Test series between England and South Africa are endangered beasts. There is just one, three matches in length, on the Future Tours Programme between now and the end of 2027. Just 32 overs here at Lord’s yesterday was enough to remind us what a pity that is.
When these teams last met, just before the pandemic, Ollie Pope was the poster boy of a promising England team. In three Tests on that tour (he missed the first due to illness), he made a maiden hundred and two more fifties to leave with an average in the high forties. The praise was gushing; Ben Stokes said that whichever batting records Joe Root set, Pope would break.
The path since has not been smooth. Injuries arrived, the runs dried up (at Test if not county level), and his technique became confused. He has been in and out of the side, but Stokes’ belief has not dimmed and, when he became captain earlier this year, he immediately installed his man at No3, a position he had never filled, even at county level.
In the early summer series, Pope had two quiet Tests, at Lord’s and Edgbaston, and two significant innings, at Trent Bridge (145) and Headingley (82 chasing). There were so many promising signs, but his average was just 35, and his position remained pencilled, rather than inked in for the long term.
That much was clear at England Lions’ fixture against South Africa last week, when Dan Lawrence, whose place Pope took in England’s side, moved up from No4 to 3, recognising that a vacancy was more likely to arise higher up the order. Lawrence made a run-a-ball 97, then Harry Brook and Ben Duckett – also considered candidates to bat first drop – made 140 and 145 respectively at a lick almost as quick.
So for Pope to make a glittering unbeaten 61 yesterday, and to be their only realistic hope of making a meaty first innings total today, was significant.
Andrew Strauss, who today runs the fourth Red For Ruth day at Lord’s in memory of his late wife, said on Sky that he thought this was Pope’s best innings for England. Certainly, it feels more significant than the runs in South Africa two years ago. It is at No3, not No6, where he was cosseted back then, and this Proteas attack is a significant step up. Gone are Dane Paterson and Beuran Hendricks, as South Africa combine Kagiso Rabada, Lungi Ngidi, Anrich Nortje and Marco Jansen, all with averages in the twenties, for the first time.
The conditions, as well as the attack, gave this a very high degree of difficulty. Of England’s batters, only Alex Lees really got himself out. The others were all victims of impressive bowling, whether it was Rabada’s relentlessness, Jansen’s left-arm swing, or Nortje’s sheer pace.
Pope was in by the third over, about 25 overs earlier than England would like him to be going in. He was immediately busy, searching for singles, but not frantic.
He loves attacking anything wide and is a reluctant leaver of the ball, doing so with a frustrated shrug. But he was prepared to leave here, as well as using his feet to negate that movement. While he was beaten a couple of times, there was just one moment of luck, when a very tough chance went down at third slip. Next ball, he drove beautifully through the covers to reach fifty.
Perhaps the greatest compliment you could pay Pope here was that, for the first time since that tour of South Africa, he looked like he does when batting for Surrey (his first-class average is 71 for them). Continue in that vein, and there will be no further doubt over the No3 berth.
