Australia sent into oblivion

The Gillette ODI series could not have gotten off to a better start for England, as Jason Roy and Joe Root power the tourists to a thrashing win over Australia at the MCG.

Eoin Morgan won the toss and elected to bowl on a good bouncy MCG surface that did ofter plenty of the bowlers early on in the game. However, much is the evolution of the limited over formats, chasing totals is no longer too much of a concern when it comes to quality teams like England.

When looking at this ODI team that England have, it seems like a fresh team that has not yet been scared by the Australian team from the test series with the exceptions of a few players. Yet, it seemed like a team with plenty of variety and aggression that was filled with players who had no fear of losing, and that is certainly what England showed in the first ODI of the summer.

Australia began the series in phenomenal fashion as Aaron Finch attempted to set the tone for the series by hitting Chris Woakes down the ground for a boundary from the first ball of the innings. But With the extra pace of Mark Wood and the hostility that he tried to bowl with had the likes of David Warner out in brutal fashion. Not only was it a spectacular sight to see quality pace but it was a moment in which England really showed hostility for the first time in the tour and for sure sent a strong message to Australia.

As Aaron Finch continued with his work, wickets at the other end continued to tumble with the in-form Steve Smith was caught by Adil Rashid. Looking at the leg-spinner bowl in the first ODI, my main impression was that he went about the innings in the right way. The fact that he may have gone for a lot of runs, but he was able to get wickets in crucial moments and that is the key to success in limited over games.

Finch, after what had been a fairly below par Big Bash tournament certainly asserted himself on the biggest stage with a sublime 107 that sent the English bowlers to all parts of the MCG. It was the partnership between Mitchell Marsh (50)  and Finch that was essentially the key to the total that Australia could have gotten. At 3/196, it seemed that with both the set batsmen at the crease, Australia had a series case to go ahead and make around 340 which would have been a very competitive score against the England batsmen. However, it was not to be as both Marsh and Finch were out in quick succession which left Stoinis (60) and Paine (27) out in the middle to rebuild the innings. But with two new batsmen left to restart the innings, 304 was a slightly below par performance considering the batting arsenal that England have.

As the game showed, 304 was all but too small for England as Jason Roy made the Australian bowlers look like ordinary citizens at the MCG. Much like the start the Australians had, England made their start looking very ordinary as the tourists belted their way to 87 runs in 10 overs of the first powerplay.

Referring to one of my earlier theories of how teams need to play against teams like Australia, I think that the way that England went about their run chase only supports that hypothesis. And it is the fact, that Australia is very poor when it comes to dealing with players with aggressive intent. It has been seen all throughout history that Australia is often seen as the rough and tough team that ultimately has a profile in which teams have to have a defensive mindset against. Becuase of the aggressive intent that Australia show in their games, they too are so used to teams having more defensive tactics against them. However, looking over lots of recent games since 2014, I have noticed that players and teams that come out with a highly aggressive approach against Australia, they are made to look very ordinary.

Examples such as Misbah ul Haq and Brendon McCullum both scoring record-breaking centuries and ultimately contributing to wins initially highlighted that they have trouble against purposeful players. Moreover, watching Rohit Sharma from India scoring a record fast double hundred in India further emphasised the point that they really lose their structure and planning which only contributes to worse bowling from Australia. But watching Sharjeel Khan play in Australia and score the runs that he did and the aggressive manner that the compiled them in was a standing feature that Australia is very much thrown back against that type of batting. Jason Roy's captivating innings of 180 only proved the theory that Australia is extremely vulnerable against aggressive batting and are made to look very ordinary.

With 60 runs scored in the first 6 overs of the innings, it certainly seemed that both Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins for the first time in the tour have been exposed slightly. However, it was a gem of an innings from Jason Roy and was very much backed up by Joe Root, who I believe was able to release himself from captaining England and play the game that he enjoys. His very calculated innings of 91 not out was a brilliant 'captain's knock' despite not being the captain of the ODI side.

I don't think that Australia needs to make any batting changes as I think that overall, most of the players did a job, but it was when the wickets fell that proved to be all but inconvenient for the hosts. It was mentioned that Pat Cummins will be rested for the second ODI which will most likely bring back Josh Hazelwood into the team. Overall, the bowling from the debutant Andrew Tye was quiet tidy considering the belting Starc and Cummins received, his change of pace and economy certainly impressed and think that his wicketless innings have deserved him another game.

Overall, it was an extremely incredible display of quality and entertaining batting from England as they had honestly destroyed Australia. But I think that the hosts have the capacity to come back in spectacular fashion and would not be surprised if there will be a much tighter contest for the second ODI.

Let's hope for another brilliant game of cricket for the second ODI.