Steve Smith remains as Major and May are locked in conversation at The Oval

HUW TURBERVILL AT THE OVAL: How much entertainment has Steve Smith provided for youngsters craving an equal contest between bat and ball this summer, one wonders?

As lovely as it is to reminisce about watching cricket on telly as a kid, it was rare to watch every ball.

Especially when the tourists were racking up a mega partnership, and England’s usually one-paced attack (post Bob Willis, pre-Devon Malcolm) was struggling.

When that was the case, some batting with a tennis ball against the wall in the garden seemed preferable – with the hope that when you returned, a wicket had fallen. The Ashes Tests at Headingley, 1989, and Trent Bridge, 1993 (Geoff Marsh and Mark Taylor batting the entire first day) spring to mind.

How much entertainment has Steve Smith provided for youngsters craving an equal contest between bat and ball this summer, one wonders?

There is no doubting the brilliance of his batting, the sheer, unrelenting, voracious run-gathering, the concentration, the perseverance, the bravery after being hit by Jofra Archer; but for youngsters, one imagines his excellence and dominance over the hosts has at times being difficult to watch.

England had momentum at the end of their innings thanks to the belligerence of Jos Buttler, but 294 felt a below-par total and it was not difficult to surmise that Smith would soon be grinding down the hosts again come mid-afternoon. And lo and behold yes, he was at it again, scoring his 10th successive 50-plus score against them, even if his team-mates were struggling.

^{Steve Smith was in fine form again for Australia}

It is peculiar that – apart from Marnus Labuschagne – none of Smith’s stickability seems to rub off on his team-mates. Like England in the first innings, many of them seemed to find curious ways to get out on this most benign of surfaces, and the hosts are now favourites to square the series.

What has been more annoying for England: the runs Smith makes, or the theatrical leaves and exaggerated tics, turning his back on the bowler, flexing a shoulder, practising his strokes after every ball, and so on?

He is always fiddling with his pads; he often makes a visible show of counting up the fielders; and he flicks his legs out like Charlie Chaplin on a long-haul flight trying to avoid a deep-vein thrombosis.

There is some fun to be had watching him between deliveries. He is a bag of energy, reminiscent of the hyperactive Derek Randall patrolling the covers. No wonder he doesn’t sleep well during Tests. The covers must be kicked around like a tent flapping in a storm.

“I reckon I average 15 to 20 hours throughout the whole five days,” he says. “It’s all positive stuff — who’s bowling at me, where I am going to hit them, how I’m going to play, where I’m going to look to score.” He really is a batting machine…

VISIT THE ASHES HUB

His bat looks a little long for him, but there is no doubting the effectiveness of some of his shots. Everything seems to come out of the middle. Stuart Broad and Chris Woakes were not at their best, and Smith played them with relative ease, but Archer and the excellent Sam Curran posed him more problems.

Before Curran’s brilliant burst of swing bowling brought the afternoon to life, it was time for a walk.

A few merry men, who no doubt started drinking tinnies on the 8.17 from Woking this morning, had clearly had enough of watching Smith too, and were playing an extremely loud game behind the Vauxhall Stand with a mini bat and tennis ball.

Just time to decide between the exotic (overpriced) fayre scattered around the ground – fish and chips, Mediterranean kebabs, crispy duck wraps (if only Smith had one of these the night before the match), or Sussex cheese on toast… and then I made my way to the wonderful, labyrinthine Oval pavilion.

I’d had a tip-off that Theresa May and Sir John Major were among the guests in the committee room. Oh to be a fly on the wall. Were they talking about Brexit? Was she comparing her experiences at the hands of the backbenchers over her deal with his, when he faced resistance from the b******* (what he called them, allegedly) over Maastricht?

^{Chris Woakes dismissed Smith}

Could I get a glimpse in there to see if they were sitting together? Alas not. I hovered outside for a while, but all I saw/heard was a county chairman barking down his phone (not the Surrey one I might add!). “Don’t suppose Joe Bloggs (name changed to spare his blushes) got any runs again? Nope, didn’t think so…”

So it was back to the press box to watch Smith batting again. And finally England removed him!

His 80 - after he had been dropped on 64 - put him seventh on the list of most runs in an Ashes series with 751. He is now only seven behind Don Bradman in 1934; 15 behind Alastair Cook (2010/11); 59 behind Bradman again (1936/37); 88 behind Mark Taylor (1989); 154 behind Wally Hammond (1928/29); and – at No.1 – 224 behind The Don again (1930).

That last one must surely be outside Smith’s reach in the second innings (although even if he scores a duck he will average more than 100 in the rubber, unlike Bradman in 1948); but England will comfort themselves that, come Monday evening, they will finally have seen the back of him. At least for this summer.