Key events
Barney Ronay
Forty-five minutes into a quietly overcast morning at the Sydney Cricket Ground, Matt Potts came into the England attack from the Randwick End, and immediately began running through his variations.
His first ball was wide and smashed through cover by Travis Head. His second ball was both short and wide and hacked over gully by Travis Head. His third ball was short and straight and smashed past midwicket by Travis Head. His fourth ball was defended with a show of furrowed caution, to loud, mocking cheers from a crowd that had begun to tuck into the day. Welcome to the treadmill, Pottsy. And yes, it’s always like this around here.
Geoff Lemon
There was a time, while Steve Smith was at the height of his batting prowess, when “best since Bradman” was used with confidence. The thing about that line is that even when the recipient has dominated for years, it gets applied too quickly, given the point of comparison is a career-lasting two decades. Lots of players reach the top for a time, no other has stayed as long. Smith was untouchable for six years before returning to the realm of the merely very good.
The combination of those phases, though, took him to a rare position on the third day of the fifth Test in Sydney. In the statistics of the game there are milestones, then there are mountaintops. For a long time in Smith’s Ashes-heavy career there have been two peaks drawing gradually closer in the mist. Donald Bradman’s 5,028 runs against England is one that even Smith will never climb. Jack Hobbs’s 3,636 runs against Australia is the one he ascended on Tuesday.
Preamble
Rob Smyth
The 2025-26 Ashes, one of the most disappointing, anticlimactic series in the 144 years since Fred Spofforth raised hell at The Oval, is limping towards a fitting conclusion. Australia are on course to crush England at Sydney and win the series 4-1, a scoreline not even the most one-eyed Pom fan could dispute.
It’s been a triumph of experience, maturity, discipline, skill and Travis Head. His audacious 123 at Perth opened English wounds that have yet to heal, and four Tests later he is still cheerily grinding salt into them. Head’s brutal 163 helped Australia to 518 for 7 at the end of day three, a lead of 134.
Steve Smith will resume on 129 after making a century that looked inevitable even before he faced his first ball. England’s unbalanced, second-string attack gave everything they had on a punishing day. For a variety of reasons, it wasn’t enough.
Australia, despite not being at their best, have won the series with an ease that is hard to comprehend. It’s not their fault England have failed to turn up – even if, on some level, they probably craved a greater challenge.
The last rites will be administered either this evening or tomorrow. There’s a chance of a complete blowout when England bat, just as there was in the final innings of 2013-14 (when England lasted 31.4 overs) and 2021-22 (38.5). Their bodies are tired, their confidence shot, their spirit broken. It’s nearly time for everyone to go home.
