There is, it seems, one more sting in the tail of this series. Australia have already been beaten in the Ashes but they are not playing dead just yet. Savagely wounded at Edgbaston and Trent Bridge, they have come back with a vengeance in the final Test, making 481 having been put in and so establishing the sort of competitive first-innings total, on the back of Steve Smith’s 143 – his 11th Test match century – that ought to act as a bulwark against defeat, and then reducing the England innings to rubble in the Kennington evening sunshine.
In reply England will begin the third day on 107 for eight, a deficit of 374, but still 175 short of avoiding the follow-on which, given the overnight rest for the bowlers, the help they are getting from the pitch and the lack of spine in the England batting, Michael Clarke would surely enforce. It was an embarrassment for an England team that had designs on taking a home Ashes series by a unique four matches to one, and thus overtake the Australians to become the second ranked side in the world. They looked to be many moons from that.
This was urgent cricket from Clarke’s side, with an obvious buzz in the field that had been lacking before. The return to the attack of the redoubtable, indefatigable Peter Siddle lent the pace attack some control and, from it, a cutting edge. There were turn and bounce for Nathan Lyon and an energetic and successful fourth seamer in Mitchell Marsh, whose omission from the previous Test was baffling.
The England batting was simply dismantled by a heady combination of excellent bowling and slipshod shot selection. All Clarke’s bowling changes (and there were plenty of them) appeared to bring immediate dividends, so there was almost a ceremonial processional element to the final session during which seven wickets fell. The demise of the England innings began with the tea interval imminent.
Alastair Cook, unusually, had got the innings away to a racing start and was looking to see out the final over of the middle session, when he pushed forward to Lyon, operating at the Vauxhall End. Lyon is a clever bowler, one who does not spin the ball any more than does Moeen Ali, but who is able to impart that element of overspin, rather than sidespin, that produces the deceptive dip in flight that can draw a batsman forward seductively but can then bounce and turn. That is all something on which Moeen will have to work, particularly in the forthcoming series against Pakistan in the UAE.
This time, from around the wicket, he angled the ball in towards middle and leg, opened Cook’s defence up and then turned it past his blade to hit the off stump, a classic piece of the off-spinners’ art.
Cook made 22 from 21 balls, skittish by his standards and hardly the sort of score that by the close might be seen as the pinnacle of England’s batting success: a captain’s innings then leading from the front.
The last session developed a farcical flavour, with entrances and exits of which Georges Feydeau and Brian Rix would have been proud, missing only Ben Stokes’ trousers falling down to reveal spotted underpants as he left the field.
The introduction of Siddle, a player who has been champing at his vegan bit all series, brought immediate success as Adam Lyth attempted to pull what was really a stiff loosener and skied a gentle catch to midwicket. He has been given the full series to establish some credentials and has not managed it. It will not have gone unnoticed that, as he was struggling away, Alex Hales was on his way to making 189 for Nottinghamshire and Lyth might well need runs in the second innings, and big ones at that, if he is to make the cut for the winter. Batting became a struggle as the Australians began to turn the screw.
Joe Root uppercut his first ball over the slips for four and then became stuck in the mire, while Siddle, after conceding a boundary through the covers, produced a perfect bail-trimmer to dispose of Ian Bell, the sort of dream delivery that, had it hit Bell full on the pad, might have been turned down on height by the umpire and received an umpire’s call on a review.
In the following over, Marsh’s first, Root was initially smacked on his bottom hand, which jerked off the handle in that motion cricketers say resembles someone starting a petrol mower, then feathered a catch through to the keeper that the umpire failed to spot but which was apparent by the smallest spike on the Snickometer, not dissimilar to the dismissal of Clarke on the first day. From 30 for no wicket, England were 64 for four. In the context of the series this may be a dead match but it was humiliating and it matters.
Next to go was Jonny Bairstow, who clipped one nice boundary through mid-wicket but then tried to short-arm a ball from Mitchell Johnson (at the start of another spell) and succeeded only in lobbing it to deep midwicket placed there for just such an eventuality.
That was juvenile, a view enhanced when Jos Buttler, woefully short of runs and all at sea against Lyon this summer, pushed forward to an offbreak and was bowled through the gate, and Stokes, swinging away like a pub sign in a gale, top-edged a Marsh bouncer to the keeper.
By the time Stuart Broad edged Marsh to second slip eight wickets had fallen for 62 runs, a situation that would have been worse had Marsh not overstepped in having Mark Wood caught in the slips. As it was Moeen and Wood were able to see things through to the close.
