Ashes 2025 live: Australia leave out Cummins and Lyon as England bat first at the ‘Gabbatoir’ in Brisbane

WICKET! Oh no, is it going to be one of those days?

Ollie Pope is next to go for a duck as a big inside edge sees Starc celebrating once more!

WICKET! England have another departure in a first over!

Ben Duckett is gone for a duck this time edging it to first slip where Marnus Labuschagne is waiting!

Mitchell Starc is obviously delighted and that is the ideal start for the hosts!

The first over of the day goes to Mitchell Start who tormented England in Perth. Can the hosts get the perfect start this time round?

Crawley and Duckett begin the day facing for England.

The first delivery is full length around shoulder height, with ‘keeper Alex Carey taking it well.

We’re underway at the Gabba! England out in the middle as captain Ben Stokes elects to bat to begin the second Test.

Tower of London, Edinburgh Castle, Agra Fort… The Gabba. A sporting fortress for Australian cricket to lean on, with England already playing catch-up in the Ashes.

“It’s the most uncomfortable I’ve been on a cricket field,” former England cricketer Mark Butcher said in 2017 of playing at the Gabbatoir. “It hurt your eyeballs. You couldn’t even blink properly.”

The venue is synonymous with Australian cricketing dominance, as the iconic series resumes following the stunning two-day blitz of Ben Stokes’s men in Perth. The shell-shocked tourists, who had the first Test in control at lunch on day two, only to capitulate and succumb to a violent, inspiring innings from Travis Head, face a daunting reintroduction to Ashes cricket. The multi-coloured seats to give an illusion of a full-house, heat hazes caused by the intense Queensland sun and 11 green baggys swarming and hollering as another wilting tourist plays an ill-judged shot. England have not won here since 1986. For 32 years, between 1989 and 2021, no one else won here at all. Just… those guys.

Read Cameron Ponsonby’s full preview of the second Test:

Monty Panesar has been hitting back at Steve Smith in their bizarre war of words, centred around Panesar’s poor performance on quiz show Mastermind and Smith’s role in the Sandpaper-gate incident of a few years ago…

“I was a little bit surprised knowing that he knew my answers to the questions the day before the Test match and the funny thing was that I’m able to rattle Australians by sitting on the sofa,” Panesar told Boyle Sports.

“That gave me a bit of pleasure but it would have been nice if England had won that Test match, that would have been even better.

“The British media didn’t really make anything out of it when I was talking about the sandpaper incident. Maybe Ben Stokes can use it as a psychological edge.

“Steve Smith had obviously read about it and he was thinking in the press conference that the British media were going to bring it up but I didn’t think the British media was going to bring it up at all. But then he’d memorised everything and I thought, well I’m going to reply back, why not? I’m guilty on a quiz show, he’s guilty… and the rest is history.”

England skipper Ben Stokes isn’t worried about the ‘Gabbatoir’ and its reputation.

“Lots of our guys are on their first Ashes tour so this is going to be a new experience for them. No, it doesn’t hold too much fear,” he stated.

Acknowledging the Gabba’s significance for Australia, much like certain English grounds, he added: “For Australia, I guess the Gabba is a little bit like Edgbaston or Headingley are for us, where you take a lot of confidence at home if you’ve got good records at those grounds.”

He concluded, “Many teams have gone to the Gabba and lost to Australia but this is a brand new outfit.”

Australia captain Pat Cummins kept everyone guessing on the eve of the second Ashes Test, leaving the door ajar for a dramatic comeback in Brisbane.

“A whole heap of things are on the table. We’ll wait and see what the wicket looks like later and from there we’ll determine a playing XI,” said stand-in skipper Steve Smith.

“(Cummins) looks pretty good to me, he’s bowled in the nets. Obviously, games are different intensity, for sure, but he’s tracking nicely and he knows his body well. We’ll wait and see.”

Steve Smith is never a man to leave anything to chance and he’s planning to employ black strips under his eyes to combat the glare of the lights in the day-night Test.

He’s been experimenting with the strips in practice but it took a legend of West Indies cricket to let him know he was making a critical error…

“I actually messaged Shivnarine Chanderpaul and asked him what his thoughts were, whether he wore the chalk or the strips,” explained Smith.

“He said the strips, and he thinks it blocks out 65 per cent of the glare. He also said ‘I’ve seen photos and you’re wearing them the wrong way.’

“So yesterday I put them on the right way and… I agree. It certainly stops the glare and yeah, I’ll be wearing them!”

One legendary paceman discussing another. Jimmy Anderson, writing in his Daily Mail column has discussed what he expects from England against Mitchell Starc.

“England will be finding ways to score, to put him under pressure, to knock him off his length,” wrote Anderson.

“Brisbane is not quite as extreme as Perth in terms of bounce, but it’s still bouncier than pitches you get in England,.

“Driving can be quite tricky, especially early on in your innings, unless it’s really full. It’s about assessing the conditions and recognising your potential scoring areas.

“Ddriving the ball on the up in Perth wasn’t the right way to go about things. He bowls fast, swings it, he’s got a great yorker on him and tends to come up with jaffas to order at the start of an innings.

“It means that regardless of what time of day you bat, whether it be daylight or under the floodlights, for the first 10-20 deliveries you are vulnerable.”