RAIN APPEARS THE ONLY HOPE TO STOP AUSTRALIA REIGNING SUPREME IN ASHES

Steve Smith celebrates with his Australia team mates after taking a catch to dismiss Joe Root, the England captain. Photograph: David Gray/Reuters

Joe Root’s momentary lapse of reason in Perth has left England’s Barmy Army looking to the weather forecasters for help in stopping the rot

Cognitive dissonance is flying the better part of 10,000 miles to watch the cricket then sing and dance and plead for rain. The healthy travelling support summed up England’s dire situation as well as any.

Maybe they had also directed their prayers in the direction of Cardiff in 2009, when the situation was much the same. Australia batted second there before a huge downpour ended Ricky Ponting’s quest for wickets on the fourth evening. We all know what happened next.

On that occasion, however, England had 105 overs to survive. This time it was 150 when they set off. And with the greatest respect to the Australian attack of that era, this lot are worldly. Oh, and the crack. Cardiff definitely did not have the standard-issue Waca crevasse running up the middle. Funny, isn’t it, how a pitch goes from a road to a minefield? So apart from all that, then.

The delivery Mitchell Starc flung to clean up James Vince – in the best form he has been since the opening day of the series – was the definition of unplayable after pitching on the fracture. Wide of the crease and angling well down the leg side, it smashed off-stump out of the ground to ensure it appears on highlight reels for as long as the bowler lives.

Despite the similarities, this was not the Ryan Harris gem to Alastair Cook that confirmed the Ashes were coming to Australia four years ago in this corresponding Test. That moment was when Joe Root elected to extravagantly drive Nathan Lyon’s first offering of the innings through cover when his side still required a further 200 runs to force Australia to bat again.

It was the shot of a man who had just spent two days directing traffic in the middle of a car crash. That it came in response to Lyon’s widest delivery of the match, CricViz revealed, only make matters worse. Sure enough, the edge was pouched sharply by Steve Smith at slip. He had been in the middle for 505 runs worth of graft himself, but context is everything.

Variable bounce informed Josh Hazlewood’s initial breakthrough, his first ball shooting low to Mark Stoneman. Much as they hope otherwise, that kind of thing messes with a batsman’s head. Little wonder he was playing when he shouldn’t have soon after. “We were aiming for that crack as Jimmy did at the start of the day,” the affable quick said after play. “It is a pretty simple method.” Maybe for those, like him, who can land it consistently in a shoe box.

His one-handed grab off his own bowling to see off Cook had nothing to do with the pitch and everything to do with his athleticism. At Adelaide, Starc and Lyon held on to chances of a similar margin for error. This was better. Hazlewood is not being mentioned in team-of-the-year lists, but his value is equal to that of his slightly pacier colleagues.

With the bat, they did not need to keep going on Sunday. Maybe, with rain always threatening, they should not have. They toyed with the visitors. The worst three words in the cricket language – third new ball – came and went. It was not taken. To 600 then 650 and finally 662, no Australian side had scored more in a home Ashes contest – their ninth largest total in more than 140 years of Test cricket. No mercy.

Pat Cummins, who has the fewest wickets of the quartet, again passed 40 as he has in each first innings of the series. His average across the series is higher than any England player other than Dawid Malan.

They humiliated Root’s men just because they could. It is a long, long way from when they sat at 368 for four an hour into the second day with two not out batsmen on more than 100. Now, the indignity of a straight-sets Ashes loss is all that is left.

That is unless the rain dancing (and drinking) delivers the desired result. Paradoxically, a rainy day in Perth would feel like thousands of British pounds well spent.