I do agree that Australia benefited considerably from the rain delay in the first session. They lost their second wicket the ball before the umpires took them off, and another half hour or so might have seen another few wickets fall.
The ball is definitely doing less today, especially through the air. The English batsmen (and I use that term loosely 
) have played some terrible shots.
Wanted to add one thing:
It’s doing less through the air, for sure, but the amount of movement off the seam is fantastic for the bowlers. It’s enough to make life really hard for the batsmen, but not so much that it’s just going to keep missing the bat.
Ricky Ponting, commentating this morning, observed that this was harder for batsmen than the large amounts of swing they were getting yesterday, because movement off the pitch comes later, and is less predictable.
All out 67.
AUS lead by 112.
How many do the need in 2nd to have enough to win?
50?
In all seriousness, 150 would make life tough. But they’ve got the chance to bat all day and into tomorrow, set a monster and still have 2.5 days to bowl England out.
Ponting just observed the following stat, that in this Test a wicket has fallen every 23.6 deliveries, even padded out with the Warner/Lambruschagne century partnership, the worst average this century!
The last 19 wickets have fallen at one every 17 balls.
What the Hell happened? I just got back from lunch, took a quick peak at the score, and now my chin is bruised from my jaw dropping and banging against my desk.
I like the answer this guy gave on the BBC cricket thread.
Lead is now 184. Australia should declare at tea as the ultimate power move.
(They shouldn’t really. But if they did and won that would be historic)
The ultimate power move is to bat til tea on day 4 and set a chase of 500. ��
Winning an Ashes series away from home is historic enough, thank you. 
Wow, that’s why you should never gloat until your own team has batted I guess.
The BBC Test Match Special (TMS) podcast begins with the following announcement.
“WARNING, this podcast includes an angry Yorkshireman”
Many years ago I said to my father (who knew little about cricket) "We got the West Indies out for 240. " His reply was “Australia has to get them yet”. That has stuck with me.
I only watched the English innings and it seemed a lot of poor shots were there. You would think that they can’t play like that again and if you have to chase a target Headingly is as good a place as any in England.
I wouldn’t be surprised to wake up tomorrow and hear that Australia has won. Nor would it surprise me to hear England had won (maybe the day after).
What ever happened to classical defensive batting. It seems that modern batsmen need medium pacers bowling unthreatening deliveries to,perform, ball misbehaves even slightly, and they have a fit.
Archer is quick, but, it’s not like he is prime Thommo, or Shoaib. Why are people struggling against him.
Exactly. I think the main reason is he is very good and mostly, the batters aren’t. However I thought the English players would handle the Australian attack a lot better as well so I think I’m missing something. I think Englands next innings will tell a lot.
But he is.
He tops out above 155k. That’s absolute top shelf pace. There is also no sign, as happened with Shoab and Lee, that bowling above 155k his action begins to break.
There was a comment from Ravi Bopara who has faced him in county cricket that he doesn’t dip his head when bowling short. George Bailey his BBL captain said the same. That means two less clues for a batsman as to length.
He maintains his form even at top pace. He stands tall, doesn’t drop his arm, stays over the stumps. And he bowled better at Headingly than Lords even with pace off a touch. He’s a Rolls Royce and the main risk is over bowling him.
Need to remember that these guys get clocked out of the hand, Thompson was measured at 160+ from the batsman’s end. Jeffery Robert Thompson was way quicker than any of the recent and current quicks.
PT, could you please explain this is bit more? I think I understand what you mean but I’d like to be sure.
Bradman stated that he thought Frank Tyson was the quickest bowler he had seen in that one series in Australia. It isn’t clear when he made the comment but it was before the Holding and Roberts era.
Everyone from the past is faster then the current jumped up medium pacers.
Wasim, Waqar, Shoaib, Donald, Holding, Lillee, Brett Lee, Roberts, Imran Khan, Garner, Walsh, Ambrose, McDermott, Jon Snow…
The list goes on and on.
Even fast medium guys from the last generation, like McGrath, or Charminda Vaas would be considered “fast” today.
Archer is fast, but come on, at the top level batsman should be able to play him. It’s not like he had McGrath like accuracy, Waqar type swing and Thommo style chin music.
Current bowling speeds are calculated from the TV cameras based on the number of high speed frames the ball crosses as delivered.
In Thomson’s time the technology was more rudimentary and they used a radar detector speed gun aligned at the batsman’s end.
So Thomson was clocked over 160km/hr at the batsman’s end (ie after losing speed to 20 yards air resistance plus bouncing) while Shoab, Lee and Starc, the only other bowlers I am aware who have been timed over 160km/hr are timed in the milliseconds from release from the hand.
You can also factor in that at his peak in Ashes 1974/75 Thomson bowled into the wind, Lillee getting the downwind gig.
I can’t find a primary source for Bradman’s quote but there is some suggestion it dated from the 1960s. Mind you, there’s no question that Typhoon was “once in a generation” quick.
Thank you. I thought that was what you meant re the speeds. The source of the Bradman statement was on ESPN. I’ll see if I can find it again. However, the article mentioned that the Roberts etc hadn’t appeared so with no mention of Thommo yet to appear to seems he had seen him.
I think I have mentioned before that I was speaking to Phil Carlson’s (former Australian player) brother at one stage and he stated that Phil had said that Lillee was more skilful but with Thommo it was a ball that would seemingly come from nowhere at a terrible speed.
My terrible prediction for tonight (3rd day) Australia to lead by 310. England to get 280. Based on no real thought process whatsoever.
Question- people have suggested that Root is shot and needs to be replaced as Captain. Who by?