Carse hails ‘leader’ Stokes as England seize opening-day momentum
The 30-year-old pacer shed light on the influence their skipper had on their performance on an action-packed first day of the Ashes
Brydon Carse heaped praise on England captain Ben Stokes as the visitors ended the first day of the opening Test against Australia at Perth in the ascendancy.
Stokes racked up figures of 5/23 as England ended the first day with a lead of 49 runs in Perth, with the hosts reeling at 123/9 after bowling out England for 172 earlier in the day.
The visitors who are looking to end a 14-year wait for a series win in Australia got the start that they wanted to the five-match series, and Carse put their early promise largely down to their skipper.
"His (Stokes) character and enthusiasm around the group, and the way he goes about his business is phenomenal," Carse said.
"Everyone looks up to him. He's a great leader to have in our team.
"He's been out here for the last two-and-a-half weeks, and as Ducky [Ben Duckett] said a couple of weeks ago, he's in beast mode at the moment. Hopefully, that pays off throughout the series for him,” he added.
The 30-year-old further revealed the captain’s words at tea that pushed England to come out hard and dominate the final session of play.
"Stokesy kept it really simple," Carse said.
"We had 45-50 minutes before tea, and he said to the lads with the ball, just give everything. The way Gus Atkinson and Jofra [Archer] started was phenomenal. And then after tea, that messaging was pretty similar, just do it over a longer period of time,” he added.
England’s decision to play five pacers at Perth seems to be paying off if the first day’s action is anything to go by, and Carse shared how strong they feel as a group.
"I haven't played in a lot of attacks where we've had five seamers, but everyone does complement each other," Carse said.
"I've said before that the group is six, seven seamers, and we've all got different attributes. Hopefully that stands us in good stead throughout the series,” he added.
Despite a positive start, England still have a lot of work to do, and Carse was quick to acknowledge that fact.
"The first thing tomorrow is obviously to knock over this last wicket," he said.
"Then, we've seen some of the guys that have got starts and some runs today, the way that they went about it was obviously taking the positive option.
"I even thought Alex Carey, towards the end, was quite proactive and positive, and it put us under a bit of pressure. So going into the second innings, I think our batters will know what sort of game plan they are going to use,” he added.
Australia has a reputation to bounce back from the toughest of situations, and so England wouldn’t count their chickens just yet. But the opening day, led by their talismanic skipper, would certainly give England the necessary confidence to navigate through the remainder of the game and beyond.
