Stephan Shemilt Ashes column: Why MCG’s two-dayer was no less of a Test

In a glass case on the third floor of the Melbourne Cricket Ground sits a neon pink suit worn by Robbie Williams for his show at the 2022 AFL grand final.

The Robster’s performance in front of 100,024 footy fans was seen as a triumph.

You might not like Robbie Williams. You might think Robbie Williams is the greatest gift to music the world has ever seen. You might take a reasonable stance in the middle, acknowledging Kids is a belting track and Rudebox is awful.

The point being, entertainment can take many forms. You like what you like. There is no one way to produce music, literature or even Test cricket.

Test cricket has unrivalled depth. It is hard to think of another sport where the playing is so dependent on conditions.

The weather, the time of day, the ball – the list is endless. Most important of all is the pitch.

If Test cricket is art, the pitch is the canvas on which the players paint their masterpiece.

The fourth Ashes Test between Australia and England at the MCG was Test cricket cubism, the great game broken apart and stuck back together in abstract form, with a hint of Brydon Carse batting at number three.

This is not a defence of the pitch which produced England’s first Test win in this country for almost 15 years and the second two-day Test of the series.

Leaving 10mm of grass on the surface, resulting in 36 wickets falling in less than six sessions, is not a fair contest between bat and ball. Not so much the Boxing Day Test, but the Boxing Days Test.

But any suggestion this was a diminished spectacle, and one that should historically be marked with an asterisk as not a proper Test, is wide of the mark.

Test cricket is a rich tapestry, 2,615 parts and counting. Sometimes, like in Melbourne, the ball does all sorts for the seamers, sometimes it turns square on a dust bowl. Sometimes the pitch is flat as a pancake, other times it spits like a cobra. Some matches drag on in interminable tedium, others are over in the blink of an eye.

This is the understanding we all buy into when we devote time to the game. The thrillers are all the more thrilling because of the investment made elsewhere.