BRISBANE: England captain Joe Root won the toss, opted to bat and lost opener Rory Burns on the very first delivery of the Ashes series, a late swinging yorker from Australia paceman Mitchell Starc.

It set the tone for the opening day on Wednesday, which was more like open season for Australia’s pace bowling pack. England were bowled out for 147 in 51 overs, with ominous lightning and thunder cracking to the west and south of the Gabba.

Pat Cummins took the last three wickets and finished with a five-wicket haul in his first innings as Australia captain.

Heavy rain and bad light combined to prevent any further play on Day 1.

“Dream start really,” Cummins said. “To keep them to 150 ... tremendous start. I’m really proud of not only how everyone bowled but I thought everyone stayed really composed. Personally, it was nice to get a couple of wickets at the end to make it a five-for — it was just a really good start.”

The overcast conditions rapidly grew more gloomy for the visitors after Starc took out Burns’ leg stump immediately.

It was an ugly dismissal for the Surrey man, who crab-walked across his stumps and trudged off with his sixth duck of the year, an all-time record for opening batsmen.

Within half an hour he had been joined in the dressing room by Dawid Malan (6) and Root as the metronomic Josh Hazlewood struck twice.

Malan dangled his bat out to catch an edge and gave debut wicketkeeper Alex Carey his first test dismissal.

Root was out for a duck by a pearl of a delivery from the big quick, with David Warner leaping wide for a superb catch in the slips.

When Cummins took his first wicket — star all-rounder Ben Stokes (5) caught low at third slip by Marnus Labuschagne four balls after the first drinks break — England were reeling at 29-4.

Opener Haseeb Hameed defied the attack and helped England to 59-4 at lunch, but was out for 25 early in the second session when he edged a Cummins delivery that moved away off the seam and was caught by Steve Smith at second slip.

Ollie Pope and Jos Buttler settled the innings, combining in a 50-run stand to staunch the flow of wickets before both were out in their 30s.

Buttler played an expansive drive for his fifth boundary to reach 39 but was out next ball from Starc, edging behind to Alex Carey as England slumped to 112-6. England added six runs before Pope (35) top-edged an attempted hook and was caught by Hazlewood diving forward near the fine-leg boundary, giving all-rounder Cameron Green his first Test wicket.

Cummins had Ollie Robinson (0) caught behind and Mark Wood (8) caught at short-leg and the stadium lights were turned on before he finished with 5-38 when he had Chris Woakes (21) caught in the deep by Hazlewood to finish off the innings.

“The wickets of Root, who entered the game as the leading test batter in 2021, and Stokes were the keys to keeping the England total under 150,” Cummins said, “but it’s only first innings of a five Test-match series.”

It turns out, it was a good toss for Cummins to lose in his first test since replacing Tim Paine as Australia’s first fast-bowling skipper in 65 years.

That left Root with a difficult decision to make, considering the greenish wicket at the Gabba in overcast conditions and with rain in the forecast.

Pope said there was no reason for England to panic, and the performance couldn’t be judged until both teams had batted on the pitch.

“We’re going to keep fighting,” he said. “We’ll come back strong and [hopefully] put a big score on second dig after knocking them over.”

For the first time since 1936, a wicket fell on the first ball of the Ashes series Down Under. England lost a wicket first ball at the Gabba in ‘36 and slumped to 20-3, but recovered to win that match.

That seems a long way off for this England lineup, given the lack of preparation caused by regular rain in recent weeks which affected their training sessions and and having to quarantine for two weeks after arriving in Australia.

England haven’t won a Test in Australia since winning the Ashes here in 2010-11, and haven’t won a Test at the Gabba since 1986. After the first two sessions, it’ll be an uphill struggle to reverse that sequence.

The England batters struggled to cope with the extra bounce and carry which are characteristics of the Gabba pitch, and Australia’s pace trio bowled an excellent line and length in the conditions.

When Australia bat on Thursday, England’s bowling attack will be missing a lot of experience Stuart Broad was not included. Broad and Jimmy Anderson have a combined nine Ashes tours to Australia but are both missing the opening match, leaving Wood, Woakes and Robinson as the specialist fast bowlers and Leach as the specialist spin option.

“I think we’ve got the skill set in our bowlers to drag this back,” Pope insisted. “We’re going to keep fighting. We don’t know how [the wicket] is going to react tomorrow.”

Scoreboard

ENGLAND (1st innings):

R. Burns b Starc 0

H. Hameed c Smith b Cummins 25

D. Malan c Carey b Hazlewood 6

J. Root c Warner b Hazlewood 0

B. Stokes c Labuschagne b Cummins 5

O. Pope c Hazlewood b Green 35

J. Buttler c Carey b Starc 39

C. Woakes c Hazlewood b Cummins 21

O. Robinson c Carey b Cummins 0

M. Wood c Harris b Cummins 8

J. Leach not out 2

EXTRAS (LB-5, W-1) 6

TOTAL (all out, 50.1 overs) 147

FALL OF WICKETS: 1-0 (Burns), 2-11 (Malan), 3-11 (Root), 4-29 (Stokes), 5-60 (Hameed), 6-112 (Buttler), 7-118 (Pope), 8-122 (Robinson), 9-144 (Wood).

BOWLING: Starc 12-2-35-2, Hazlewood 13-4-42-2, Cummins 13.1-3-38-5 (1w), Lyon 9-2-21-0, Green 3-1-6-1.

AUSTRALIA: M. Harris, D. Warner, M. Labuschagne, S. Smith, T. Head, C. Green, A. Carey, P. Cummins (captain), M. Starc, N. Lyon, J, Hazlewood

UMPIRES: Paul Reiffel and Rod Tucker (both Australia).

TV UMPIRE: Paul Wilson (Australia).

MATCH REFEREE: David Boon (Australia).

Published in Dawn, December 9th, 2021