To say this magnificent Test match has see-sawed would be to do it an injustice: never has the weight of balance swung sufficiently to ground it in either team’s favour.
With one day of the five to play, that remains the case, despite a morning session that began with the reverse-scooping Joe Root threatening to take England clear, then an evening on which Australia’s openers appeared to be making serene progress towards their target of 281.
Three wickets in the final hour of play, though, have England as slight favourites, the breakthrough made by Ollie Robinson but the two big scalps - of Marnus Labuschagne and Steve Smith, the top two ranked batters in the world - claimed, inevitably, by the irrepressible Stuart Broad.
So, strap in folks - we’re going the distance.
Heading into the final round, in Australia’s favour is a wicket still bearing few demons, particularly with Moeen Ali’s blistered spinning finger struggling to coax them to the surface, and Usman Khawaja, still at the crease fresh off a hundred in the first innings. They remain, though, 174 runs shy of what would be their second-highest Ashes chase away from home with only seven wickets in hand.
On England’s side is the potential for a forecast morning storm to make an afternoon resumption perilous, as well as the theory that the bridge between the touring middle-order and victory could be a short one to cross. And, of course, that in Broad they have a player who has built more of his brand on occasions than Clinton’s, the evening burst that took the edges of Australia’s master and apprentice part of his best Ashes spell since at least Saturday morning.
Earlier, England had set out with the intent to build a swift and sizeable lead, Root’s ramp-and-miss to Pat Cummins first-ball somehow still the shot of the day despite failing to connect.
With openers Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett consigned to watching briefs after succumbing in a miserably tough passage under lights on Sunday, then Ollie Pope nailed by an unplayable Pat Cummins yorker, England’s middle-order each made contributions without any kicking on to the big score that might have taken the game away. As well as Root, Harry Brook and Ben Stokes made scores in the forties, the latter playing with control unrecognisable from his first innings, but the 273 runs added to a midway lead of just seven felt a club short.
Analysis of England’s dismissals again depended broadly on the degree of occupational hazard one is willing to accept. In isolation, on a still passive surface, several looked daft, but the Bazball mantra insists there are no bad shots.
Root’s was not the worst of them but perhaps grated most, the third England player in the match to needlessly walk past one from Nathan Lyon, who now has eight wickets in the match. The former skipper had been playing the seamers best and might have left the take-down of the spinner to Brook, who was enjoying that part of the job, but instead advanced and was out stumped for the first time in his 240-innings Test career.
While wickets fell, though, the lead continued to grow, Brook’s crisp on-drive taking it beyond 100 inside ten overs of the day, then Jonny Bairstow past 200 with successive fours off Cummins as he and Stokes looked to press on after lunch. Appeals and boundaries were, it felt, in almost equal supply, the Hollies Stand at that stage in some of its most raucous voice of the match, its occupants, unlike their weekend predecessors, having made the commitment of booking a day off work and determined to make the most of it. Travis Head may have acquired favourite status across the course of the last four days, but any notions of water passing under the bridge were disavowed when Smith and David Warner were posted to the same boundary for the first time in the series. Labuschagne was not popular either, having claimed what would have been a brilliant catch had it not been half-taken by the ground.
Cummins and Lyon, bowling almost two-thirds of Australia’s overs between them, kept England in check, but the home tail wagged, Ollie Robinson frustrating with a determined 27 after he had told Australia their lower-order was not much cop and made himself a short-ball target with a sweary send-off of Usman Khawaja. Even James Anderson played his part, reverse sweeping his first ball for four on his way to double figures in an Ashes match for the first time in a decade.
Not since it since its 2005 epic has Edgbaston been set up for a finish like this.
