Ashes 2019: Australia’s summer toil is finally set to deliver the urn as England left to search for fresh miracle

For Australia, the ending will be happier this time than it was at Headingley. Surely

A part of the ritual when a team collapses is the post-mortem detailing of dressing-room chaos. We’re told about the silence, shortness of breath and kit flying everywhere as the bowlers pad up well before time. For a moment on this fourth afternoon, Australia were heading in that direction. An hour earlier, the discussion (at least theoretically) was around the follow-on mark. Now, anything other than batting looked desirable on a track. For the briefest moment, this volatile Ashes series looked like it might have another absurd twist in it. But an hour after that, the only discussion was if Steve Smith had enough time to clock twin tons.

In the exceedingly unlikely scenario where Tim Paine’s side can’t stick the landing tomorrow and take the eight further wickets they need for their Ashes retention, the latest shambolic start to an innings will be of more importance to what happens next. Indeed, if they run out of time to get that done, the skipper’s decision to bat on after Smith holed out for 82 will be reviewed with bewilderment. But not to worry. The ending will be happier this time than it was at Headingley. Surely.

Back to that batting, though. A logical reason offered for Australia’s series-defining stumbles in 2015 was that not enough of the top order had experienced proper cricket in England. That doesn’t quite tally this time around, with the top six having spent long enough here to have witnessed at least a dozen failed resolutions to Brexit. The numbers are brutal: Australia’s openers in this series have made just 169 runs between them at 10.6 apiece. Indeed, their opening partnerships average 9.8, the lowest for any Ashes clash since 1888. To give a sense of how the game has changed in favour of bat, that year the Old Trafford Test was over by 1:51pm – on day two.

David Warner was desolate when realising his inside edge had again been beaten by Stuart Broad; the first pair an Australian Test opener has bagged in a Test for a quarter of a century. Coming into this week, he was proud of the half-century he made at Leeds on the first day in the most trying of conditions. Three ducks on the trot later and the comparisons to Greg Chappell’s run of four consecutive blobs in 1981 are inevitable. Yes, the left-hander has dominated his era to such an extent that he made it to 20 Test centuries faster than Viv Richards did. But this will hurt a proud man wanted it badly this week. Too much, perhaps.

Marcus Harris copped his second good’un from Stuart Broad from the match, which will happen when the England opener is bowling as well to southpaws as he is in this series. It begs the question of why the right-handed Cam Bancroft was replaced after getting through 110 minutes at Lord’s across two innings, but that debate has been run and won. Marnus Labuchagne and Travis Head both might both be future captains, but neither could handle Jofra Archer’s extra yard, so sorely missing the first time around. That six of the South Australian’s dismissals in the series have been bowled of leg before wicket should also be noted.

But then, from 44 for four, Smith – the man most likely – found the necessary ally in the man who some might have assumed the least likely after his first innings demise, Matt Wade. After 87 deliveries, they had put on 50 and all was well again. There would be no repeat of Trent Bridge or Hobart or Newlands – Australia would control their own destiny.

After tea, with the foot firmly down, Smith passed 50 again, in just 62 balls. The one innings we have missed out on from the master through this utterly dominant string of performances has been the one where he gets to unleash his full range of nonsense shots, usually reserved for this kind of declaration batting. In Birmingham, the situation was too tense and at Lord’s he had been subbed out of the game, a moment that feels now like it occurred three months ago, not three weeks. Two boundaries of Archer – one a late cut off leg stump, absurdly – moved him to 66. The tennis serve slap is the best of this genre, but unfortunately, he didn’t middle it. All the same, when falling on 82, he and Wade had added 105.

Pat Cummins removes Joe Root late in the day (Reuters) (Action Images via Reuters)

That is his lowest score this series too, one where he now has 671 runs at an average of 134.2 heading into the finale at The Oval. In 1930, Bradman batted seven times for his 974 runs. Smith should get two bites of the cherry with 304 require for him to overtake that mark, also in seven hits. That he’s even within striking distance of this speaks volumes about what we have been blessed to witness from his blade over the last five weeks.

With Pat Cummins having enough time to bowl the ball of the series to magnificently uproot skittle Joe Root first ball after winning Rory Burns’ leading edge before the close, the Australians again go to bed on a Saturday in poll position to triumph in England, just as they did at Leeds. There, a Sunday afternoon miracle denied it. At Old Trafford, it will take at least that again. Their job is nearly done.