaw’s approach was like that of a zen monk, clearing his mind with no thought of grasping or striving for an elusive goal.
He hit the jackpot when Australian chairman of selectors George Bailey phoned later with news of the Ashes squad.
“I had spoken to Usman Khawaja and he got his call the day before so I knew mine was coming,” Renshaw said.
“George gave me a call and it started with all the standard stuff and I said,’ Come on, just tell me whether I am in or out’. He told me I was in and I was really excited to be going to England.”
Renshaw opened the batting early in his Test career but said being dropped from the Queensland side several years ago was “a silver lining”.
“It made me force my way back into the side at No.5, just because of how strong our batting order has been,” Renshaw said.
“I always thought I had the game to bat in the middle order. A lot of openers do, it’s just that they haven’t had the opportunity.
“In terms of this tour, it is going to be about supporting the boys at the start and if I do get an opportunity to play, whether as an opener or in the middle order, I will enjoy myself.
“It is the Ashes. There will be more emotions and more people watching but at the end of the day it is a bowler against a batter trying to score runs.”
Green goes big in IPL
Mumbai had been yearning for the real Cameron Green to reveal his true colours in the Indian Premier League – and when he did, it was well worth the wait.
Hoping their big-money signing would deliver when most needed, Green obliged on his home turf in Mumbai with a sensational match-winning century against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Sunday to send them into the playoffs at the last gasp.
Alas for the big allrounder’s Australian international colleague Glenn Maxwell, Green’s heroics ensured that a stirring tournament for ‘Maxi’ ended in anti-climax as Royal Challengers Bangalore later missed out on the knockout stages with an agonising loss.
But Green was the story of the final day of group matches. Smashing the Sunrisers Hyderabad attack to all parts of the Wankhede Stadium, Green, who’d threatened a monster innings like this for a couple of months, scampered a winning single to move to three figures and leapt in the air for joy.
His price tag of $3.15m, making him the most expensive Australian IPL player of all, may have been a heavy one, but Green hadn’t let himself down throughout the event, cracking a couple of blistering fifties and bowling whole-heartedly for six wickets.
But this was a performance of a very different order. Having conceded just two runs off his one excellent over in Hyderabad’s crushing total of 5-200, Green, who came to the crease at 1-20, was all business as he flayed the Sunrisers with a remarkable demonstration of power-hitting.
He motored to 50 off just 20 balls, leaving India captain Rohit Sharma very much the junior partner early in their 128-run partnership.
And when the skipper was dismissed for a 37-ball 56, the 23-year-old Green took control along with the peerless Suryakumar Yadav to guide Mumbai to victory with 12 balls still remaining.
Green muscled eight sixes as well as eight fours, with the only question being whether he might run out of time to get that precious maiden IPL ton as Suryakumar (25no) was making hay at the other end.
The pair managed – just about, amid a touch of farce – to contrive that Green hit the winning single while also making three figures.
Yet even the great Sachin Tendulkar was left laughing on the Mumbai bench at the transformation which saw Green ending up scratching around to earn the precious single after he’d spent the rest of the innings wreaking mayhem.
“When we had about 20 to get, I just said to Sky (Suryakumar) ‘just finish it’,” explained Green.
“Obviously, we’d come here to win so you’ve got to make sure of that first. But with a couple of runs left, I thought I might as well trickle across the line (for the hundred).”
Asked if he’d felt any pressure this season because of the high expectations from Mumbai before he finally got into his stride, Green shrugged: “Potentially – but the whole set up has been awesome. It (the pressure) wasn’t from the team, but probably myself.”
After Green’s heroics in the eight-wicket win, Mumbai were left with an anxious wait to see if they could hold on to their fourth and final playoff spot from Bangalore.
But despite being inspired by a record seventh IPL hundred from Virat Kohli (101no off 61) which propelled them to 5-197 – Maxwell only made 11 – RCB were beaten by ladder leaders Gujarat Titans, who powered to a six-wicket win thanks to Shubman Gill’s two-runs-a-ball 104no.
It meant Mumbai will face the Marcus Stoinis and his Lucknow Super Giants in Wednesday’s eliminator, while Gujarat will take on the Chennai Super Kings in Tuesday’s playoff match.
Ashes countdown: Days to go …
25
The number of fours Don Bradman hit during his majestic 254 against England at Lord’s in 1930. He then amassed 334 in the next match at Leeds before adding 232 for good measure two games later at The Oval.
On This Day …
May 22 – “The Big Ship” Warwick Armstong was born in 1879. He led Australia to the first Ashes clean sweep with a 5-0 triumph on home soil in 1920-21 by scoring three centuries in the rout. The 140kg all-rounder scored 2863 runs and took 87 wickets with his leg-spinners in a 50-match career from 1902-21, finishing as the skipper of a 3-0 Ashes tour triumph.
with AAP
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