There was a wry smile on Joe Root's face when he won the toss at the WACA and chose to bat. At Adelaide Oval, he had learnt the hard way that sending the opposition in and then losing is difficult for a captain to live down. So in Perth it was back to conventional wisdom: bat first and put runs on the board. On a day when Dawid Malan scored his maiden Test century and Mark Stoneman posted his highest Test score, and England moved to 4 for 305 at stumps, Root must have breathed a sigh of relief.
And by the close of play, another decision had also paid off for England: the move of Jonny Bairstow up from No. 7 to No. 6. Bairstow was the second leading scorer in Test cricket in 2016, but has found himself batting behind Moeen Ali in this series - until today. At stumps, he was on 75 and Malan had 110, and their unbeaten 174-run partnership was England's best Ashes stand in Australia since the second Test of their memorable 2010-11 campaign.