It is hard to know how much of England’s warm-up game will be remotely relevant when their Ashes campaign begins 10km away at Perth Stadium on Friday – no distance in space or time but light years away in import and atmosphere – but if it achieved nothing more than boosting Ollie Pope’s confidence that alone has made the exercise worthwhile.
England’s No 3 – that much is surely absolutely certain – followed his first-innings century by scoring another 90 in the second, and what was impressive was not so much the number of runs but the manner in which they were scored. At times the 27-year-old looked imperious, hitting a dozen fours and a pair of sixes, timing the ball sweetly but with devilish intent.
It was only a friendly against a Lions team that used fully 11 bowlers across a match played in front of a few dozen people in a public park, but it was still hugely impressive. For the record England, set a target of 202 after the Lions declared their second innings on 251 for six, won by five wickets after Jamie Smith sped the team across the finish line with a stream of boundaries.
Joe Root clocked up another 31 runs but was not hugely convincing during England’s warm-up. Photograph: Gareth Copley/Getty Images
Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett, the two other big first-innings successes, both failed in the second knock while Joe Root scored several more runs – 31 on this occasion – but was not enormously more convincing, before being bemused and duly bowled by Will Jacks. Harry Brook met an identical fate soon afterwards.
Shoaib Bashir – who ended the match having bowled 12 overs for each side – will have found some of the batting he faced pretty hostile. His first six overs against the Lions went for 56, with Ben McKinney tucking in to bowling that if not exactly loose was certainly not very threatening.
At the end of the sixth of those overs, England’s three other bowlers had conceded almost precisely the same number of runs – 57 – from 15, though Bashir became a little less generous in time, conceding 27 from his remaining six. He took one wicket, taking a smart, low catch, falling to his right, to end Jacob Bethell’s innings for 70, off 80 balls.
Bethell, making up for managing only three in the first innings, was one of three half-centurions in the Lions’ top four. McKinney’s returns from opener were more consistent than those of their No 3: he scored 66 in their first innings and went two better in their second, taking 61 deliveries over his half-century, with five fours and two sixes, both off Bashir’s bowling. Bethell reached 68 before a mis-hit to Ben Stokes at cover, who took a stooping catch at ankle height.
Jordan Cox showed similar consistency, and followed his first-innings 53 with another 57, at just over a run a ball. There were some outstandingly handsome shots on the way, including a straight drive and a pull off consecutive Brydon Carse deliveries to reach his half century.
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Having missed the first day of this game with a stomach upset and made only the most minor of contributions to the second, Carse bowled excellently when finally given the chance, with McKinney and Cox among his three wickets.
This report will update
