His sparring second ball at a full and wide delivery from Starc had the hallmarks of a man who wanted the comforting feel of bat on ball even if he has trained for thousands of hours to suppress such urges.
Root’s heart rate would have soared the next over when he came perilously close to losing his wicket in the cruellest way imaginable – a run out at the non-striker’s end from a deflection off the bowler’s hand.
He was spared by having the bat in the hand closest to the stumps, saving him precious hundredths of seconds to ground his bat in time.
The delivery that removed Root came somewhat out of the blue. As well as Starc bowled on one of the biggest days of his career, the set-up to his biggest wicket was non-existent.
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Just one of the previous four deliveries required Root to play, the others so short and wide that even the judgement of a tailender would not have been tested.
Among the trash, Starc found treasure with a delivery that moved away after pitching, leaving Root in a tangle – all squared up and squirting an edge to third slip, about 180 degrees from where he had intended to play the ball.
