Pope Reinforces Status to England's No 3 Slot with Bold 90 Against Lions

It's difficult to know how significant of the English team's practice game will end up being meaningful when their Ashes battle kicks off a short distance away at Perth Stadium on Friday – a brief gap in geography or duration but worlds away in importance and atmosphere – but if it managed solely strengthening Pope's assurance, that by itself has made the exercise valuable.

The English side's number three batsman – that point is certainly completely clear – built on his initial innings hundred by notching a further 90 in the second innings, and the most notable was less about the quantity of runs but the manner in which they were made. On occasion the 27-year-old seemed dominant, hitting a twelve fours and a couple of sixes, connecting with the ball perfectly but with aggressive determination.

It was just a practice match versus a England Lions team that used exactly 11 pitchers across a match played in front of a small group of onlookers in a public park, but it was still hugely impressive. Officially, England, chasing of 202 following the Lions ended their follow-on innings on 251 for six, won by a margin of five wickets when Smith sped the team over the finish line with a series of boundaries.

Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett, the other two significant first-innings' successes, both fell short in the second knock, while Joe Root made several more points – 31 on this occasion – but was not enormously more assured, then being bemused and subsequently out by Jacks. Brook suffered an similar outcome soon afterwards.

Bashir – who ended the match having delivered 12 overs for each side – will have encountered some of the batting he bowled to pretty hostile. His first six overs versus the Lions conceded 56, with Ben McKinney taking advantage to bowling that if not entirely loose was surely not overly threatening.

At the end the sixth over of that period, the English side's other pitchers had allowed almost precisely the equivalent number of runs – 57 – from 15, though the bowler grew a somewhat less leaky as time passed, giving up 27 from his remaining six. He claimed one wicket, taking a clever, low-down snare, falling to his right, to finish Bethell's batting stint for 70, facing 80 deliveries.

Jacob Bethell, redeeming managing merely three runs in the opening knock, was one of three players fifty-scorers in the Lions' top four. McKinney's scores from opening batsman were more reliable than those from their No 3: he scored 66 in their initial knock and went two better in their follow-up, taking 61 deliveries for his fifty, with five and a couple six-hit shots, both against Bashir's's bowling. Jacob Bethell got to 68 before a mis-hit to Stokes at cover position, who held a low grab at shin level.

Cox exhibited like consistency, and built on his first-innings 53 with another 57, at slightly more than a run a ball. He produced several remarkably elegant strokes en route, such as a straight drive and a hook against successive Brydon Carse deliveries to achieve his half century.

Having missed the first day of this game with a illness and provided just the most minor of inputs to the follow-up, Brydon Carse bowled excellently when finally afforded the opportunity, with Ben McKinney and Cox included in his three scalps.

This report may be updated