Another reverse sweep from Jennings brings him four more from an Ashwin full toss. Could Cook bat at 3 when Hameed returns, as he did when he started all those years ago? The skipper averages 52 at first wicket down. 

Vic Marks
Ex-England spinner on BBC Test Match Special

This is what has haunted Cook throughout. Somehow, he's missing the ball.

Excitable shrieks from the crowd as film star-style spinner Ravi Jadeja enters the fray in his dark glasses. He has dismissed Cook five times in the series and traps him on the pad first ball. There is a huge appeal but no review and the replays showed it would have gone down the leg side.

Vic Marks
Ex-England spinner on BBC Test Match Special

Jennings and Cook are quite similar. Both are tall left-handers. However, if you see one of them reverse-sweeping, you know it isn't Cook.

Image source, Reuters

Jennings is confident enough to unveil the reverse sweep from Ashwin and it brings him two to record a resilient, perfectly equal, fifty partnership. How will the order change when Hameed comes back into the team?

Amit Dhingra: 36 runs off 20 overs. Isn't it the death of Test matches now?

Charles Fairs: Up early listening to @bbctms because I'm too sick to sleep. Hopefully, the play will be so uneventful it knocks me out...

Gary Roberts: Unusual as an Aussie but I'm hoping the English batters fight today. Had a double hernia op yesterday and it hurts when I laugh.

Umesh again, he's up at 92mph but he cannot get the radar right and it flies harmlessly down the leg side.

Austraila have called uncapped Western Australia all-rounder Hilton Cartwright, external into their squad for the Boxing Day Test against Pakistan. Not an English-born player this time, this one hails from Harare!

Selector Trevor Hohns said: “The bowlers got through a high workload in Brisbane and although everyone has pulled up OK, we wanted to give ourselves the option of including an all-rounder in Melbourne to ease that workload. 

“To do that we wanted a batting all-rounder, someone to bowl seam-up and capable of batting in the top six, and after considering several names we came to the conclusion that Hilton fits that bill."

Image source, Getty Images

Three men circling like bailiffs from slip to silly point for Ashwin, but a rare short one allows Cook to go on the back foot and cut away for two more.

Sunil Gavaskar
Former India captain on BBC Test Match Special

India are looking to bounce England out with two fielders in the deep. Both Jennings and Cook are tall men and have got on top of the bounce. Maybe Kohli should have spin from both ends.

Umesh has been asked to unsettle the openers with some short stuff but both left-handers are in excellent position to pull boundaries and the first hour has been negotiated with assurance.

MikeyBlighe: Flying to England tomorrow for my first Christmas home since 2012. I should be sleeping, but I'm here. Dedication or stupidity?

Ashwin again, challenging Cook constantly from round the wicket. The England captain edges one that spins away but he plays it with the requisite soft hands and it drops short of the eager gully fielder diving forward.

Umesh, elasticated grips covering both elbows, is already up at 90mph and hits Jennings on the shoulder with one timed at 88. The left-hander got his pad and gloves out of the way and wore it where there is no padding. Brian Close would have been proud.

Sunil Gavaskar
Former India captain on BBC Test Match Special

Jennings musn't get into a defensive mindset, he must always look to score. Defending might be natural to Cook, but Jennings has a few more shots, so he should play them.

Another maiden for Ashwin, who has 207 wickets in 31 Tests in Asia and 41 from 13 in other parts of the world.

Douglasson: Is my wickets alert down? I expected them to be raining!

MAW Holmes: I get up... No wickets down... It's a Christmas mirac... (SHHHH!)

Umesh Yadav, whose name I seem to associate with the Basement Jaxx ditty, "Where's Your Head At", is the new bowler. After some threatening looking squats to warm up he's around the mid 80smph, having reached 91 in the first innings. He tries a couple of short ones but no alarms for the batsmen.

An edge from Jennings is taken on the first bounce by Kohli diving from slip. Would it have carried to a gully? The India captain puts one in after the event and he immediately in the action to field a reverse sweep.