The former England batsman Kevin Pietersen is annoyed by the fact that the England batsmen are not trying to take on Australia’s off-spinner Nathan Lyon in the ongoing Ashes test match at Adelaide and are letting him bowl his areas and create pressure.
According to Pietersen, it’s not that Lyon is one of those bowlers who have got other variations apart from the stock delivery. He is a conventional off-spinner who turns the ball one way and the Adelaide Oval surface, where the second Ashes test match is currently played, is one of the flattest surfaces in the world anyway. It’s hard to understand why the England batsmen are still too cautious against Lyon.
Nathan Lyon got three wickets on the third day of the Adelaide test match today, but more than the no. of wickets he got, what was important for Australia was the fact that he bowled plenty of overs from one end and just dried up the runs to allow Steve Smith to rotate the fast bowlers from the other end.
The England batsmen, at no stage, tried to disrupt the rhythm of Lyon or tried to hit him out of the attack with a few boundaries. The off-spinner was allowed to dot it up, and the fast bowlers were hence able to bowl short and sharp spells in rotation.
Kevin Pietersen, who himself was brutal with the bat against spin bowling and is someone who has got a double hundred to his name at the Adelaide Oval, put out a tweet in criticism of England batsmen when the Poms lost back to back wickets in the second session after a good third-wicket partnership between Dawid Malan and the skipper Joe Root.
England eventually got bowled out for 236 in the first hour of the third session, despite having gone into the dinner break with only two wickets down early on in the day. One of the major factors of their downfall was the pressure that was created by Nathan Lyon at one end.
Can SOMEONE please smack Lyon?!?!! FFS!
Off spinner with zero variations and bowling on world crickets flattest road!!!! #Ashes— Kevin Pietersen🦏 (@KP24) December 18, 2021
Indian wicketkeeper-batsman Rishabh Pant had smashed Nathan Lyon during last Australian summer
The last time Australia had played a test series at home, the Indian wicketkeeper-batsman Rishabh Pant had smashed Nathan Lyon to all parts of the ground in both the Sydney as well the Brisbane test match and Australia had lost the 4-match test series by 2-1.
Kevin Pietersen clearly wanted the same kind of role to be played by one of the England middle-order batsmen as well, but it wasn’t to be.
