Unfortunately for the bucket hats it was bucketing down all day. In fact that’s not quite true, this was light Manchester mizzle at first, followed later by heavier, unforgiving Manchester drizzle; the fringes of a biblical front to the north that means Australia’s men, sitting 2-1 up with one Test to play, have retained the Ashes.
This series is not over because England can square it at the Oval, the same party they pooped in SE11 four years ago to ensure 2001 was Australia’s last outright Test series win on these shores.
But while the chance for similar schadenfreude remains, the widely held sentiment at Old Trafford when the officials eventually called things off at 5.24pm was pretty much Captain Darling’s final diary entry: “Bugger”.
The match had not progressed one jot at this point, Australia still on their overnight 214 for five in the third innings and still 61 runs adrift. There was a brief flurry of activity out around noon-ish, England’s players warming up as the covers were being peeled away and Australia’s amusingly staying put. But the rain and the covers soon returned, draining away any hopes of a winner as the water table rose.
Everyone felt robbed. OK, perhaps not everyone. There were still pockets of Australian supporters in the ground who whooped at confirmation of the news, much like their counterparts when England similarly dodged one here in 2013 and retained the urn thanks to rain. But those who have simply been basking in the radiance of the first four Tests would surely have preferred a winner-takes-all fifth, regardless of allegiance.
Certainly both captains were a little flat at the end. Pat Cummins described it as “weird” after his team took a bit of a pasting this week; a very different feeling to four years ago on this ground, he said, and one that would not be celebrated in quite the same way.
Ben Stokes had spent the day moving around the dressing room in the hope a certain spot might somehow make the rain relent, describing it as “a tough pill to swallow” when dreams of setting up a blockbuster finale were finally extinguished.
Australia still get their shot at history next week but it feels like both sets of players have missed out on something bigger. Look down both team sheets this week and they are packed with names who will not be around in four years’ time; names who have given us so much to savour, not just over the past five weeks but pretty much the last decade of this rivalry. In the case of the remarkable Jimmy Anderson, make that the last two.
Should Stokes have declared at lunch on the third day, 189 runs ahead? Should his players have picked their heels up in the field generally, eking out every possible over? You can argue the first question and surely only nod at the second. But on a pitch where Australia’s first innings score of 317 was under par, and an avalanche of almost 600 runs followed in response through Zak Crawley’s ebullient 189, the loss of five sessions at the back end would likely have proved ruinous whichever way you slice it.
We should probably give Marnus Labuschagne his dues too. Australia looked utterly broken after first Crawley and then Jonny Bairstow, with 99 not out, stuck Cummins and his fellow bowlers in the Bazball blender. Though unsure how to feel about it at the time, Labuschagne can now draw huge satisfaction from that century brought up during Saturday’s 30-over outbreak of cricket.
This session, it turned out, was the latest in a series of clutch moments, of which Australia won more to go 2-0 up initially.
There will be some who see all this as the failure of Bazball; that England’s evangelical approach has finally had its comeuppance. But this was their 17th Test under Stokes and Brendon McCullum and when you compare this run to the previous 17 – that zombified team of one Test win that left Australia in early 2022 amid predictions they would be crushed in the return series – well, there really is no comparison.
This was the first draw under Stokes, to go with 12 wins and four defeats. Two of those defeats were by one run and two wickets; the barest of margins, if you will. Sure, England could have picked Ben Foakes – even if the viability of this shrunk when it became clear Stokes could not play a full role with the ball – and they could have been more ruthless at Edgbaston. They also started the series wastefully overall, with some of the basics like catching and no-balls not rectified quickly enough.
Stokes does not do regrets, however, and said afterwards that his team’s wider appeal remains the most important thing. On one level you know what he means. The culture clash thrown up by this approach meeting an Australian side prepared to bury egos and park the bus at times has made for some seriously gripping cricket.
But even if this is mission accomplished as far as Stokes is concerned - and he seemed pretty convinced when saying it - England’s supporters will still be desperate for the hosts to level the series this week and prevent Australia from achieving theirs.
