Australia is out to press home their advantage in the second Ashes Test at Lord’s, with opener Usman Khawaja nearing his 16th Test century.
If the Queenslander reaches triple figures, he will become the first Australian opener to score multiple hundreds in an away Ashes series since 1997, when Matthew Elliott achieved the feat.
The visitors are currently 2-183, with Khawaja (76*) and Steve Smith (31*) unbeaten in the middle.
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The start of day four was delayed by five minutes due to weather, with overcast conditions greeting Khawaja and Smith as they walked out to bat on Saturday morning.
But the Australian vice-captain started to work his magic once the clouds parted, nailing three elegant boundaries against England veteran James Anderson in the 51st over.
The hosts resorted to a short-ball strategy, mimicking Australia’s tactics from the previous innings, and Ollie Robinson almost created the much-needed breakthrough in the 58th over. Khawaja toe-edged a bouncer into his arm, which ballooned towards England wicketkeeper Jonny Bairstow — but the lunging gloveman couldn’t hold onto the one-handed chance.
After a poor third day from the hosts, England will be looking to turn things around and give themselves a chance at victory.
And Jeetan Patel, England’s spin-bowling coach, believes the day’s first session will be crucial.
“The first session tomorrow is huge for both teams,” he said after stumps on day three. “If we can turn some of the skill that we showed tonight, tomorrow morning … we can bowl them out and give us a day and a half to chase something down.”
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“We’ve seen some amazing things from this team,” he said. “It’s going to be a different ask against a different attack but we’ve seen some crazy things from this line-up in the last year.
“This team is about breaking records, they want to set new standards. They want to sell out grounds and the way to do that is firstly to bowl them out and set the crowd alight and then chase whatever it is down.”
England will take heart from a succession of improbable run chases under skipper Stokes, including their astonishing pursuit of 378 to beat India last year — the highest successful chase in their history.
“We’ve always said that we want to play an aggressive brand,” said Patel. “It’s not always going to come off and that’s not a cop out. It’s just reality.”
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Firmly on Australia’s minds will be the absence of injured spinner Nathan Lyon, who could well be ruled out for the entire series. While Australia’s pace attack delivered an England collapse before lunch on Day 3 with a short-ball barrage, the lack of an elite spin threat in the final two days could influence a potential declaration on Day 4.
Travis Head bowled remarkably well for his two wickets in England’s first innings, while Steve Smith rolled his arm over – and delivered both off-spin and leg-spin in his only over with the ball.
But there’s no doubt that Australia’s pace attack, which was led by three wickets for Mitchell Starc in the first innings, will be left with plenty to do to hand Australia a 2-0 series lead that would put England well and truly on the ropes.
Only Donald Bradman’s Australia in 1936/37 has managed to overturn a 0-2 series deficit to claim the urn – and that campaign, Bradman made 810 runs at an average of 90.
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