Rory Burns' 'huge' Ashes century shows his great mental strength, says Kumar Sangakkara
Kumar Sangakkara: "It was an excellent display of opening batting and it made the going a lot easier for those coming after him"
Friday 2 August 2019 19:42, UK
After Rory Burns started his Ashes career by scoring a maiden Test century on day two at Edgbaston, his former team-mate at Surrey, Kumar Sangakkara, assesses an innings that was as much about the left-hander's mentality as it was technical ability…
Rory Burns was excellent. He will have been pretty nervous coming into this game. I don't think he will have had any doubts about his ability but there has been a lot of criticism and a lot of attention paid to his unorthodox technique, his temperament, the way he was dismissed in the last Test against Ireland.
To come here and look so organised and do his job so well shows great mental strength and that's really key, especially against the moving Dukes ball. In England, to succeed as an opener it takes a lot and Rory Burns today has shown that he has got what it takes to fight through tough periods against some of the best bowlers in the world.
It was an excellent display of opening batting and it made the going a lot easier for those coming after him, especially Joe Root. It was a battling innings where he absorbed pressure a lot of the time, he had some good balls bowled at him but he stood up and was counted.
He continues to challenge himself to get better.
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I think his technique has remained the same but I think mentally he has come to terms with the fact that he doesn't have to worry about his back-lift or his stance or where his bat comes from as long as he is aware of where his off stump is, of what the role of an opener, against the Dukes ball, in an Ashes series should be and how long it takes to battle through tough periods in a Test innings.
From here onwards, he knows he can really step up and face the Australian new-ball attack, it's now about maximising his runs, changing gears throughout an innings and knowing when to take a calculated risk, targeting a specific bowler to get through a tough spell in terms of getting a few easy boundaries.
That will enable him to get those fifties and then convert them into hundreds without really encountering too much mental fatigue.
It's huge for him that this hundred has come in the Ashes, in the first Test. With England coming off the back of a World Cup victory, this Ashes needs to continue that high, both for the England team and the public.
The opener's role in an Ashes series is absolutely vital, it's an area where England have been found wanting in the last couple of years. They've been searching for two quality openers since Alastair Cook retired and have actually needed batsmen at one, two and three.
Joe Root has now pushed himself up to No 3 where I believe very, very strongly that he belongs and should bat all the time. It's important that an opener or two stand up and do their job as well so it was really good, in the context of the Ashes and England's future plans as well in Test cricket, to see Rory bat as well as he did.
As a Test opener, it is understood that you will get out if you make a mistake, an error of judgement or just get a good ball.
What I saw from Jason Roy in his first Ashes innings was that he has worked really hard to have those soft hands in defence and play the ball under his eyes. He will have watched Steve Smith, he will have watched all the analysis being done about where his hands are in Test cricket.
The only thing is that today he will have been really conscious of it and you could see his defence was really, really controlled. What he doesn't want to happen is for that to enter his psyche and make his mindset defensive.
His defensive game has to be geared towards allowing his attacking mindset to flourish at the right time. Pick the right balls, keep the good ones out or leave the good balls but keep looking for that ball to pounce on and score his boundaries or rotate strike.
If his defensive game affects his mentality that is where the danger lies for Jason Roy. He has been asked to open because he is in form, he's an attacking opener in white-ball cricket, a great foil for Rory Burns.
He needs to keep that attacking mindset and have that defensive game as a moat or a wall around his attacking game in a way that still allows him to switch to his attacking game at the right time. That's something he can work on as he continues to play for England.
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