I wish Mitchell Johnson would bowl at both ends.

I can't believe some twat on here tipped him to be top wicket taker for the series!

When Lee is fit he'll be dropped. Bowling shite that would get whacked in club cricket!

England are still 4/7 to win the game. If it was the Aussies 240 odd in front with 10 wickets left they'd be about 1/10. It just shows what a hold the Aussies have on us that even when we're in such an unbelievable position that there is still such doubt that we'll go on and win.

Siddle and Hilfenhaus are going to have to put in the bowling performances of their lives for them to have a chance, if it was McGrath and Lee they'd have a chance but these two aren't in the same league. Welcome to the real world, Ricky.

The game has been stopped on both days so far because of bad light,

Nice to see England still on top in this match. Good start to their 2nd innings. It was right to bat again looking at the pitch. I just hope Strauss doesn't set the declaration too late to bowl the Aussies out again.

and how many overs have been lost because of bad light? Not very many.

They'll have to survive around 150 overs to get a draw/win, losing a few overs to light will still mean they'll be trying to survive well over 120 odd overs so as PJ says; light won't be a consideration. Rain might be but not light.

Has Ricky Ponting got money on England winning this test or something?!

Either the commentators are fookin blind or they are too gutless to voice an opinion but re that alleged 'catch' while we were about 130-2 , it was fookin obvious from the replay that it did not carry!!!

and Bopara is still shiit

Think it's getting close to recalling Bell.

Bopara looks like he has got Ian Bell syndrome. He can do it against other teams but not against the Aussies.

Only Broad and Panesar are averaging less so far and Panesar barely knows how to hold his bat. Not good.

and that will help us how?

By scoring more runs?

Ian Bell has averaged 17 and 33 in the last two Ashes series.

I don't think I'd drop Bopara. Just change the order, bat KP 3, Prior 4, Colly 5 and Bopara 6.

Prior is too good a batsman to be down at 6.

Good innings from Prior today. Shame about the run out. Only a direct hit would have got him.

Think we will declare overnight? 521 ahead.

I think we will. They will never get that many.

It's a big total and no team has ever got close to it batting 4th but with 98 overs tomorrow(8 to make up for lost time) and at least 90 on Monday. They only have to score at approx 2.8 an over and with men round bat, probably no third man or fine leg, that leaves lot space for edged fours and playing behind off legs. Agreed it should be enough but think we will bat for at least an hour try run up another 70 or 80, leaving them with somewhere in region of 170 overs to score 600,that's a rate of 3.5

Maybe it is worth batting for another 30-60 minutes, surely the Aussies will be expecting a declaration so batting for a little while might upset the concentration of some of their batsmen

See what the weather / forecast is. If fine bat for a while - I'd go for 30 minutes, if the forecast means there may be stoppages declare overnight.

Well the gutless commentators are at it again. That second wicket of the morning clearly should not have been given as the ball clearly hit the ground before it was caught but will they admit it even after watching the replay 20 times?? No, will they bollocks. Beefy should be commentating, at least he says how it is.

Great morning so far like!

That was a clean catch his fingers were under the ball, It's a problem with those on a 2D TV screen they always look like they bounced as the ball goes into the hand. If it had been sent upstairs to the TV umpire he'd have been given not out as Bopara was yesterday but Strauss knew he caught it.

No way did he catch it before it hit the ground! You can see on the replay that he lifted it off the floor, his fingers were not underneath it, they were round the side of the ball.

Look Grave I'm going to tell you something here I'm extremely biased to an extent that it distorts my views and that was a clean catch, the Katich wicket was also not even close to being a no ball.

If you disagree you an Aussie.

Streuth, I cant be bothered arguing, I off going to crack a tinnie of XXXX and tell our Sheila to fire up those shrimps on the barbie.

5 Down and Flintoff has them soiling their whites!!!

Bad luck Ricky...

Still work to do.

We're going to lose. Strauss out.

At 128-5 that appeared to be wrong, at 313-5 it seems right, they don't have score at a big rate, hopefully it still enough, but I stick by my two previous posts, it was wrong not to enforce the follow on , and it could well be wrong not to have batted for an hour this morning to ensure the game was out of their reach.

Surely even we cannot grab defeat from the jaws of victory!??

cant we ?

If any team could do it we could

I actually think your theory about enforcing the follow has been proven wrong in the last two days, it's a very good wicket and we could be possibly facing an awkward chase tomorrow had they followed on. If they knock off 520 they deserve to win, if they get over 200 with only five wickets remaining on the last day they also deserve to win. Australia are never going to get rolled over twice on a flat deck for 200, batting again was exactly what they'd have chosen to do.

You'd take being in England's position now going into the last day every single time. They have a hell of a long way to go now and only have to make a couple of mistakes and it's game over. Saying we should have batted on this morning is ridiculously over cautious. You've got give Clark and Haddin credit as they've played superbly especially Clark who's knock has been of the highest quality.

Don't panic!

missed today's play, but looking at the scores I'd say it was 50-50 now - if England don't break that partnership in the morning, the odds of an unlikely victory for the Aussies will increase as the day goes on. I can't see it ending in a draw now

This partnership has gone on long enough. I think we will get a wicket early tomorrow and the rest will fall quickly.

Doesn't matter too much now if England lose cos they've had a good go and if they lose now it's to a better side.

What gets my goat is when they don't have a go at beating the opposition, y'know all those batting collapses, all out for 190 etc.

At least they've set a good target, had a go at bowling Australia out and if they don't do that they've been beaten fair and square but haven't thrown the game away.

Stlll hoping for an early wicket tomorrow and a win by 35 runs.

If we lose by one or two wickets then not going back out yesterday morning for an hour will have been crucial. An extra 50 runs at this point (and an hour less do Clarke and Haddin) would mean the game would definitely be ours, not that there is any guarantee it'd have worked out like that. The game has swung in direction so many times it's been excellent, two wickets before lunch and it should be OK but I won't be confident of anything after what happened at Edgbaston last time and it could be equally as close.

Heres a benchmark for you:

Do any of you believe Ponting would have declared at a time that gives the opposition more than enough time to get the runs, no matter how big the total?

If the boot had been on the other foot, and Ponting had given England 6 sessions to get 522, on that pitch, and against that bowling, I would expect England to win.

Its a complete fake and stupid record that people say cant be chased down.

I doubt many sides have ever been given 2 full days on an easy batting track to do it.

England should still win as it happens, but if they dont, no one will ever wipe the smile off Pontings face. Infact he might piss himself laughing that much he drowns.

Agreed about the target, it's normally very rare to have two days to chase a target which is partly why such a big chase have never been done before. The forecast wasn't that bad and with Flintoff, Broad and Swann all being big hitters we could have done some further damage without losing more time. We've bossed about 7 of the 9 sessions so far but if we don't boss the next one then it will probably be fatal. I have confidence in Anderson and Flintoff's bowling but not so much i the others, if Harmy was playing I think I'd feel a lot more confident at this stage.

I really could not tolerate Pontings smug mush if they do beat us today! I would sooner hack my nadgers off with a butter knife

Well yes, slightly different. 30 runs more, and McGrath and Warne chipping in with the odd over.

More than slightly different.

Well that's some start. I still won't settle till/if I see Hilfenhaus walking back.

Stuart Broad is feckin rubbish. We lose our way once he starts bowling

Swann has just bowled Clark, so it's just a matter of time now before we win...

Oh fcking yes.

He's gonna be tough to replace is Freddy....

odds on i'd say

got his 5, took 5-92 win by 115 runs

Well done to England getting rid of that 1935 millstone that keeps being mentioned every four years at Lords.