Retained! - Day Four at Melbourne

And so it came to pass. England’s players and management will wake up tomorrow morning with headaches brought on by too much champagne: Australia’s selectors, meanwhile, have rather more worrying headaches to deal with.

Unlike at Adelaide or, indeed, unlike their own batting at Perth, England had to work for their wickets. Once Mitchell Johnson had gone to an indeterminate push at a good delivery from Tremlett, Haddin and Siddle at least showed some character in prolonging the game into the second hour of the morning. Both offered tough chances to Collingwood at slip, both played and missed and Siddle was millimetres away from being run out, but they showed the kind of character and application that has been all too rare from Australia in this series. Siddle, in particular, has had a match to remember but eventually perished – having had one big shot beautifully caught in the crowd he went for another and fell to a well judged catch by Kevin Pietersen. After that it was simply a case of watching and waiting and it was appropriate, given his dismantling of the top order yesterday, that the final wicket fell to Tim Bresnan, Hilfenhaus’s inside edge being beautifully caught by a diving Matt Prior.

England were suitably jubilant but also careful to say that the series has not been won yet while Ricky Ponting, as always, was more generous in his post match interview than he had been on the field. The captain’s future is just one concern for the selectors, but it seems to be the main topic of conversation in the Australian media. It is hard not to feel a little sorry for Ponting, for someone had to be captain at the point at which the side went into decline and he happens to have been the man with the poisoned chalice. It is always easy to blame the man in charge, and his captaincy certainly hasn’t been great, but Australia’s problems run far deeper than that.

The only change that England may ponder for Sydney will be the return of Steven Finn, although I suspect that they will be unchanged, while Australia will, at the very least, need to replace Ryan Harris, presumably with Michael Beer. My prediction of 3-1 is still looking reasonably good.

One final note: I notice that the more cretinous of the media who were keen to attribute the defeat at Perth to the arrival of the players' families have kept quiet about the fact that they are still there.