Mason Crane steps in at the SCG
England are ready to blood the 20-year-old leg-spinner Mason Crane at Sydney for the finale to their fraught Ashes campaign. It’s a bold move, but a necessary one, as the tourists seek to inject variety and guile into their hitherto toothless attack.
Though the whitewash was averted at the MCG - where the pitch was rated poor by the ICC, with just 24 wickets taken in the match - England will be desperate to finish the Test leg of their tour on a high. By bringing in Crane, mooted to replace Chris Woakes, who has taken just 10 wickets in four matches and is struggling with a side strain, England are taking a gamble. But it’s one they feel could well pay off.
“We think he’s a guy that has got the goods,” said England Head Coach Trevor Bayliss, "and the more he plays at this level, the better he will get. You have to start somewhere.”
Crane is undoubtedly a prodigious talent and a quick learner. The Hampshire leggie made his county debut in 2015 aged just 18 and duly bagged the great Kumar Sangakkara for his first wicket, before taking out Warwickshire’s top five in just his second first-class match.
A winter spent playing Grade cricket in Australia sharpened his skills and his performances for Gordon CC were rewarded when he became New South Wales' first overseas star to play Sheffield Shield cricket since Imran Khan in 1983/84. Handed the famous baggy blue cap, he responded by snaffling five South Australia batsmen.
Despite that fruitful stint in Australia, and a successful first T20I appearance last June which saw him claim AB de Villers as his first international wicket, English supporters were left baffled and frustrated by the relative lack of opportunities given to Crane in first-class cricket in 2017. For decades now, English cricket has been searching for a genuinely Test-class wrist spinner to emerge, and it was a source of much debate that a talent as special as Crane’s was afforded only eight matches throughout the season. He has played 29 first-class matches so far, grabbing 75 wickets at 44. If the numbers are yet to make an irresistible case, his energy and self-belief have left a favourable impression on the England management team.
With Moeen Ali largely ineffective on Australian pitches so far, Crane looks set to shoulder the bulk of the slow-bowling options on a Sydney pitch traditionally renowned for taking turn. This year’s model is by no means guaranteed to follow suit, with reports of tinges of green on the surface. For Mason Crane, he will give it a rip regardless. He will bowl on anything, anywhere. Now is his time.