Ashes 2025 live score: England search for early Australia wickets on day three

“Absolutely filthy,” Lyon told Australia’s host broadcaster Seven Network when asked how he felt about being dropped.

“But yeah, I can’t do anything about it, so I hope I can play my role in making sure I get the guys ready and do whatever I can to make sure that we get the right result here.”

“It’s clear we weren’t our best at that phase of the game,” Root told TNT Sports.

“But the way that we dragged things back, by managing to take those wickets in a cluster, it shows what the nature of this game can be like, especially with the pink ball.

“It is different to a white ball. We get a lot of exposure to [floodlit cricket] in ODI cricket and T20 cricket, but it is slightly different. But you still back yourself. We practice really hard for the five days leading into it.

“We made sure we got our work done. Unfortunately, it’s just one of those days where a few didn’t quite stick to hand. We’ve got to make sure we stay confident, we stay up and, when we get those chances later on in the fixture, we’re ready to take them.”

“You’d be foolish to call anything too soon in this Ashes series as it seems to switch so quickly from a poor position to a good position and back again. But if England lose this Test, it’s a long way back,” Nasser Hussain told Sky Sports.

“We have not yet had Australia’s Mitchell Starc bowling with a brand new pink ball at twilight in this Test, so England need to wrap up these four wickets early on tomorrow and get batting before Starc gets a new ball under lights.

“If England bat well second time around and get a lead of 200 and the pitch then does get uneven, batting last on it could be hard for Australia.”

“How often have an England team come to Australia and dropped catches?” Michael Vaughan told BBC Sport.

“I said months ago that England have a great chance, but the one thing we don’t focus on in the UK – and they focus so much on it here in Australia – is catching and fielding.

“We have come here again and five catches have gone done. Two or three of them were goobers (simple chances) that have to be taken.”

• First Test (Perth): Australia beat England by eight wickets
• Second Test (day/night): Thursday December 4 – Monday December 8 (4am) – The Gabba, Brisbane
• Third Test: Wednesday December 17 – Sunday December 21 (11.30pm) – Adelaide Oval
• Fourth Test: Thursday December 25 – Monday December 29 (11.30pm) – Melbourne Cricket Ground
• Fifth Test: Sunday January 4 – Thursday January 8 (11.30pm) – Sydney Cricket Ground

Josh Hazlewood’s hopes of playing a part in the 2025/26 Ashes series are hanging by a thread after he suffered another setback on his recovery.

“Josh Hazlewood reported achilles soreness this week during his rehabilitation from recent hamstring injury,” a Cricket Australia statement said.

“It is a low-grade issue and he is expected to recommence running and bowling next week.”

“England with the new ball: it’s just a given that when you rock up to The Gabba, rock up to Australia, you don’t get carried away with the bounce,” Nasser Hussain said on Sky Sports Cricket’s Ashes Daily podcast.

“The same attack that was so brilliant in the first innings in Perth – with no [Mark] Wood – just ran up and said ‘cut me’. I’ve never seen so many upper cuts and ramps in the first 15 overs of a new ball spell. It was incredible.

“There’s nothing in between with this England side. They’re either really poor or they show a bit of character and try and fight back towards the end of the day.

“Australia going along at six an over, England bowling short and wide, getting clattered to all parts.

“Brydon Carse had a particularly rough day. But I thought none of them were particularly good; [Jofra] Archer was the pick, and there was a drop off when you moved away from Archer and [Gus] Atkinson in combination.”

It was good, it was bad, and then it was terrible.

England may only trail by 44, but it feels like more. Day two at the Gabba was chaos punctuated by erratic bowling and poor catching.

“That’s third-grade standard,” former Aussie great Mark Waugh said on Fox Sports of England’s bowling display. “Look at this pitch map. That’s all over the place.”

“I just saw Glenn McGrath, Brett Lee and Jason Gillespie,” said Stuart Broad on Channel Seven. “I said to them England have bowled more bad balls today than you did in your entire careers.”

Joe Root has insisted England’s Ashes campaign remains firmly on track, despite a series of dropped catches gifting Australia five extra lives and a crucial first-innings lead at the Gabba.

“We’re not perfect, we’re all human and we’re going to make mistakes. But it’s how we respond,” Root stated.

“It’s about making sure we turn up with the right frame of mind, right attitude and knowing our best game of cricket is good enough to do very special things here. The wheels could have come off and at other times, probably on a tour where I was captain, they would have.

“But we know our best cricket and when we execute well we’re a very difficult side to play against. I don’t think we’re massively out of it at all.”