Jack Leach reverses his England fortunes with five-star display

You make your own luck, or so they say, and Jack Leach’s took a lot of making. Since his debut in New Zealand in 2018 he has played 25 of England’s 55 Tests, thrust into the side and plucked out, injured and recovered. Once someone fractures his skull after fainting in his own kitchen, as Leach did in 2015, they probably learn to take the regular rough with the occasional smooth – and the kind of rough that Leach has been presented with has not often been the sort that spinners feast on.

Shortly after lunch on the second day at Headingley he left the pitch with the ball in his hand, after claiming his first Test five-fer in England, or indeed anywhere outside Sri Lanka. This was not an everyday achievement – he was the first spin bowler to take five in the first innings of a Test at Headingley since Jim Laker in 1958 – and it was the reward of uncommon effort.

Only twice now in 55 years, and only seven times ever, has a spinner bowled more than 38 overs in the first innings of a Headingley Test; only one of the others took as many as five wickets, and none of them matched Leach’s achievement in being individually responsible for 33% of all balls bowled in the innings. So it could be argued that Leach took the route to success favoured by the father of Veruca Salt here: if you buy enough chocolate bars, you’re bound to get a few golden tickets.

Having dismissed Will Young with his first ball of the match, a decent delivery that the batter misjudged, something shifted for Leach when Henry Nicholls drove the ball into Daryl Mitchell’s bat, and thence into the hands of Alex Lees, on Thursday afternoon. He added three more wickets on Friday, the result less of his excellence than of clumsy slogs and fine catches.

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