First Glenn McGrath, then Michael Slater: after a third day of euphoria at Mark Butcher's century the reality of Ashes cricket hit home at The Gabba yesterday as England were hung out to dry in the sun like a hunk of kangaroo jerky.
McGrath the Enforcer, a magnificent fast bowler up there in the pantheon alongside any that Australia has produced, simply blew the England lower order away in the morning session. A spell of five for nine in 35 balls - he took six for 85 in all - left Mark Ramprakash unbeaten on 69 and, not for the first time, stranded by the ineptness of a tail that, Robert Croft excepted here, collapses when someone of authority goes "boo" at them. England were all out for 375, the last six wickets tumbling for 60.
Australia began their second innings with an advantage of 110 and gave Slater, an assassin in such circumstances, carte blanche to subject the England attack to death by a thousand strokes. It was magnificent stuff, a full and extravagant display of shot-making. In 139 deliveries, before he offered a tame return catch to Angus Fraser, Slater hit 113.
England's bowlers were blasted to bits. Darren Gough's pride in bowling fast for England and Yorkshire took a severe dent as three successive deliveries in his second over were dispatched to three different points of the boundary and the last five of the six overs he bowled conceded 49 runs. Later Fraser was slogged back over his head and kicked the turf so violently that he might have loosened his fillings. In all Slater hit 13 fours and a straight six back over Croft's head and high into the Clem Jones Stand.
After Dominic Cork had bowled Mark Taylor for nought via the inside edge, Slater and Justin Langer added 162 for the second wicket - an Australian record for an Ashes match on this ground - with Langer going on to make 74 good runs before he launched Croft towards long-on and was caught by Alan Mullally.
So well did Australia progress that Taylor felt able to declare on 237 for three, leaving England seven overs, a full final day and a couple of overs added on to make up time lost, to make 349 to win, around 3.5 runs per over. By the close Mike Atherton (18) and Mark Butcher (seven) had made a good start, reaching 26 without loss.
But Taylor knows his cricket history and understood that the record books would need to be rewritten. No side has made as many in the fourth innings to win in Australia, nor England.
If McGrath was unable to have the final say as the evening closed in on a 7 1/2-hour playing day, then the morning belonged to him. Graham Thorpe and Ramprakash had taken their fifth-wicket stand to 75 when he struck for the first time, inducing a hook shot from Thorpe that lacked control.
Langer took the catch by the square-leg umpire and it opened up the tail. Dominic Cork, entrusted with batting at seven, was subjected to an over of short-pitched deliveries, liberally garnished with invective, and the batsman rose to the bait, attempting a pull stroke when discretion was called for and lobbing a gentle catch to mid-on. McGrath told him his fortune and sent him on his way.
Croft, whose batting woes of the past two years were induced by McGrath's aggression in England, played well for Ramprakash for almost an hour, seeing him to a composed half-century before Michael Kasprowicz pegged back his leg-stump.
The rest was short and not very sweet, with Gough lbw without scoring, Mullally skying a catch to mid-wicket after idiotically trying to pull his first ball and Fraser, having survived the hat-trick ball and a shout for lbw, gloving a catch to second slip. Croft had made 23, his four tail-mates one between them.
