Women's Ashes: Australia and England serve up vintage Test

This is how the game should be.

Nine women crowded around the bat, plus the wicketkeeper close behind the stumps, plus the bowler guarding the non-striker's end. A field packed like a morning Tube station. The last batting pair at the crease, too nervous to do so much as meet in the middle. A couple of deliveries separating all four results: Australia win, England win, tie, draw.

For a couple of hours, England had a chance to pull off the biggest and boldest run chase in women's Test cricket history. When those hours were done, and the match was drawn, the cold, hard statistics could tell you it was one of the closest finishes the game has produced. The far less quantifiable things — the feeling, the tension, the atmosphere — at the ground, told you that it was one of the best.

Of course, there were things that could have been different. Australia had to set up that finish with a declaration challenge, betting that England could not chase 257 runs in 48 overs. England had to take up that challenge, albeit with little left to lose in a multi-format Ashes series they trailed on points.

If administrators allocated these matches five days instead of four, things would have been different. If rain had not wiped out most of the third day, different again. If Australia had batted more boldly in the third innings, they might have set a bigger target with more time to spare.

But what was done was done. In this instance, at this moment, both teams had only what was in front of them. A score to target or a score to defend, with the hope that the final innings would either stay together or fall apart. In this instance, that contest turned into something glorious.

As England began, they displayed a concerted effort to attack instead of