VAUGHAN HAILS SMITH

Michael Vaughan has hailed Steven Smith for scoring a brilliant hundred in Australia’s first innings in the 5^th Ashes test match which is being played at Kennington Oval.

Smith played a superb knock of 138 runs and helped Australia get close to a score of 500 in the first innings.

This was Smith’s first test hundred. He had been a bit inconsistent in the series before this test match. He only had a couple of decent scores and this was supposed to be his last chance. Another failure here would have made it hard for him to find a place in the Australian squad for the return Ashes series back home.

But, the 24 years old right hander showed great temperament and became the 4^th Australian batsman to score a hundred in this series.

When Vaughan was asked about Smith’s inning, he said, “He played beautifully. He is a gutsy player and has got a good cricketing brain. He seems to have a bright future.”

“This inning will give him plenty of confidence. It will make him believe that he can play big knocks against quality bowling line ups.”

When asked if he thinks Michael Clarke declared at the right time, Vaughan said, “Yes, I think so. It’s a flat deck and the bowlers need time to get 20 wickets. Tomorrow is an important day.”

“Australia will have to get England 5 down for 150 or so. Nathan Lyon will be doing the bulk of the work for them as it’s a very slow pitch.”

“There is not much help for the bowlers in this wicket, but, England will have to deal with the scoreboard pressure. So, you never know.”

At the end of the second day’s play, the score of England was 32 without loss in reply to Australia’s 492.