Not Too Little But Certainly Too Late

GH sees the Ashes stay put

It cost $30 to gain admission to the last day of this Third Test - not a token gold coin donation, but cheap in these inflationary times. It was, to be sure, a speculative investment: four deliveries and it could all be over. As it happens, a crowd of glass-half-fullers had bought themselves a piece of some absorbing cricket. A Test match that began with Usman Khawaja rising from the grave ended with England almost conjuring a Bazball Christmas miracle.

Fat Lady: (sings)

At 2.11pm, Josh Tongue edged Scott Boland to slip where Marnus Labuschagne pocketed his fourth catch of the innings and ninth of the series, prolonging Australia’s Ashes tenure beyond eight years. While the victory margin was 82 runs, it felt tighter. At times across the day, when Will Jacks’s consecutive partnerships with Jamie Smith and Brydon Carse were unfolding, a genuine hush fell, even among the Barmy Army. Chase 425? They couldn’t, could they? No, they couldn’t. But they might have.

As at Lord’s in 2023, Australia were reduced to ten men by injury to Nathan Lyon. As then, England could not quite take advantage - all the more reason for them to rue yesterday’s self-immolations by Ben Duckett and Harry Brook, and for Australia to bless Pat Cummins’s abiding edge on Joe Root. The strain to Lyon’s right hamstring occurred without warning, in the 77th over, when Jamie Smith pulled Cameron Green to long leg. Lyon, momentarily unsighted, responded late, dived full-length to his right, made a brilliant one-handed save, but rose to his feet as though shot in the leg - he is in for a sore Christmas and, one strongly suspects, an inactive Boxing Day.