Plenty of work ahead for England to level series, says Hoggard by CricketArchive staff reporter

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Player:	MJ Hoggard
Event:	England in Australia 2006/07

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DateLine: 4th December 2006

 

Matthew Hoggard says the noose is not yet tight enough around Australia for England to expect an Ashes series-leveling victory in the second Test at the Adelaide Oval. The Australians moved to within 40 runs of the 352-run follow-on target at third day stumps Sunday in reply to England's imposing first innings of 551 for six declared. At the close, Australia were 312 for five with Michael Clarke on 30 and Adam Gilchrist on 13. Hoggard was England's best bowler, bowling a lion-hearted 27 overs to take 4-76 including the vital wickets of Ricky Ponting (142) and Mike Hussey (91) with the second new ball late in the day on a benign batting pitch. "We know it's still going to be hard work, we've got 250 runs to play with, we've got five wickets to get, it's been hard work to get wickets on that wicket, so it's going to have to be a good professional performance tomorrow," the 29-year-old Yorkshire seamer said. "We will be trying to get five wickets reasonably quickly and then we have to re-assess from there." England are still in a position to win the Test and bounce back after their crushing 277-run loss in the first Gabba Test, but Hoggard said it wouldn't be a "massive disappointment" if England did not go on to claim victory over the final two days of the Adelaide Test. "I don't think the noose is quite tight at the moment and the wicket is very placid, like a sub-continent wicket and it takes a long time to bowl people out," he said. "We've had 11 wickets now in three days and there's still two days left so I don't think it's going to be a massive disappointment if we don't win from here. But to show Australia that we can beat them at home as well we have to put in another good bowling performance tomorrow and hope we put some pressure on them on the final day." Hoggard said it was important for England to come back hard in Adelaide after the disappointment of their first Test performance last week. "I think it is vital that we put in a good performance in this game to show the Australians that we've come here to compete and not to just roll over. Obviously, the first game didn't go to plan, but I think in this game we've showed them that we're here to fight and to compete and I think we've fired a shot over their bows to show that we're here to hopefully retain the Ashes." Hoggard and England would have loved to have dismissed Ponting at a pivotal time in the match when the Australian skipper on 35 was dropped by Ashley Giles on the square leg boundary off his bowling. Giles leapt high for the two-handed chance but could not hold the catch in a major let-off. Ponting went on to score 107 more runs. "It's disappointing to have a dropped catch but you can back Ash to catch 99 times out of a 100. If you didn't have catches dropped in cricket it would be a boring old game, it's not anything personal," he said. "It's something that happens and I'm sure you'll see another dropped catch before the end of the series."