Having played the little brother to James Anderson for so long, Stuart Broad stepped up to replace England’s attack leader with a career-defining performance
George Dobell at Trent Bridge06-Aug-2015It was, as Stuart Broad, put it “one of those days you dream of”. With his captain, Alastair Cook, having implored England’s players to seize the moment, it was Broad who rose to the challenge and produced what may well be remembered as the defining performance of his career.He might have felt the pressure. Going into this game with 299 Test wickets, his family present, the Ashes in the balance and England’s senior bowler absent through injury, Broad could have been forgiven for feeling nerves.But within three balls of the start of this Test, he had become the fifth England bowler to claim 300 wickets. Within 19, he had claimed the equal fastest five-wicket haul in the first innings of Test history and, by stumps, he was hailing “one of the best days England have ever had in the Ashes”. It is hard to disagree.Home advantage certainly played a part. England won the toss in conditions offering assistance in the air and off the pitch and Broad exploited his opportunity – and an Australian line-up hopelessly unprepared for such a challenge – expertly. “Home advantage is a big thing,” he said. “We’ve played on these wickets all our lives.”But make no mistake. This was no horror track. This was, like Edgbaston, what might once have been termed “typical” English conditions. A generation ago, batsmen would have left the ball carefully and attempted to defend with the bat right under their eyes. They would have been happy to go into lunch at 60 for 1 with the bowlers having tired and the ball having aged. Instead, despite several of their top order having experience of county cricket, they pushed, prodded and, in Michael Clarke’s case, thrashed at balls as if they had never encountered anything like it. Drowning men have acted with more composure.Maybe it is the advent of T20 cricket, maybe it is the embrace of all things positive, maybe Australia have been lured into a false idea of their quality by playing in conditions where seam and swing movement is rare, but here they provided further evidence to suggest that some of the skill, some of the craft, some of the subtlety that once went into the art of batting has left the modern game. When Broad admitted it was the best analysis of his life – overtaking his performance against Kimbolton School U15s – he was being light-hearted, but his words exposed a bitter truth.But Broad bowled beautifully. While Hawk-Eye would suggest that only three of the 57 deliveries he bowled would have hit the stumps, he put enough in the dangerous channel just outside off stump to force the batsmen to play. And, as Clarke noted, Broad “was bringing the ball back into the right-hander where he normally takes it away, so that makes you feel like you have to play a lot more”. It was a performance of which Glenn McGrath or Richard Hadlee would have been proud. And there is little higher praise than that.”The pitch offered the perfect amount,” Broad said. “It was swinging massively and it wasn’t seaming loads. We put the ball in the perfect area and didn’t give them the opportunity to leave the ball. We got seven edges and only one play-and-miss. With it being my home ground, I felt very comfortable in the surroundings. It was probably the allround perfect bowling and fielding performance.”So Broad capitalised on the conditions. But the seeds of this performance were sown much earlier. For a start, Broad benefitted from some outstanding catching in the cordon, with Ben Stokes clinging on to an especially memorable chance.These things do not happen by accident. Trevor Bayliss had identified England’s slip catching as a key area in this series – and a key area for improvement – and, on the squad’s pre-series trip to Spain worked the team hard on it. “It was all Trevor banged on about,” Broad said. “And it’s paying off. Now we’re taking half-chances.” Only at Lord’s, where few chances came their way, have England looked fallible in the field.But even before that, Broad had changed as a bowler. He had matured.The roots of that probably stem back to the Caribbean tour. Midway through it, just after England had been held to a draw in Antigua, Alastair Cook asked Anderson and Broad to a meeting.Exactly what was said remains unclear, but it seems England’s captain – frustrated by the inconsistency of his senior bowlers – asked for more from them. He asked them to lead, he asked them to take responsibility and he asked them for help in moulding his talented but raw squad into a team that England supporters could be proud of once more.Broad’s career, at least, was at a crossroads. While his reputation as a fine bowler was assured, there was a sense that he had yet to fulfil the substantial promise that catapulted him into international cricket as a 20-year-old. He was good, certainly, but not great. He could be brilliant, certainly, but he could also go missing. His obvious potential made the inconsistency even more infuriating.Stuart Broad salutes the crowd after claiming a career-best 8 for 15•PA PhotosIf that sounds harsh, think back to the World Cup that preceded that Caribbean tour. Despite all the talk that England were going to pitch the ball up and attack the stumps, Broad and Anderson reverted to back-of-a-length bowling in the opening overs that failed to take the early wickets England required. With a young side relying upon the incision of their two experienced bowlers, they failed to deliver.The same might be said about the Lord’s Test against India in 2014. Anderson and Broad failed to exploit a pitch tailor-made for them and England succumbed to a memorable defeat.But since that talk with Cook in Grenada – since his friend implored him for his help – Broad’s bowling has risen to a new level. In 75 Tests up to then, he had claimed 267 wickets at an average of 30.04. Since then, in seven-and-a-half Tests, he has claimed 40 wickets at an average of 21.65.They key has been a fuller length. Where once he seemed keen to protect his figures by bowling just back of a length and allowing the batsmen to leave with ease but conceding few runs, he now invites the batsmen to drive. Where once he delivered regular short balls that were taken at head height by the keeper but did little to threaten the batsmen, he is now threatening the stumps. Here, he delivered just one delivery above chest height and none above head height. He invited the drive and sought the edge.It is no coincidence that, over the last seven-and-a-half Tests, his economy rate has risen (from 3.05 to 3.44) as he has risked being driven more often. But it is surely a price worth paying. In that same period, his strike-rate has fallen dramatically (from 59 to 37.7). He might just be maturing into the bowler his talent always threatened he could be.Might it be relevant that Anderson was absent? Might it be relevant that, while Broad has sometimes filled the role of enforcer, or sidekick, or junior partner, here he was required to take responsibility?It may well. Broad knew his team were relying upon him. His knew his captain and his country were relying upon him. And he relished it.Broad has been the little brother too long. It bodes well for him and England that, on the biggest stage of all, he produced his best. This was his and England’s golden day.