Australia take commanding 2-0 lead in the Ashes after 43-run win over England

Ben Stokes played one of the great Ashes innings even by his standards but fell agonisingly short of winning the second Test for England on a day of huge controversy at Lord’s.

Stokes made 155, including nine sixes, an Ashes record, with a breath-taking display of hitting but England fell 44 short of their victory target of 371 in front of one of the most highly charged and febrile crowds ever seen at Lord’s.

The final day had been ignited by the most disputed of decisions when Jonny Bairstow was ‘stumped’ by wicketkeeper Alex Carey after leaving his crease thinking the ball was dead with England making a decent fist of chasing their formidable target.

Bairstow had ducked under a bouncer from Cameron Green at the end of the 52nd over and saw the ball go through to Carey, who had earlier produced another excellent catch to send back Ben Duckett for 83 after England had made a productive fifth day start.

The Australian keeper rolled the ball towards the stumps and hit them after Bairstow had scratched his ground and left his crease thinking the over was done. He was clearly out of his ground but the bottom line was that all indications were the umpires had started to move into position for the next over.

Australia took a commanding 2-0 lead in the Ashes after a 43-run win over England at Lord’s

England captain Ben Stokes gave his side hope with a scintillating knock of 155 on the final day 

It was a dramatic day as tempers flared after Jonny Bairstow was controversially stumped

Bairstow couldn’t quite believe what had gone on and was clearly not happy as he went off

Umpires Chris Gaffaney and Ahsan Raza called for TV official Marais Erasmus to adjudicate and Bairstow had clearly left his ground so was given out. But Australia captain Pat Cummins wasted a golden opportunity to do the right thing and withdraw his appeal and his failure to do so sent a full house at Lord’s wild.

The Australians were booed throughout the rest of the final day and members in the Lord’s long room, usually one of the most genteel, traditional and well-behaved areas in sport, angrily confronted the Australians at lunch, leading to a complaint by Australia and an apology from MCC.

But what the incident did was awaken the beast in Stokes who was on 62 from 126 balls at the time but then smashed his next 38 off 16 balls to go to a hundred. Suddenly out of nowhere England had a great chance of one of the most famous of all Test victories and levelling this series.

Stokes joined forces with Stuart Broad, who angrily took issue repeatedly with the Australian fielders for their act of poor sportsmanship in dismissing Bairstow, to add 108 for the seventh wicket and raised English hopes of a victory even greater than that inspired by Stokes against Australia at Headingley in 2019.

Stuart Broad was the next man in and exchanged intense words with the Australian players

At the lunch break both David Warner and Usman Khawaja clashed with MCC members 

Earlier, Stokes played one of the greatest knocks of all-time as he gave the Aussies a real worry

But Stokes, who had been missed by Steve Smith on 114, dropped his head to his haunches when he aimed another big hit at Josh Hazelwood and succeeded only in top edging to Carey with 70 still needed.

There was no coming back for England after that and the last three wickets quickly subsided with Australia taking a 2-0 lead in this five-match series and almost certainly retaining the Ashes. Only once in Ashes history have any side come back from two down to win the urn and no England team have ever done it.

But at least the series was ignited in the most eventful and unbelievable fifth day imaginable, with England heading to Headingley for the third Test on Thursday nursing a grievance and with renewed spirit after another classic encounter.

He was visibly devastated when he was dismissed after mis-timing a pull off Josh Hazlewood

The Aussies now have a 2-0 lead in the series and are on course to retain the Ashes