Something unusual in this Ashes summer occurred in Stuart Clark’s first over at Headingley today: he bowled a ball down the leg side, which cost Brad Haddin a bye. That, though, was unusual only for Clark. What was unusual for this series was that he acknowledged the lapse with a wave of his arm to the keeper.
Australia have wanted all summer for a bowler who understands line as a cardinal virtue, who strives above all for consistency, who tries to make batsmen play but is averse to surrendering easy runs off the pads—now they had him. He bowled the day’s first maiden, didn’t concede a first run until his 17th delivery, claimed his first wicket with his 21st—and not just Clark but every bowler around him benefited.
Australia celebrated the early fall of Andrew Strauss with an abandon that had little to do with the delivery, which was nondescript, something to do with the catch, an improbably clean pluck, and much to do with the perception of England’s captain as the key wicket—a status magnified here by Flint-off’s absence. The door was ajar; now to kick it in.
After eleven overs, Ponting made a double change, Clark and Johnson replacing Siddle and Hilfenhaus. Almost immediately, one was conscious of the attack’s changed dynamics. While Australians imbue ‘bowling in partnerships’ with the same significance as ‘batting in partnerships’, there has been little evidence of it on this tour. Clark’s steadiness here, however, was the perfect foil for Johnson’s pace and prodigalities.
Rather than bartering runs for wickets, Ponting could concentrate fielders in the cordon, where five chances were eventually accepted, and maintain a short leg, who took two further catches. Rather than wondering where to hit their next boundary, as on the first morning at Lord’s, batsmen were concerned about where their next run was to come from.
After an hour and a half, each Australian bowler had a wicket, an evenness of distribution reflecting the equality of contribution. Johnson was inevitably wild and woolly, but Clark tightened round the scoring like a tourniquet, until he was leading Australia off at lunch with figures of three for 7 from 41 deliveries.
The vital breakthrough was Alastair Cook, who made few errors until the last, falling for the fifth time to Clark in six meetings, an encounter rather like The Itchy & Scratchy Show: interesting enough but with consequences foreordained.
Clark finished with 3 for 18. Four of his ten overs were also maidens. Australia have struggled to bowl maidens on this tour almost as much as they have struggled to get batsmen out. In the three preceding Tests, Australia have achieved a maiden roughly once every six overs—especially unimpressive considering that almost a third of the total maidens were propelled on the last day in Cardiff when runs were unimportant. Glenn McGrath, for reference, achieved a maiden almost every third over. And McGrath springs readily to reference where Clark is concerned.
Clark first came into Australian selection calculations in England four years ago as a McGrath epigone, before outbowling the master down under thirty months ago. They have similar virtues: height, a tight wicket-to-wicket line, a strong wrist to regulate a perpendicular seam. There are few variations, but as Shane Warne once drolly observed: ‘It’s batsmen who worry about variations, not bowlers.’
In one respect, Clark clearly departs the McGrath mould. There is no chuntering, no glaring, and certainly no propensity for ‘5–0’ predictions. On the contrary, he is disarmingly inscrutable; sometimes he might as well be bowling against a wall.
Once in a while, as he returns to his mark, an inner smile is outwardly expressed: there was a quizzical one today when he beat Graeme Swann’s outside edge by the small matter of 18 inches. A certain Yorkshireman of yesteryear would have grumbled: ‘’Twere bludy well wasted on thee.’
Otherwise, Clark does the business with a less-is-more, let’s-just-get-on-with-it, we-all-know-what-we’re-here-for lack of ostentation. Where Brett Lee proclaimed his fitness from the rooftops before this Test, for instance, Clark was determinedly low-key. ‘I haven’t got any massive statements; I’m just waiting for an opportunity … Whether I get no wickets or 20 wickets, I just want to play.’
That calm is clearly contagious. The other beneficiary of Clark’s penetration today was Siddle, able to attack England’s elongated tail with a ball just a session old, and gaining 4 for 3 in 14 deliveries for his very minimal trouble.
The question inevitably will arise why Clark has waited so long for his chance here, when his experience, especially of Lord’s as a former Middlesex player, would have been invaluable. One reason is that Clark was harshly judged at Hove for a lacklustre spell, after a prolonged absence following elbow surgery. Another is the commitment of his captain to the bowlers who served him so stoutly in South Africa: Johnson, Siddle and Hilfenhaus.
Ironically, Clark’s opportunity finally arose because of a return to the selection precept Australia followed successfully during that very series: that of choosing your best four bowlers, regardless of pace, irrespective of balance.
Nathan Hauritz has done little wrong in England, not quite enough right. He has rescued Australia’s over rate from the wretched and expensive depths it plumbed in India last year, but there is no doubt whom the home team’s batsmen would prefer to face, and in the end the overs hardly mattered: England had to take the slack up, which they did with almost incorrigible slackness.
Australia’s response was aggressive, with a touch of their old authority, and even pitilessness. When Australia was at its peak, errors stood out, and were swiftly atoned for. Stuart Clark remembers.