Gus Atkinson can solve England’s looming No 8 problem after maiden century

Chris Woakes might not be England’s No 8 in the next Ashes for more than one Test match, the pink-ball day-nighter in Brisbane, but when he is not selected in that influential position, England now know a man who could replace him ably: Gus Atkinson, whose maiden first-class hundred of 118 off only 115 balls combined with Joe Root’s hundred to give England full command of the second Test against Sri Lanka.

Atkinson, at the relatively ripe age of 26 for a fast bowler, had scored only 505 first-class runs – red-ball opportunities being limited at opulent Surrey – before he walked out to support Root at 216 for six. Yet Atkinson has so much nascent talent that he, rather than Root, was soon belting four sixes; and after reaching 74 off 81 balls overnight, he steamed to his first hundred in first-class cricket, let alone Tests, to bring the house down.

The fact that Sri Lanka on the second morning had a still-new second ball was brushed aside by Atkinson. He had so much time for all his shots even against a harder ball; and on his inaugural path to three figures, he was never guilty of trying to hit the ball too hard. The cover-drives were strokes, not hits.

Given that the chief objective of English cricket, as always, is the Ashes, it was gratifying that Atkinson’s first two main scoring shots were hooks for four. Woakes, promoted to No 7 in the absence of Ben Stokes, had just been bounced out: like many a pace bowler with respect to bouncers, or a pharmacist with bills, Woakes prefers to dispense rather than receive.  But Atkinson seems equipped both to dish ‘em out and cop ‘em.

It dates back to when he was 15, in the nets (indoors and out) at Bradfield College and being coached by the former Hampshire batsman Julian Wood. “He was extremely talented in bowling quick or hitting a long ball,” Wood recalled. “Extremely talented but lazy – or lethargic might be a better word than lazy. The cricket was good but the school didn’t push him that much. He floated in and out of Surrey age-group cricket and it was his mum that pushed him then.

“I used to pepper him in the nets,” Wood said. “I used softer balls than the ones you use on a bowling machine – Bola make them – and he would either take them on or leave them. For him it was fun. There was no pathway for him at that age, he did it just because it was fun. I tried to make him an impact player at number five or six rather than an opening batsman.” Wood does not recall Atkinson making a century at Bradfield, so there was not much precedent before he put his name on the Lord’s honours board.

When Atkinson first faced Sri Lanka’s left-arm spinner Prabath Jayasuriya, Atkinson drove him for his first two sixes – one straight, the other nearer to long-off – as effortlessly as if he had been Root. “I’ve seen him play that shot before,” Wood said. “I’ve seen him do it regularly.” Atkinson’s third six – and it will be so important to accelerate in Australia when the ball, whether first or second, is soft – was pulled over the furthest boundary at deep midwicket off the spinner again.

“He needed to leave school, get into the gym and realise how hard he had to work,” Wood added. And Atkinson has. It was apparent again after Sri Lanka took the second ball and Atkinson had Matthew Potts to nurse through to the close. If there was a shot of day one, it could just as easily have been one of Atkinson’s cover drives, during his eighth-wicket stand with Potts, as one of Root’s.

If we recollect the last Ashes series, the tide was turned England’s way by Woakes and Mark Wood, and by their lower-order batting – or hitting in Wood’s case – as well as their bowling. An ageing attack, if Australia still cling to their big three of Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood, can be worn down in Antipodean heat and dismantled. To this end England are quietly but assiduously assembling their resources.