Ashes 2021-22: Mark Wood’s deadly beamer floors Travis Head, the batter survives nasty blow

The first Ashes test match at the Gabba stadium has gotten off to a fiery albeit one-sided start. While hosts Australia have managed to keep a dominant stranglehold over the game for the most part, England’s moments of on-field brilliances have only arrived in patches. 

The frustration of being behind in the game was quite conspicuous on the England bowlers’ faces. During the first session of the second day, all-rounder Ben Stokes bowled as many as 14 no-balls in his opening spell! What’s even more ridiculous is that out of those 14 overstepped deliveries, only one was noticed by the third umpires- the one that almost sent David Warner back to the pavilion. 

Mark Wood knocks down Travis Head with a nasty beamer

For our featured pick of day 2, though, we’ve chosen Mark Wood, and his spicy beamer that nearly knocked the air out of Travis Head. In the 81st over of Australia’s innings, Wood lobbed an angling delivery that hit Head on the gloves. The ball further ricocheted off Travis’ hands and jammed into his chin, knocking down the set Australian batsman onto the pitch. Here’s the video of the incident:

Thankfully, Wood was quick to walk up to Head and apologise for his dangerous beamer. The Australian physios assessed Head to be free off any concussion risks and let him play on until the close of day 2.

ALSO WATCH: Mitchell Starc’s fiery yorker cleans up Rory Burns on the first ball of Ashes 2021-22

That nasty beamer and a potential injury scare was the only time Head would’ve felt uneasy during Thursday’s day of play. The mercurial left-hander batsman made a stellar comeback to the test side as he notched up his third test century off just 85 balls- the fastest ever at Gabba. 

Brief scores: Australia 343/7 (T Head 112*, D Warner 84, O Robinson 3/48) lead England 147/10 by 196 runs.