Boxing Day Test 2025: Australia v England fourth Ashes Test, day one – live updates
The breakthrough! Atkinson does what he nearly did in the first over – cramping Head for room and drawing an inside edge onto his stumps.6th over: Australia 27-0 (Head 12, Weatherald 10) Carse goes full outside off, for the first time today, I think.Head says thanks very much and drives for four.Next ball, same line, same result, though Head has to take more of a risk, hitting the ball on the up.He takes a single and hands over to Weatherald, who takes over, drop-kicking for two over the bowler’s head, then driving for four more.
Fifteen off the over: that’s rubbish.“The persistence with Carse is really driving me to distraction,” says Luke Regan.“He’s so inconsistent with his line and length, just not good enough at this level.His FC stats don’t lie.Potts is a much better bowler (FC stats don’t lie) and not materially worse with the bat.
” This email arrived ten minutes ago and has already proved prophetic.5th over: Australia 12-0 (Head 3, Weatherald 4) Atkinson pitches it up, until he doesn’t.Head goes for the cut – and Bethell pulls off an excellent stop in the gully, low to his right.He’s already improved England’s fielding.4th over: Australia 12-0 (Head 3, Weatherald 4) As Carse continues, Jacob Bethell gets into the game for the first time with a dive at gully that saves a run or two.
Carse bowls better, locating off stump, jagging one ball back into Head, but then reverting to leg theory.A poor ball gives Head an easy two off his legs.3rd over: Australia 9-0 (Head 1, Weatherald 3) Jake Weatherald, who faced only one of the first 12 balls, gets a proper go against Atkinson.He plays the first scoring shot of the day that goes where it was meant to – a punch into the covers for two.Atkinson won’t mind: at least he was on the front foot.
2nd over: Australia 6-0 (Head 1, Weatherald 0) Brydon Carse, bowling to Head, starts with … a no-ball.And the rest of the over is a mixed bag.After beating the bat outside off, Carse aims at the legs, perhaps because there’s a leg slip and a short square leg.Head keeps flicking and missing, but he picks up four leg-byes.Hmmm.
1st over: Australia 1-0 (Head 1, Weatherald 0) It turns out to be a good first over.Atkinson gets Head jumping around and the only time the bat hits the ball, it’s an inside edge that could easily have been played on.You could almost call it a moral victory.1st ball Gus Atkinson bowls to Travis Head.The line isn’t bad – sixth stump – but it’s too short.
Same old story!The players are out there,England go into a huddle, then disperse,And here comes the most significant element on the scene: Travis Head’s moustache,“And merry Christmas to you!” says Gareth Wilson,“If I can gently disagree with Andrew Benton, what is most galling, and slightly puts your lovely stat on runs difference to bed, is that Australia have not been amazing.
They haven’t needed to be.Sure – one Travis Head innings, one Alex Carey Test, and some good Starc, but none of those by themselves should have been enough to go 3-squat up.”England have faced a historically poor Aussie team and STILL blown it.It’s depressing, but hey, 0-0 right?“Love your work.” Thanks! The Christmas spirit is flowing.
Would it be churlish to point out that there have been two big innings from Travis Head? And I’m not sure about historically poor – you should have seen Graeme Yallop’s gang in 1978-79, who lost 5-1 to England at home.“Nervous anticipation” is the subject line on the next email.“The usual pre-match anticipation somewhat sharpened,” says Brian Withington, “as I wait to find out whether £500 spent on a pair of tickets via a secondary platform has been a wasted investment.My son and his partner are currently queuing for the first moment of truth – can they actually get into the ground? Other truths may emerge through the course of the day.” Ha.
