Nathan Lyon’s future in the Ashes series is in doubt after the Australia spinner sustained a potentially serious calf injury on the second day of the second Test.
Lyon pulled up when running to field the ball in the evening session and needed to be helped to the dressing rooms by a physio, and though the injury is still being assessed Steve Smith admitted “it didn’t look good”.
Lyon has taken nine wickets in the series, the most on either team, and was playing his 100th consecutive Test, becoming the sixth player and first bowler to reach that milestone.
“I haven’t been up in the sheds yet but it didn’t look good and doesn’t look ideal for the rest of the game,” said Smith, who was himself injured during the Lord’s Test four years ago.
“Your spin bowler, it’s one player, one role. Batters, there’s loads of us so it’s a bit different. If he’s no good he’d be a huge loss.”
Ben Duckett said Lyon’s injury was “a huge shame”, noting that “he was going to play a massive part in the fourth innings”. His departure was a hammer blow for Australia in what was – apart from a wild half-hour when three wickets fell for 34 runs against a barrage of short balls – a day dominated by England.
They took 77 for five in the morning to bowl Australia out for 416 and ended the day on 278 for four, with Zak Crawley falling two short of a half-century and Duckett, his fellow opener, following two shy of a ton.
Duckett was the second of the three batters to get caught off short balls, with Ollie Pope and Joe Root similarly dismissed, while Harry Brook reached stumps unbeaten on 45 after getting dropped off another.
“It’s the way we play our cricket,” Duckett said. “I feel like if they’re going to have plans like that and we go into our shells, that would be going totally against what we do.”
Pope, who was caught by Smith on the boundary after toe-ending a pull shot, had told Duckett moments beforehand that he was going to “smack it into the stands”. “I said, ‘Go and do it,’” Duckett recalled. “He’s so unlucky to get a toe-ender there – if that’s anywhere near the middle or even a top edge it’s going miles back for six … it’s the kind of fun environment we are creating.
“If you want to back away and hit it over cover for six then just commit to it. No one in that dressing room will be disappointed with how he got out – everyone will just be a bit gutted it didn’t go for six.”
Duckett then top-edged a pull to David Warner at fine leg off the bowling of Josh Hazlewood, professing no regrets despite being only two runs away from a place on the fabled Lord’s honours board.
“I’ve got no regrets at all. I would have been gutted with myself if I’d gone into my shell and gloved one behind,” he said. “I’d only have been disappointed if I’d gone away from my natural game. It’s a shot that I play and it’s a shot that I’ve scored plenty of runs doing, so I’m not happy I got out, but I’d rather get out like that.”
With Lyon already off the field and Australia’s seamers switching approach after finding little lateral movement, it felt like a more sober approach in that period might have paid greater dividends – that certainly seemed to be Ben Stokes’s conclusion when he emerged to score a risk-free and unbeaten 17 off 57.
“He was the only one looking to ride it, the rest were trying to take it on,” Smith said. “We probably didn’t feel as in the game against him as we did with the others ... they kept taking it on and kept presenting opportunities for us. It was great that we were able to create that many opportunities on that kind of wicket.”
In the absence of Lyon, Travis Head bowled five overs of spin and Smith contributed one. “Hopefully I won’t have to bowl too much,” said Smith, who from 85 overnight completed a 12th career century against England in the morning session (his four innings at Lord’s since 2013: 58, 215, 92 and now 110).
“I thought Heady bowled all right,” Smith continued. “He’s the one who’s going to have to take a fair amount of the spin overs. It’s not great when you lose your spinner on a surface that isn’t offering much for the seam bowlers.”
