The Ashes 2015 continues on Sunday with Day 4 of the Second Test between England and Australia, with England's hopes of holding onto their 1-0 lead in the series fading fast. Saturday saw Australia clean up England's first innings, and saw them put back out in the field again as Australia looked to build a massive lead with still two days to play. Sunday's Day 4 can be watched online through live stream via the link below.
England were eventually bowled out for 312, a massive 254 runs behind Australia's first innings total.
That gave Australia the chance to make England follow-on, however, rather than potentially allowing England to gain a lead in the game, and forcing Australia to chase a total last, they opted to put England in the field again and build a winning lead.
Australia's openers went out with intent and by the end of play of Day 3, Australia were at a healthy 108-0 with Warner on 60 not out.
That means Australia has a total lead of 362 over England, and they still have all 10 wickets in hand and a total of two more days to put England back in and get 10 wickets.
It is likely that Australia will still look to bat for a significant portion of Sunday morning, and may look to set a lead of over 500. Fans can expect Australia to come out on Sunday morning aggressively, looking to get an extra 150-200 runs in the opening session. Their ideal situation would be to get up to a 550 lead by lunchtime - and with all 10 wickets in hand they could go out a treat the opening session almost like a 20-20 game to pile on as many runs as they can in about 30 overs or so.
Australia will want to have England back in batting at some point in the second session of Day 4 to give themselves the best part of five sessions to bowl them out. But they will also be aware that the pitch is still very much a batting wicket, and so will not rush a declaration unless they get past the 500 mark. They will not want to give England a sniff of being able to chase down the runs to ensure their potential victory will be absolute. They will also want to make sure they can maintain the most aggressive field possible throughout the rest of the game - so that means they must have runs on the board not to worry if a flurry of boundaries happen during any period.
England meanwhile, will just be hoping that in their aggression, Australia will be too reckless and that they may be able to wipe out the Australia top order quickly on Sunday morning. If England can stop Australia scoring another 100 runs in the first sessions they will have done excellently and may force Australia to come back out to bat in the session after lunch. That would all be eating into the time England's batsmen will have to last to see off a draw.
If England do get put in to bat at the start of the second session (or early into it), then the goal will be clear - they must try to get through that first session without losing any wickets. If England's top order fails again in the second innings then even if the middle-order and tail end to admirably, they are still unlikely to get anywhere near to the third session on Monday's final day.
So England's top order must do well, and they will want to lose no more than one or two wickets by the end of Day 4 if they are to give themselves a realistic chance of holding on for what will be a very long and intensive Day 5.
The Ashes 2015 Day 4 between England and Australia can be watched online through ESPN live stream by clicking here.
