Australia promise ‘different plans’ to snag Ben Stokes’ wicket
Stokes has performed excellent innings in every of the final two Tests, scoring 155 at Lord’s to take England near an inconceivable victory, then belting an important 80 within the first innings at Headingley with the hosts threatening to concede a sizeable deficit.
Despite battling a persistent knee downside, Stokes’s 309 runs make him the sequence’ second-highest run-scorer, 47 runs behind Australian opener Usman Khawaja, who has confronted virtually twice as many balls.
“It was nice to get him early,” Starc mentioned, after dismissing Stokes cheaply in England’s chase at Headingley, just for Harry Brook, Chris Woakes and Mark Wood to see the facet house and halve Australia’s sequence result in 2-1.
“But we spoke about getting him while he was with another batter, the way he’s been playing with the tail.
“It’s always nice to get someone of his calibre early, but obviously, one we’re going to come up with some different plans for in the last two Tests.”
Starc is having a fantastic sequence himself, with 13 wickets in two matches since being overlooked of the opener at Edgbaston and the fast, who performed just one Test in 2019, appears to be like sure to maintain his place in Manchester.
While Starc has all the time been recognised as a potent strike bowler, he has additionally been costly, which was a part of selectors’ resolution to enter the First Test with Scott Boland and Josh Hazlewood alongside captain Pat Cummins. However, England’s aggressive method means no touring bowler has been particularly economical thus far within the sequence and Starc says that’s permitting him to deal with taking wickets.
“The way they’ve been playing over the last period of time means they’re naturally going to be faster scorers,” he added. “Even some of our scoring rates and strike rates as batters have been a bit higher throughout this series, which speaks to flatter, truer wickets and faster outfields.
“It’s never really been a concern of mine, my role is to attack and take wickets, that’s shown in my strike rate. I’ll keep getting better that way.”