Man of the match already

Test match No. 1981. Is that significant?

To lunch. We didn't think it was our lucky number - Botham and all that - after the third ball when Strauss cut a ball that dipped in straight to slip. What a miserable moment after winning the toss and declaring he could not wait to start. At 41 Jonathon Trott was bowled following an hour of painful batting. Lunch 86-2 and KP looking good while Cook stumbled but survived.

To tea. Even though four were out for 172, England seemed set fair for a decent if not spectacular score. Wrong again. Pietersen was caught at slip but Collingwood lasted only ten minutes. Bell survived a dropped catch by the keeper and was solid in footwork and technique while Cook was improving. Then at 197 the sky fell in.

The close. Cook edged Siddle to Watson's midriff for 67, Prior played anywhere but straight next ball and, despite an appeal, Broad was lbw - all to Siddle. A hat trick! Wow. Now which side was on top as England surveyed the wreckage of 197-7.

Siddle, on his 26th birthday and a year after his last Test, had bowled dynamically at no more than 82 miles an hour. Man of the match already. I wished Alec Bedser, who disapproved of all fast bowling, had been alive to see a classic display of fast medium in the way of Sydney Barnes, Maurice Tate and a dozen other Englishmen. It was not Australian bowling which is usually seven or eight miles an hour quicker; the nearest modern example is Shaun Pollock, an underestimated great South African.

Bell, Swann and Anderson scrambled a few more; England 260. Katich, hopping around like Kim Barnett on speed AND a hot tin roof, and Watson scored 25. Australia's day by a kangeroo kilometer. Day one of 30 had been an England disaster.

From my sofa I got a couple of glimpses of the Lotto lot. I guess they had had something to drink; they looked so happy. As for their promised texts of wisdom about the reasons for this mayhem - not a word. I hope they enjoyed Siddle and Australia as they made a major contribution to one of the great days of Ashes cricket.

Jo King, Queen Stat, says: Peter Siddle's magnificent hat trick was the 11th by an Australian bowler; the first was by Fred Spofforth, aged 25, 6ft 3in and, judging from his pictures thin as a super model. "A swarthy, black-haired lady killer with long sideburns, a droopy moustache and surplus vitality" so the old books say. His hat trick came in the Melbourne Test of 1878-9 and from that moment legends grew round the quick bowler. Those same books say he rode to and from a match in Victoria to Sydney by horse - a round trip of 400 miles. Eventually he settled in Surrey, played until he was more than 50 and died, aged 73, leaving the equivalent today of £3m.

Hours later an unprintable text arrives. I think it fair to translate it as a day of disappointment. For those near and far.