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<\/p>\nBetween a shot-making English top seven and the increasingly spicy nature of pitches in Australia, 37-year-old Lyon is in for an Ashes summer to remember.<\/p>\n
As for the prospect of England coming to Australia with a more loudmouthed persona than in the past, Lyon is up for the verbals \u2013 even as he detects some evolution in Bazball from pure entertainment to something harder-edged.<\/p>\n
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Nathan Lyon in the SCG dressing room.Credit: Sitthixay Ditthavong<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the way they\u2019re playing their cricket, which is totally fine by me. It\u2019s shaping up for one hell of a summer,\u201d he said. \u201cI think their approach has changed a little bit. They\u2019ve got some stars in their cricket side who can win games of cricket off their own back. Joe Root, Ben Stokes and these guys.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it looks to me like they\u2019ve totally changed their approach, and they\u2019re trying to think about how to win games of cricket rather than just being pure entertainers. And they\u2019ve played some decent cricket over the last little while.\u201d<\/p>\n
There has been some impatience with Bazball in the UK, now that four English Test summers have passed without a series victory over India or Australia. It was that kind of criticism, from within, that Lyon was responding to in 2017.<\/p>\n
In the days leading up to those comments, his ears had been stung by the commentary of many, but none more so than the late Shane Warne.<\/p>\n
\u201cAustralia look confused. They\u2019re picking wicketkeepers that aren\u2019t even keeping for their state,\u201d Warne said at the time. \u201cTo me, I think England are in a better situation going into that first Test than what Australia are. At the moment, the biggest shift … over the last few years, is they don\u2019t fear Australia any more.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Nathan Lyon at the Gabba in 2017.Credit: AAP<\/p>\n
Lyon\u2019s attack on England made him the focus of several days\u2019 commentary.<\/p>\n
Former captain Nasser Hussain suggested \u201che was trying to deflect from the bad week Australia have had as far as selection has gone\u201d. <\/p>\n
If it was a deflection, as Lyon has now agreed, it worked better than a Glenn Maxwell switch-hit. Lyon took 21 wickets for the series, still his best return in an Ashes bout, and strangled England\u2019s scoring rate in a 4-0 outcome. England lost by the same margin here in 2021-22.<\/p>\n
Naturally, Lyon believes that spin is essential to winning a series in Australia. Moreover, he warns that the global cupboard for tweakers is getting harder to replenish because of a preponderance of grassy pitches \u2013\u00a0the kinds of conditions that saw Lyon dropped for Scott Boland in the Caribbean.<\/a><\/p>\n This week, Lyon has been hosting a series of spin-bowling seminars in regional New South Wales, where prospective cricketers are schooled not only on bowling, but also insights on management and fitness. <\/p>\n \u201cI do care about spin bowling and I\u2019m not saying this because I\u2019m concerned about my position in the team,\u201d Lyon said. \u201cI know my role, I know how important spin bowling is, but there is a degree of me that\u2019s concerned about spin bowling around the world, not just Australia, with the wickets we\u2019re playing on.<\/p>\n Loading<\/p>\n \u201cIf you look at spin bowling and your younger spin bowlers around the country whether they\u2019re not getting the overs or the opportunities to bowl on day-three, day-four wickets, or spinning wickets, or even green seamers because the fast bowlers are dominating.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone focuses on the first 10 overs of a game and then usually the last couple of overs and how to win a game. But there\u2019s a big part of the game where it can be quite hard to create chances or change the momentum of the game, and I feel like spin bowlers have the opportunity to do that. So I\u2019m always going to fight for spin bowlers, and that\u2019s my biggest concern.\u201d<\/p>\n