Australia frustrate England on first day of the second Ashes Test although Craig Overton solves Steve Smith puzzle

Australia 209-4 (81 overs), England yet to bat: Joe Root became the first captain in 25-years to win the toss and field at the Adelaide Oval as Australia frustrated their rivals

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A slow shuffle of a day: a day of stops and starts, of long inactive periods off the field and long inactive periods on it. Another low-key instalment in what has been a largely low-key Ashes series, in a strictly cricketing sense at least.

Again, the scoring rates were immaculately old-school; again, England were required to extract their bounties with a scalpel rather than smash them open with a mallet. And yet Australia were the happier of the two sides at stumps, having weathered the moving pink ball and the chilly twilight for the loss of just four wickets.

Joe Root gambled by putting Australia into bat after winning the toss, and unless England can take the last six wickets in a session or thereabouts, it is a gamble that will have backfired. There were flurries of promise: Craig Overton barrelled into international cricket with aggression, craft and the small matter of Steve Smith as his first ever Test wicket, which is a bit like your child’s first word being “synecdoche”.

But overall, England’s bowlers did not quite do enough to vindicate Root’s punt. The early conditions were resoundingly English: cable-knit-sweater weather, grey clouds wreathing the Adelaide Oval like a damp towel, frequent rain breaks to interrupt the batsmen’s momentum.

And yet England bowled too short in the first session, and not consistently enough in the final two.

Stuart Broad, the sort of bowler for whom this setting should have been tailor-made, was a disappointment. James Anderson chipped in with the wicket of Usman Khawaja after dinner, but looked a few drops short of his usual menace. Chris Woakes had a good day all-round, running out Cameron Bancroft just as England were beginning to despair of breaking the opening partnership. Moeen Ali, still recovering from a blistered finger, was as innocuous as the mild sauce at Nando’s.

And so the jury remains out on Root’s decision to become the first captain ever to win the toss and bowl first in a day-night Test, as well as the first to do so at Adelaide for 25 years. Perhaps Root had been encouraged by the previous two day-nighters on this ground, both won by the team batting last, albeit on moister wickets than the one laid here. England began the day dispiritingly, hitting that irritating back-length that is not conducive to either hitting the stumps, swinging the ball or preserving its shine.

A 90-minute rain break, during which tea was taken, allowed England to regroup. Shortly after the restart, David Warner pushed the ball into the covers, Moeen fumbled the ball, Bancroft tried to steal a run, Warner sent him back and Woakes threw down the stumps after shrewdly taking a second to anchor himself. At the end of the over, Broad trotted up to Warner and pointed at his ears, savouring the silence.

And for all the absence of pyrotechnics with bat and ball, there was certainly a lively background noise to the day’s proceedings. It could scarcely have been otherwise after a turbulent week in which England, bruised and belittled in the wake of their Brisbane defeat, resolved to match Australia word for word. At one point umpire Aleem Dar was required to curtail a frank exchange of views between Anderson and Smith.

Meanwhile, Khawaja was trying to conquer his aversion to spin by attacking Moeen, with mixed results. A miscued chip over mid-off earned him two. A late cut to short third man earned four when James Vince let the ball slip between his legs. A top-edged hook off Woakes was dropped by Mark Stoneman, running in from long leg. Khawaja was struggling, but he was also scoring. A thick edge for four off Moeen brought up a half-century seemingly accumulated almost entirely in edges.

Khawaja frustrated England with a patient half-century (Getty)

England, for their part, looked listless. But once again, an enforced break in play seemed to jolt them into competence. With his first delivery after the drinks break, Woakes extracted a little lift and bite off the surface - no mean feat after 33 overs on the ball - and found a sliver of a feather of Warner’s bat.

And so to the main event. Smith drove his third ball for four as a sort of benediction: an announcement of his arrival more convenient than a notice in the newspaper, more flamboyant than texting ahead.

But this was not a classic Smith innings. Riled by the verbals with Broad and Anderson, he looked just a little overwrought at times, even if his technique as quirkily immaculate as ever. He played and missed at a stonker from Anderson, looked a little uneasy against Overton, popping a catch to vacant short leg.

Will Root regret asking Australia to bat? (Getty)

The first ball of Overton’s next spell was a 79mph off-cutter, whipping his fingers across the side of the ball, giving it every chance to nip off the surface. The ball flicked Smith’s inside edge, flicked his pad flap, and flicked the stumps. It was an ice cold bit of dexterity that nobody, certainly not Smith, saw coming. England celebrated wildly. They had always believed Smith could be dismissed. But until they had actually seen it happen, they could never quite be sure.

Yet the wicket of Smith had only just about dragged England level. Australia had been in a roughly similar position here four years ago, and went on to make 570. It became apparent that the last 90 minutes, under lights, would prove crucial.

And as Peter Handscomb and Shaun Marsh saw Australia through to stumps, seeing off the last few overs of the old ball and one over of the new, using the skiddy surface to work the ball neatly square and behind square, Australia moved into the driving seat. Another good batting day and they will be able to extinguish England’s best chance of getting into the series.

England are not dead yet. But they are running out of chances.