England stick with the XI they announced in advance, so Jacob Bethell replaces Ollie Pope – who was giving him some throwdowns this morning, so no hard feelings.Jofra Archer is injured, so Gus Atkinson comes back.Graeme Swann and Alastair Cook feel that, with some grass on the pitch, England may regret not picking Matthew Potts, who pitches it up more than their other seamers.Australia leave out Brendan Doggett, preferring Michael Neser, who did so well in Brisbane, and Jhye Richardson, who returns from four years of bad luck with injuries.Smith replaces Josh Inglis, Cam Green is demoted to No 7, and there’s no spinner, which may have been one more reason why Stokes has asked Australia to bat first and bowl last.
Australia 1 Head, 2 Weatherald, 3 Labuschagne, 4 Smith (capt), 5 Khawaja, 6 Carey (wkt), 7 Green, 8 Starc, 9 Neser, 10 Richardson, 11 Boland.England 1 Crawley, 2 Duckett, 3 Bethell, 4 Root, 5 Brook, 6 Stokes (capt), 7 Smith (wkt), 8 Jacks, 9 Atkinson, 10 Carse, 11 Tongue.It’s a grey day, so Ben Stokes has put Australia in to bat.Steve Smith says he would have done the same.As it is, he has to bowl last with no spinner.
It’s Melbourne, it’s Boxing Day, it’s a crowd three times the size of Lord’s, and it’s seen some spectacular cricket.Andy Martin picks five Ashes Boxing Days to remember, all from the past 40 years, and not all going Australia’s way.The next email starts with a line I’m not used to seeing.“Dead right Tim,” says Dean Kinsella.“I haven’t been able to follow the previous 3 tests all that closely for various reasons (perhaps not a bad thing), but ready for this game.
So it’s a clean slate for me.Two matches of my absolute favourite sport to come.”Some players are hoarders, others are not.Shane Warne, it turns out, was a secret hoarder, and some of his stuff is now on display at the MCG.Jim Wallace, of this parish, has had a preview.
The first email of the day has landed.“Hope you had/are still having a super Christmas,” says Andrew Benton.Thanks, it’s been very nice, hope yours has too.And everyone’s!“I can see a scenario,” he goes on, “in which Rob Key and Brendan McCullum are advising the England players to be laid back and chill, and Ben Stokes is quietly telling everyone they need to work 24/7 on everything at all times in order to have a good chance of winning.Given the whole point of the Bazball style was to win the Ashes as McCullum and Stokes said many times over the years, why have the Key/McCullum heads not yet rolled? Australia have been amazing, but you’d sort of expect that.
”Heads don’t usually roll during the series, do they? That’s one of the ways in which cricket still keeps its distance from football.But as you say, it’s been very interesting to hear Stokes and McCullum singing from different hymn sheets.If only one of them gets to stay, you’d expect it to be Stokes.But McCullum has an assignment straight after this series – the WT20 in the subcontinent – so maybe his fate, like Joe Root’s as captain four years ago, will be decided at the end of the next chapter.So here it is … Merry Christmas! Everybody’s having fun (except perhaps Ben Duckett).
Look to the future now, it’s only just begun.Does Sir Geoffrey always tell you that the old ways are the best? Then he’s up and rock’n’ – hang on, there’s no way of making that work.Much like being in charge of an England Test team in Australia if your name is not Andrew.Anyway, here’s a quiz question.Of all the losing squads England have sent on an Ashes tour this century, which one has done least badly? Using a simple yardstick: the gap between their average score and Australia’s.
Look away now if you want a minute to think about this.But you’ve probably guessed where I’m going with it.Yes, the answer is … Ben Stokes’ brave boys from 2025-26.They’re averaging 258 per completed innings (actually, all their innings have been completed – for some reason, not even Stokes has been inclined to declare).The Aussies have made 372 per completed innings – only four of those so far, but the two romps to victory still feed into the average.
So the difference between the two sides has been 114,That may sound embarrassing, but, by England’s Ashes-tour standards, it’s highly respectable,Last time round, under Joe Root, they averaged a feeble 202,Their bowlers kept the Aussies down to 350, which still left them, on average, 148 behind,The time before, also on Root’s watch? England batted better, averaging 292.
