Crawley’s run-a-ball 189 propels England into lead

England 384 for 4 (Crawley 189, Root 84, Moeen 54) lead Australia 317 (Labuschagne 51, Marsh 51, Woakes 5-62) by 67 runs

With rain anticipated to wipe out the fourth and fifth days, Ben Stokes hinted the day earlier than this Test that England would modify their technique accordingly by doubling-down on their ultra-attacking fashion with the bat. True to their captain’s phrase, they overhauled Australia’s first-innings 317 inside 55 overs.

And it was Crawley who led the way in which. He flicked the primary ball of England’s innings previous Alex Carey for 4 and, after a shaky begin earlier than lunch, he batted with utter disdain in opposition to the perfect seam assault on the earth all through the afternoon. His first Ashes hundred took solely 93 balls, the fourth-fastest by an Englishman, and left Pat Cummins and his bowlers floundering.

He fell 11 runs in need of a second Test double-hundred, bottom-edging a swing throughout the road onto his personal stumps, however by that stage he had grow to be the main run-scorer within the sequence. It served as vindication of England’s religion in a gap batter who had arrived on the floor on Thursday morning with a median beneath 30, but has come to characterize their progress underneath Stokes and Brendon McCullum.

Australia had been a bowler down by the shut after Mitchell Starc broken his left shoulder whereas diving within the area. Despite the wicket of Root for 84, bowled by a ball which shot by way of low from Josh Hazlewood, they lacked any semblance of management; their determination to not area a frontline spinner for the primary time in a decade was uncovered as a blunder.

There had been few indicators early in Crawley’s innings of what was to come back. He played-and-missed a number of instances in opposition to Starc and Hazlewood of their preliminary new-ball bursts, edging Hazlewood simply in need of Steven Smith at slip on 12. When Cummins got here into assault within the twelfth over, Crawley edged his first ball previous his personal stumps.

He misplaced his opening associate Ben Duckett to the thirteenth ball of the England innings, edging Starc’s outswinger behind, and Moeen’s driving exterior his off stump was quick and unfastened as he walked out in his short-term function as a makeshift No. 3. Crawley himself was given out lbw on 20, trapped on the entrance pad by Cameron Green, however reviewed efficiently.

But within the over earlier than lunch, he creamed a trademark cowl drive for 4 off Cummins and by no means regarded again. Carey could not get his hand to a half-chance by way of the within edge as he cruised in direction of a 67-ball half-century, raised with a reverse-swept 4 off Travis Head’s first ball and celebrated with a swept six off his second.

Moeen reached his first Test fifty since January 2019 when he flogged Head over mid-on, then miscued him in the identical course. Cummins put him down at brief midwicket on 53, however he did not survive his subsequent ball: Starc went brief, Moeen took on the pull, and nailed it straight to the identical place, when Usman Khawaja held a diving catch.

Australia hoped that, after a second-wicket stand of 121 in 152 balls, this was the place the carnage ended. When Root pulled his first ball behind sq. for 4, then glided his fifth away previous gully with an open face, it turned clear that it had solely simply began.

Cummins tried to sluggish the sport down, tinkering with the sphere a number of instances in the identical over, however Crawley cared little for adjustments of plan. He swung back-to-back boundaries off first Hazlewood, then Starc, earlier than threading Cummins by way of cowl to succeed in three figures. He grinned with arms aloft, as Old Trafford rose to its ft.

By the time Mitchell Marsh – who dismissed him in each innings at Headingley – was introduced into the assault, Crawley had 112. England had been treating a must-win Ashes Test like an exhibition match: Root reverse-scooped Marsh for six; Crawley slog-swept Head for six extra, mentioning a century stand.

Another Root reverse-scoop, this time for 4 off Cummins, introduced him a 45-ball half-century and Crawley went back-to-back as soon as extra to lift 150. He swung Marsh over his head for six to place England into the lead, and his dismissal – chopping Green’s round-the-wicket brief ball onto his stumps – got here from nowhere.

The scoring fee fell after Root’s dismissal, bowled by a grubber that scudded underneath the toe of his bat, as Stokes and Harry Brook noticed out the ultimate phases of the day. Starc’s harm, diving at mid-on, appeared to compound Australia’s issues, even when their administration are optimistic about his prospects of bowling on Friday after icing his shoulder in a single day.

The portents had been ominous for Australia from earlier than the scheduled begin of play: by the point the clock within the previous pavilion on the James Anderson End had ticked previous 11am, Cummins had chipped a tame half-volley from its eponymous bowler straight to Stokes at cover-point, falling to the very first ball of the day.