England, with a broken spirit, are once again facing an upbeat Australia in the 4th test of the series at Sydney.
The series is already lost for them at Melbourne. Their main focus will be to fashion something from the rest two games and avoid humiliation, to do better than their previous outings.
Being destroyed in Australia is nothing new for England now. Their last test win there was almost a decade ago. Since then, they have played 13 matches and won none. In fact, they drew only once. 5-0, 4-0 and 3-0(continuing) were the results.
This time, everyone is expecting a 5-0 win for Australia again. Considering England’s recent form and their dependency on Joe Root, it seems quite imminent.
This was also the case in 2017, the last time they were in Australia. Although they played better cricket than this time’s horror show, still they were 3-0 down by the 3rd game and another whitewash was looming.
But England escaped that time. All of that was due to a certain Alastair Cook. His magnanimous innings of 244 single-handedly saved England.
Although there were debates about the pitch condition of Melbourne after that match and that also got a demerit point, yet, you cannot take anything away from Cook’s innings.
England once again find themselves in a similar situation, a side in total disarray once again, are 3-0 down.
And by the looks of the English side, they’ll need something heroic like Alastair Cook once again.
It seems that their batting is in all sorts of shambles bar Joe Root. Their bowling is doing comparatively good. But taking 20 wickets is not proving enough for them.
So once again, they will look for their hero who’ll step up to save them from this. Joe Root looks to be the most likely. But he has been carrying the English batting for all the last year. Still, it didn’t work.
So, ahead of the next game, England needs to figure out many things. But they also will hope for another saviour this time. If that’s not the case, England–as a team–better buckle up to swallow another regular humiliation.