But we may have to give most of the credit to the pitches, as the Aussies averaged 514.No, that is not a misprint: the gulf was 222, almost twice as bad as in the present series.How about 2013-14, under Alastair Cook? England averaged 216, Australia 414, so the gulf was 198.Or 2006-07, under Fred Flintoff? England 264, Australia 528, the gulf 264.Should have stuck to calling himself Andrew.
Which just leaves Nasser Hussain’s tour in 2002-03 – surely that wasn’t too bad? Well, the batting wasn’t.England 293, Australia 468, the gulf 175.With the ball, Stokes’s team have been more effective than any other bunch of England losers, bar the lockdown gang of 2020-21.With the bat, they are fourth out of six, and as they’ve done better in each Test of this series than the one before (yes, really), they could end up second.In terms of the gulf, they’re the bees’ knees.
It hasn’t been worse than usual: it’s just been more galling for the fans because their hopes were higher.Some are calling these last two Tests a dead rubber, but that’s a term that just doesn’t belong in Test cricket.Every match is an occasion, never mind Melbourne on Boxing Day.Every match counts – for the World Championship, for the mood in the camp, for the individual’s self-respect, for the reckoning afterwards, and for the career average that a Test cricketer has to carry around on his back like a snail.The first game I went to in Australia was the fifth Test of 1986-87 in Sydney.
It was billed as a dead rubber because England, of all people, had just gone 2-0 up to seal the series.The Aussies, captained by Allan Border and buoyed by a dream debut from Peter Who?, took the game seriously and won it.The great John Woodcock reckoned it was that game that sowed the seeds of the 1989 series, when Border’s team beat England 4-0.Far from dying, that rubber had helped the Aussies to bounce back.Recent history tells England supporters that the wheels may well be about to come off, but there’s still plenty to play for.
And neither Pat Cummins nor Nathan Lyon is playing, so Root and Stokes, England’s two old stagers, won’t have to face their nemeses.The other England batters need to treat Mitchell Starc the way they treated Jasprit Bumrah in the summer: don’t take him on, do see him off.Then they just have to figure out how to play the demon Neser.Oh, and Jhye Richardson, who, the last time he bowled in a Test, four years ago in Adelaide, helped himself to five England wickets.A consolation victory is still a victory.
And it would bring some consolation.
Motor neurone disease patients in England die waiting for home adaptations, campaigners say
People with motor neurone disease (MND) are dying waiting for grants to make their homes fit to live in due to a huge backlogs in applications, campaigners have said.The MND Association has found it takes an average of 375 days for people in England to get essential home adaptations through the government’s disabled facilities grant (DFG) due to growing delays in the system.But a third of people with MND die within a year of diagnosis, and about half die within two years, meaning they are spending the last months of their lives fighting for support, with many dying in unsafe and unsuitable homes.The charity’s chief executive, Tanya Curry, said: “For someone whose condition may progress dramatically in a matter of months, waiting a year or more for vital adaptations is equivalent to being denied them altogether.”Nicole Foster, 56, was diagnosed with MND in May and has spent her entire life’s savings, as well as money fundraised on her behalf, replacing her bathroom with an accessible one after she was told she faced a two to three-year year wait for DFG funding
People in poorest areas of England ‘more likely to need emergency care for lung conditions’
People from the poorest backgrounds in England with serious lung conditions are more likely to be admitted to hospital for emergency care than their more affluent counterparts, according to research.Analysis of NHS admissions data for November by Asthma + Lung UK found people from the most deprived backgrounds in England were 56% more likely to be admitted for emergency care, while 62% were more likely to be readmitted within 39 days of an emergency admission, which is linked with an increased chance of dying.The research also found that people in deprived areas were almost twice as likely to be admitted to hospital for a respiratory condition.One expert said the findings should act as a wake-up call to end the “postcode lottery”.The highest rates of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) admissions per population are in deprived areas including Blackpool, Manchester, Hastings and Burnley
