Waugh believes Warner, Bancroft will turn the corner

Warner fell prey to Stuart Broad yet again, making it three out of three times so far. © Getty

The weather forecast on Friday (August 16) for London, and pretty much all of England and Wales, suggested that the rains would come by around lunch-time and not leave for the rest of the day. If anything, they arrived a tad prematurely but the umpires chose it wise to keep the teams on the field and continue playing through the heavy drizzle before it got inevitably heavier. It was a session, where Australia as the batting team, could only have taken a step if any towards spoiling their chances of going 2-0 up. And though they did get through it with Steve Smith crucially intact, they couldn't get away without further damage to their openers' confidence, who failed for the third time in a row in the series.

Steve Waugh though, came to their defence at the end of the day despite David Warner and Cameron Bancroft averaging 4.33 and 9.33 respectively so far in the series. The team mentor also revealed that the Aussies would stick with the combination and backed them to "bounce back". Warner and Bancroft were dismissed cheaply once more on a rain-curtailed day at Lord's, which meant that their partnerships across three innings so far have read 13, 2 and 11. Bancroft ended up being Jofra Archer's first Test victim, trapped lbw by a quick and sharp in-coming delivery, while Warner fell prey to Stuart Broad yet again, making it three out of three times so far.

"I think it's just Test match cricket, and they haven't been easy wickets. Batting last night was difficult, six o'clock at night, an hour to go, under lights, overcast conditions, that's as tough as it gets and this morning was difficult again. I thought Bancroft hung in there pretty well, he just needed to spend another half hour there, get a few more balls away out of the middle and he would have been right. It's a fine line, you can analyse and scrutinize players, but that's Test match cricket. Sometimes you are going to miss out. If you pick a guy you back him for the long term and right now we are confident those guys are going to bounce back," the former captain said.

To his credit, despite the lack of runs, Bancroft has spent time at the crease in his last two outings to the middle and on Friday did manage to bunt the new-ball and Archer to an extent. It wasn't a very comfortable stay, however, but he's already faced 122 balls across three innings as compared to the 39 that Warner has survived. Bancroft's stay at Lord's lasted 66 balls and if nothing it ensured that Smith didn't have to come out to bat till the 23rd over, by which time Archer was already in his 11th over - fifth of the day. It allowed Australia's premier batsman to start off against a tiring Archer and he only had to deal with him for two overs. And Waugh did admit that batting currency in English conditions cannot always be measured in runs when it comes to judging performances.

"I don't think you look at the runs too much. I think Dave Warner looked really good last night. It was a pretty good delivery which got him. I don't think that's too much cause for concern. Bancroft stayed in there for quite a while, did a good job for the team. They both want to get a lot more runs obviously. It's challenging and the conditions over here are not easy for batting, it's not as if the ball is coming on and you can play a big cover drive. You have to work really hard for every run," he said.

Unlike Bancroft who has been dismissed in different fashions each time-caught at slip off Broad, short-leg off Moeen Ali and trapped in front by Archer at Lord's-Warner has succumbed to the round-the-wicket angle from Broad each time he's walked out to bat. It was interestingly an angle that he rarely had to come up against during his stellar run in the World Cup. And he's already had Broad get him out after having beaten the inside and outside of his bat - lbw, caught behind and bowled at Lord's. The veteran English seamer put it down to his focus on targeting Warner's stumps.

"I don't think I've done anything majorly different apart from bringing stumps into play a little bit more. In the past I've seen Warner as looking to find his edge all the time, whereas this has been a slight change of plan. That's been on the pitches we've played on. They've been quite dry, much drier than we were expecting as a side. That wobble seam has moved off the dryness of the pitch rather than there being a bit of moisture and swinging. I've just been looking to wobble it onto off stump. There have been a couple of decent balls in there to Warner," said Broad.

Waugh though believed that both Warner and Bancroft would only improve and that they could turn the corner, and to get them to believe in it he said was his role as a mentor.

"I see my role is to get guys comfortable and confident and relaxed, that's what I am trying to do. Cameron's preparation for this Test was excellent. He looked really good in the nets, and he's pretty relaxed at the moment. He's a thoroughly professional cricketer, a nice, decent guy who works hard at his game. He's tough and he'll come back," said Waugh.