Ollie Pope Reinforces Claim to England's No 3 Slot with Strong 90 Against Lions

It is hard to gauge how much of England's warm-up fixture will end up being meaningful when their Ashes battle kicks off a short distance away at Perth Stadium on Friday – a short span in space or time but light years away in significance and atmosphere – but if it achieved only enhancing Ollie Pope's assurance, that alone has made the exercise worthwhile.

England's No 3 – this fact is surely completely certain – followed his initial innings ton by scoring an additional 90 in the second innings, and the truly remarkable was not merely the total of scored runs but the way in which they were scored. Periodically the young batsman seemed imperious, hitting a twelve boundaries and a pair of maximums, timing the ball beautifully but with fierce purpose.

This was just a practice match versus a Lions team that deployed exactly 11 pitchers across a contest staged in amid a handful of people in a local ground, but it was nevertheless hugely praiseworthy. For the record, the England team, chasing of 202 after the Lions ended their second innings on 251 for six, won by five wickets after Jamie Smith hurried the team across the conclusion with a flurry of boundaries.

Crawley and Duckett, the remaining big first-innings performers, both fell short in the second innings, while Root scored additional points – 31 on this instance – but was not enormously more convincing, then being bemused and accordingly dismissed by Will Jacks. Brook suffered an identical outcome shortly after.

Shoaib Bashir – who concluded the fixture having bowled 12 bowling spells for each side – will have found part of the batting he confronted rather challenging. His initial six deliveries against the Lions conceded 56, with Ben McKinney taking advantage to bowling that if not exactly poor was certainly far from intimidating.

After the sixth of those overs, England's three other pitchers had given away almost precisely the same total of runs – 57 – from 15, though the bowler became a little less giving as time passed, giving up 27 from his remaining six. He claimed one wicket, taking a clever, low catch, leaning to his right side, to finish Bethell's innings for 70, from 80 deliveries.

Bethell, making up for managing merely a small score in the opening knock, was a member of three fifty-scorers in the Lions team's top four. Ben McKinney's returns from opener were steadier than those of their No 3: he scored 66 in their first innings and scored 68 in their second, facing 61 deliveries for his 50 runs, with five fours and two maximums, each off Bashir's pitching. Bethell got to 68 before a mis-hit to Ben Stokes at cover position, who held a low grab at shin level.

Cox exhibited comparable steadiness, and backed up his first-innings 53 with a further 57, at slightly more than a run per delivery. He played a few exceptionally beautiful strokes during his innings, including a drive down the ground and a pull shot off consecutive Carse deliveries to achieve his 50 runs.

After missing the opening day of this match with a illness and provided only the most minor of contributions to the second day, Brydon Carse bowled brilliantly when finally afforded the shot, with Ben McKinney and Cox among his three wickets.

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