Cricket: Jones Vital to England Cause

This is no time for pussyfooting around. England will move heaven and earth, mountains and more, to ensure that on Thursday, at The Oval, Simon Jones takes his place in the side for a momentous match that could change the face of the game in this country.

If the final Test sounds like something that ultimately faced Hercules on his labours, then that is pretty much what this Ashes series has been about. Mythological monsters such as Shane Warne, a two-headed creature if ever there was one, Glenn McGrath and Adam Gilchrist have attempted to block England's path in pursuit of the Ashes and since the set-back at Lord's each ordeal has been survived.

Now one more labour awaits and, to help achieve it, Jones will be jabbed and stabbed, pushed, prodded and pummelled, filled with pills and potions, dunked in ice, wrapped, strapped and then, if necessary, encouraged out of the dressing-room door at the point of a cutlass in the manner of someone walking the plank. That is how much the presence of the Welsh flier means to Michael Vaughan and his side as they approach the last obstacle preventing them from reclaiming the Ashes.

Jones has been suffering from an anterior impingement to his right ankle, a bone spur which even in its early stage can have the effect of inflaming surrounding soft tissue causing pain and immobility. After four tentative overs in the second Australian innings in the fourth Test at Trent Bridge he retired to the dressing room and took no further part in the game.

Since then he has received intensive treatment, including periods spent in an oxygen chamber, a move designed to increase blood flow and so accelerate the healing process. Gradually the reports on his progress have moved from the early pessimism of the coach Duncan Fletcher to something altogether more encouraging.

Yet in the final analysis, for all the medical advice, there is only one person who will know what is possible - and that is the player himself. Jones is no stranger to injury, having hurt his back badly during his Test debut at Lord's three years ago, before suffering the potentially career-threatening ligament damage to his knee in Brisbane the following winter. He might carry some natural reticence about placing his body on the line, reinforced perhaps by the experiences of his father Jeff, himself an England pace bowler whose career was brought to a premature end by injury.

But England need him now and they need to see what this genuine fire-breathing fast bowler is made of when faced with real adversity. If he really did need inspiration beyond the chance to help make history - and in truth this young fellow, in a revelatory series, has shown scant inclination to back off from any confrontation - then he could draw it from the performance of Andy Flintoff in South Africa last winter.

Preston's new freeman was himself suffering from a bone spur - posterior rather than anterior and to his left foot, a more common condition in cricket and suffered in the past by McGrath - and was aware that surgery would be needed. In the interim, though, he was patched up and sent out to bowl his heart out. There will be no braver bowling this summer than the 32 overs he sent down in the drawn last Test at Centurion, that brought him six wickets for 110 in a match that, like now, England needed only to draw to take the series.

Mark Butcher's performances in the Caribbean, made with gritted teeth as he sought to persuade the management his sprained ankle was no handicap, also spring to mind. These are strong men, both of them.

Jones's progress has been monitored on a daily basis, including yesterday at Arsenal's London Colney training base, and he will be expected to undergo rigorous fitness tests tomorrow and on Wednesday to see if there is any reaction. "He is continuing to make progress and we will give him as much time as he needs," said the chairman of selectors David Graveney yesterday. He will, added Graveney, continue to receive treatment and will be reassessed by the medical team at practice tomorrow. Incapacity would prove a problem. Freedom of movement, albeit with pain, can be dealt with. Then it is down to him and let the winter take care of itself.

Just in case England are unable to field an unchanged side for the fifth Test in a row, contingency has been made in the announcement yesterday of a squad of 13 players for the match. Included, as expected, is the Durham all-rounder Paul Collingwood, an experienced one-day player who has played two Tests and was brought into the squad for the second Test at Edgbaston before being released. More surprisingly, so is the Lancashire pace bowler James Anderson, a centrally con tracted player who has spent the entire season with his county endeavouring, after a trying winter, to rediscover the ebullience that characterised his meteoric rise to the England ranks.

This means there is no confidence in the capacity of the Hampshire bowler Chris Tremlett to rise to the occasion if required. But all reports say he has bowled indifferently for Hampshire, was unspectacular in Saturday's C&G final and might prove a soft target for Australia's batsmen.

Tremlett's inclusion would have indicated strongly that Collingwood was the belt-and- braces preference should Jones not play, a move that would strengthen the batting but leave them a pace bowler light. Yet Tremlett's inclusion in a game of such importance might have left England effectively with 10 men. Anderson, though, has played a dozen Tests and has faced Australia in one-day internationals without too many qualms. His re-emergence here, following more than 50 wickets for Lancashire this season, speaks not just of confidence in him but of England's intent to continue to take the fight to Australia.