Aussie batters let big total slip away after being sent in

Australia's decision to bolster their batting by including two allrounders has not delivered the dividend hoped after England's seamers claimed regular wickets and their Ashes rivals squandered a series of starts in the fourth Test at Old Trafford.

Sent into bat on a pacy but mostly true pitch, Australia ended a sun-soaked day 8-299 but knowing that position might have been decidedly stronger in a game they need only draw to retain the urn they've held since 2017-18.

If Australia is to take solace from another frustrating day of missed batting opportunities, they might find it in history.

Not only are England seeking to become the first team to win a Test at Old Trafford after sending in their opponent, of the 31 prior matches Australia have played at the venue they have never lost after posting a first innings score of 300.

However, they will look at the reality five batters in their heavily buttressed top-seven reached 30, but only two of those – Marnus Labuschagne and Mitchell Marsh – made it to 50 and they both perished immediately upon doing so.

While England repeatedly wrested back the initiative through crucial strikes from pace demon Mark Wood and Stuart Broad who reached another major milestone in a remarkable Test career, it was a final-session cameo from seamer Chris Woakes that may yet prove decisive in this finely balanced series.

The allrounder nicknamed 'The Wizard' – recalled to England's starting XI at Headingley after more than a year on the outer – snared two wickets in the first over of his post-tea spell and then the key wicket of Alex Carey late in the day when given the second new ball.

Woakes had been initially instructed by his skipper Ben Stokes to limber up after Australia's dual allrounder ploy looked to be paying dividends in the way Marsh and Green were taking to England off-spinner Moeen Ali.

The Western Australia duo, most notably Marsh who played a similarly belligerent rearguard knock in the third Test loss at Headingley, had flexed their collective muscle to notch a crucial half-century stand for the sixth wicket at almost a run a ball.

But having loosened up, Woakes landed his first delivery on the perfect length and got it to seam back past Green's urgent forward press and into his front pad.

The Australian immediately sensed he was in strife and turned his back on umpire Joel Wilson who eventually honoured England's beseeching appeal, and even though Green's belated review showed the ball to be barely clipping his leg bail the damage was done.

A deeper blow was inflicted four balls later, with the crescendo that accompanied the removal of in-form and ever-threatening Marsh compounded by the unlikely manner in which it arrived.

Having been pilloried for much of the series, more so for his clumsy keeping than his dozy stroll beyond the crease at Lord's, wicketkeeper Jonny Bairstow plucked perhaps the catch of the summer when he threw out his right gauntlet and saw the ball somehow lodge in its midst.

In fairness to the England 'keeper, the ball that saw Marsh squared up and take the edge of a bat that had seemed as imposing as the allrounder himself also meant Bairstow was left largely unsighted and forced to react instinctively.

Perhaps he has unlocked the solution to his earlier glovework woes in the process.

Either way, Woakes's double strike reduced Australia to 7-255 and staring at a sub-par total in the best batting conditions they've enjoyed for the series at a ground where the average first innings score since the wicket block was rotated 90 degrees to a north-south configuration in 2011 has been 382.

Despite the uncharacteristic profligacy of top-order stalwarts David Warner (32), Marnus Labuschagne (51) and Steve Smith (41) who failed to convert starts to scores of substance, that median score appeared feasible when Australia began today's final session 4-187.

With an extended batting line-up and their most destructive player Travis Head unbeaten on 47 from a breezy 62 balls faced, the expectation was for the visitors to make hay while the rarely seen Manchester sun shone across the final two hours.

Instead, Head fell in the first over after resumption when he top-edged a pull that gave Stuart Broad his 600th Test wicket and enlivened both England and their fans as the game tilted their way.

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That meant Australia's top five were back in the sheds with less than 200 on the board, and among the vanquished was Smith who was the difference between the teams when Australia retained the urn at Old Trafford in 2019.

Smith was fortunate his return to a venue where he plundered 211 and 82 on his previous visit four years ago didn't yield a first-ball duck.

He went to the wicket clearly intent on taking the game to England, and responded to a short-pitched offering from Chris Woakes by launching an up-and-under pull shot, the same stroke that proved his undoing in the second innings at Lord's.

But Mark Wood had positioned himself several metres inside the rope at deep fine leg, and despite his athletic run and dive with left hand thrust out hopefully, the ball landed beyond his outstretched fingertips before bouncing inside the boundary to bring four.

Smith's attack then turned to the game's sole specialist spinner, Moeen, who was brought into the attack 10 minutes prior to lunch and immediately put to the sword.

Seemingly mindful of the influence Moeen exerted at Headingley where he sent down 17 consecutive overs at a cost of just 34 runs late on day two, Smith skipped down the track to launch his fifth delivery over long-on for six.

Next ball brought a fluent drive through mid-off, and Moeen's two overs prior to the adjournment cost half as many runs as his entire spell at Leeds a fortnight earlier.

Having opted to field first, England would have hoped for a brace of wickets in the opening session but with Australia 2-107 and scoring above four an over with their two most-prolific batters in situ, the home team needed to regroup after lunch with the Ashes on the line.

That shift in approach was obvious immediately as Wood regularly pushed 150kph but varied the searing bouncers he sent down almost exclusively pre-lunch with the occasional dart at the stumps, a ploy that brought the prized wicket of Smith.

Australia's batting behemoth had habitually walked across his stumps against the lesser-paced England seamers and relied on the true bounce to knock the ball into gaps while waiting for additional width to free his arms.

