Great piece from the Daily Mirror about the Old Trafford Test

THIS WAS AS GOOD AS SPORT GETS
Owzat? It's still 1- 1 in the greatest Test series ever
By Oliver Holt
NO VICTORY this time. No fairy tale ending. No wild celebrations.

But Old Trafford still witnessed something wonderful yesterday. And not just a thrilling contest packed with twists and turns and high drama.

But the rebirth of our summer game as a popular passion just when it had begun to seem it would forever be football's submissive partner.

To be at Old Trafford yesterday felt like being part of cricket's second coming in this country.

It felt like being transported back to a golden age of magnificent contests and sporting heroes that once gripped the public imagination.

It was a day for heroes and for feats of great defiance. And for unremitting effort and perseverance. And for sportsmen who toiled to their limits. I got to the entry gate at the Stretford End an hour before start of play yesterday and the streets were still thronged with queuing crowds.
An official came out to tell the thousands waiting at Gate 8 the bad news.

"The stadium is full," he said. "It's time to go home."


When did you last see 20,000 people turned away from a cricket match in this country?


In the sea of crestfallen faces that greeted the announcement, there was evidence cricket is marching back to the forefront of our national consciousness again. It's hardly surprising when you consider the drama England and Australia have brought us at Edgbaston and here again in Manchester.


The only thing that comes close to it this year in the theatre of sport is Liverpool's comeback against AC Milan in Istanbul.


But if these two teams can come close to reproducing the same levels of sustained suspense at Trent Bridge and The Oval in the coming weeks, the renaissance of the game will only gather pace.


Because yesterday was about as good as you can get in sport. Two teams giving everything, the match veering one way then the other.


Classic drama like the moment with ten overs to go when Shane Warne edged a slip catch to Andrew Strauss off the bowling of Freddie Flintoff.


Strauss made a hash of it but it bounced off his thigh and hung agonisingly in the air.


Geraint Jones, heavily criticised for his wicketkeeping, flung himself to his right and clutched it as it fell to earth.


Warne looked on in disbelief and Flintoff, England's giant, fell to the floor on his back in unrestrained joy.


The day seemed full of moments like that. Ashley Giles's magnificent slip catch off the bowling of Flintoff to get rid of Simon Katich.


Umpire Billy Bowden's refusal to give out Brett Lee when Steve Harmison seemed to have trapped him plum leg before.


Kevin Pietersen's dropped catch when Warne spooned a full toss to him. You could almost hear former captain Steve Waugh whispering 'you just dropped the Ashes, mate'.


And when England finally established that only they could win the third Test, Australia defended their wickets as if their lives depended on it.


This time they would not fold. They would not die. They made it.


For a team that is supposed to be in their death throes, they are showing remarkable signs of spirit and fight.


After so many years at the top, they raged against the dying of the light here as England sensed the Ashes might be within their grasp at last.


Ricky Ponting's courageous rearguard innings of 156 was reminiscent of Mike Atherton's famously defiant 185 against South Africa in Johannesburg in December 1995 that saved the match for England.


So much for Ponting and Shane Warne falling out, by the way.


They shared a crucial stand of 77 that did more than any other to stave off defeat.


If this is the way they play when they squabble, God help us when they're happy campers.


Perhaps some will say yesterday ended in anti-climax. Not me. From here it seemed like it was the latest instalment in an endlessly fascinating titanic struggle.


And a day when two teams fought out a draw and the game of cricket celebrated another great victory.