England’s short ball hara-kiri shows need for Bazball adaptation.

The great naturalist, Charles Darwin, gave his name to two very different honours. The Darwin Medal is a prestigious prize awarded for "distinction in evolution, biological diversity and developmental, population and organismal biology". The Darwin Award celebrates, more than a little macabrely and often posthumously, individuals who eliminate themselves from the gene pool in the most idiotic manner. Examples include a man who was crushed by a vending machine he was trying to steal from, while honourable mentions have been awarded for feats including strapping enough helium balloons to a lawn chair to reach 16,000 ft of altitude.

There is one point on which the awards agree. Adaptation is critical to survival. Bazball began as an evolution that helped England, as rampantly brilliant in the white ball game as they were timid in the red ball game to get their mojo back. They played aggressively yes, but they did it with smart cricket shots, trying to score at 5 an over not 10 an over. This series though, things have felt more frenetic. The suicidal declaration in the first innings at Edgbaston was good for three things, drama, Joe Root’s average, and Australia’s chances. It’s fine, laudable even to prioritise the first of those, and there’s certainly no suggestion that anyone was thinking about the second, but this is an Ashes series. It matters. Giving the opposition a chance to claim a win rather than putting a foot on a throat was reckless. And yet, compared to yesterday’s bout of hooking, it was as calm, collected, and institutionally English as a David Attenborough voiceover.

During the second half of their first innings, at Lords, the plucky lizard wasn’t playing to its strengths and sprinting away from the snakes, it was standing still and trying to bite back. It was fighting how the snake wanted to fight. And it got bitten.

England have had all the luck in this series so far. Two tosses won, the best of the conditions in this crucial second test. Ollie Pope’s shoulder recovered for him to bat. Nathan Lyon’s calf will not heal for him to bowl. And they are still at huge danger of going 2-0 down.

Bazball has been a thrilling liberation of a team of talented attacking batsmen. But any form of cricket, and especially the test arena, requires a recognition of conditions of the game and an adaptation to those conditions. Australia are a world class test outfit in all departments. They bat deep, bowl fast, accurately and with guile, and they field well. Nobody is asking England to go back to scratching around at one an over before they nick behind, but against the best, you have to pick your moments.

At 188-1, with Australia’s depleted attack resorting to bouncers in desperation, the time was right for England to adapt, not to reach for the helium balloons and take to the sky. Forget Bazball for half an hour. Play dodgeball. Dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge. Let Australia’s seamers burn themselves out, with plenty of miles left in the test match and the series. It is not even a contradiction with the approach to rein it in for a short period of time if doing so creates greater opportunities for attack later on, against a tired attack with no frontline spinner.

Remember also that Test Match Cricket is full of meta games. In trying to assert dominance over the short ball, England submitted to it instead, tacitly admitting to Australia that they will prioritise scoring rate over sensible scoring. Australia will not miss the message, and England will face the tactic again and again. The other nuance of Duckett, Pope and Root succumbing to the short ball is the message it sends to other batsman. At the time England’s engine room were conspiring in their own downfall, their number seven and the best puller on the team, Jonny Bairstow, whose clubbing of New Zealand over square leg remains perhaps an abiding memory of last summer, was watching. It cannot have made him feel more confident in his approach. Bazball promotes an avoidance of overreflection, but it is inevitable that teammates’ actions do not rub off.

Australia will play a different style. They will try to grind England into submission If England cannot skittle Australia, there will be no charitable declaration and only two possible results come the fifth day. If that does happen, then England must adapt, must learn when biting back is not an option, learn when to run, to take the draw, to come back another day. The presence of that third result is why Test cricket is a more nuanced, fascinating game than limited overs cricket. There is always the chance to seize a draw from the jaws of defeat, a win from the jaws of a draw. England’s attacking commitment must not become an excuse to snatch a defeat from the jaws of a draw. They must adapt, evolve, not compete for a cricketing Darwin Award.

And yet, there is this. Ben Stokes, playing properly, sensibly, and soberly against Australia’s short ball, scored 17. There is nothing to say England’s other batsmen would have fared better aping the skipper for a bit. Perhaps a few hours’ passivity would have brought about their downfall in a different way. Usually the strong find a way to feed. England would not have expected to have this series their own way. Natural selection as well as natural variation happens in cricket.

Bazball can feel like both the cause of and solution to all England’s problems. Remembering how many problems there were before – how joyless an experience it had become watching England play timid cricket, perhaps we should be grateful for Bazball’s gleeful contradictions. England's bold new approach has earned the right to exist, and, in the evolutionary timeline of Test Cricket, it is moments young. Perhaps we should let it evolve at its own speed.