But Wood's extra speed proved the difference, and although the delivery that thundered into the former Australia skipper's pad was deemed to be bouncing over the stumps on-field, upon review it was shown to be hitting the top of middle to Smith's undisguised disillusionment.

Wood then switched back to intimidatory mode, firing a series of frightening bouncers at new batter Head who fended the first awkwardly away from his face and on to the pitch, then took the next on the left side of his protective helmet having got himself into an awkward position.

But as he's argued all series, suggestions he is vulnerable to the short-ball ignore his capacity to withstand and then score from those sorts of barrages and it proved the case again today … until it didn't.

Head took on the role of scoring with Labuschagne bunkering down as he closed in on his first half-century of the series, with the left-hander scoring 38 of the pair's 63-run stand for the fourth wicket.

With the bright sunshine negating swing and only occasional nibble off the tufty dead grass aiding the seamers, Stokes turned to his spinner as Australia looked to tighten the screws.

And it was Moeen's removal of Labuschagne shortly before tea that shifted the day's momentum.

Australia's number three has struggled throughout the campaign but looked at his most assured today, solid in defence and leaving the ball studiously as England nagged away at the weakness they had exposed outside off stump in earlier matches.

Labuschagne could therefore scarcely believe the manner of his dismissal, pushing forward to Moeen and trying to turn him through square leg with a closed bat face only to be hit on the pad and England's insistence on a review rewarded.

Once again, England had conjured a wicket when the game seemed to be rolling their rivals' way and even with the additional batting power Australia had opted to invoke the home team had the capacity crowd of around 22,000 behind them as they broke for tea.

When Broad bounced out Head in the first over after the break, the mood became unapologetically joyous as Woakes worked his magic aided by some Bairstow sleight of hand.

Despite the selection punt of loading up their batting by going without a specialist spinner for the first time in a Test since late 2011, the batting frailties exposed by England's grey-tinged bowling attack were uncomfortably familiar.

But after Cummins called incorrectly for the fourth consecutive coin toss (each time he's nominated 'tails'), the sight of sunshine bathing Old Trafford wasn't the only suggestion events might play out not quite as foreseen.

The resumption of Broad's ongoing battle with Warner saw an emphatic win for the latter who pinned back his ears when he saw his adversary's opening delivery banged in short and swinging further way, and lashed it to the extra cover boundary.

Perhaps unsettled by a burst of clement weather in Manchester, Broad did not pose his usual potent threat in the opening overs as he struggled to find an optimal length on a dry and pacy pitch that belied the unrelenting wet of preceding days.

Or maybe the 37-year-old was still struggling to thaw after England's aged pace attack (average age 36) reportedly visited a cryotherapy facility at Hale near Old Trafford – where extreme cold is used to treat muscle damage and inflammation – in days prior to the Test.

But with the last ball of his third over, England's second-most prolific Test bowler hit paydirt with a delivery pitched slightly fuller and angled into the left-hander from around the wicket, beating the inside edge of Usman Khawaja's bat.

Given the amount of bounce being extracted by England's veteran new-ball pair, Khawaja reasoned he might be saved on review but the technology proved umpire Joel Wilson's on-field decision to be correct.

Broad had been in no such doubt, charging down the pitch in celebration with barely a glance back at the official, a sight that has been hardly unfamiliar across his 599 Test wickets to that point.

Warner and Labuschagne then seemed largely untroubled despite the introduction of England's Headingley heroes Mark Wood and Woakes, adding 46 at a rate of almost five an over before a quaintly English turn of events brought the breakthrough.

It was foreshadowed that Manchester's interminable inclementia would bring regular breaks in proceedings, but nobody had predicted a scenario whereby sun stopped play.

Shortly Australia reached 50, Labuschagne was distracted by by solar glare reflecting from metal railing at the base of Old Trafford's James Anderson end sightscreen.

As umpires ferried messages to ground staff and Broad took on the role of seating steward as he relocated spectators to act as a human shield to block the refracted brightness, drinks were taken and more than five minutes of playing time was lost in perfect conditions.

Both Australia batters at the crease might well argue the frustrating interruption did likewise to their concentration.

Labuschagne fended at a fizzing delivery from Wood second ball after the game got going again, and it fortuitously flew in the gap between third slip and gully for a boundary.

But from the first he faced upon resumption, Warner appeared leaden-footed as he drove at a full-length delivery from Woakes that presented Bairstow with a regulation catch to his left.

The opener's removal for 32 after he appeared in as good touch as he's looked all series set the script for the day, as England found a way to claw their way back into the Test and therefore the series every time Australia tried to assert.

2023 Qantas Ashes Tour of the UK

First Test: Australia won by two wickets

Second Test: Australia won by 43 runs

Third Test: England won by three wickets

Fourth Test: Wednesday July 19-Sunday July 23, Old Trafford

Fifth Test: Thursday July 27-Monday 31, The Oval

Australia squad: Pat Cummins (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey (wk), Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Josh Inglis (wk), Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitch Marsh, Todd Murphy, Michael Neser, Steve Smith (vc), Mitchell Starc, David Warner

England squad: Ben Stokes (c), James Anderson, Jonny Bairstow, Stuart Broad, Harry Brook, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett, Matthew Potts, Ollie Robinson, Joe Root, Josh Tongue, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood