Travis Head noted feeling extremely pleased with his efforts, especially after reaching an unbeaten score of 154, which is his individual best, and helping the Australian team, the World champions to a convincing seven wickets win over England in the first one day international at Trent Bridge on Thursday.
Then, apart from offering a difficult chance early in his innings when Brydon Carse dropped a tough catch at backward point, Head had every reason to be pleased. After a new bout of injury and his first Twenty20 International in December 2019, Archer replaced David Willey in the XI to face Australia at World Cup 2019. The southpaw attacked and dominated the bowlers again and again.
He hit twenty fours and five sixes in 129 balls.
Chasing a 316-run target in 44 overs, Travis Head’s inning and an opening stand of 148 with 15 stroked Marnus Labuschagne, helped Australia take a 1-0 lead in the 5-match series, with 6 overs and 6 wickets in hand.
In another match, Labuschagne had been dangerous with the ball as well, taking 3-39 in yet another cry for help from England. He gave away the same number of runs but in just seven fewer wickets. The England team collapsed from 213 for 2 to 315 all out, despite Ben Duckett’s 95 runs coming in reasonably quick order.
Player of the Match Travis Head, who also featured prominently on the England team’s agenda in the recently concluded T20 series ‘It’s always good to get a hundred it was a good night in the office’ condemned such comments.
“Wh at enjoyed the most,” he added. “Jof (Archer) is way too good for me…He’s an amazing bowler. There are good days and bad days for every man man, and this is one of those days…. The first couple of overs were fairly orthodox and I remember there wasn’t too much movement in the air, so I just wanted to back my technique and stay on the pitch.”
“I got a couple of wickets too with my part time spin on the batting day at Trent Bridge,” Travis Head said with a smile. “Two-for as well.” “I was a little bit fortunate at the beginning of my innings but I understand that once you get through that period then there are sufficient runs to score.”
Since David Warner announced retirement from the longest format of the game, it is understood that Head may be slotted in as an opener, in that model of the game in the near future. With African coutrn played in 2014, these debates have been further ignited after Head scored beautifully coming at No.6 against India during the final of world Test championship last year which Australia won.
Nonetheless, following inquiries concerning the expectation of ever encountering the new ball while playing Test matches, Travis Head did not come fore answering in conclusive terms about his position in the team batting order going forward. Such was Head’s retort, as he was pretty sure he was not ready to say anything definitive on that point in the talk.
“Especially: don’t do it. It’s interesting. I’m not going to dive into that. I’ll just let that play out.”
“‘Sometimes ‘width’ can actually mean middle and off stump because he makes that space very well,” said England coach and former batsman Marcus Trescothick.
At present, Trescothick is looking after the omaN team for this series, after which brendon will start looking after the diagnosed team.
The fine run of Australian ODI victories has now stretched to thirteen matches and within this time no losses have been recorded. This latest victory was achieved without their main strike fast bowlers. Regular Australian captain Pat Cummins was rested for the series, and more worryingly both Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood missed the fixture on Thursday with illness.
Except for the Ricky Ponting-led undefeated Australian side, there is no other team in ODI history better than that. That remarkable team managed to win the 21st match in 23 consecutive matches which is still a record to this day.
