England’s Ashes are all but over and heads will roll

Good evening and welcome to live coverage of day four of the third Test of the 2025-26 Ashes series from Adelaide which, in keeping with the tone of the tour so far, begins with England in even more trouble, 356 behind with six Australian second-innings in hand and a partnership between the two home-town heroes, Travis Head and Alex Carey, on 122. Add to that daunting prospect the fact that Jofra Archer, a thoroughbred who has been broken before by inconsiderate captaincy, is being nursed after his five-for and maiden half-century following years of multiple stress-fracture issues while Ben Stokes, who has been injured twice since successful knee surgery in the spring of 2024, also needs to be employed sparingly after his efforts in the first innings and his 150 minutes of defiance with the bat in 42C heat on Thursday. There are no straws left to clutch.

I believe Australia are more concerned with making sure the series ends with a nil against England’s name than whether it’s five, four or three-nil by the end so will want to grind them into the dirt today in the first of back-to-back-to-back Tests and would risk a draw to that end. But they also know the more overs they make them bowl, the more sprinting hard to the boundary to chase the ball, the bedrock principle of the McCullum era, the more hopeless they can make the situation seem, when the quadriceps start to scream and the feet feel as if they’ve been pogoing on coals, the more likely they are to blow them away in the fourth innings in any case.

On days like this we need a bit of Aftermyth of War: “The war’s not going very well, you know. We’re two-nil down and the ball’s in the enemy court. War’s a psychological thing, Perkins, just like a game of football. Ten men often play better than 11. Perkins, we’re asking you to be that one man… we need a futile gesture at this stage. It will raise the whole tone of the war. Get up in a crate, Perkins, pop over to Bremen, take a shufti, don’t come back.” Well, got to be worth a try.

Defeat today on the 10th day of play of the series would break the one ruefully held by Nasser Hussain and his 2002-03 touring side. Defeat tomorrow would equal it. Let me just repeat what I said yesterday. For all the joy they’ve given me writing about them, if they are to go down, I hope they go hard, no blood or sweat withheld.

Play starts at 11.30pm GMT.