Heavy-handed Head sheds facial hair, short-ball rust

What Travis Head has lost in facial hair, he has gained in short-ball prowess, with the counter-punching dynamo channelling Ben Stokes to give Australia a fighting chance at seizing the Ashes urn in Leeds.

With the visitors floundering with a slim 165-run lead after their only other remaining top-order batter was dismissed late on day three, Head put his team on his back by blazing 43 off his last 30 balls to leave England with a challenging run-chase.

The 29-year-old did it without his trademark moustache, which he revealed had become a victim of a clipper mishap after the Lord’s Test when Australia went 2-0 up in the series.

"I’ve only got the one setting, so I butchered it and now it’s come off," said Head, adding dryly there had been no requirement for payment to a third-party for his trim following an erroneous report in a UK newspaper that had suggested Alex Carey walked out on paying for a haircut in Leeds earlier this week.

Unbeaten on 18no overnight, Head had spent hours with his pads on watching rain fall before finally being called into action when play resumed in dark bowler-friendly conditions on Saturday.

His fighting hand of 77 (from 112 balls) saw him put on 85 vital runs for the final four wickets having silenced the Headingley crowd with a series of daring strokes, including several against speed demon Mark Wood, that went between or over all nine fielders station on the boundary.

It was exactly what England captain Stokes had done to Australia on the previous day, and in the previous Test, but Head insisted: "I don't think you can pair me and Stokes together.

"I just tried to pick targets and tried not to get a hole put through me with Wood.

"I just tried to give myself as much space and not be predictable. (Wood) is a challenging bloke to get after, especially in those positions where I'm taking most of the strike off him. I thought we worked through it well."

Head has been challenged in a vastly different way to previous series since his storming Test comeback got underway during the 2021-22 Ashes.

Despite that, he has been Australia's leading batter on their tour of England so far, managing 447 runs in eight innings, including a century against India that earnt him player-of-the-match honours in the World Test Championship final last month.

England took note of that game-changing 163 at The Oval and India’s concession they had switched to a bouncer strategy against him too late.

Stokes has not made that mistake.

Opta data shows that more than 70 per cent of all balls bowled by England's pacemen to Head have been short or back of a length.

"No doubt it's a challenging thing. It's foreign. There's not many periods think we’ve seen in Test cricket where it's just been (close to) 100 per cent short balls," said Head, who was controversially dropped during the tour to India earlier this year.

"I wasn't surprised with the plan. I prepared for the plan and thought it was going to come (but) maybe not to the extent that it did.

"I feel like if there's anything I'm going to leave with from England it might be a pull shot.

"I feel like as the series has gone on, I have played it better.

"It was the one thing I said to ‘Diva’ (batting coach Michael di Venuto) when I arrived here. I'd had a long period of time off, didn't touch a bat since India.

"Going into the World Test Championship (final), it was the one part of my game that I felt just hadn’t clicked yet.

"Just finding it a bit tough to find length. I was just probably a little bit rusty. India didn't come to that tactic until later in my innings (in the WTC final) and I didn't play it particularly well which then lends itself to a little bit of media around it."

Yet Head is satisfied at how he has handled the ensuing barrage.

The left-hander has managed half-centuries in three of his six innings against England in this series and while his three dismissals to pace have all been to short balls (the other three have been to spin), Head insists that is inevitable given the volume of bumpers he has copped.

"It's no different when you can't find the forward defence and Broad is swinging it away. If I come here a little bit rusty on that, they would have honed in on that and I would have been under pressure," he said.

"I just want to try and make really good decisions around the short ball. Yes, I'm going to nick one down leg (occasionally)… But vice-versa on the forward defence

"I've got to score off it. I can't just sit and cop them, because as we've seen there's going to be the whole day worth (of bouncers).

"It's hard to say 'get under it for a few overs and then they'll change their plans'. They've just proven that they won't.

"I want to try and put some pressure back on, I want to try and keep the scoreboard moving."

2023 Qantas Ashes Tour of the UK

First Test: Australia won by two wickets

Second Test: Australia won by 43 runs

Third Test: Thursday July 6-Monday July 10, Headingley

Fourth Test: Wednesday July 19-Sunday July 23, Old Trafford

Fifth Test: Thursday July 27-Monday 31, The Oval

Australia squad: Pat Cummins (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey (wk), Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Josh Inglis (wk), Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitch Marsh, Todd Murphy, Michael Neser, Matthew Renshaw, Steve Smith (vc), Mitchell Starc, David Warner

England squad: Ben Stokes (c), Moeen Ali, James Anderson, Jonny Bairstow, Stuart Broad, Harry Brook, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Dan Lawrence, Ollie Pope, Ollie Robinson, Joe Root, Josh Tongue, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood