Joe Root (left) and Harry Brook put on an unbroken 150 stand for England in Sydney. Photo: AFP <\/p>\n
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Joe Root and Harry Brook tamed Australia’s all-pace attack with an unbroken 154-run stand on Sunday to rescue England and give them the upper hand after a rain-hit day one of the fifth and final Ashes Test.<\/p>\n
Batting after skipper Ben Stokes won the toss at a sold-out Sydney Cricket Ground, they steered the tourists to 211-3 when bad light forced the players from the field just before tea.<\/p>\n
Subsequent rain and the risk of lightning made no further play possible, with stumps called an hour early.<\/p>\n
Root was not out 72 and Brook on 78 after coming together with England tottering at 57-3 following the wickets of Ben Duckett (27), Zak Crawley (16) and Jacob Bethell (10) before lunch.<\/p>\n
The world’s top two-ranked batsmen set about counter-attacking on a decent batting pitch providing little movement for the bowlers.<\/p>\n
Both brought up hard-fought half-centuries and, with dark storm clouds looming, kept the scoreboard ticking over at a fast clip.<\/p>\n
“We’re in very good position, obviously three down at the end of the end of play,” said Brook.<\/p>\n
“Hopefully we can make the most of that going into tomorrow.<\/p>\n
“It was good pitch,” he added.<\/p>\n
“When I first went in it felt like the bounce was fairly steep. But then it it started to get a little bit lower and slower and just generally feels like a good wicket.”<\/p>\n
England came into the game buoyed by a four-wicket win inside two days in the previous Test in Melbourne, desperate to keep the momentum going.<\/p>\n
That victory snapped a 15-year winless streak in Australia but came too late to save the series, with the hosts retaining the urn by winning in Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide.<\/p>\n
Australia sprang a surprise by including all-rounder Beau Webster in place of quick Jhye Richardson, with off-spinner Todd Murphy overlooked.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
‘Hate doing it’<\/p>\n
It is the first time in almost 140 years that the hosts have not played a front-line spinner during a Sydney Test.<\/p>\n
“Hate doing it,” said Australia skipper Steve Smith.<\/p>\n
“But if we keep producing wickets that we don’t think are going to spin and seam is going to play a big part and cracks are going to play a big part, you kind of get pushed into a corner.”<\/p>\n
England brought in seamer Matthew Potts for the injured Gus Atkinson in their only change, with their frontline slow bowler Shoaib Bashir missing out for a fifth straight Test.<\/p>\n
The day began with a tribute to first responders at the Bondi mass shooting last month that killed 15 people, with huge cheers when hero Ahmed Al Ahmed, who tackled one of the gunmen, appeared.<\/p>\n
Duckett was lively when play started, crunching five boundaries from Mitchell Starc in a quickfire 27 off 24 balls.<\/p>\n
But England’s tormentor-in-chief Mitchell Starc had the last laugh, enticing an outside edge from an angled ball to wicketkeeper Alex Carey at full stretch.<\/p>\n
It was the fifth time Starc has bagged Duckett this series.<\/p>\n
Crawley was next to go, trapped lbw by Michael Neser, with both openers back in the sheds by the first drinks break and the tourists in trouble on 51-2.<\/p>\n
A cautious Bethell took 15 balls to get off the mark and never looked confident.<\/p>\n
He departed after prodding at a moving delivery from Scott Boland that took a faint edge to Carey as England fell to 57-3.<\/p>\n
Root joined Brook at the crease and they began to rebuild.<\/p>\n
They rotated the strike well and punished any loose balls with Root bringing up his 67th half-century, and the 100-partnership, with a single off Webster.<\/p>\n
Only Indian great Sachin Tendulkar, with 68, has scored more Test fifties.<\/p>\n
Brook was fortunate to survive on 45 when he slogged Starc and the ball dropped between three chasing fielders.<\/p>\n
But he kept his composure to reach a 15th half-century four balls after Root, cracking Webster through the covers for a boundary.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Joe Root (left) and Harry Brook put on an unbroken 150 stand for England in Sydney. Photo: AFP SYDNEY: Joe Root and Harry Brook tamed Australia’s all-pace attack with an unbroken 154-run stand on Sunday to rescue England and give them the upper hand after a rain-hit day one of the fifth and final Ashes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":103286,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.tribune.com.pk\/media\/images\/pg12-lead1767536630-0\/pg12-lead1767536630-0-640x480.webp","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-103285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t