Fifth in our countdown of the Test innings of 2023 is Zak Crawley’s Manchester masterclass – his 182-ball 189 in the fourth Ashes Test at Old Trafford.

Wisden’s men’s Test innings of 2023, No.5:  Zak Crawley – 189

England vs Australia

Fourth Test, Manchester

Sometimes the scorecard can be deceiving.

Take Virat Kohli’s 38 in the first innings at Centurion, or Jonny Bairstow’s 37 in the first innings in the recent Hyderabad Test. Two knocks that started flawlessly but were prematurely terminated by borderline unplayable deliveries, the final analysis perhaps not doing justice to the batsmanship on display. Both players will have batted with less control and gone on to compile more substantial scores.

Sometimes, it can work the other way. Take Zak Crawley’s 14-ball four in the first Test of last year’s series in New Zealand. On paper, an early failure against the new ball. In reality, perhaps not dissimilar to Ollie Pope’s skittish 11-ball one in the first innings in Hyderabad, it was more chaotic than that.

Dropped in the cordon second ball, bowled off a no-ball off his sixth, a miscued hoick off the seventh, beaten off his 13th and finally out caught in the slips off the 14th. Crawley followed it up with scores of 28, 4, and 24 as memories of his rollicking day one hundred in Rawalpindi faded into the distance. 

Familiar questions around his suitability against the moving ball resurfaced. Despite showcasing occasional flashes of brilliance, it was hard to escape the conclusion that those good days were far too infrequent for a Test opener about to take on perhaps the most formidable fast-bowling unit on the planet in the 2023 Ashes. Even his tyre-pumping head coach effectively cast Crawley as a type of opener who would never be consistent. And to be fair, the numbers backed it up. At the end of the New Zealand tour Crawley averaged 27.60 from 33 Tests. Even his first-class average teetered around the 30-mark. With the return of Jonny Bairstow looming, Crawley was the obvious candidate to make way for several pundits.

“I always planned to hit the first ball of the Ashes for four,” said Crawley after the series.

From that moment at Edgbaston that instantly went down in Ashes folklore, there was a very different energy to Crawley. For the first time in his England career, there was a sense that he knew what kind of batter he wanted to be. At times, Crawley, battling to establish himself, would almost resort to imitating the caricature of what opening batters are supposed to be. Bunkering down and playing the survival game in contrast to his natural instincts and strengths. 

In Ben Duckett he found the perfect partner. A pugnacious left-hander almost allergic to leaving the ball, Crawley had someone with him who wanted to challenge the orthodoxy of what an English opener should be. Together they quietly became England’s most stable Ashes opening pairing in a decade.

The apex of their series together was without doubt Crawley’s Old Trafford masterclass. Balls that would previously be his undoing, full deliveries outside off stump, were now his bread and butter. His intent was on show from the off, charging Josh Hazlewood whose lengths are generally impeccable, flicking him through mid-wicket. Crawley was committed to not letting Australia settle. Australia had gone into the Test without a frontline spinner, with Todd Murphy left out after the Headingley Test. Travis Head, a more than serviceable part-time off-spin option, was expected to step up. His first two balls? Reverse swept for four and slog swept for six.   

Crawley was relentless. When there was an opportunity to score, he took it. Australia’s storied attack looked bereft of ideas, their most likely mode of dismissal a skewed lofted drive to the man at fly slip. In the end he dragged on for 189. A spectacular 182-ball stay at the crease, one that put England firmly in the driving seat for a series-levelling victory. 

Crawley walked off the field to the congratulations of the Australia team and the adulation of a adoring Old Trafford crowd, grateful for what they had just witnessed. Sometimes the scorebook can be deceiving. Crawley’s 189 was even better than it looked on paper.

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