The Ashes: Recap the action from Day five of the Third Test from Adelaide Oval

Here’s Ricky Ponting summing up the concerns of plenty of fans watching on:

“There could be all sorts of ramifications here for Australia. If Lyon can’t bowl, Pat Cummins hasn’t bowled this morning, there’s some worries around him and his fitness and Mitchell Starc is on two warnings for running on the track. Travis Head’s going to bowl this over and he might have to do a bit more bowling now as this day goes on.”

There’s serious concerns for Nathan Lyon here, after appearing to injure himself while diving in the field.

Lyon grabbed at his right hamstring and has limped off immediately.

Travis Head has replaced him as the new ball beckons in two overs, but this is a big story developing - particularly if Cummins is also not right to bowl this afternoon...

The partnership is up to 52!

It’s just the 11th time this series that England have managed a stand in excess of 50 - and only four of those have gone north of 70.

Five overs remain until the new ball.

The Lyon-Green bowling partnership continues, having been unchanged since the first ball of the day.

We’re just about set to go. The delay will end up being a frustrating 40-minute one.

It might not be the worst thing in the world for Australia, who will look to regroup a fraction after failing to find the breakthrough in the first 12 overs on Day 5.

We’ll see two more deliveries in the Lyon over, then we’re six overs away from the new ball.

The covers are being removed as some blue skies breaks back through in Adelaide.

We’ll have a resumption at 11.50am EDT (8.50am WA time).

The delay creeps up toward the 15-minute mark, but we hopefully shouldn’t be much longer, according to the radar.

Here was the scene from the Barmy Army POV as the players went off!

As we await word on resumption, is there a worry around the Aussie skipper?

We didn’t see him with the ball for a considerable period toward the back end of yesterday, and then we haven’t yet seen him this morning - though he is out on the field. Couple that with the fact that we haven’t seen Scott Boland, and you’d suggest the Starc-Boland partnership would be being kept fresh for the new ball in six overs’ time to account for the lack of Cummins.

It’s a short turnaround from here until Boxing Day in just five days, so there’s naturally going to be questions asked around whether either Australia’s captain or vice-captain - Cummins and Steve Smith - are going to be cleared to play in Melbourne.

They’re off!

The rain gets heavier, the umpires call it, and the ground staff are racing onto the field to cover the centre square.

A great first 40-odd minutes of the day for England gets even greater!

Hopefully we’re not going to be delayed for too long here.

​

​

There’s just a tiny bit of drizzle creeping in at Adelaide Oval...

The forecast suggests a 50 per cent chance of rain today. It appears it’s more likely across the next couple of hours before clearing later in the afternoon. England have nudged their way to 6-241. Lyon hunting today’s breakthrough.