Ollie Pope Reinforces Status to England's No 3 Slot with Strong 90 Against Lions

It's tough to know how significant of England's practice match will prove meaningful when their Ashes campaign starts not far at the Perth venue on Friday – no distance in space or time but light years away in import and environment – but if it accomplished nothing more than strengthening Pope's self-belief, that alone has rendered the effort beneficial.

England's No 3 – this fact is certainly totally established – built on his initial innings hundred by notching an additional 90 in the follow-up innings, and the most notable was not merely the number of scored runs but the manner in which they were scored. At times the young batsman looked imperious, striking a dozen fours and a two of sixes, timing the ball perfectly but with fierce purpose.

This was only a practice match against a England Lions side that used exactly 11 bowlers throughout a match held in before a small group of people in a local ground, but it was still very noteworthy. Officially, the England team, needing of 202 following the Lions closed their follow-on innings on 251 for six, succeeded by five wickets after Smith raced the team past the winning target with a flurry of boundaries.

Crawley and Duckett, the other two significant first-innings achievers, both failed in the second innings, while Root made further runs – 31 on this instance – but was not enormously more dominant, prior to being bemused and duly dismissed by Will Jacks. Harry Brook experienced an identical outcome shortly after.

Shoaib Bashir – who finished the game having bowled 12 overs for each side – will have encountered part of the hitting he faced rather challenging. His initial six deliveries against the Lions went for 56, with McKinney tucking in to pitching that if not completely loose was definitely far from threatening.

By the conclusion the sixth of those overs, England's other pitchers had allowed roughly the same amount of points – 57 – from 15, though the bowler turned a somewhat less giving as time passed, allowing 27 from his remaining six. He secured one wicket, taking a smart, diving snare, diving to his right, to conclude Jacob Bethell's knock for 70, from 80 deliveries.

Jacob Bethell, redeeming achieving just three runs in the opening knock, was one of a trio of players with fifties in the Lions team's top four. Ben McKinney's scores from opener were more consistent than those from their number three: he scored 66 in their first batting effort and improved by two in their follow-up, taking 61 deliveries to reach his 50 runs, with five and two six-hit shots, the pair from Bashir's's bowling. Bethell got to 68 prior to a mishit to Stokes at cover, who took a low grab at shin level.

Cox displayed like consistency, and backed up his first-innings 53 with an additional 57, at about a run per delivery. He produced several exceptionally elegant hits on the way, featuring a drive down the ground and a pull off successive Brydon Carse deliveries to reach his half century.

Following his absence from the initial day of this match with a illness and made only the smallest of inputs to the second, Brydon Carse delivered superbly when at last afforded the shot, with McKinney and Jordan Cox included in his three dismissals.

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