England (258 & 5-258) drew with Australia (250 & 6-154) @ Lord’s

MOTM: Ben Stokes (13 & 115)

People say this was apparently a good test match (That’s like, your opinion man), but you know what I’ve learned these past five days of rain delays intermixed with periods of cricket?

Police Ten 7, or ‘Police Tin Sivin’ as it’s known across the ditch, is a top show that people are missing out on.

It was superb watching those drunk Maoris downing Johnnie Walker straight out of the bottle, swearing their tits off and giving it to the Kiwi Fuzz, and complaining that they were being arrested for the crime of “Eating a succulent Chinese meal.”

It makes those RBT episodes where pissed drivers blow 0.2 look as boring as Rory Burns at the crease.

And then there were the episodes of UK Customs, which showed the extent of the cigarette smuggling crisis that even Brexit can’t stop.

Thousands of cartons of John Player Special being smuggled in via suitcases, and possibly up arsecracks, although the officers never bothered to check.

JPS haven’t had that kind of coverage since Ayrton Senna was piloting a Lotus.

In disappointing news, play began on Thursday, and due to being the Lord’s Test, I heard the most mentions of a slope since Top Gear went to Burma.

England debuted another player who they bent their selection rules for, Jofra Archer, who I remember being pulled by the umpire in a Big Bash match back in January for dangerous bowling.

Apparently they also wanted to match Australia by having a bald leg spinner, so they brought in Jack Leach for Moeen Ali.

Of course, Jofra came to the fore on Saturday for his gripping physical mini-battle with Steve Smith, which resulted in that brutal hit to the arm, and later the hit to the neck, which led to the incessant verbal wanking which has polluted test match broadcasts, as the likes of Warnie just kept going on blabbering “Ohhhh this is good test cricket” incessantly.

WE GOT IT THE FIRST TIME, SHANE.

That sums up England- A debutant is the only one who shows some nuts against Steve Smith.

For the crime of being hit in the neck, Smithy was booed by the usual rabble that inhabit English test matches (Apparently the MCC booted a guy that abused him) as he departed and later came back on, and then obviously displayed the first effects of his hit to the head, when he didn’t even offer a shot to Chris Woakes, and was out for 92.

England celebrated keeping The BSB to 92, which could be like the Japanese saying “Sure, Godzilla destroyed Osaka, Yokohoma, Kyoto, Sapporo, Kobe and Nagoya, but he didn’t destroy Tokyo.”

The Poms then led by a handful of runs, and by the final day, their middle order had highlighted just how poor Australia were after Day Two- Crap fielding and crap bowling galore (Lyon and Hazlewood were carted), and dear little Davey was on the end of quite a few missed catches, as he had to field in the slips in place of Smith.

He’ll now be fielding in front of the Barmy Army for the final 3 Tests as punishment.

Day 5 summed up Australia after Thursday, as a result of some poor bowling and poor fielding, resident Kiwi Ben Stokes belted out the only century of the test, despite copping one, in his words, “In the dick”.

And thus, trailing by 266 runs, the Aussies found themselves in the position of having to bat out 48 overs without Smith, which is as impossible as a one-armed man drinking tea with a cup and saucer.

But, with the worst performing opening partnership in 110 years, the Aussies were in the crap within 4 overs, and Warner has now been dismissed in single figures 4/4 times this series, and in the field, he couldn’t even catch herpes in a brothel.

Adding to the fun, Khawaja went without making a start, and with the BSB unable to bat due to delayed concussion, we would see the feats of the first ever concussion sub in Test cricket, Marnus Labuschagne, a name which when pronounced, sounds like that ‘Danke Schoen’ song that Ferris Bueller sang at the Von Steuben Day parade in 1986.

Alongside Travis Head, Lasagne ended up doing more to save the match than any other Australian with his impromptu 59 (3 times as many runs as Warner has scored this series), which is a damning indictment on the state of our batting lineup… and at the same time, downright hilarious.

Of course, it took some dodgy sportsmanship from Joe ‘Dud’ Root to get rid of Lamb Shanky, and some more useless officiating from Joel Wilson to back it up.

Wade was dismissed by a commentator’s curse, and the glorified cheerleader behind the stumps completely got his sums wrong with the bat, as he decided to take England head-on, and as a result, Painey once again holed out playing a hook shoot with 8 overs to go, thanks to what was a spectacular one hander by Joe Denly.

If Paine wasn’t the captain, he’d be working for Kookaburra right now… probably hand stitching cricket balls.

Fortunately in the remaining overs, Head and Cummins figured out that the right hander had to soak up Jack Leach’s remaining overs, so he couldn’t use the foot holds outside off stump for the mollydooker Head.

At the same time, it ticked past 6:30 in the evening, becoming too dark for Jofra to bowl (Typical Brexit voting racists), so the Poms had to go through the spinners with the entire outfield within a centimetre of the bat, and some patient defense got the Aussies arse first over the line for the draw, a result that had probably been coming since Day 3 was washed out.

I saw it mentioned that Jofra appears to be another Morne Morkel, who while being very good, had a worse average than Steyn and Philander for a simple reason.

He never bowls at the damn stumps.

Anyway, heading to Leeds in a few days, the team 1-nil down is on the up, and the team 1-nil up is up Shit Creek without a damn canoe, let alone a paddle.