Hothouse kid Jamie Smith starts as he goes on and changes Test in 20 minutes | Andy Bull
It started in the worst possible way.By the second over of the day England were 84 for five, five hundred runs and a thousand miles behind.Their best batter, Joe Root had just been caught off the ninth ball of the morning, and their captain, Ben Stokes, who has worked so many miracles for them before, had been caught off the 10th, done by a wicked, lifting delivery, nasty, brutish and short, which brushed off his glove on its way through to the keeper.The bowler, Mohammad Siraj, was on a hat-trick, and here comes England’s No 7, Jamie Smith, 24 years old, playing his 19th Test innings.The field was set, the slips were waiting, the crowd was up.
There was, everyone watching felt sure, only one way the game was heading.The ball was a good one, on a length just outside off and moving in towards middle.Smith took a half-step forwards and, crack, thumped it back down the ground for four.Everyone else in this England team had to unlearn a lot of what they had been taught to begin to bat like this.But not Smith.
He and Harry Brook are hothouse kids,Brendon McCullum is the only coach they have had in Test cricket and his way of playing is all they have known,Between the two of them, they turned this into one the great days of Test cricket,If you offered the 25,000 fans who were lucky enough to be inside the ground the chance to spend this July Friday anywhere else, you would have struggled to find one person among them who would not have turned you down flat and snapped their head back to the match,You can berate England, you can shake your head, puff out your cheeks and suck your teeth, but you surely can not take your eyes off them.
Where any number of England sides before them would have tried to poke, prod and block their way towards the end of the innings, and the inevitable defeat lying beyond it, this one decided to crash, bang and wallop their way ahead instead.It was like watching Butch and Sundance come charging out of the building in the final reel.In the first innings in the first Test at Headingley, Smith had been caught on the boundary when he had scored 40, trying to hook a second consecutive six off a short ball from Prasidh Krishna.Time was when English cricket would not have forgiven a shot like that.Sign up to The SpinSubscribe to our cricket newsletter for our writers' thoughts on the biggest stories and a review of the week’s actionafter newsletter promotionBut Smith revealed that instead of giving him a “smack on the wrist” all Brendon McCullum said was that he felt the shot had been the right choice because Smith was hitting with the wind.
Which Smith said left him thinking he would do the same thing all over again the next time he found himself in a similar position,That happened sooner than Smith might have imagined,After he had been in for 20 minutes on Friday, Krishna hammered a short ball in at his ribs, which Smith whipped away for four,India already had two men back on the leg-side boundary, waiting for him to play it that way, and Shubman Gill decided to move a third back to join them,Krishna bowled a second short ball and Smith hit this one up and over the fielders for six.
So Gill moved two more fielders over to the leg side.India now had six men there ready and waiting.Krishna bowled a third short ball and this time Smith whistled his pull shot away for four.So Krishna tried a fourth and Smith hit it the same way.Krishna pitched the sixth ball up full.
So Smith hit it back past him for four more.The over went for 23 and counting from that first four onwards Smith took 35 off 13 balls Krishna bowled to him.The game changed in that 20-minute stretch.All of a sudden, England were up and running.Smith had raised his fifty one minute and overtaken Brook in the next and before you knew it he was closing in on Gilbert Jessop’s record for the fastest Test century by an Englishman.
