Another hour of madness puts England out of sight as Australia on automatic mode

Manchester: For a little over two hours, Australia were a much improved force relative to their travails on the second day.

England still scored plenty of runs, but wickets were taken regularly, patience was tested, and the second new ball used with intelligence by Josh Hazlewood in particular.

At 9-526, England were a long way in front but not quite out of sight. There was a chance to be somewhere near parity by the close of play with an uncertain weather forecast ahead.

So it was dispiriting for many to see how Pat Cummins’ team approached James Anderson’s arrival to accompany Jonny Bairstow.

Initially, Anderson had appeared nonplussed to be batting at all. But when he was finally dismissed lbw to Cameron Green, England’s lead had ballooned by another 66 runs, Bairstow had clouted 99 and his batting partner received 17 balls before being out to the first one that would have actually hit the stumps.

Trailing by 275 rather than something closer to an even 200, Australia’s batters limped to the close at 4-113, leaving most observers with an air of inevitability about what will follow over the next two days. England will need little more than the equivalent of two sessions out of six to be played in order to wrap things up and get to 2-2.

Unquestionably, it would be an injustice of major dimensions should rain allow Australia to escape from Manchester with the Ashes in their keeping. It would be an undeserved reward for one of the poorest displays of Cummins’ two-year captaincy reign.

The Anderson/Bairstow sequence went a long way towards illustrating the sense that Australia have become progressively addled by England’s boldness and their own inability to remain consistent in response.

A bowling attack including Cummins and Hazlewood in particular should take pride in being able to persist with plans, and also to choose the right ones for the scenario that confronts them. But, having just seen Mark Wood lose his off stump and Stuart Broad sky another delivery directed at his pegs, the Australians seemed more concerned with bumping Anderson than dismissing him.

So transparent was this basic plan that more than once Anderson and Bairstow were able to scramble a bye as the ball floated through to Alex Carey; moments of some irony given how Australia’s gloveman had dismissed Bairstow at Lord’s.

As for the bowling to Bairstow, it was everything England wanted to see Hazlewood and Cummins trying to test him on the pull shot on a true pitch against a ball that was still hard. Stokes’ reaction of “that’s massive” when Bairstow swung another back of a length ball from Cummins into the stands said it all.

Overall, there seemed a sense of going into automatic mode about the Australians, rather than thinking on their feet. It is one of the main reasons that Ben Stokes and his side have been able to run tactical rings around the tourists, particularly since Nathan Lyon was ruled out of the series with a torn calf.

Contrast this with how things unfolded when England took the ball. While he is aided to a degree by Australia’s more orthodox batting methods, Stokes is always finding ways with his plans and fields to ask questions of his opponents.

Increasingly over this series, he has been helped also by the fact that England’s bowlers have hit more consistent areas than those of Australia.

One of the best indicators of that pattern has been the growing number of Australians who have been dismissed either trying to leave the ball or deciding too late to do so. The latest in the group was David Warner, again making a start and then failing to do anything substantial.

Given his tremendous career record of playing the sorts of damaging innings put together by Zak Crawley on day two, it was surely a sign that change is required to see Warner unsure whether to play or leave. On other days in other years, Chris Woakes’ skilful, serviceable seam and swing would have been monstered by Warner.

Here, though, Warner batted in the funk of someone trying to survive when that is not really his game. Like Crawley, he is twice the player when he puts pressure on bowlers, rather than letting Woakes corral him into the error of a much more conservative player.

Indecision was also evident in the critical losses of Steve Smith and Travis Head as the clock ticked past 6pm.

Mark Wood’s pace has been allied to terrific accuracy, and now a cross-seam bouncer coaxed Smith into a half-hearted paddle pull that was feathered behind. Head, having played Wood well at other times, now made no decision about playing or leaving and could only flinch as it reared at his gloves.

How great the contrast between that dismissal and those pull shots played with absolute conviction by Bairstow, and how sizable the gap in tactical quality that made them possible.

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