In front of second full house here on another sparkling summer’s day, Australia capitulated to 128 all out in conditions that simply screamed runs.
Then, when England decided to bat again rather than enforce the follow-on, they missed the chance of an early breakthrough when an edge by Joe Root off Shane Watson passed between first slip and the wicketkeeper.
It was a break England should have capitalised on to put the game beyond Australia, but as in the first Test, they struggled to summon the killer instinct, scarcely playing a shot save the slap to cover that did for Kevin Pietersen.
Instead, Peter Siddle found a bustling rhythm from the Pavilion end to dismiss Alastair Cook, Jonathan Trott and Pietersen in the space of 16 balls to keep England, their lead extended to 264 by the close, just this side of the horizon.
Australia’s batting was identified as their weak suit before this series began, though nobody suspected how bad it was until they were 117 for nine in their first innings at Trent Bridge.
There they were rescued by a teenager making his debut and in the second innings by a veteran making a comeback, but that leaves a lot of dead wood in between, something turned gleefully into kindling yesterday by England’s bowlers.
It left Darren Lehmann, Australia’s new coach, cutting a lone, disconsolate figure on the visitors’ balcony, which looked like an isolation ward. Whatever the malaise he inherited with this team the prospect of a cure seems distant.
There could be no excuses for Australia either, after Stuart Broad and Graeme Swann gave them a pointer as to how to score when they added 48 breezy runs in 40 balls for the last wicket.
With Swann later taking five for 44, the visitors’ surrender was so tame that England’s continued possession of the Ashes looks as if it will happen with minimum fuss.
For anyone wanting the semblance of a contest it was a depressing display and its meekness made a case for Alastair Cook enforcing the follow-on. Although there was overwhelming logic to England batting again with the weather set fair, the bowlers in need of a recharge and a dusting pitch wearing by the session, Australia looked so shot as to be ripe for another rout.
The rot did not set in immediately as the opening pair added 42 without undue alarm. Shane Watson, a brilliant driver of the ball, had even looked dominant, taking 21 runs off two overs from James Anderson and Tim Bresnan.
But a switch to the Pavilion end for Bresnan saw him nip one down the slope into Watson and win not just an lbw for himself but probably one for Swann too, after Watson reviewed, apparently at the insistence of Chris Rogers, an lbw that always looked dead.
For with one review left, Rogers seemed loathe to request the other when he missed a thigh-high full toss from Swann after lunch. Had he done so, he would have been reprieved after Hawk-Eye had the ball missing the top of leg-stump.
It was arguably the worst ball to get a wicket in Test history, though David Gower’s dismissal of Kapil Dev for 116 in Kanpur 28 years ago was reputed to be pretty appalling. High full tosses can present problems when bowled by pace bowlers but Rogers should have been able to pick any spot on the leg-side boundary and hit it there.
England bowled as they mostly do, with discipline and skill, but this was no overwhelming force blowing away batsmen unable to cope with pace, swing or spin.
The pitch is dusting in places, which allows the seam to grip occasionally for pace bowlers and spinners, but it is no minefield.
Having seen his rank full toss hit the jackpot, Swann wheeled away, getting some to grip off the pitch and others to leap from the footholes. One theory why Mitchell Starc was left out of this match was that Australia’s selectors feared the rough he might create for Swann.
With Bresnan luring Phillip Hughes into a wild slash and another wasted review by Australia, Swann was left to work his way through the remainder of the order. He began with Usman Khawaja, who looks a walking wicket providing you can keep him pegged down for an over or two.
Dropped by Trott at slip off Swann, Khawaja never looked comfortable and his demise, caught by Pietersen after miscuing a lofted drive, was entirely predictable.
Steve Smith followed next, his technique of playing defensively with bat well in front of pad undone when the ball bounced more than expected to rebound off the splice into Ian Bell’s hands at short leg.
Swann then deferred to Broad for the wicket of Michael Clarke, lbw to one that flirted with hitting leg-stump but which, with no reviews left, he could not query.
Ashton Agar, now seemingly permanently promoted to eight, tried to add responsibility to his repertoire but Brad Haddin refused his pursuit of a quick leg bye. Prior’s quick thinking and even quicker throw beat the teenager’s hasty retreat to the bowler’s end.
Although there did not appear to be much reverse-swing, Anderson made out as if the ball might be
