THE equation is simple. Either Australia chase down the 546 needed for a miraculous and record breaking win – the previous highest is only 418 – or England regain the Ashes sometime today or tomorrow.
Expect the latter, a deserved victory for their cricket in this match has been far superior to Australia's despite the defiant opening stand of Shane Watson and Simon Katich last evening.
Hopefully it will not be celebrated with a gaudy open top b
us ride around the capital or an orgy of drinking and partying. Both happened after the 2005 Ashes victory but that was a series of compelling cricket between the two best sides in the world.
This series has rarely reached such quality. It has been a war of mediocrity and Australia can have no complaints about the result. The pitch for this final Test has been too dry and has broken up far too early in the piece but England have scored in excess of 300 in both innings. Their batting, or more precisely the batting of Andrew Strauss and the impressive Jonathon Trott on debut, has sucked the life from an Australian side still trying to discover an identity.
For too long they were able to rely on two giants of the modern game, Shane Warne and Glenn McGrath, but since their retirements Ricky Ponting and the selectors have struggled to adapt. What they should do is ruthlessly select an XIfor each Test dependent on form and conditions. They have not which is why Nathan Hauritz has been sidelined on a pitch tailor-made for spin. Indeed even if it was a more normal Oval wicket, a spinner would still be an obligatory selection for variety and the fact that the later days usually assist the tweakers.
To go in with four seamers and only part-time spinners was ridiculous folly.
Marcus North is a worthy option but not a front-line one. He took four wickets, could have had another three and was the most threatening bowler Australia possessed. Imagine what Hauritz would have done. Possibly the same as Graeme Swann for England.
Not that England can be entirely happy with their lot. Strauss has excelled as a captain and batsman in this match. His judgment on the field has been shrewd, witness his aggressive placing of catchers in front of the wicket to Michael Clarke on Friday, and he has been lucky. Ponting called wrong for the fourth time this series and allowed England to bat first. It is not hard to envisage if he had called correctly that Australia would be in the dominant position now and the Ashes remaining Down Under.
Trott has ably supported his captain and in partnership yesterday they weathered the all important first session. If wickets had tumbled quickly then Australia would have fancied a victory chasing around 300 or so. His technique favours the leg side which bowlers around the world will learn and adapt to but his bat comes down straight in defence, his footwork is committed going right back or well forward and he hits the ball crisply.
His method of combating the spin of North was almost a salutary lesson and if done by a player from the sub-continent would have had the commentators reaching for superlatives. It was simple. He went back, countered the steep bounce, waited for the spin and seized with alacrity anything slightly too short with a short arm punch through midwicket.
It was well conceived and superbly executed. He became the 18th England player to score a century on debut and this, added to his composed 41 in the first innings, amounts to a mighty fine week's work.
Interestingly, he batted more than five hours and rarely hit the ball in the air which is exactly what a Test batsman should do. Too often this series wickets have fallen in frenetic style, possibly a hangover form too much Twenty20 and one day cricket.
Importantly, his temperament on a difficult pitch was exemplary. In one match he has leapfrogged Ian Bell, Ravi Bopara and the old stager, Paul Collingwood, and it is these three and Alastair Cook that Strauss must make difficult decisions about. Collingwood is safe as he is part of the management clique within the dressing room but the success of Trott on debut must make Strauss wonder if the likes of Michael Carberry of Hampshire is worth a game this winter. Cook has struggled bar one innings at Lord's and nothing breeds complacency more than a lack of competition for places. That is a discussion for another day though.
What remains is the matter of bowling out Australia for a second time. Swann will be pivotal as the ball is spinning sharply. He bowled well in the first innings, although Asad Rauf helped him with two poor decisions, but his entertaining cameo with the bat as he drove and pulled a half-century at a run a ball will only have made this cheeky chappy more cocky.
Broad will also be important. It was his work in the first innings that has really set up this victory. He bowled straight and pitched the ball up, trusting his natural swing and the vagaries of the pitch to pose problems for the batsmen. The occasional cutter, a sensible variation, only added to his threat.
His belief in slower bouncers, inswingers and other "liquorice allsorts" should now be firmly banished to his past. He is an accurate medium fast bowler who generates steep bounce. It is enough for batsmen if he is accurate. McGrath would be an ideal role model for Broad and his philosophy was remarkably simple – hit the top of off-stump every ball. Batsman, pitch and luck will do the rest.
Sport can have its own irony and in a match where the folk hero Freddie Flintoff was meant to make his final bow amid a flurry of runs and wickets, he has done nothing but watch the next generation perform.
Not that he will care. He has always been a team man and it is the victory that counts. He had his moment at Lord's This one has been Broad's, and Trott's, and Swann's and above all else Strauss'. It was a pity he was dismissed just before lunch. He had steadfastly blunted Australia's hopes by defending, accumulating and then attacking superbly by coming down the wicket to Stuart Clark and hitting him for consecutive boundaries through the covers. When he was out he looked tired, the brain not working but captaincy is a very draining job. Not that he will feel it if his bowlers provide him with the win and the Ashes.
Then he will be part of history.
