The Ashes: Australia and England line dancing again

Australia and England say it is in different places, but neither can say where. Steve Smith came closest on Friday, saying it was where the umpires said it was, post facto. In other words, sometimes it was only when the Australians crossed the line that they knew its exact whereabouts. Joe Root said England always knew. "I think their line and our line are slightly different things," he told cricinfo.com. "Let's leave it at that."

That puts it on a fuzzy alignment dividing the high moral ground and the high morale ground.

Open mockery would be beyond the pale, all agree. England thought Smith was mocking them with his paroxysms of laughter at the media conference after the first Test. Smith said he was laughing with the admittedly comical Cameron Bancroft, not at England. O-K, said England, doubtfully.

Then Jimmy Anderson wrote in a newspaper column that Australia had overstepped the line in the first Test in the way that bullies do, when they were already on top. Smith said he had read Anderson's column. Anderson, of all people, Smith snorted. In 2010, when he, Smith, was "no good" and Anderson was very good, Anderson had been all over him. "He's one of the biggest sledgers in the game," said Smith.

An aside. Older cricketers will think Smith stepped over the line by reading a newspaper. Younger cricketers will wonder what a newspaper is.

Anderson was not quite done. In a separate interview with the BBC, he said that near the end of the first Test, the Australians were close to the line in the number of short balls they bowled to England's tail, him included. But umpire Marais Erasmus didn't. And he's the line judge.

Maybe Nathan Lyon's headbutt had moved the line. Two can play that headbutting game, you know.

And on it goes, line by line. Anderson said the Australians had co-opted the media into their overstepping by making their remarks close to the pitch microphones. Anderson, far from merely holding the line for England, was nudging it. The ECB have right of veto over his column, remember. Much as Anderson off his long run might seem to be a bit of ad lib line-drawing, this is England's official line.

And still the line is as Moeen Ali's crease in Brisbane: bowed, somewhat ragged and hard to discern. It's a bit like the poles: there's true and magnetic. True would be the rules of cricket and the ICC's code of conduct. Magnetic is the actual way of play, a departure. It's also an Australia-England thing. Sometimes Australia set out to give offence. Sometimes England feel offence and sometimes they choose to take it. Don't underestimate gamesmanship.

So where and what is the blessed line? Here's a wild guess: maybe it dare not speak its name.

There are other lines. In the second Test, there's the start line, moved to mid-afternoon. We know already that it makes for a different style of cricket. First, instead of seeing red, they'll be seeing pink. Second, as well as line, there's length to think about. Batting on autopilot, as Smith sometimes made it seem in Brisbane, won't work.

But if England choose to try to bore Smith out rather than bowl him out, as they did in Brisbane, the Australian captain will rejoice. "I love batting," he said. "I hate being in the sheds."

Practice is making perfect. The Adelaide Oval first pink ball Test between Australia and New Zealand two years ago was a low-scoring bowlers' carnival. The second, Australia-South Africa, was hard going at times for batsmen, but three made centuries.

Based on his experience in a day-night Sheffield Shield game here last month and an inspection of the pitch on Friday, Smith expects this to be somewhere between classic Adelaide Oval and new Adelaide Oval. Mitchell Starc, Anderson and Stuart Broad at dusk will be challenging, so the trick will be to make runs while the sun shines.

If it does. The forecast for the first two days is rain and cool. Root says that and the prospect of seam and swing will favour England. "Trent Bridge," you could read between the lines. Australia weren't.

So to the battle lines.