BRISBANE: Joe Root finally broke his long-awaited century jinx in Australia on Thursday, but the loudest sigh of relief didn’t come from England’s dressing room — it came from Matthew Hayden’s house. And more specifically, from his daughter, Grace.Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!Root’s fluent 135 on Day 1 of the pink-ball Ashes Test at the Gabba not only ended 10 years of Australian heartbreak but also saved Hayden from fulfilling a bizarre promise. The former Australia opener had jokingly vowed to “walk naked around the MCG” if Root failed to score a hundred this series.
The moment Root reached three figures off Scott Boland, social media exploded — and Hayden’s daughter stole the spotlight with a cheeky Instagram story. Posting a selfie, Grace wrote: “Root, thank you, you’ve saved all our eyes.” The hilarious post instantly went viral, turning Root’s milestone into an internet spectacle.
Hayden himself quickly posted a congratulatory video shared by England Cricket on X, laughing at his own wager while praising Root’s perseverance.“Congratulations mate on a hundred here in Australia. Took you a while and there was no one that had more skin in the game than me, literally. I was backing you for a hundred in a good way. So congratulations, ten fifties and finally a hundred. You little ripper mate. Have a beauty and bloody enjoy it,” Hayden joked.A decade-long wait endsRoot’s ton was his first in Australia after 16 matches, 30 innings, and four Ashes tours. He brought calm to a tense English innings and climbed to 40 Test hundreds — just one behind Ricky Ponting (41) and trailing only Sachin Tendulkar (51) and Jacques Kallis (45).At stumps, England were 325/9, with Root unbeaten on 135 and Jofra Archer on 32.While Australia dropped regular captain Pat Cummins again and shockingly benched Nathan Lyon for Michael Neser, it was Root’s history-making innings — and Grace Hayden’s viral punchline — that ruled the day.For Root, it was a career milestone. For the Hayden household? It was a national emergency narrowly avoided.
