Pope Strengthens Status to England's Number Three Slot with Strong 90 Versus Lions

It is hard to know how significant of the English team's preparatory game will end up being meaningful when their Ashes series battle starts not far at the Perth venue on Friday – a short span in space or time but light years away in significance and environment – but if it achieved nothing more than enhancing Ollie Pope's confidence, that alone has made the exercise valuable.

The English side's No 3 – this fact is undoubtedly completely established – followed his initial innings century by notching an additional 90 in the follow-up innings, and what was remarkable was not so much the number of scored runs but the style in which they were accumulated. At times the young batsman appeared imperious, smashing a dozen boundaries and a two of sixes, hitting the ball beautifully but with devilish intent.

This was just a exhibition game versus a England Lions side that deployed fully 11 bowlers during a contest held in amid a small group of spectators in a local ground, but it was nonetheless hugely praiseworthy. For the record, the England team, chasing of 202 once the Lions ended their second innings on 251 for six, triumphed by five wickets once Smith hurried the team past the conclusion with a flurry of fours and sixes.

Zak Crawley and Duckett, the other two big first-innings' successes, both were dismissed in the follow-up, while Joe Root added further runs – 31 on this instance – but was far from more dominant, then being puzzled and accordingly dismissed by Will Jacks. Brook suffered an same outcome a little later.

Bashir – who finished the fixture having delivered 12 overs for both teams – will have found some of the strokes he confronted pretty challenging. His first six deliveries versus the Lions conceded 56, with McKinney taking advantage to deliveries that if not entirely wayward was definitely not very threatening.

By the conclusion the sixth over of those deliveries, the English side's three other bowlers had conceded roughly the same total of runs – 57 – from 15, though Bashir grew a slightly less leaky as time passed, giving up 27 from his remaining six. He secured one wicket, taking a clever, low grab, diving to his right, to end Jacob Bethell's batting stint for 70, off 80 deliveries.

Jacob Bethell, redeeming achieving merely three runs in the first innings, was one of three fifty-scorers in the Lions team's top four. Ben McKinney's returns from opener were more consistent than those of their number three: he scored 66 in their first innings and scored 68 in their second, taking 61 balls for his half-century, with five fours and two six-hit shots, both against Bashir's pitching. Bethell reached 68 then a poor shot to Ben Stokes at cover, who made a bending grab at shin level.

Cox displayed comparable steadiness, and followed his initial innings' 53 with a further 57, at slightly more than a run per delivery. He played a few exceptionally beautiful strokes during his innings, featuring a straight drive and a hook off consecutive Carse deliveries to reach his half century.

After missing the first day of this match with a illness and made merely the smallest of inputs to the second, Brydon Carse bowled superbly when eventually provided the chance, with McKinney and Jordan Cox among his three dismissals.

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