Australia needs to chase down 281 to win the first Ashes Test after Pat Cummins and Nathan Lyon stood up to dismiss England for 273 right on tea on day four at Edgbaston.
On another enthralling day of Ashes cricket, England went out all guns blazing from the opening after Joe Root attempted, but failed, to reverse-scoop the first ball from Cummins.
But Australia’s bowlers were able to respond to an early barrage, with Lyon bagging 4-80 and Cummins 4-63 to give the tourists what they will believe is an attainable target.
The figure needed is just one run below the target Australia fell three short of in the famous 2005 Test.
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After rain washed away more than half of Sunday, further wet weather is forecast for the morning of day five before clearer skies are tipped for Tuesday afternoon.
It means all results are still very much in play headed into the final innings of the match.
Resuming at 2-28 and with Australia slightly on the front foot, Root just about survived Cummins’ first ball which just missed the top of off stump but then scooped Scott Boland for six and four in the next over.
It was clear at that point England were eying off a day-four declaration, while giving themselves enough time to bowl Australia out in the fourth innings.
Lyon had other ideas.
With Root on 46, England’s main man charged down the wicket at the spinner, who dragged it down, cramped the right-hander for room, and allowed Alex Carey to whip off the bails.
It was the first time Root had been stumped in his Test career, as Carey took his third of the game.
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Lyon then removed Harry Brook on the same score briefly before lunch, when he had the counter-attacking Englishman caught low and athletically at mid-wicket for 46 by Marnus Labuschagne.
Playing in his 99th straight Test, Lyon claimed figures of 4-149 in the first innings and was always going to play a big role for Australia in the second.
His next wicket was crucial, ending a 46-run partnership between Jonny Bairstow and Ben Stokes that loomed as England’s last hope of posting an imposing target.
He trapped Bairstow in front reverse-sweeping on 20, before Cummins angled one in at Stokes on 43 and had his opposing captain lbw when ball-tracking showed it clipping the top of leg stump.
England’s tail still managed to wag, as Australia adopted short-pitched approach and Ollie Robinson (27), Stuart Broad (10no) and James Anderson (12) added a valuable 44 for the final two wickets before Lyon and Cummins finished the job.
Cummins had earlier produced a contender for ball of the series with an in-swinging yorker to bowl Ollie Pope, after also having Ben Duckett’s wicket on day three.
