OPINION
Follow UsJonny Bairstow resumed his innings on Day 3 at the overnight score of 12 off 47 balls. Soon he was 13 off 60 deliveries. The strike-rate was 21.7. It was rather uncharacteristic for a batter who mustered 394 runs at a strike-rate of 120.1 in his last series which ended less than a week ago. The BazBall was put on the back burner and quite understandably so.
In the final hour of Day 2, Bairstow batted for the time when the Indian bowlers had their tails up. On Day 3, however, he opted to fight fire with fire. The duo of Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammad Shami was right on the money again. In addition, he had Virat Kohli in his face.
Bairstow was beaten four times in the fourth and the fifth over the day, trying to get on with it. The last of these four deliveries was a waft way outside the off-stump. It brought out a cheeky giggle from Kohli in the slip cordon.
Built like a warrior, Bairstow has fought numerous battles in his life thus far. Overcoming the loss of his father at the age of 8, bursting into England’s ODI side at the time of their white-ball resurgence, and winning his spot back in the Test side, the 32-year old has done them all.
Here, from a point where he was being pushed back, Bairstow pulled through to express himself. He completed his hundred off only 119 balls. This is 87 runs from 59 balls in a back-against-the-wall situation.
The most likeable aspect of his acceleration was his stroke-making. Unlike his skipper Ben Stokes, who offered multiple catching chances, Bairstow’s knock was based on maximizing the scoring opportunities on the merit of the ball in a pristine manner. It was astonishing how quickly and smoothly he was able to switch gears.
You can blame Kohli for poking the bear but the form the Yorkshireman is in, he didn’t need a confrontation with the former Indian skipper. All he needed was one boundary off the sweet spot of the bat to get him into the zone. It came in the next over after his animated chat with Kohli. The ball was just a little full and Bairstow drove it over mid-off for four to get the engine running.
This is Bairstow’s fifth Test ton in the summer and all of them have come in a situation of crisis - walking in at 36/4 in Sydney, 48/4 in Antigua, 56/3 in Nottingham, 17/3 in Leeds and now 44/3 in Birmingham.
Each of these five high-quality tons has been based on taking the attack to the opposition. An attacking shot percentage above 35 with a control percentage of over 80 is the common theme across all these hundreds. Fair to say, Bairstow has been rolling the BazBall before Brendon McCullum’s appointment in the coaching seat.
Probably, that is the difference between him and Stokes, the two flagbearers of England’s new approach over the past four weeks. Stokes has fiddled around the boundaries of slogging and has numerous innings cut down by reckless strokes. The right-hander, on the other hand, has acknowledged the merit of the ball.
Consequently, he has tackled different challenges thrown at him by different bowling attacks. Against New Zealand, Bairstow scored 23% of his runs square of the wicket in the off side. He almost mastered the Joe Root dab to churn out boundaries through the third-man. That option was not available in this innings as the Indian seamers delivered 73.9% of deliveries angling in towards him, as compared to only 36.9% from the Kiwi pacers. Hence, he took on the driving option and aced it.
This constitutes a glorious comeback for Bairstow in the Test cricket arena. Between 2017 and 2021, he managed three hundreds in 41 Tests. Halfway through 2022, he has five tons in eight Tests. His last big year in Test cricket was 2016, when the Englishman gathered 1470 runs with three hundreds striking at 58.2. This year, his run tally is at 880, the most for any batter. The strike-rate is 75.9. The balls-per-boundary ratio has improved from 16.5 in 2016 to 9.6.
This is a scary upgrade on the run-scoring front in Bairstow’s peak six years apart. To enunciate further, no one in the top five run-scorers’ list in 2022 has a balls-per-boundary ratio of under 14. His control percentage is the least in this lot but the differential between him and the best is only 5%.
Bairstow has compromised a sliver of his control to create a vast upside in the scoring rate. This is what you call ‘percentage cricket’ in the modern era. In simpler words, it is taking the most efficient calculative risks to optimize your time at the crease.
The right-hander has the strength, technique and the range to execute it. To support it, he has the heart for a fight. The Edgbaston knock (106 off 140 balls) had all these qualities on display. Needless to say, it has added another chapter to his sensational comeback to red-ball cricket.
