Australia's chances in the second Test rest heavily once again with Steve Smith after England took the upper hand in difficult batting conditions on Friday before rain intervened to spoil the third day at Lord's.
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The match remains precariously placed with Australia 4-80, 178 runs short of England's first-innings total, with two days to play. Importantly, Smith is still there, unbeaten on 13, but as was the case at Edgbaston he has lost partners quickly and not for the first time a great deal is on his shoulders and those of anyone who can stay with him.
While a draw is the most likely outcome, a result is not out of the question and the teams only need to look back to last year's Lord's Test when the first day was lost to rain and England still romped past India inside four days.
Joe Root's side will certainly fancy their chances of squaring the series here if they can run through the rest of the Australian order on Saturday, with boom fast bowler Jofra Archer, Lord's specialist Chris Woakes, senior campaigner Stuart Broad and all-rounder Ben Stokes having made life challenging in overcast conditions under lights.
There was no play after lunch on Friday but England had the best of what transpired before it, with Australia losing 3-11 after progressing midway through the first session to 1-60.
The loss of opener Cameron Bancroft for 13, becoming Archer's first Test victim, triggered the mini-collapse, with Usman Khawaja out for 36 three balls later and Travis Head coming and going for seven.
But Smith and Matthew Wade, who is yet to score, were able to avoid any further damage and the persistent drizzle meant Broad and co did not get another shot at them.
"We'd have liked to continue because that morning session put us in a good position," Broad said. "It's a real shame. We're pretty positive. We'd need to bowl Australia out by lunch tomorrow. There's 98 overs for the next two days, which for both teams has been enough to bowl each other.
"There's certainly hope for both sides. There could be quite an interesting, intriguing game left in this Test match although we've lost so much for rain. Our bowling unit's aim is to get the next six wickets by lunch and then ideally bat until an hour, half an hour before lunch on day five and try to force a result that way."
Saturday could well be a pivotal day in not only the match but potentially the series.
"I thought we did actually pretty well [on Friday]," Australia team mentor Steve Waugh said. "We talked about it before the series, the key to doing well over here is to not have a disastrous session.
"You're going to lose some sessions but just lose them closely not by a big margin. That's what we've talked about and that's what the guys did really well. When you lose a couple of quick wickets there is potential to lose five, six or seven and in the Test match you're going to struggle to come back from that.
"So we hung in there really well. I thought while Wade is ... not out, he faced 20-odd balls. Steve Smith again looked pretty self-assured. That was a crucial partnership. If we lost a couple of more wickets there it could have been a tough session."
On the prospect of an outcome other than a draw, Waugh added: "England will think if they have a good session bowling they can force a result. If we have two good sessions batting we think we can force a result."
The woes of the Australian openers in the Ashes continued on Friday, with Bancroft and Warner having now contributed just 41 runs between them in six innings.
Resuming on five, Bancroft never really settled on Friday. There was an edge through third man for four but he was otherwise bogged down, seemingly in a fight against himself as much as the England bowlers.
He took a spectacular catch at short leg on the second day of the match, living up to the pre-series statement by Waugh that he is the best he has ever seen in that position.
There will be further queries about Bancroft's technique and whether it can hold up at the top level in English conditions, with this planting of the front foot appearing to leave him particularly susceptible to being trapped lbw, as he was on day three day here.
Bancroft could count himself somewhat unlucky in that instance in that he was struck above the knee roll by Archer but given out by umpire Aleem Dar. He reviewed the decision, hoping the height would be an issue as it seemed it was, but it stood on umpire's call, with Hawk-Eye showing the ball hitting the top of middle stump.
While Bancroft's occupation was halted after 45 minutes of play, Khawaja would have been disappointed not to go on with another start.
He had looked far more comfortable than Bancroft, scoring freely, but moments after the opener's departure he paid the price for a rare false shot when Woakes enticed him into an edge.
The curtain was drawn on the much-hyped showdown between Archer and Smith, with the former captain utilising his eccentric range of leaves as he sought to manage his way through a testing period against Woakes and Broad in light drizzle and under a gloomy sky.
Having seen the back of Khawaja shortly after making his way to the middle, Smith then lost Head - and unlike Bancroft, there was nothing unfortunate about the No.5 batsman's mode of dismissal. Dar turned down Broad's claims for lbw but England's review justified their boisterous appeal, with the ball-tracking confirming the stumps would have been obliterated if not for the intervention of Head's pad.
Wade was given out leg-before to Stokes but umpire Chris Gaffaney's decision was overturned on review as the ball pitched outside leg.
"Smith played nicely today. You could see he was looking to leave so we could maybe have tightened up our lines slightly," Broad said.
"He just adjusts to what fields you set and what pitch there is. He's a brilliant batsman at finding the gap. Today was a good spell of bowling from us at him and hopefully tomorrow morning we get similar conditions."
- SMH/The Age
