Australia vs England third Test day three score and updates

Good evening and welcome to live coverage of day three of the third Test of the 2025-26 Ashes series from Adelaide which begins with England on 213 for eight, 158 behind Australia and 12 overs to go before the new ball (which Australia have not yet needed to take in the series so far). There’s nothing quite like the sight of Australian Tests from an English winter, the verdant green of the square, the phosphorous yellow/white of the pitch and that sky of the closing lines of Clive James’ Unreliable Memoirs, “the texture of crushed sapphires”. But for the fourth successive tour the housebound England fan turns into the Fast Show’s Johnny Nice Painter – all we can see now is “black, black, black, black”.

If this is the end of the cycle, the so-called Bazball era, let us not join the stampede to dance on its grave without a little context. Ben Stokes took over a side that had won once in 17 Tests. It was not only exhausted, it was demoralised. They had been exploited as a commodity during the Covid pandemic, cash cows sent across the world to keep the farcical structure of the English game alive with no thought for their wellbeing. They were tested beyond endurance and reason for the virus in increasingly intrusive and painful ways, shut up in hotel rooms on their own in Southampton, Manchester, across Sri Lanka, Australia and India and their form and spirit collapsed.

What Brendon McCullum, Rob Key and Stokes tried to do was introduce some empathy into the way the players were treated, to empower them to enjoy themselves while earning their living and to entertain. It brought them some thrilling victories after the dog days of the late Root captaincy and much of the Alastair Cook regime, three fine series wins over India away and two home Ashes wins notwithstanding. They have come a long way but have not developed any genuine leaders in the ranks. Sadly, it seems, when it came to the crunch, as it did from the start of their second innings in Perth, too many players are oddly diffident and indecisive. The indecision over selection has become contagious and the flaws in technique, which aggression and flat pitches masked, are exposed in the Australian sun and under the interrogation of masterly bowlers.

We are not even at the midway point of this Test. There are 22 wickets and three days left. Normally that would inspire some clutching at straws, trawling for encouraging statistical precedents, whistling in the dark. But there seems to be little point tonight. Only grit and an enormous slice of luck can miraculously save them now. We have seen it before at home and by other teams in Australia. But their performances on the tour and in this Test to date have never made the prospect of resurrecting their most stirring days seem so far away. If they are to go down, though, I hope they go hard, no blood or sweat withheld.

Play starts at 11.30pm GMT.