Prosecutions for strangulation in England and Wales increase sixfold in three years
The number of suspects charged for strangulation and suffocation in England and Wales has increased almost sixfold in the three years since the offence was first introduced, Crown Prosecution Service data has revealed.Brought in under the Domestic Abuse Act, which came into force in 2022, the legislation closed a gap in the existing law, giving courts much greater sentencing powers.Kate Brown, the CPS’s lead prosecutor for domestic abuse, said that previously there had been “a lot of cases for which it didn’t seem like we had the right offence”, and the new legislation marked “a significant shift in recognising the serious nature of the offence”.“There were some thoughts that it might not be necessary and that the act of strangulation or suffocation could be covered by other offences,” she said, but added that the options previously open to prosecutors “didn’t really hit the mark in terms of the seriousness, because strangulation is a really serious offence”.Suffocation and strangulation carries a maximum sentence of five years’ imprisonment, whereas previously, except for the most serious cases which could be charged as grievous bodily harm or attempted murder, prosecutors were having to charge offenders with common assault, which carries a much lesser maximum sentence of six months
Britons reported to be drinking less, as data shows consumption at record low
People in Britain are drinking less alcohol than in previous years, according to reports.The average UK adult consumed 10.2 alcoholic drinks a week last year, the lowest figure since data collection began in 1990 and a decline of more than a quarter from the peak of 14 two decades ago, according to figures published in the FT from research company IWSR.However, total abstention is not on the rise despite the decline in consumption, which suggests more moderate drinking habits have driven the trend.“The population is ageing and older consumers physiologically can’t drink as much,” Marten Lodewijks, the IWSR president, told the newspaper
Resident doctors say they will resume talks to avoid further strikes with ‘can-do spirit’
Resident doctors have said they will approach talks with Wes Streeting with a “can-do spirit” to avoid further strikes in the new year, as their five-day action ended on Monday morning.The British Medical Association called on the health secretary to come to the table with the same “constructive” attitude, saying the tone of 11th-hour talks before their stoppage had been encouraging but too late to avoid the strike in England.Streeting also signalled his determination to get back to the talks, saying he did “not want to see a single day of industrial action in the NHS in 2026”, and that he would “be doing everything I can to make this a reality”.“My door remains open, as it always has done, and I’m determined to resume discussions with the BMA in the new year to put an end to these damaging cycles of disruption,” he said.Streeting and Keir Starmer have taken a tough line towards the strike, with the prime minister saying it was “beyond belief” that it should go ahead when the flu-hit NHS was facing its worst crisis since Covid
Starmer has no coherent social mobility plan, says top government adviser
Keir Starmer has no coherent strategy to tackle entrenched inequalities harming the life chances of millions of people, the government’s social mobility commissioner has said.A report warned last week that young adults in Britain’s former industrial heartlands were being left behind as a result of failed or abandoned promises by successive governments.The Social Mobility Commission (SMC), a government advisory body, said big cities such as Manchester, Edinburgh and Bristol were starting to thrive but that opportunities were “overconcentrated”.In a Guardian interview, the commission’s chair, Alun Francis, urged Starmer to outline a bold vision to tackle “the defining social mobility challenge of our generation”.He said: “We have a government that talks quite a lot about social mobility, but mainly about individuals – often about [the] social mobility of themselves or their colleagues … But what we don’t have is a coherent approach to social mobility as a useful concept that you can build a strategy around
No more kitchen martyrs – a guide to sharing the load at Christmas
A meat-free Christmas: Chantelle Nicholson’s French mushroom pie, caramelised pear pud and more
10 of the best Australian sparkling wines for every budget
Cosmopolitan Christmas: Stosie Madi’s French-African-Lebanese Christmas lunch – recipes
From a showstopping pavlova to a £7 sherry: what top chefs bring to Christmas dinner
A fresh take on wine pairings for Christmas dessert