Travis Head has made a career of gate-crashing tidy narratives, but even by his standards this was impolite. An Ashes Test that kept shape for roughly six hours blew apart in the space of a single innings, and Australia walked away 1–0 up after two days that felt like cricket written by someone who’d only skimmed the instruction manual. Head’s 123 off 83 balls was a century so brutal it probably required a parental‑advisory warning. A century that turned England’s swagger into static and left Perth Stadium buzzing with daylight‑stunned disbelief.
Head wasn’t even meant to open. Usman Khawaja’s back locked up again, the kind of injury that usually elicits sympathy rather than excitement, yet Head responded like a man whose boarding pass had been upgraded. Four sixes, sixteen fours, a 69-ball hundred that sits second only to Adam Gilchrist’s WACA detonation, and a partnership of 117 with Marnus Labuschagne that turned a tricky chase of 205 into a long lunch. When he finally holed out, Labuschagne greeted him with a hug that said: thank you, and also what on earth was that?
England will spend days replaying the previous 24 hours in their heads, mostly because the present makes no sense. They were 105 ahead with nine wickets still breathing. The pitch had calmed. Australia had been rolled for 132 with all the ceremony of a primary school fire drill. But Mitchell Starc (3–55, ten for the match) and Scott Boland (4–33) shredded the script in under a session. England lost 3-0 in six balls – an event so sharp it should come with a warning label – and suddenly 300-plus became 205. Even that required Gus Atkinson (37) and Brydon Carse (20) to stage the sort of tail resistance that looks noble until you realise it’s also evidence of collapse.
Starc opened England’s innings with another first-over wicket – Zak Crawley’s second duck, claimed via a one‑handed return catch that saw him stretch so far to his left he briefly looked made of elastic. It left the stadium wondering whether there is anything this man can’t do.
Stokes’ attack, terrifying the day before, seemingly re-emerged defanged. Archer and Atkinson struggled to crest 130kph. Stokes stuck to the short-ball plan anyway, perhaps out of defiance, perhaps because the alternative would have required admitting the day had slipped completely out of their control. Mark Wood bowled just three overs, as though quietly excused from the madness. Weatherald chipped in with 23 – his first Test runs, earned after an 11-ball wait that felt like cricket’s version of buffering – before Head and Labuschagne rewrote the afternoon.
Labuschagne finished with a flourish against Root’s spin; Steve Smith nudged the winning runs with all the ceremony of someone confirming a delivery receipt. Nearly 50,000 people belted out “We love Head,” an anthem one suspects will not age well but was undeniably sincere at the time. The only unhappy locals were third-day ticket-holders, realising they’d now be forced to spend Sunday pretending they love their families as much as they love Test cricket. “I feel sorry for the people who can’t come tomorrow,” Head said, which was generous given tomorrow had been cancelled and he was the sole cause.
Somewhere in the middle of all this, the Ashes swung, the laws of momentum filed for leave, and the game briefly resembled performance art. And in the spirit of disclosure: the No Ball team were there on day one, watching 19 wickets fall and wondering whether we’d fallen into a time warp. Congratulations to us – we are now, officially, enmeshed in Ashes history.
