Mitch's stare-way to heaven

Australian pace ace Mitchell Johnson has revealed his innermost thoughts when he famously stared down England’s Jimmy Anderson during the second Commonwealth Bank Ashes Test at the Adelaide Oval.

Johnson told cricket.com.au the eyeballing after uprooting his middle stump wasn’t planned, but admitted his first instinct was to give the England bowler a send-off.

“The first initial instinct was to say something but I held myself back and kept my mouth zipped,” Johnson said.

The Anderson wicket came during a blistering spell of 5-12 in 24 balls, with the middle-stump seeking missile that took Anderson’s wicket producing a stare so deadly Medusa herself would have envied it.

“I don’t premeditate how I’m going to celebrate or anything like that,” Johnson told cricket.com.au.

“There might be guys like that, but it just happened.

“We’ve had a bit of history, that rivalry for a number of years now.”

With adrenaline surging through his veins, Johnson said he wanted to deliver some parting words to his long-time Ashes rival, but decided to let the lifeless stump lying metres from the wicket do the talking for him.

“What more do I need to say? I’d done what I needed to do,” he said.

“At that moment things were going pretty well for myself personally in that match and it was the perfect ball to get him out - to knock his middle stump out of the ground.”