He did not quite make it.His hundred came in the last over before lunch off the 80th delivery he had faced.When it was all over, at the far end of the day, England trailed by 180 and had 10 wickets left to get.The field was set, the slips were waiting, the crowd was up, there was, everyone watching felt sure, only one way the game was heading …
Young Europeans losing faith in democracy, poll finds
Only half of young people in France and Spain believe that democracy is the best form of government, with support even lower among their Polish counterparts, a study has found.A majority from Europe’s generation Z – 57% – prefer democracy to any other form of government. Rates of support varied significantly, however, reaching just 48% in Poland and only about 51-52% in Spain and France, with Germany highest at 71%.More than one in five – 21% – would favour authoritarian rule under certain, unspecified circumstances. This was highest in Italy at 24% and lowest in Germany with 15%
Labour’s 10-year health plan for the NHS is bold, radical – and familiar
The government’s 10-year health plan to revive, modernise and future-proof the NHS in England has arrived as the service is facing a dual crisis. It has been unable for a decade now to provide the rapid access – to GPs, A&E care, surgery, ambulances and mental health support – which people need and used to get.Normalisation of anxiety-inducing, frightening and sometimes fatal delay has produced a less tangible, but also dangerous, crisis: of public satisfaction, born of a profound loss of trust that the NHS will be there for them or their loved ones when they need it.Barely one in five people in Britain are happy with the NHS. Polling by Ipsos this week, just before the NHS’s 77th birthday on Saturday, found that about 60% of voters have seen little improvement in it during Labour’s first year in office
Twelve key takeaways from Labour’s 10-year NHS plan
The 10-year NHS plan aims to make healthcare more digital, focus on preventing ill health and provide more services locally, rather than in hospitals. It will greatly expand the NHS app and increase the use of AI and other technology.Structural changes aim to bring routine healthcare closer to patients, with the aim that most outpatient care will happen outside hospitals, while new neighbourhood health centres will provide most services so that acute hospitals can focus on looking after the most unwell.The main measures include:The NHS app will be expanded to become a “doctor” in patients’ pockets. A new part of it, My NHS GP, will use AI to help people navigate the service better, taking patients’ symptoms, asking questions and providing guidance
Starmer outlines 10-year plan to change NHS ‘from sickness service to health service’
Keir Starmer has outlined a 10-year plan for the NHS based on a shift from hospitals to community health hubs, a renewed focus on prevention and an embrace of technology, which was billed as perhaps the last chance to save the health service in its current form.Speaking at a health centre in Stratford, east London, alongside Wes Streeting, the health secretary; and Rachel Reeves, the chancellor – who had not been expected to appear – Starmer insisted this would be different to the long list of previous NHS revamps that achieved little.“We’re putting in the resources, we’re putting in the priorities and we’ve got the resolve to see this through,” he said. “In the end, I genuinely think it is only Labour governments that can do this.“I want in 10, 20, 30 years for people to look back and say this was the government that seized the moment and reformed the NHS so it’s fit for the future
‘Am I just an asshole?’ Time blindness can explain chronic lateness - some of the time
Dr Melissa Shepard has a problem with managing her time. She had always been a high achiever, making it through medical school to become a psychiatrist and assistant professor at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. But no matter how hard she worked, she struggled with one of life’s simplest expectations: being on time.“I really felt like I could just not crack the code,” Shepard said. “I worried: am I just an asshole? Is that why I’m always late? No matter how hard I wanted to be on time, it was a struggle
Wes Streeting: ‘half my colleagues’ in Commons using weight loss drugs
Weight loss injections are the “talk of the House of Commons tea rooms” and widely used by MPs, the health secretary has said as he pledged to widen public access to them.Speaking as the government launches a 10-year-plan for the NHS, Wes Streeting said access to weight loss injections should be “based on need and not the ability to pay”.Currently people with a body mass index (BMI) of 35 or more, or 30 or more with a linked health condition, can be prescribed jabs on the NHS through specialist weight-management services.It is estimated that about 1.5 million people in the UK are already taking weight loss drugs, which may have been prescribed through specialist weight loss services or obtained via private prescription costing hundreds of pounds a month
Google undercounts its carbon emissions, report finds
‘A billion people backing you’: China transfixed as Musk turns against Trump
AI companies start winning the copyright fight
China hosts first fully autonomous AI robot football match
Whitehall’s ambition to cut costs using AI is fraught with risk
Musk vows to unseat lawmakers who support Trump’s sweeping spending bill