The fourth and final test match between Australia and England finished in a rain-affected stalemate, and the last day of play at Old Trafford was washed out due to the inclement weather.
As a result, Australia has maintained possession of the ashes.
Regardless of the outcome of the fifth and final match in the series, which would take place at The Oval the following week, the outcome of this match insured that Australia, the current owners of the urn, will maintain their 2-1 lead in the series.
The outfield became saturated as a result of the heavy rain that fell over night, which meant that play could not begin at 11:00 local time (1000 GMT) as planned in Manchester.
As soon as it was stated that play would start at 1200 GMT, provided that there was no more rain, the pitch was treated to a new rainfall that lasted for many hours. This rain continued throughout the day.
At 16:24 (GMT), the match was called off as a draw by the umpires and declared a draw official.
Even though this match ended in a tie, Australia still has to avoid losing the next one at The Oval if they want to win the Ashes series in England for the first time since 2001.
“The gang has a lot of reason to be pleased. “Our preference is to come over here and win the Ashes, but it’s nice to retain it, even if the circumstances aren’t ideal,” said the captain of the Australian cricket team, Pat Cummins.
Ben Stokes, the captain of England, was naturally pessimistic after the loss and said that “it is a tough one to take, playing the cricket we did over the first three days, but it is all part of the journey.”
We were aware of what actions were required of us, which worked to our advantage. It was another game in which we had to win or go home, and I don’t believe there was much more we could have done to improve our chances other than bowling them out and then scoring 590 points.
We have one game remaining, and our goal is to finish strong by winning that game and tying the series, just as we did in 2019.
After weather limited play on the fourth day of the match to just 30 overs, Australia was able to end their second innings with a score of 214-5, which was 61 runs behind England’s first-innings score of 592.
During that time, England only managed to capture one wicket, which was Marnus Labuschagne, who was caught behind by part-time off-spinner Joe Root. However, this was after the Australian had halted the progress of the home team’s victorious push with 111 runs.
“The weather put a dent in our plans.”
Old Trafford is known for its inclement weather, as the venue has already seen a total of 25 whole days of test cricket play rained out, in addition to an extra two entire tests being called off altogether.
After limiting the reigning world test champions Australia to 317 in their first innings, England raced to 592 all out, partly because to the stupendous 189 scored by opener Zak Crawley and the unbroken 99 scored by Jonny Bairstow. Australia were bowled out for 317.
On Friday, fast bowler Mark Wood blasted through the top order of Australia’s batting lineup by taking three wickets.
But Australia was able to stave off England on Saturday thanks to a partnership of 103 runs between Labuschagne and Mitchell Marsh (who was not out at the time).
The player of the match, Crawley, commented further by saying, “We are rather flat. The weather prevented us from winning this game while we were in an excellent position to do so.
The outcome on Sunday put an end to England’s hopes of being only the second team in the history of the Ashes to come back from being down 2-0 and win the series.
This deficit was overcome by the Australia side of 1936/37, led by batting great Don Bradman, who ultimately led them to a 3-2 victory.
The first match of the current series was played at Edgbaston, and it was won by Australia with a dramatic two-wicket triumph. Stokes controversially declared the innings at 398-8 on the first day, even though the star batsman Root was still batting with 118 not out.
After England’s first innings fell from 188-1 to 325 all out, the visitors won by 43 runs at Lord’s to go up 2-0 in the series. This victory came after Stokes offered his team hope of attempting an impossible run-chase with a magnificent 155.
Although England made a comeback and won the third test match at Headingley by three wickets, the weather in Manchester meant that this would not be enough to launch a fightback that would win them the Ashes.