Pope Reinforces Status to England's No 3 Slot with Bold 90 Against Lions

It's hard to gauge how much of the English team's warm-up fixture will prove meaningful when their Ashes contest starts not far at the Perth venue on the coming Friday – a brief gap in space or time but worlds away in import and atmosphere – but if it managed solely boosting Ollie Pope's self-belief, that on its own has made the exercise worthwhile.

The English side's number three batsman – that point is undoubtedly absolutely certain – built on his first-innings century by adding an additional 90 in the follow-up innings, and the most impressive was not merely the quantity of scored runs but the style in which they were scored. On occasion the young batsman looked commanding, smashing a dozen fours and a two of sixes, hitting the ball beautifully but with fierce purpose.

It was just a friendly versus a Lions team that employed a total of 11 pitchers throughout a match held in before a few dozen of people in a public park, but it was nonetheless hugely impressive. For the record, England, chasing of 202 after the Lions declared their follow-on innings on 251 for six, triumphed by five wickets when Smith raced the team across the conclusion with a flurry of boundaries.

Crawley and Ben Duckett, the two other big first-innings' achievers, both fell short in the second innings, while Root made further points – 31 on this occasion – but was far from more dominant, prior to being puzzled and duly dismissed by Jacks. Harry Brook experienced an same end a little later.

Shoaib Bashir – who ended the fixture having delivered 12 overs for either team – will have found part of the batting he confronted quite challenging. His initial six deliveries versus the Lions conceded 56, with Ben McKinney taking advantage to deliveries that if not exactly poor was certainly not overly dangerous.

At the end the sixth over of those overs, England's remaining three bowlers had allowed almost precisely the same number of points – 57 – from 15, though the bowler grew a little less giving later on, giving up 27 from his final six. He secured one wicket, taking a smart, low snare, falling to his right, to end Jacob Bethell's innings for 70, facing 80 deliveries.

Jacob Bethell, making up for scoring only three runs in the initial innings, was among three fifty-scorers in the Lions team's leading batsmen. Ben McKinney's performances from opener were steadier than the scores of their number three: he scored 66 in their first batting effort and improved by two in their second, using 61 balls for his fifty, with five boundaries and a couple sixes, each against Bashir's's pitching. Jacob Bethell made 68 before a mishit to Stokes at cover, who made a bending grab at ankle height.

Jordan Cox showed similar steadiness, and built on his initial innings' 53 with an additional 57, at just over a run a ball. He produced a few remarkably beautiful shots on the way, such as a straight drive and a pull against successive Brydon Carse balls to attain his 50 runs.

After missing the first day of this game with a stomach issue and made merely the most minor of efforts to the follow-up, Brydon Carse bowled excellently when at last given the opportunity, with Ben McKinney and Cox included in his three wickets.

The coverage could change