Relive day two's highlights as Perry hits century

If you're just joining us and hoping for some cricket... I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed. They've been off for rain since lunch - persistent rain rather than heavy rain - and we're expecting that they could call it off for the day reasonably soon.

Test Match Special have gone off air - and we're going to pause this live text too.

We'll be straight back if there's any news - but I fear that it might just be the announcement that play's been called off. We'll let you know.

I would rather England lose this game trying to win it than going out to play for a draw.

I'm going to be interested to see what Tayla Vlaeminck can do tomorrow - she's very quick, but won't get a lot of help from the pitch.

What will England have learned from Australia's approach to batting?

You have to be strong in defence - but they have to capitalise on anything they can, if they want to move the game along. There will be a few demons from the ODIs - but attack can be the best form of defence.

Do you fear for England tomorrow?

I do. They've got to be aggressive and I don't think it's easy to be aggressive on that pitch.

If Australia declare, there's two ways that I hope Heather Knight and Mark Robinson are thinking about. You either go out and score quickly and declare behind, or you go out and score 100 more than Australia, declare and try to get them out [and win by an innings].

The longer it rains here, the better for Australia in terms of retaining the Ashes, as the less time England have to try to take 15 wickets and score enough runs to surpass Australia.

The crowds I see here for women's games are sometimes more than we get in South Africa for men's games.

They've set their sights on getting 93,000 to the MCG for the T20 World Cup final on International Women's Day next year. If it's Australia v India, I think they'll get it. If it's other teams, they might still get 70,000.

In a lot of places, they've taken women's games away from the bigger grounds, and to the smaller grounds where the crowds are packed in. But at what point do you go back to the bigger grounds?

I've been a bit disappointed by attendances for women's games [in England] since the 2017 World Cup. I don't know what the answer is - we've had a successful team, it's on TV and radio, but it's the same sort of crowds we were getting five years ago. It'll be interesting to see what crowds we get for the T20s at Hove and Bristol.

In cricket, there is a comparison to the men's game more than in a lot of other sports.

Should the women's game move to shorter pitches?

I don't agree with that. You can do it in age group cricket as it makes the game a bit quicker and helps girls play off the back foot. But we've played off 22 yards for so long - we should stay with it.

Professionalism, strength and conditioning will help bowlers become quicker - a lot of age-group coaching is still voluntary. Get the high performance coaches in with the 12-year-olds. Issy Wong, who we've got at the Southern Vipers, is only 17 and is one of the quickest bowlers I've seen coming through. With a few years of coaching, she could bowl 75-80mph.

From Natalie's comments, I would make an honourable exception for SA opener Lizelle Lee. I saw KSL games last year which were played as double-headers with men's T20 Blast matches, and Lee was hitting sixes that cleared the men's boundaries, let alone the women's.

The boundaries in South Africa were at the minimum - and so when the Proteas women came to England last year, they were bigger, and they struggled.

I think 65m is the right boundary size for women's cricket. It frustrates me when I go to some grounds, you go to a massive ground but they put it at 55m and it looks like an under-11s game. Hit the ball well, you should get six - if you don't, you shouldn't. It looks about right at most ICC events.

Imran Sheikh: Under seven sessions remain in the Test - declare at 341-5 & get the England girls in. Batting further kills the match.

I was at the three-day game last week with England A playing Australia - and there's so much you can learn from playing the longer format, Ellyse Perry's success shows that. You have to learn how to bat, and how to get people out. If we can keep playing Test cricket, we should. I'd like the top eight teams to play bilateral series.

Should there be more Tests in women's cricket?

There is space for more women's Test cricket. But the platform for pushing the game forward underneath the top four or five countries, you have to say the T20 format needs to be pushed as much as possible. In terms of the calendar there is space and the multi-format series is perfect for that.