OLIVER HOLT: Australia took the Ashes but it won’t be long before the urn returns if Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum keep England’s white-knuckle ride going

Men with black umbrellas, held resolutely above their heads for hour after hour, and thick red anoraks to protect them further from the elements, stood at each corner of the covers that shrouded the Old Trafford pitch on the final day of the fourth Test.

Like four grim outriders of the isobar apocalypse, they waited in position until the puddles around them had grown into small lakes and the teeming rain had defeated England’s hopes of regaining the Ashes more comprehensively than this flailing Australia team ever could.

In the England dressing room, Ben Stokes shifted from seat to seat in a superstitious ritual to try to change the weather. The England captain sat in his usual seat and the rain didn’t stop. 

He switched to a chair where he could watch the Open golf on television. It still didn’t stop. The England captain has often seemed superhuman in this series but even he could not stop the rain.

And so the last fling of what has been an enchanted English summer of cricket ended here with Ricky Ponting and Nasser Hussain studying meteorological charts on Sky, Michael Atherton staring at Brian Statham’s boots in the Old Trafford museum and the Barmy Army trumpeter playing Bring Me Sunshine.

Ben Stokes had to admit defeat as rain scuppered the fourth Test of the Ashes at Old Trafford

Australia captain Pat Cummins (left) has retained the urn for Australia after drawing the fourth Test

It is hard to think it is over after little more than a month of some of the best sport you could wish to see, but only consolations and pride are left to fight for now. Even though England could still square the series at the Oval this week, the big prize will be going home with Australia.

‘Yeah, it’s a bit of a strange one,’ Australia captain Pat Cummins said after the match, alluding to the fact that his team had retained the urn after a match when they had been completely outplayed and saved from defeat only by the weather. ‘It was an off-week across the board.’

An unsatisfactory, deeply dispiriting end to England’s hopes of producing a fightback for the ages will not change the fact that this has been a series that has captured the country’s attention and brought cricket in England into a new age of entertainment and thrill.

There is an irony here, of course. T20 is supposed to be where all the thrills are now. The Hundred was introduced to appeal to a younger audience.

But none of it will match the joy of the way Stokes and his side have played their cricket since the first Test began at Edgbaston last month and Zak Crawley smote the first ball through extra cover to the boundary. 

What a series it has been, one that inflamed the emotions so much that it turned the denizens of the Long Room at Lord’s into the modern-day equivalent of blood-lusting fans at the Colosseum as the Australians walked back into the pavilion after the controversial ‘stumping’ of Jonny Bairstow.

It feels as if the series has been one long highlight, from the debate around Stokes’s first-day declaration at Edgbaston to Joe Root’s breathtaking cameo to the match-winning stand between Cummins and Nathan Lyon that won that first Test.

Bairstow’s stumping, the bodyline sessions at Lord’s, Stokes’s incredible second-innings century at the home of cricket, the bowling of Mark Wood at Headingley, Crawley’s magnificent innings on the second day at Old Trafford, Bairstow’s 99 not out — and that is just scratching the surface.

Cummins was gracious when he spoke after the game. He said there would be ‘a bit of a party’ but no huge celebrations. He was not in a triumphal mood. Nor were the Australian press. A lot of their questions probed at the ineffectiveness of his captaincy in Manchester.

Stokes has seemed superhuman in this series but not even he could stop the rain

Australia players will enjoy some small celebrations after drawing at Old Trafford

It is the first draw that England have experienced since Stokes and coach Brendon McCullum took over the reins of the team and there was a great sense of frustration that the weather had robbed cricket fans of what would have been a humdinger of a decider at the Oval.

More lasting legacies of this struggle between these two teams will linger, though. England may not have regained the Ashes but, of these sides, it feels as if they are the one on the rise. They are the team people want to watch. They are the team setting the tempo to which others react.

It is a white-knuckle ride but it’s better for that.

Some will point at the result and say that it is everything but it is not everything. If England continue to progress like this, if they keep faith with this philosophy of attacking cricket, of Bazball, it will not be long before the urn returns.

The Bazball cricket England have played under head coach Brendon McCullum (pictured) has drawn new eyes to Test cricket

Australia skipper Cummins was grilled by media over his captaincy during the fourth Test

‘I said to the players in the dressing room, “The reward for your work isn’t what you get, it’s what you become”,’ Stokes said. ‘I think what we’ve managed to become is a team that people will remember. 

‘I wanted our team to try to play a brand of cricket that people will always talk about and I think, regardless of how the series ends up, people will always talk about us.

‘For me, being the leader of this certain type of cricket, to sit here and say that we’ve achieved that over the last 18 months… I find it very easy to be able to get out of bed and go out to play cricket.’

Before he left, Stokes was asked if this was the worst he had felt since he took over as skipper. ‘It’s tough to feel bad as England captain,’ he said.