DANE ELDRIDGE: Joe Root’s hopes of improving his record in Australia got a massive boost with Cummins out

The omission of Pat Cummins has left the door slightly ajar for England to finally produce something in Australia that isn’t a bruising operatic failure.

With the Aussie skipper on ice indefinitely with a back injury, this upcoming Ashes is suddenly not shaping as the ritualistic slaughterhouse we pencil in for the hapless Poms whenever they tour Down Under.

Australia entering a home Ashes without their skipper is like a Discovery Channel special without an Irwin, especially when it’s a leader as assuring as our Pat.

But luckily, the hosts will only face the first-world crisis of relying on Steve Smith as captain - a man with 40 tests experience in the role - and a pace cartel reduced to only three world-class spitfires instead of four.

As such, nobody would be surprised in 10 weeks time if the only difference Cummins’ absence made was England’s batsmen occasionally lasting to stumps instead of tea.

But extract the captain from any team and it invariably uncorks opposition confidence, even for a team like England that usually shrinks in the gooseberries the moment they enter Aussie airspace.

And there is one particular Pom whose ears would’ve pricked most prominently at the news of Cummins’ layoff and the mystery surrounding his return.

Joe Root - England’s abiding middle-order rock - is eyeing this summer as his third and final chance to finally register a long-awaited century Down Under.

Cummins absence will only serve to grease this passage to dreamland for the veteran, mainly because the paceman has spent years tormenting him like a tabby’s yarn.

Root averages an underwhelming 26 against Cummins, with the Western Sydney native dismissing him on eleven occasions in the Test arena- the most of any bowler tied with India’s Jasprit Bumrah.

And with Cricket Australia’s mixed messaging on a return date for the captain, the former English skipper could be free of his tyrant’s wiles for longer than anticipated.

This gifts Root a golden chance to not only seal his legacy by ticking off the elusive triple-figure mark in Australia’s gulag conditions, but also secure him the most sought-after prize for any English cricketer:

Shutting up Australia.

Arguably the Mother Country’s greatest of all time, Root is immensely respected in world cricket for his longevity, modesty, and a bat as broad as a railway sleeper.

But the tenacious Yorkshireman’s achievements go well beyond amassing a jaw-dropping 13,543 Test runs over 13 gruelling years.

A run scorer who initially preferred accumulation over aggravation, Root has maintained a charming decorum to his craft that has somehow survived the uncouth ravages of the Bazball era.

But while remaining largely true to this technical purity despite Brendon McCullum’s urgings to bash everything, the 158-gamer has evolved an extra gear in recent years that can see him thrash like Kevin Pietersen when required but without any of the ink or arrogance.

But despite all these virtues - and being the second highest run scorer in Test history and the format’s number one ranked batsman - Australia still largely consider him just a bloke with a funny name.

This isn’t only because we’re so difficult to please that we still don’t rate Michael Clarke merely because he drove a Ferrari to grade cricket 20 years ago.

It’s because Root’s blue chip test average of 51.3 diminishes to 35.68 on Australian shores- and that’s a red rag to our discerning standards.

Put simply, we’re already so dismissive of England that we reckon the only prerequisite to being a quality Pommy batsman is just staying in your crease.

And with Root continually failing in our own conditions, he may join Graeme Hick and Lucozade as the latest entity who isn’t big beyond Britain.

Of course, the 34 year old can go a long way to silencing these nasaly caveats from Down Under by scoring a ton in the next few months under our 39 degree sun with 90 overs of rockets at his Adam’s apple.

But even then, would any crown earned be weighed down with an asterix?

Root conquering his Everest in Australia would be an immense accomplishment, but doing so in the absence of his greatest tormentor presents a philosophical question:

If a tree gets cut down in the forest and Pat Cummins isn’t there to condemn the fractional decrease in carbon emission reduction, did it even happen?

Root won’t be handing back any century he scores this summer, but it’s hard to deny that doing so against a pace attack minus his chief weakness may see Australians reluctant to rubber stamp his greatness.

And rightly so- because as nitpicky as this would be, an asterix on Root’s legacy won’t be out of place amongst an Ashes history legioned with caveats, what-ifs and post-rationalisations.

For example, asterixes like England winning the last series on moral grounds, Johnny Bairstow being not-out, and Stuart Broad’s assertion his side’s 4-0 thrashing in 2020/21 was “null and void” because of covid.