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Like any virus, hope spreads fast. It spreads without apparent logic and without regard for its victims. In the age of mass media, it doesn't even need physical proximity to infect new populations. It can race through them with a flicker of electrons.
When England was bowled out for 67 on the second day at Headingley, the suitable response among the team's supporters was despair. By the start of play on the third morning that had curdled into disdain, reflected on the savage pages of the local newspapers.
There was also a sense of resignation: that there was nothing to do but wait for Australia to finish scoring whatever runs Australia wanted, then to bowl England out for the second time and keep the Ashes within three Tests.
But all it took was a partnership of 126 to turn this storm of negativity into a calm summer sky. Just like at the end of Sharknado where they launch a pick-up truck full of explosives off a ramp to explode in the eye of the tornado and collapse it and send schools of murderous sharks crashing to the ground. You know that bit? Of course you do.
As Joe Root and Joe Denly batted on through the third afternoon, little hopeful English comments began popping up their heads, delicate spring blossoms after a harsh frost.
From an early score of 2 for 15, the English pair took the score past 50, then past 100. What if England could keep going, people began to ask, in the stands, in the press box, on the internet. What if England could win it?
Which of course was pretty funny given the target was still a distant 359, and the ball was beating the outside or inside edge of the bat approximately twice an over, and Denly couldn't have looked less awkward at the crease if you'd dressed him in one of those padded mascot suits as a giant insurance company rhombus.
Denly battled his way to 50 before he gloved a Josh Hazlewood short ball, and Root was still there by stumps on 75 with Ben Stokes for company and seven wickets in hand, needing a further 203 to win across the final two days.
Which basically makes this situation a version of Adelaide in 2017, when Root was not out overnight needing slightly fewer runs with slightly more wickets, and Australia's then-captain sat up all night worrying that he might lose the match, and everyone talked up the chances of a miracle result.
If you don't remember that one, Hazlewood got a wicket within two balls the next morning, then got Root in his next over, and things rather unfolded as one might expect from there.
And if it's too early to remember day four at Headingley because it hasn't happened yet, some version of that is probably what's going to happen once our perception of linear time catches up with the inevitable future.
I'm not saying that because I don't like beautiful dreams. If England could somehow manage to chase 359 after being bowled out for approximately Steve Smith's batting average then it would be one of the more extraordinary wins in the history of the game.
It's just that it won't happen, because the most extraordinary wins in the history of the game by definition don't come along very often.
To make that more concrete, consider teams chasing 350 or more to win in the last innings. In the 2,355 Test matches that have been played, it's happened 10 times.
Especially on a surface that provides movement for the bowlers, and especially with a ball that swings in the air, chasing 350 is just too hard a task. All that a bowling side needs are 10 errors. Bad shots, good balls, forced or unforced mistakes.
Across the time and overs that it would take to score so many runs, those 10 errors are all but guaranteed. It takes either extraordinary batting, extraordinary fortune, very gentle conditions, or a combination of all three, to defy probability.
So there won't be an English win, unless there is. A moving ball will take an edge or beat one into the pads. Root may make a hundred or may not, but one way or another the moment will end.
What it has already provided though is Root's moment on the day that was, rather than the day that might be. When he was caught behind in the first innings, his second duck in three balls in the series, the idea that he could compile something like this unbeaten 75 was remote.
When he followed that duck by dropping catches, dropping bundles, making bizarre bowling changes, slumping in the field, any chance of resistance seemed gone altogether. He was miserable, he was tired, and too many cares were his.
Root still hadn't found personal equilibrium after his successful innings: he snarked at BBC commentators as he left the ground that they had been too negative, as though teams being bowled out for 67 offered fertile ground to accentuate the positive.
But he had found some balance at the crease during the day, getting into better positions to address the ball because he was staying more still as it arrived.
Hazlewood was all over him early, thundering into the pads, beating the bat. Root's only boundaries until late against spin came from edges. But he accumulated in between times, running well and building his score. By the time stumps rolled around, his 75 was so high as to be surprising.
It was already enough to seed that painful sprout of optimism, that bit of hope that some onlookers will nurture until the day begins again. The hope that 75 will become something grander, the hope that something memorable for the worst reasons will become memorable for the opposite.
Just like in Adelaide, Root will probably be out when play resumes. He'll probably be out early. If he isn't, you know the story. If the vaster likelihood comes to pass, at least England's captain showed he could fight.
Topics: sport, cricket, united-kingdom, england
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