1. Just Reward
Ryan Harris bowled admirably with little luck or assistance at Adelaide, and backed up Mitchell Johnson superbly in the first innings here. Today he got a deserved place in the spotlight as he ripped out four of the five wickets to fall with dizzying speed on the fourth morning, exploiting the first evidence of any deterioration in the WACA pitch to dazzling effect. Once there's a bit of uneven bounce, a bowler of reliable line and length and sufficient pace becomes the key danger. Harris simply kept the ball on a line and length and reaped his rewards as the uneven bounce and uncertain techniques of England's lower order did the rest. Ian Bell missing a straight one was a welcome bonus.

2. Four Warning
You can spin this one either way, but Australia have won this match on the efforts of just four players: Mike Hussey and Shane Watson with the bat, Mitchell Johnson and Ryan Harris with the ball. The rest of the top six remain painfully out of form or simply lacking the required quality, while Peter Siddle and Ben Hilfenhaus - as they have been since the first day of the series - were almost entirely ineffective with the ball. They took just a single wicket apiece while Mitch and Rhino shared the other 18. Whether you paint that as evidence of just how strong Australia will be when and if they all 'come to the party' or the fragility of their recovery is entirely down to you.

3. Sweet Sixteen
Has anyone ever made a better-looking 16 runs than Ian Bell today? England obviously needed a great many more, but the man is quite simply incapable of scoring an ugly run.

4. Momentum
It's all with Australia. If the evidence of the last couple of Ashes series is anything to go by, they are now in a whole host of trouble.

5. Five Alive
Many - including this column, rather passionately - have commented on how the Ashes once again highlights all that is wonderful about Test cricket. But more than that, the events in Perth have shown the value of something in far more immediate threat of extinction than Test cricket: the five-Test series. The ebbs and flows and running themes are what make Test cricket so magnificent, and the five-Test series allows these to be played out to their full conclusion. If this were almost any other modern Test series, it would now be over. We'd be left to reflect on a gripping but somehow unsatisfactory 1-1 draw. Instead we head for the biggest Boxing Day Test at the MCG in a generation to enjoy another helping of brilliance, ineptitude, rollercoasting emotions and yet more of Swann's epic tussle with Hussey, Johnson's equally epic battle with himself and Brad Haddin's non-stop baiting of the Barmy Army, whose numbers will surely be swelled for the Melbourne-Sydney leg of the tour. Quite simply, it's going to be magnificent.

Dave Tickner