Men’s Ashes Fifth Test Report Card, Day Four

Featuring rewriting narratives

Rewriting Narratives
Grade: C

The penultimate day of this Ashes series began in normal fashion. A guard of honour for the retiring Stuart Broad (who, by the way, revealed that he was retiring because he’s at his happiest in the dressing room right now with a team full of mates and he wants to leave on that high. Big mistake from Stokes to create such an environment, in my opinion), followed by the great man turning down singles, hitting a six from the final delivery he faced in Test cricket (a bouncer, obviously) and then wandering off after James Anderson was trapped LBW at the other end.

It meant Australia needed 384 runs to win. Impossible, obviously, and yet, a few hours later, as the rain came tumbling down, with David Warner and Usman Khawaja both having reached half-centuries and Australia 0/135, the feeling was that England were the team happier to get off the ground.