Australia and England played out a perfectly evenly poised first day of the 2009 edition of the Ashes at the Sophia Gardens in Wales as the much-awaited series began after much wait for either fans! England ended the day on 336/7 when they could have easily have lost five, while Australia would have probably wanted to have conceded fifty runs less at the same stage.
English skipper Andrew Strauss won the toss and batted first as the track was supposed to turn big in the fourth inning. England went in with a couple of frontline spinners in Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar, while Australia chose to play Nathan Hauritz despite all the criticism that he has had. They also picked Ben Hilfenhaus over Stuart Clark in a rather strange move.
Alistair Cook departed early to Hilfenhaus, thick-edging one to Michael Hussey in the gully region, but Strauss and the in-form Ravi Bopara did some damage-control with a 46-run partnership. Mitchell Johnson came onto bowl his second spell and got rid of both, Strauss to a bouncer that flew off his gloves to the slips and Bopara to a slower one that had him play his shot early. Paul Collingwood and Kevin Pietersen saw their team off to lunch at 97/3.
The second session had the early introduction of spin, but the pair of former English captains did not dislodge, adding 138 runs for the fourth wicket. They began slow, but soon garnered runs at a fair clip to go into tea with a half century each. Hauritz had a rather long spell of bowling, in which he did not bag any wickets but spun the ball enough to create pressure on the duo.
Post tea, it was the turn of the Australians to get back into the game, with a couple of quick wickets. Collingwood seemed to have lost his concentration and edged one off Hilfenhaus to the ‘keeper while Pietersen played a stroke that he would be kicking himself; a slog-sweep off Hauritz that he top-edged to the Simon Katich at short-leg.
There was another rear-guard action by wicket-keeper Matt Prior and all-rounder Andrew Flintoff, as they added a rather quick 86(95 balls) for the sixth wicket and looked to be cruising at 327/5 when tragedy stuck. First Flintoff off an inside edge and then Prior, through the gate, was bowled by Siddle in a span of couple of overs as the hosts ended the day at 336/7.
All the three pacemen ended with a couple of wickets each, while Hauritz accounted for Pietersen.