Poor old Will Jacks spent almost exactly half the day standing on the fine leg boundary rope.
On day two of the second Ashes Test at the Gabba, England’s spinner bowled exactly one over more than Australia, who had been unceremoniously dropped the day before. This small numerical detail barely tells the story of a day dominated by Australian control, persistent English missteps, and the predictable ebb and flow of Ashes theatre.
When the bowling was being done from the Stanley Street End of the Gabba, Jacks was deployed on the opposite fence. And so the 27-year-old all-rounder from Surrey became the latest in a long line of English tourists to receive the unique hospitality of Australia’s most lubricated and overconfident in the outer. It was a day where spectators’ amusement seemed inexhaustible, and Jacks, standing alone at fine leg, became a focal point of their attention.
They called him “Jocksy” all day, for reasons known only to the select few. They called him other things, of course, when they were feeling less kind, but for the most part Jacks was an unfortunate intermediary for the crowd’s views on this England team. The insults were as predictable as the Australian dominance; some good-natured, some pointed, all highlighting the frustrations of English fans witnessing familiar struggles on foreign soil.
The bowling, Jacks was told, was subpar and was consistently too short. Ben Stokes’s tactics were said to be ill-advised and Bazball as a concept was fundamentally flawed. These may not have been the exact words used, but you get the idea. Criticism rained down as freely as the balls on the pitch, leaving Jacks to absorb it all with remarkable composure. He took the whole experience well enough, and maybe one day will reflect upon the fact he was part of a rite of passage as old as time.
This is simply what happens to the English during the Ashes in Australia, when the home side is in the process of grinding them into the dust. It is a pattern repeated for generations, and day two at the Gabba felt like history replaying itself. The wayward bowling, the slow decline of body language, the sarcastic cheers, and the general merriment of the home crowd all contributed to the sense of inevitability. The only mercy came from nightfall, which spared the Barmy Army the traditional late-afternoon broiling.
And the dropped catches, oh boy. For as long as England has played Test cricket in this country, the dropped catches have been the initial symptom of infection. Jamie Smith’s misjudgement behind the stumps was the tickle in the throat, and Ben Duckett’s two shockers in the gully the first sneeze and cough. By the time Brydon Carse batted away that sitter at cover, the cold sweats had long since kicked in.
The only new element to all of this was Australia’s scoring rate, a cruising altitude of 5.17 an over through the course of the day. Rarely did the scoring feel forced, and when it did a wicket tended to follow. This approach reflected the Australians’ confidence and patience, as well as their commitment to letting the scoreboard steadily grow while exposing England’s mistakes.
Australia will take a strange kind of heart in the sharing of the load on this day, as nearly every batter helped himself to a start without claiming the occasion for his own. Travis Head threatened a sequel to his Perth heroics but found his luck was out. Jake Weatherald looked a good thing for a thrilling first Test century but left only with 72 and a sore front foot, courtesy of Jofra Archer. Marnus Labuschagne batted delightfully, but nicked one on 65. Cameron Green was just gearing up on 45 before he got sucked into Carse’s double-bluff. Steve Smith’s 61 felt like the absolute least he could have scored on an evening that briefly appeared too easy for him.
The individuals were left to rue errors, but the collective reigned. And with 33 minutes still left to play in the day, Australia took the lead. It was a display of disciplined batting and unrelenting pressure that left England searching for answers.
England, meanwhile, went looking for heroes. Archer bowled unchanged for an hour after the tea break, threatening regularly but taking only one wicket, while in the night session Stokes took it upon himself to manufacture inspiration. This is what Stokes thrives upon, of course. Make the situation as dire as possible, stack as many odds against him as you can, and ensure his body is right on the cusp of total collapse and you’ll get his best version.
But Stokes’s one-man machismo stood in stark contrast to the Australian scorecard. He may be the only cricketer in the world who could turn a Test into a 1 vs 11 battle and win it, but not at the Gabba. His efforts, admirable though they were, could not stem the tide of Australian dominance.
The game is still comfortably alive, though Australia has earned the opportunity to shut the door on day three. Alex Carey will resume with the hopes of breaking the mould and becoming the lone-century maker, but will need the batting support of Michael Neser and Mitchell Starc if he is to do it. England needs to somehow do what it has not managed to do on these shores for a generation — shrug off a bad day and bounce back.
It can be done, and the English need look no further than young Jocksy for inspiration. They may not have let him bowl at all, and he may have spent most of the day in the verbal firing line, but when his moment came, Will Jacks took it. His brilliant catch at short fine leg to remove Smith was England’s highlight of the day. He celebrated it like a man who has waited his whole career for the opportunity to make a difference for his country in an Ashes Test. The accumulation of the jeers from the outer must have made the moment even sweeter, the fraught state of the game making his effort even more significant.
England needs to hope each of its 11 shares Jacks’s resilience, lest Australia enjoy many more days like this one. As day two at the Gabba proved, the Ashes in Australia is a marathon of pressure, patience, and small moments that collectively shape the story — and this time, the home team is firmly in control.
