Ashes 4th Test: Cook's hundred puts England in charge
Starting the Day 2 of the 4th Ashes Test at 244-3, Australia struggled to bat and were bowled out quickly for 327, giving England a chance to get back in the game. Former skipper Alastair Cook went on to hit a drought-breaking century, helping England post a score of 192-2 at the end of day. Let's look at the Day 2's highlights.
Hosts collapse on Day 2
Steve Smith's early dismissal on Day 2 at 76 spurred the collapse of wickets for hosts, who lost their last 7 wickets for 67 runs, and last 5 for 13 runs. England are the only team to have restricted Australia to below 330 in their 1st innings in Melbourne since 1997. The last time it happened was in 2013-14 for 204 runs.
502 runs in the series so far for Smith
Steve Smith is the leading run-scorer in the ongoing Ashes series having scored 502 runs so far at an astonishing average of 125.50. The next highest is far behind - Dawid Malan at 302.
Cook's ton the highlight
Alastair Cook (104*) brought up his 32nd Test century putting an end to his dry spell of 10-innings-stretch without a half-century. The Englishman is now joint-seventh in the list of most Test hundreds alongside Steve Waugh. With 11,816 runs in his 151-Test career he also moved past Mahela Jayawardene (11,814) onto 8th spot in the list of all-time Test run-scorers.
Cook's centuries in Australia
All of Cook's five Ashes hundreds have come in Australia. He now has centuries in all five big venues in Australia becoming the only second overseas batsman after Sunil Gavaskar to do so.
