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Aussies grasp gold as England clutch straws

The contrasting fortunes of the two Ashes combatants can be summed up in day four's most exhilarating moments

The distance that separates the respective Ashes combatants was neatly encapsulated in the time it took Josh Hazlewood to complete a stuntman roll and unleash a roar of celebration into Perth's howling westerly wind.

The neatness of Hazlewood's manoeuvre, bringing as it did the valued wicket of England's former and fading captain Alastair Cook, reflected a team at the peak of their performance for whom the exceptional is starting to feel decidedly routine.

That was the case for Steve Smith, who earlier today inked a new top line in his routinely rewritten list of personal batting bests.

It certainly applies to Mitchell Marsh who, despite perishing on the morning's second delivery without increasing his overnight total, now eyes a lengthy tenure in the Test team on the strength of his breakthrough knock of 181, more than double his previous best at the elite level.

And if Marsh is 'The Bison' in deference to his bullocking frame, then Hazlewood might become 'The Feline' such was the cat-like surety with which he pounced on Cook's errant forward push to pluck the ball in his right paw a whisker off the turf, in the midst of his follow-through.

It was not quite as showy as Nathan Lyon's athletic leap the width of the pitch to pouch a similarly fleeting chance during the second Magellan Ashes Test in Adelaide, but as a moment of pure reflex that was executed as flawlessly as it was instinctively it succinctly summed up the state of the series.

Australia can do little wrong; England cannot take a trick.

"Sometimes the harder ones are a little bit easier," Hazlewood explained at day's end with England 4-132 and still 127 runs from forcing Australia to bat again, with the Ashes tantalisingly close like the mythical gold pot at a rainbow's base.

Image Id: 521D9671D4AB4D6681A158B167FFEF86 Image Caption: A Perth rainbow sets over the new Optus Stadium // Getty

"The ones that come straight back at you are sometimes hard to judge when you're bowling, hard to judge the pace.

"The ones that are down or to one side are sometimes a bit easier and today I was lucky it stuck."

Contrast Hazlewood's acknowledged lucky strike against that which played out almost 48 hours earlier when, for the first time in the campaign, the tourists felt the game was in their hands if not yet fully under their control.

An untimely lower-order batting calamity had reduced their first innings from a potentially hefty 550 to a handy 403 instead, but the early removal of Australia's most explosive batter David Warner an hour into the hosts' reply had them back and bullish.

England collapse on second WACA morning

That was when Usman Khawaja miscued in a manner not dissimilar to Cook's marginal error today, attempting to work a ball to the leg side only to have it hold up and lob back down the pitch where England seamer Craig Overton went after the chance.

But in a thumbnail sketch of England's inability to grasp the decisive moments of the series to date, Overton's hand extended to where the ball mostly wasn't and the opportunity to claim a double breakthrough and send Australia's number three packing for a third-ball duck was lost.

What's worse, although not altogether surprising given the script thus far, Overton in the process appeared to aggravate the rib injury he sustained while batting on that dire (for England) final day in Adelaide and subsequent examination revealed he is carrying a hairline fracture.

Overton goes off field with rib injury

Which means the man who has been his team's most consistently threatening bowler since receiving his Test cap a fortnight ago might now be in doubt for the remainder of the campaign, having been restricted to a solitary over and a lengthy stint off the field today.

It's the compound effect of all those minor moments that seem to regularly fall Australia's way yet break against the visitors that give this series a sense of inevitably, even though it has two and bit Tests yet to run.

Take, for example, the number of lofted drives that Mitchell Marsh pinged back past England's tiring seamers during his inspired innings yesterday, none of which looked like producing a freak return catch in the way that Hazlewood's also probably shouldn't.

Marsh answers critics with maiden Test century

Then there's Cook who, in his previous Test at the WACA Ground four years ago, was knocked over by a delivery from Australia quick Ryan Harris that was so exceptional the ex-England skipper revealed last week it formed one of the first questions he fielded on his arrival back in Perth.

The haunted look he carried back to the England dressing room today indicated his level of mistrust in the gods of cricket, or whatever entity divines such random acts.

Three reasons Alastair Cook hates the WACA

And if England needed any final, definitive proof that this campaign was perhaps never meant to be it surely arrived when their number three James Vince was bowled by what some casual observers claimed was a contender for 'ball of the century'.

But which, on closer scrutiny, proved not all it was cracked up to be.

The fissure that had opened up on the WACA pitch at the Lillee-Marsh Stand end had caught Mitchell Starc's fancy as Australia went through their warm-up routines this morning, and Starc noted to his teammates that bowling around the wicket and aiming for the crack was likely to cause some damage.

Hitting it at precisely the right angle, speed and moment was all he needed to do.

Starc's 'ball of the summer' skittles helpless Vince

So when Starc took the ball after the tea break and landed one so perfectly on the edge of the fracture that Vince's textbook defensive shot was rendered comic book by the ensuing deviation, the feeling of fortune's betrayal within the England camp was palpable.

"I think if I faced that another 20 or 30 times it would get me out every time," Vince ruefully conceded tonight having been clean bowled in emphatic if extenuating circumstances for 55.

"I said at tea, the ones that had hit the cracks had done too much and weren't endangering the stumps, and then that one obviously was.

"It's still frustrating to get out, but they're a bit easier to take than the ones when you feel you're at fault yourself."

Another tell-tale admission – clutching at straws while everything the opposition grasps turns to gold.

2017-18 International Fixtures

Magellan Ashes Series

Australia Test squad: Steve Smith (c), David Warner (vc), Cameron Bancroft, Usman Khawaja, Peter Handscomb, Shaun Marsh, Tim Paine (wk), Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins, Nathan Lyon, Josh Hazlewood, Jackson Bird, Chadd Sayers.

England Test squad: Joe Root (c), James Anderson (vc), Moeen Ali, Jonny Bairstow, Jake Ball, Gary Ballance, Stuart Broad, Alastair Cook, Mason Crane, Tom Curran, Ben Foakes, Dawid Malan, Craig Overton, Ben Stokes, Mark Stoneman, James Vince, Chris Woakes.

First Test Australia won by 10 wickets. Scorecard

Second Test Australia won by 120 runs (Day-Night). Tickets

Third Test WACA Ground, December 14-18. Tickets

Fourth Test MCG, December 26-30. Tickets

Fifth Test SCG, January 4-8 (Pink Test). Tickets

Gillette ODI Series v England

First ODI MCG, January 14. Tickets

Second ODI Gabba, January 19. Tickets

Third ODI SCG, January 21. Tickets

Fourth ODI Adelaide Oval, January 26. Tickets

Fifth ODI Perth Stadium, January 28. Tickets

Prime Minister's XI

PM's XI v England Manuka Oval, February 2. Tickets

Gillette T20 trans-Tasman Tri-Series

First T20I Australia v NZ, SCG, February 3. Tickets

Second T20I – Australia v England, Blundstone Arena, February 7. Tickets

Third T20I – Australia v England, MCG, February 10. Tickets

Fourth T20I – NZ v England, Wellington, February 14

Fifth T20I – NZ v Australia, Eden Park, February 16

Sixth T20I – NZ v England, Seddon Park, February 18

Final – TBC, Eden Park, February 21